TechnoLawyer

Coming today to Answers to Questions: Denis Jodis discusses the prickly issue of suing a client for non-payment, Mary Grace Hune shares a tip on enforcing your fee retainer policy, Jason Anderman discusses new state bar ethics opinions cloud computing and client confidentiality, Douglas Shachtman reviews LexisNexis' CaseMap, NoteMap, and TimeMap, and Sandy Hagman reviews GoToMeeting, WebEx, and Dim Dim. Don't miss this issue.

How to Receive Answers to Questions
Do you believe in the wisdom of crowds? In Answers to Questions, TechnoLawyer members answer legal technology and practice management questions submitted by their peers. This newsletter's popularity stems from the relevance of the questions and answers to virtually everyone in the legal profession. The Answers to Questions newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire covers practice management software (see article below), a Web-based scanning service, an online group password management service, and two iPad apps to help you with jury selection. Don't miss the next issue.

Capture All Your Billable Time in Less Time

Each new year brings well-intentioned resolutions. But most resolutions go unfulfilled. While software can't drag you out of bed and take you to your local gym, it can help you achieve resolutions in other areas of your life — like ensuring that you bill all the hours you work. One company that helps law firms achieve such resolutions seems to have a resolution of its own that it always fufills — a new version every January.

Amicus Attorney 2011 Premium Edition … in One Sentence
Amicus Attorney 2011 Premium Edition is practice management software designed to help law firms improve their efficiency and profitability.

The Killer Feature
Jim Croce wanted to save time in a bottle so he could spend eternity with his significant other. Lawyers would settle for recording all their billable time so they can get paid for all their work — emphasis on "all."

Amicus Attorney 2011 Premium Edition's new Time Entry Assistant is designed to help you prevent billable hours from slip sliding away. For example, Time Entry Assistant displays a single list of all your activities that might need a time entry — appointments, documents, email, notes, tasks, telephone calls, etc. — anything completed that does not yet have a matching time entry.

You can filter the list by date range as well as sort by date, client, matter, and type of activity. With one click, you can transform an activity into a time entry. You can also remove non-billable activities so they will not reappear. As a result, you'll spend less time capturing more of your billable time.

Amicus Attorney also supports bulk time entries via its new Time Saver technology. For example, at the end of the day you can select all your billable email messages and with one click create a time entry for each of them. You can also enter time on behalf of others.

Other Notable Features
Amicus Attorney doesn't just want to help you capture all your time, but use it more productively. As an example, you'll find the Amicus Tasks toolbar in Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat. With this toolbar, you can link PDF documents to clients, matters, and library pages in Amicus Attorney, send them to your Amicus Attorney contacts, and check them in and out when collaborating with colleagues.

Because the new version of Amicus Attorney resides atop a robust SQL database, reports now update in real-time and provide direct access from report line items to underlying data in Amicus Attorney. Thus, if you run a report and then change the parameters, the report will instantly update. There's no need to run it again.

Other new features include more flexibility when configuring client and matter fields for integration with Worldox, the ability to globally synchronize Amicus Attorney with your accounting system at a specified time, and an enhanced Accounting Profile Wizard that includes more options for defining custom time entry export formats.

What Else Should You Know?
Gavel & Gown also offers Amicus Attorney 2011 Small Firm Edition — a less expensive version for solo practitioners and small law firms with more modest needs. Learn more about Amicus Attorney 2011 Premium Edition.

How to Receive TechnoLawyer NewsWire
So many products, so little time. In each issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The "In One Sentence" section describes each product in one sentence, and the "Killer Feature" section describes each product's most compelling feature. The TechnoLawyer NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

This special edition of TechnoLawyer NewsWire was originally published on December 15, 2010.

Ruth Edlund once described TechnoLawyer as a "collective mind" — one of my all-time favorite characterizations. TechnoLawyer is also a data-driven media property. We try to rely on data rather than anecdotal evidence whenever possible to guide our decisions. And nowhere is our reliance on data more evident than in TechnoLawyer NewsWire as we track the number of clicks on the 250 products we cover in this newsletter each year. Below you will find the 15 products you and your fellow TechnoLawyer NewsWire subscribers found most intriguing as suggested by the number of clicks they received.

1. Libretto W100

Was 2010 the year of the tablet? Yes, but not all tablets. We wrote about Toshiba's Libretto W100 (pictured above) and its two screens on August 18th. Remember, we just report on new products here (we review products in some of our other newsletters but not in this one). So how has the Libretto W100 fared? Has it sold millions of units? Not quite. The critics panned it and Toshiba quickly pulled it from the market.

