Many of you would like to know how Virtual Server is being used at Microsoft. Here's a response from Jeff Woolsey, Lead Program Manager for virtualization. Thanks Jeff! Virtual Server is being used in a variety of ways at Microsoft, including for test...

If you're connected to Virtual Server over a Terminal Services or Remote Desktop connection, you'll get a "Page cannot be displayed" error if you try to launch the Administration Website from the shortcut on the Start menu. Instead, you can provide this...

If you want to turn off the beep that sounds when you turn on a virtual machine, you can run the following two commands. The first stops the BEEP service and the second disables it on subsequent reboots. net stop beep sc config beep start= disabled...

If you want your applications to install more quickly in a virtual machine, do this: After you install the guest operating system, install Virtual Machine Additions, restart the virtual machine, and then install the applications.

Here's a tip from Paul Adare (author of Paul's Digital Lounge and Cigar Bar ). If you want an application to discover it's running in a virtual machine, you can do the following: You could query the registry for the existence of the HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft...

You can easily change your virtual hard disk (VHD) attachment from IDE to SCSI: Shut down the guest operating system. Add a SCSI adapter to the virtual machine, if one isn't already available (under "Virtual Machine" Configuration, click SCSI...

In his keynote address this morning at Microsoft Management Summit 2005, Steve Ballmer reaffirmed Microsoft's commitment to the Dynamic Systems Initiative (DSI), of which virtualization is a key component. Ballmer explained that Microsoft is increasing...

This morning at Microsoft Management Summit 2005, Steve Ballmer announced the availability of Virtual Server 2005 Service Pack 1 (SP1) Beta. To view an on-demand Web cast of Steve's talk (including Jeff Woolsey's demonstration of Virtual Server 2005 SP1...

Platespin CEO, Stephen Pollack, talked to VirtualStrategy Magazine about PowerRecon, Platespin's new tool for consolidation planning. Read all about it at http://www.virtual-strategy.com/article/articleview/778/1/2/ .

Finally, this very cool tool created by Nelson Araujo is available as a free download from Microsoft (it was demo'd last year at TechEd in WINIL401). VSDM manages a virtual library of templates and ISO images and provides a streamlined way to manage and...

Chong Lee and Thomas Mathew -- Technology Specialists here at Microsoft -- are developing a report that you can load into Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 (MOM) to monitor the performance of physical computers that are candidates for virtualization....

Title: Course 2288: Using Microsoft® Virtual Server 2005 Course Type: Self-paced course Available Offline: Yes Estimated Time to Complete: 5 hours Description: This course prepares students to migrate legacy applications and consolidate server functions...

I just posted two scripts from John Kelbley, a technical specialist at Microsoft. They are examples of scripts you can write to perform a warm backup of your virtual machines and restore them to a different instance of Virtual Server. You'll find them...

I just posted a new article: a draft whitepaper that I'm writing to compare Virtual Server and Virtual PC ( http://blogs.technet.com/megand/articles/category/8232.aspx ). If you read it, I'd appreciate hearing your comments and suggestions. Update...

This Management Pack is an add-on for Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005. It monitors the health, availability, and performance of Virtual Server. You can download it from the Microsoft Web site at: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx...

I just posted an article on figuring out how much system capacity a host computer will need in order to run a given set of virtual machines. You can find it in the Deployment section ( http://blogs.technet.com/megand/articles/category/8299.aspx ). ...

TechEd 2005 is coming right up, from June 5 - 10 in Orlando, FL, US. Register before April 15 to save $300. The following are some breakout sessions and hands-on labs where you can learn more about using Virtual Server and Virtual PC: Consolidating...

As you may know, Windows Server 2003 SP1 has been released, and a lot of people will be rushing to upgrade their virtual machines. If you're thinking about doing this, though, plan on postponing it for a bit. Virtual Server 2005 was released many months...

Mikko wants to know about best practices for backing up virtual machines. Well Mikko, according to Jeff Woolsey, a Virtual Server Program Manager, there are two ways to backup a virtual machine. Both have pros and cons, so you'll need to determine which...

You may have noticed that this blog is now published on TechNet rather than MSDN. It has been moved so it will be more discoverable by IT Pro readers. You may also have noticed that there have been a few minor glitches in the transition. The biggest one...