7:07pm: We gave away our first Nintendo Wii at 6:45pm tonight! The lucky winner is Ric Johnson of Waynesfield, OH. We’ll be giving out three more Wiis tomorrow to those attendees who we spot wearing their black ‘ON’ t-shirt around the exhibit hall.

So the exhibition floor is closing up, and day one is nearly in the books. I got to meet dozens of VARs, solution providers and IT pros today, as well as having a quick chat with industry guru Heather Clancy , and our friends over at Autotask. Now, I’m off to an undisclosed location for a meeting with The VAR Guy. I can only assume that, since he didn’t win today’s Wii, we’re going to have some explaining to do. Looking forward to another great day tomorrow. Cheers from Orlando!

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6:18pm: The area around our booth at Breakaway has been packed for the past hour and a half. There are black ‘ON’ t-shirts and buttons being worn in every area of the show floor. Check out these three gents sporting the finest in OnForce wear… from our summer 2008 collection

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5:12pm: The doors opened about 75 minutes ago. The show floor was fairly calm and quiet for the first 1/2 hour, but the last 45 minutes have seen a major increase in foot traffic and energy level. There’s a lot of activity and noise around the hall right now.

We’re about four or five people deep at our booth, giving multiple demos at all times, and handing out ‘ON’ tees left and right. There’s an audible buzz (and a serious crowd) right now. That always makes our neighboring booths happy… regardless, it’s very interesting and educational to meet so many VARs, OEMs and IT professionals in such a short window of time.

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3:00pm: The OnForce crew has made it safely into sunny Orlando, our booth is set up and looking sharp, and we’ve been having some interesting discussions with media and channel players throughout the day.

Earlier today, we had a great chat with Chris Loringer, Editor for Network/Security & Storage at Business Solutions, discussing solution providers who focus on serving retailers, and the opportunities / challenges they face in offering POS, storage and CE-oriented solutions, as well as how media in the channel is evolving.

Show starts in less than an hour!

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