2. Doxie

What can I say? TechnoLawyers love learning about scanners — even this consumer model with little hearts on the front that we covered on April 28th.

3. Snapdone Version 6

Document management is also a hot topic (download our free document management system buyer's guide if you don't have a copy yet). Snapdone, which we covered on November 17th, adds document management and document assembly functions to Microsoft Office. No wonder it ranked third.

4. TaskMerlin 3.1

This project management software, which we covered on August 25th, offers lots of customization options for those who like to tinker with their workflows. But despite its name, it cannot perform magic. You yourself must complete all the tasks you enter.

5. Square

This credit card processing company replaces all the inscrutable fees in typical merchant accounts with a single, albeit higher, discount rate. However, TechnoLawyer subscriber James McCorquodale subsequently reported that it's not a good fit for law firms. We covered Square on May 12th.

6. Pimero

We reported on this Outlook alternative on July 14th. I like that it offers true bulk mailing. There's nothing more annoying than an email amateur who uses BCC to send bulk mail.

7. Alfresco Enterprise 3.2

On March 24th, we told you about this open source document management system that can automatically archive your email. Despite being open source, Alfresco Enterprise is not free.

8. iPad

We usually report only on finished products that you can buy — but how could we have waited until April to tell you about Apple's iPad, the most anticipated gadget of the year? Instead, we covered this game-changing tablet on January 27th within hours of its announcement.

9. HotDocs 10

We reported on HotDocs 10, which makes it easier to transform your model documents into templates, on June 2nd. Six weeks later, document assembly guru Marc Lauritsen reviewed it in our TechnoFeature newsletter, awarding it a perfect TechnoScore of 5.0.

10. OnIt

On December 1st, we told you about this new online project management system that borrows from social networks like Facebook. The company seemed pretty happy with our coverage, tweeting "Thanks for the great review of Onit. Your article sent us a lot of website traffic." It wasn't a review but glad we could help all the same.

11. Law Charge

Do you sense a trend here? Yes, another credit card processing company though Law Charge, which we covered on May 5th, specializes in servicing law firms.

12. Stacks

Another Web-based task management system? Clearly, we have some busy subscribers seeking organizational nirvana. On July 28th, we reported on Stacks, which uses charts and data to help you visualize your workflow. I'm not sure if these charts will make you feel better or worse so keep some Valium handy and brace yourself.

13. Portal4Law 5.0

Portal4Law 5.0, which we covered on November 10th, offers Web-based practice management, including document management. Some legal vendors make it easy for us to cover their products and some don't. If we gave out awards for helpfulness, PortalSoft's Director of Marketing would probably win.

14. ADERANT Practice Manager

Expect to see more products like ADERANT Practice Manager in 2011 and beyond — Web-based practice management systems from established vendors. Thus far, scrappy startups have dominated the SaaS landscape, but this era won't last forever. Some of these pioneers will become major players in their own right, but others will be acquired or squashed by software companies with a large installed base of customers. We reported on ADERANT Practice Manager on October 6th.

15. Less Accounting

Last but not least (since it ranked higher than 235 other products), Less Accounting, which we covered on June 17th, is an online accounting system that imports data from QuickBooks and integrates with PayPal.

Read about the other 235 products we covered in 2010 in the TechnoLawyer Archive.

How to Receive TechnoLawyer NewsWire
So many products, so little time. In each issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The "In One Sentence" section describes each product in one sentence, and the "Killer Feature" section describes each product's most compelling feature. The TechnoLawyer NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Coming today to TechnoFeature: Does legal process outsourcing seem like the best thing since the billable hour or the biggest threat to American (and Canadian) lawyers since Nolo Press and LegalZoom? Regardless of where you stand on the issue, LPO is here to stay so you may as well understand its mechanics. In this TechnoFeature article, Fidelity Investments' Vice President and Associate General Counsel Martha Mazzone explores the ethical obligations of corporate legal departments and law firms that outsource legal work overseas (or insource within the United States for that matter). While not every state has weighed in yet, Martha analyzes those that have plus the American Bar Association, which often spearheads new ethics rules for the legal profession.

