The Datamax Thinking Blog

It's no wonder that organizations are more active than ever in pursuing solutions to streamline traditional methods of managing documents. 

Every year, I learn more about copiers, document management, workflow, and, increasingly, managed IT topics than I did they year before.

I do my best to pass on what I learn to you.

Here are the 10 most popular posts in 2017. How to get the best service. Tips for HIPAA compliance. Scanning tips. How to track printing to keep costs down.

Read on for insights into those topics – and more – to get yourself ready for 2018!

There's a point of diminishing returns when it comes to using old office equipment – like copiers and printers – because they're still working.

Are you a “buy, don't lease, find a trusty mechanic because the car dealer will always rip you off” kind of a buyer? If so, I suspect you might also have a 10 year old copier sitting around that you have no plans to ever replace as long as it’s working. Why replace it until it breaks, right?

Maybe not.

The fact is that just because your trusty old office equipment might still be cranking out pages, you could be missing out on advancements in equipment technology that will not only make you say, “how did I ever live without this before,” but might also save you some money in the process!

Office equipment, like vehicles, can be an expensive investment to make. But the reality is that technology is moving at such a rapid pace that, just like your vehicle that immediately depreciates the second you drive it off the lot, office equipment has a point of diminishing returns.

If you've ever asked yourself why your prints don't match your screen color, then you need to understand color calibration.

If there’s one thing that drives creative-types crazy it’s when their prints don’t match what they see on their screen—especially when they are on a deadline! So why does this happen?

Before we dive in to some solutions, it’s important to understand how color works, specifically in the digital sense. 

Happy New Year from the Datamax Thinking Blog!

Thanks for stopping by during the Holidays. I hope you've enjoyed reading these posts and much as I've (usually) enjoyed writing them. Here are the six most popular Datamax Texas posts for all of 2016. Enjoy and learn for the first time or refresh your memory – read on.

Click on the following titles to read the posts.

According to research from InfoTrends, the biggest hurdle to printing from mobile devices is “technical connectivity problems to the printer.”

The majority of office workers don’t print from their mobile devices because they don’t think it’s an option.

What if that weren’t a problem? Well, it’s not. “There’s an app for that” is a pretty common phrase these days and in this case is true – there’s an app for printing from smartphones.

For personal printing at home there is a quick caveat

Save time and a walk back to your computer, scan a document and share via email directly from your copier.

We may all live in a digital world but, even so, at some point you’ll receive physical pieces of paper and need to send them to someone electronically.

Accomplishing this always seems to involve a small amount of irritation. For whatever reason those few extra steps tend to make the process seem daunting (even when it’s really not).

Call Out: Inefficient office equipment costs you more to “keep the lights on.”

You turn the lights off when you leave a room (or have motion sensors do it for you), adjust your cooling and heating to economize during non-work hours, but are you taking advantage of the energy-saving opportunities of your office equipment?

If you’re scanning and then manually adding documents into SharePoint, you don’t need to be.

Many of you use SharePoint as a collaboration and document management tool for your office (either as a standalone product, in the cloud, or in conjunction with Office 365).

SharePoint is a secure place for you to store, organize, share, and access information from many devices and locations.

Print tracking tools help you understand where you’re incurring costs, so you can get them under control.

It’s a question we are asked often: “Can I track how much my office prints?” Office print tracking captures and records information about your office’s printing behaviors.

You can’t plan for what you can’t measure. And not knowing the total number, length, etc. of what documents are being printed and by which department and individual makes it difficult to ensure that printing costs are under control.

Play follow the leader with your print jobs on any of your office’s networked copiers.

Called pull, push, or follow me printing; this productivity functionality allows employees to roam the office and print from a convenient device.

Have a large print job, but don’t want to carry it from your desk up two floors to the big conference room? Hit print, select the device closest to your meeting,