I saw an event entitled Virtual Server: The Tip of the Iceberg appear on the list of forthcoming events and and got a bit panicky - as Virtualization is one of the things I speak on, and I didn't know anything about it.

It's an all day event on Tuesday Novemeber 28th, and a quick check revealed it was being delivered by my Architect colleagues; I will be attending to see what I can steal best practice in this area. Just follow the link above for a detailed agenda and to book a place.

Not everyone can make it to Microsoft's office in Reading for Technet events, so we're taking What's new in administering Windows Vista to Manchester next week - the afternoon Thursday 19th to be exact. The event is free - just click the link for more information and to register.

We have put RC-2 on the Vista download site. It has not yet appeared on the MSDN and Technet member sites, although we have said it will do, so expect it to appear there in the next day or two.

I remember the first time I saw the comedian Eddie Izzard perform live, he walked onto the stage in Oxford, and looked around the audience. There wasn't a single empty seat. He said "I've sold out! People always say 'Stay true to yourself and never sell out' but I say NO!!! "

It's one of a few comedy lines which comes to me like some kind of Pavlovian reaction, and I had this in my email this morning.

Tech Ed: IT Forum is a complete sell out. In total 4.500 people will attend the conference and the expo hall with sponsors and exhibitors is also sold out. This evening we are closing the public registration.

Wow, sold out six weeks ahead of time. It's obviously popular this year. I'll be there, I might do a turn in the ask the experts area. But my main job is to recording for virtual Tech-ed. I'll post the links for that in due course ... but we've been interviewing some of the content owners and the folks who put the event infrastructure together. If you've booked it looks like it's going to be great event. If you haven't booked you'll have to watch Virtual tech-ed.

It looks like someone has been giving Paul Thurrott some internal emails again. We have the build which we think will be RC2 - 5744. Numerologists will note that we have moved on 144 - a multiple of 16 - from RC-1, which is 5600. (See my explanation of build numbers spurred on by Paul).

I'm running 5728, which has some noticeable improvements over RC1. 

We seem to have been incrementing the builds in steps of one over recent days, and there were builds numbered 5743.0 and 5743.1. Paul suggested that we were going to release one of those, but have switched to 5744. The minor build number for 5744 is 16384, which normally indicates a build we think we may release...

RC2 will be on the Technet and MSDN sites soon after the build is judged "fit". Watch this space.