How to Receive TechnoFeature
Our flagship newsletter never disappoints thanks to its in-depth reporting by leading legal technology and practice management experts, many of whom have become "household names" in the legal profession. It's in TechnoFeature that you'll find our oft-quoted formal product reviews and accompanying TechnoScore ratings. The TechnoFeature newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Coming today to BlawgWorld: Our editorial team has selected and linked to 107 articles from the past week worthy of your attention, including our Post of the Week. Here's a sample:

Annual Maintenance Plans and Yearly Upgrades

Review: BlackBerry PlayBook (Prerelease)

Top Five Reasons Why Large Law Firms Cause Depression

Here Is Your 2011 Marketing Plan (BigLaw Edition)

Don't miss this issue or future issues.

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Our newsletters provide the most comprehensive coverage of legal technology, practice management, and law firm marketing, but not the only coverage. To stay on top of all the noteworthy articles published in blogs and other online publications you could either hire a research assistant or simply subscribe to BlawgWorld. The BlawgWorld newsletter has received rave reviews and is free. Please subscribe now.

Today we launch our ninth email newsletter — LitigationWorld!

What Will Each Issue of LitigationWorld Cover?

Many of the best litigation tips are buried in lengthy articles, or worse, inside the minds of top litigators and consultants who share them only with paying clients.

LitigationWorld will unearth these tips. Every Monday, you'll receive a brief but useful tip relating to electronic discovery, litigation strategy, or litigation technology.

In addition, each issue will contain links to the most important litigation articles published on the Web during the previous week so that you won't miss anything important.

Who Is LitigationWorld's Editor?

Kimberlee (Kim) L. Gunning serves as the editor of LitigationWorld. She is a member of Terrell Marshall & Daudt PLLC in Seattle, Washington.

Kim concentrates her practice on complex civil litigation and appeals, with a focus on consumer class actions, employment law, business torts and commercial litigation. She has a special interest in the emerging law of eDiscovery and is a self-confessed civil procedure geek.

Who Should Subscribe to LitigationWorld?

Corporate counsel who manage litigation matters, litigators, paralegals, litigation support managers, litigation consultants, and others in the litigation field. Like all of our newsletters, LitigationWorld is free. Please subscribe to LitigationWorld now.

Not a litigator? Check our our eight other newsletters.

Today's issue of Fat Friday contains these articles:

David Hudgens, Review: Headset Battle: Plantronics Voyager 510S v. Sennheiser BW900 v. BlueAnt v. Jawbone

Paul Mansfield, Tips For PCLaw Users Choosing a Smartphone

Dixon Robertson, Adobe Acrobat and Microsoft Office 2010

Question of the Week: What's Going on at Your Firm in 2011?

Don't miss this issue — or any future issues.

How to Receive Fat Friday
Our most serendipitous offering, Fat Friday consists of unsolicited contributions by TechnoLawyer members. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The Fat Friday newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on January 4, 2011 in our free SmallLaw newsletter. Instead of reading SmallLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

Do you work in a large law firm? If so, you're reading the wrong version of this column. Read the BigLaw version instead.

This month a variety of "experts" will push your firm to put together a marketing plan for 2011. That's a great idea! Many of us who manage small firms will get to it right after we put the finishing touches on our 2010 marketing plan.

Oh yeah, that's right. We're really not going to write a 2011 marketing plan. We'll be lucky to find the time and energy to get to any marketing in 2011 between the clients, the upset paralegal, the unpaid receivables, the kids calling on the cell phone, and the need to hit the grocery store on the way home. A marketing plan isn't on the agenda no matter how much we know we should plan, budget, and calendar the necessary activities to continue to grow the quantity and quality of our clients. We just don't have the time, the energy, or the inclination.

Well, I have a solution for you so you won't have to feel guilty about skipping out on the planning. I've written your 2011 marketing plan for you. It's not the perfect marketing plan, but I guarantee that if you complete even half the tasks I've planned for you, you're going to see substantial new business flowing through your door. If that doesn't happen, email me a note in December and I'll fully refund what you paid for this SmallLaw newsletter.

You'll have to pick and choose the elements of the plan that work best for your firm. Obviously, you'll have to adapt the plan to your practice whether it's representing businesses or handling criminal cases. Tweak it to make it fit. If your firm has multiple practice areas, focus all of your marketing activities on your most promising (or favorite) practice area.

January
Send a letter to one-tenth of your existing clients. Thank them for allowing you to perform their work and ask whether they'd like to talk to you, at no charge, about any issue. Have them call and schedule a phone conference if they'd like to talk. Also, schedule lunch with two prospective referral sources.

February
Send the same letter to the next tenth of your clients and repeat every month until you finish in October. Also, schedule two more lunches and continue these lunches each month until November.

March
Continue with letters and lunches and write an article for any publication your target clientele likely reads. Limit yourself to 750 words (shorter than this article) and submit it.

April
More letters and lunches. Be sure to buy a reprint of the article from last month and place it on your Web site to note that you've been published. This month, join a club — any club will do. Lots of people like the Rotary. Just join a club. Also, write a quick note to everyone you've had lunch with since January and schedule coffee with them for next month.

May
Letters, lunches, and coffee with everyone you lunched with from January to March. Start asking your happiest clients and former clients to post reviews on your Google Places page (if permitted by your state's rules). Also, rack your brain for a connection to a local media outlet — TV, radio, or newspaper. You've got to know someone who knows someone. Just think it through for now.

June
Letters, lunches, and coffee with everyone from your April and May lunches. Call your media contact and introduce yourself. Sure, it's going to be weird if your connection is tenuous. Just do it — it's in the plan, right? Tell the contact that you're an expert in your area of the law and offer to make yourself available if he or she ever has questions.

July
Letters, lunches, and coffee. Also, write follow-up notes to everyone on your lunch list just to check in. Now you should be in a cycle with the lunch people. Do lunch, have coffee, and send a note every 90 days to everyone on the list. Also, go ahead and write another article for publication. Plus, you're still going to your club meetings, right? Offer to help with the club newsletter (it's good to get your name in print).

August
Letters, lunches, coffee, and follow-up notes. Keep the cycle going. Reprint your article on your Web site. Keep going to the club meetings. It's time again to ask for endorsements on your Google Places page. These endorsements need to become a regular practice so that you're asking new people to recommend your firm every three months.

September
Letters, lunches, coffee, follow-up notes, and club meetings. Call your media contact again. Offer information on recent developments and remind the person that you exist. Be friendly and helpful. Maybe the journalist would like some lunch or coffee? Send a follow-up note.

October
Letters, lunches, coffee, notes, and club meetings. You're busy, you're tired, and you're overrun with new clients. Seriously, if you've followed this plan, you're getting crushed. Keep it up. Don't slow down. If you need to regulate the volume of work, then raise your prices or hire some help. Don't stop. Stopping is the enemy. Go, go, go!

November
Take a break from client letters. You've made it through the list. Send holiday cards to everyone. Consider a holiday party for your lunch and coffee people. Don't stop with lunches, coffee, notes, and club meetings. Your club will have a holiday party. Offer to play the trumpet for people to dance to (I'm kidding, but you should go to the party next month).

December
Take a break from everything except the club holiday party, your bar association holiday party, and your firm holiday party. Rest and draft your marketing plan for 2012 (I won't be able to write your 2012 marketing plan).

By the end of 2011, you've sent all of your clients a letter reminding them that you exist and can help. You've met a bunch of new referral sources and had a chance to get to know them. You've met a ton of new people in your club. You've been recommended numerous times on Google. You've likely been published in several magazines, and you've probably been quoted in the local media. It's been a very good marketing year.

That's the plan. If you execute on this plan, you'll have a huge year. If you don't, you probably won't. Marketing can be systematic, entertaining, and productive. It doesn't have to be complicated. Try this plan. You'll be glad you did.

Written by Lee Rosen of Divorce Discourse.

How to Receive SmallLaw
Small firm, big dreams. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, SmallLaw provides you with a mix of practical advice that you can use today, and insight about what it will take for small law firms like yours to thrive in the future. The SmallLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on January 4, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

Do you work in a small law firm? If so, you're reading the wrong version of this column. Read the SmallLaw version instead.

This month a variety of "experts" will push your firm or practice group to put together a marketing plan for 2011. That's a great idea! Those of you who manage large firms or practice groups within large firms or who serve as a Chief Marketing Officer will get to it right after you put the finishing touches on your 2010 marketing plan.

Oh yeah, that's right. You're really not going to write a 2011 marketing plan. Between your clients, the fires you'll need to put out, and all the other unforeseeable events that you know will occur, you'll be lucky to find the time and energy to perform your job let alone write a marketing plan. Even at the world's largest firms, a marketing plan often falls off the agenda no matter how much everyone knows they should plan, budget, and calendar the necessary activities to continue to grow the quantity and quality of clients.

Well, I have a solution for you so you won't have to feel guilty about skipping out on the planning. I've written your 2011 marketing plan for you. It's not the perfect marketing plan, but I guarantee that if you complete even half the tasks I've planned for you, you're going to see substantial new business flowing through your door. If that doesn't happen, email me a note in December and I'll fully refund what you paid for this BigLaw newsletter.

You'll need to pick and choose the elements of the plan that work best for your firm or practice group. And you'll have to adapt the plan to your practice areas. However, you'll find it surprisingly malleable and, therefore, applicable to just about any practice area from ERISA to intellectual property litigation.

January
Send a letter to one-tenth of your existing clients. Thank them for allowing you to perform their work and ask whether they'd like to talk to you, at no charge, about any issue. Have them call and schedule a phone conference if they'd like to talk. Also, schedule lunch with two prospective referral sources.

February
Send the same letter to the next tenth of your clients and repeat every month until you finish in October. Also, schedule two more lunches and continue these lunches each month until November.

March
Continue with letters and lunches and write an article for any publication your target clientele likely reads. Limit yourself to 750 words (shorter than this article) and submit it.

April
More letters and lunches. Be sure to buy a reprint of the article from last month and place it on your Web site to note that you've been published. This month, join a club — any club will do. Lots of people like the Rotary. Just join a club. Also, write a quick note to everyone you've had lunch with since January and schedule coffee with them for next month.

May
Letters, lunches, and coffee with everyone you lunched with from January to March. Start asking your happiest clients and former clients to post reviews on your Google Places page (if permitted by your state's rules). Also, rack your brain for a connection to a local media outlet — TV, radio, or newspaper. You've got to know someone who knows someone. Just think it through for now.

June
Letters, lunches, and coffee with everyone from your April and May lunches. Call your media contact and introduce yourself. Sure, it's going to be weird if your connection is tenuous. Just do it — it's in the plan, right? Tell the contact that you're an expert in your area of the law and offer to make yourself available if he or she ever has questions.

July
Letters, lunches, and coffee. Also, write follow-up notes to everyone on your lunch list just to check in. Now you should be in a cycle with the lunch people. Do lunch, have coffee, and send a note every 90 days to everyone on the list. Also, go ahead and write another article for publication. Plus, you're still going to your club meetings, right? Offer to help with the club newsletter (it's good to get your name in print).

August
Letters, lunches, coffee, and follow-up notes. Keep the cycle going. Reprint your article on your Web site. Keep going to the club meetings. It's time again to ask for endorsements on your Google Places page. These endorsements need to become a regular practice so that you're asking new people to recommend your firm every three months.

September
Letters, lunches, coffee, follow-up notes, and club meetings. Call your media contact again. Offer information on recent developments and remind the person that you exist. Be friendly and helpful. Maybe the journalist would like some lunch or coffee? Send a follow-up note.

October
Letters, lunches, coffee, notes, and club meetings. You're busy, you're tired, and you're overrun with new clients. Seriously, if you've followed this plan, you're getting crushed. Keep it up. Don't slow down. If you need to regulate the volume of work, then raise your prices or hire some help. Don't stop. Stopping is the enemy. Go, go, go!

November
Take a break from client letters. You've made it through the list. Send holiday cards to everyone. Consider a holiday party for your lunch and coffee people. Don't stop with lunches, coffee, notes, and club meetings. Your club will have a holiday party. Offer to play the trumpet for people to dance to (I'm kidding, but you should go to the party next month).

December
Take a break from everything except the club holiday party, your bar association holiday party, and your firm holiday party. Rest and draft your marketing plan for 2012 (I won't be able to write your 2012 marketing plan).

By the end of 2011, you've sent all of your clients a letter reminding them that you exist and can help. You've met a bunch of new referral sources and had a chance to get to know them. You've met a ton of new people in your club. You've been recommended numerous times on Google. You've likely been published in several magazines, and you've probably been quoted in the local media. It's been a very good marketing year.

That's the plan. If you execute on this plan, you'll have a huge year. If you don't, you probably won't. Marketing can be systematic, entertaining, and productive. It doesn't have to be complicated. Try this plan. You'll be glad you did.

Written by Lee Rosen of Divorce Discourse.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on December 6, 2010 in our free SmallLaw newsletter. Instead of reading SmallLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

With admitted fear and trepidation, I recently upgraded my XP computer to Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit version. The conversion was prompted by many considerations, including a desire to leave behind what had degenerated into 15-plus minute boot-ups (no matter how many times I ran my registry cleaner), and other tell-tale signs exhibited (as with my body) by an aging operating system.

The Pros and Cons of PCmover

There is reportedly no direct in-place upgrade from XP to Windows 7 (at least without an intermediate installation of the hated Vista), but this conventional wisdom is not entirely true. Laplink software has updated and is now again separately marketing the venerable PCmover software.

With PCmover, you initially decide whether to transfer only "settings" to a new machine (or to a machine with a newly upgraded operating system), or whether to transfer as well part or all applications to the new operating environment (PCmover being the only package widely acknowledged to successfully transfer applications).

In the OS upgrade scenario, PCmover is first installed on the machine while it is still running XP, and then the program transfers all specified settings and applications to a virtual "moving van" that is then stored elsewhere (e.g., on an external drive). The new operating system is then installed along with PCmover, followed by "unloading" the pre-existing settings and applications from the "moving van" into the new OS environment.

Whether to use PCmover versus a clean install of Windows 7 is a personal call. The PCmover routine can take a very long time if your PC is loaded with programs, to the extent that there might not be much time savings over a clean installation of the OS followed by reinstallation of at least your most essential programs. I began with PCmover, but found a system problem with the "Fourth" step described below and so ended up using a clean install.

Preparation

You can (maybe) avoid uttering profanities if you make proper advance preparation for the OS switch-over including:

1. Make a full-image backup of the "old" XP machine useable to restore your computer to its starting condition should anything — or everything — go to hell in a handbasket.
2. Run a good audit program like the free Belarc Advisor on the "old" XP machine. It will provide you with a detailed profile (audit) of your installed software, hardware, including installation license keys for many (but not all) of your software packages.
3. "Deactivate" software packages like Acrobat, Microsoft Office, etc. from companies that keep tabs on the number of installs under each License Key, since that will likely permit you a much easier activation of the package under your new operating system using the existing License Key.
4. Double check that your principal drive (usually C:) is recognized by your system as Drive 0 (zero). If it is not you may run into other complications and should probably avoid PCmover in favor of a clean install after correcting this problem so that the system recognizes your "C" drive as Drive 0. Go to "Administrative Tools" > Computer Management > Storage > Disk Management where you can ensure that what your system sees as "Disk 0" actually is your C Drive.

The 64-Bit Question

64-bit Windows has the substantial advantage of being able to use more than 4 GB of memory (RAM). Not only is increasing RAM the single best way to improve PC performance, but RAM is dirt cheap. I just purchased 8 GB from Crucial.com for a total of around $167 — and don't ask me what I used to pay for 1 GB unless you want to see a grown lawyer cry.

Certainly if you use your machine for such demanding applications as trial control and trial presentation, get the maximum RAM you can cram into your machine. Frankly, I had anticipated a lot of problems not only in changing operating systems, but also in going to the 64-bit version of Windows. So far, problems have been few and far between. Almost all peripheral manufacturers and software publishers now accommodate both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows 7 operating systems, and if not, many can be run in "compatibility mode."

Create a Software Library

Many of the above transitions (and innumerable other scenarios) will proceed more smoothly if you adopt my practice of maintaining on a network drive a "Software Library."

Virtually all software packages permit you to maintain a backup copy of the software. These backups fill my Software Library, which has a sub-directory for each general class of software (e.g., Word Processing and Text Tools, Trial Presentation Tools, etc.) with breakdowns for each package within that main category (e.g., Microsoft Office).

Within the final category breakdown, each package and/or update appears in its own sub-directory, the name of which begins with the date (YYYY-MM-DD) so there is never any doubt as to which is most recent, and ends with the License Key. Thus, the lowest level directory (which holds the installation software itself) will look something like this: "2010-11-19 Fancy Program Version 6.4 — KEY R79021JJK" — much easier than trying to keep track of all of those CDs and CD cases with License Key stickers. (You will thank me later.)

One warning though. A few software programs will not later reinstall from your network directories, but demand to be loaded from a CD or DVD. You can of course either image (rather than merely copy the contents of) the installation CD to your Software Library in the first place, or you can burn your Software Library directory content to a new CD or DVD for purposes of the reinstall.

All's Well That Installs Well

While an OS makeover is certainly not something you should embark upon the night before trial, absent any such exigency a switch to Windows 7 (preferably the 64-bit version, hopefully accompanied by a modest investment in additional RAM) probably falls into the "sooner the better" category for all small law firms not planning on shutting down within the next 12 months. It's like having a brand new computer, but a heck of a lot cheaper.

Written by Yvonne M. Renfrew of Renfrew Law.

How to Receive SmallLaw
Small firm, big dreams. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, SmallLaw provides you with a mix of practical advice that you can use today, and insight about what it will take for small law firms like yours to thrive in the future. The SmallLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.