On Friday, I blogged about “ Project Sundance ”, which is an upcoming release from the Solution Accelerators team that combines the Vista/XP/2003/2008/Office security guides with the Configuration Manager Desired Configuration Management (DCM) packs for security, along with the GPOAccelerator tool into...

I love the next-generation TCP/IP Stack and SMB 2.0 . It makes for quite zippy transfers :) More on the new networking features of Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb726965.aspx

I'm in the process of setting up a new Hyper-V server, and for some reason I was unable to connect via Terminal Services to the server... I had properly enabled the "Allow connections from computer running any version of Remote Desktop (less secure) option". However, no matter, what I did, I got the...

Download the eBook here . There is nothing particularly fundamental about this book, unless you are a CCNP or otherwise live and breathe packets. Surprisingly (to me) however, the book remains quite readable. Written by Joseph Davies (aka The Cable Guy in TechNet Magazine )... he even has an entry on...

I see over on Matt's blog that MBSA 2.1 has been released, with the following new features: Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 compatibility New revised user interface 64-bit support Improved Windows Embedded support Compatibility with Microsoft Update, Windows Server Update Services 2.0 and 3.0,...

The latest version of the links below can be found here , or download a PDF version here . Don't ask me where they got that US-Army-looking-font in the PDF... it probably wouldn't have been my first choice ;) Group Policy Documentation Essentials These links help you get started with Group Policy. Learn...

One of the best parts of working at Microsoft is the amazing discussions and debates that take place on our internal Discussion Lists. A few months ago, the greatest security minds at Microsoft were undergoing a hot and heavy debate on Security by Obscurity . Does it make sense to rename the Administrator...

Aaaaah... to come full circle.  Microsoft's OSs started at the command line, went GUI, and you can now do more from then command-line than ever before.  Between PowerShell , the Windows Command Reference , and now the Netsh Technical Reference , you can script until you are blue in the face...

Great Stuff from SysInternals (and Mark Russinovich): Inside Windows Server 2008 Kernal Changes : Mark goes deep inside the Server 2008 kernel to describe enhancements to memory management and I/O processing, as well as how Server 2008 implements new features like Hyper-V, self-healing NTFS, SMB2, and...

Some highlights... Windows Media Services 2008 for Windows Server 2008 This software is an optional supplement to Windows Server 2008. In Windows Server 2008, the Streaming Media Services role (which includes the latest version of Windows Media Services) and remote administration tools are not included...

With the upcoming Windows Server 2008 release, there are a TON of cool books coming out from MSPress. You can always check out the list here ( http://www.microsoft.com/mspress/hop/ ), but the books that will be lining my bookshelf upon release are: MCITP Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-237): Designing...

Ever see your hard drive LED chugging away, while there was no apparent activity on your screen?  Apple solves the problem by choosing to not providing a HD LED.  What you don't know can't bug you! My wife, however, asked me to track down the reason for a recent slowdown in performance on our...

If you have not played with the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Solution Accelerator, you really need to. It was awesome as the Windows Vista Hardware Assessment tool, and it is even better now that it adds support for Windows Server 2008, Virtualization, and Server Consolidation. If you read this...

I spent some time in the lab today playing with Windows Vista hardware Assessment Tool (WVHA) 2.0. WVHA is an awesome utility from the Solution Accelerator team that allow you to scan a network (of both AD-joined and workgroup computers) and report on what machines in your network are capable of being...

If you are a standard user, the following post will not help you, but if you are a power user with multiple Windows Vista Keys sitting around from MSDN, TechNet, Betas, Roadshows, Retail... You may run into the problem (when flattening and rebuilding a box) of not knowing WHICH key (from your drawer...

In my next post, I'll cover my Boot Camp experience on my MacBook Pro.  But in order to do so, I wanted to take some screenshots.  Unfortunately, the MacBook Pro does not have  a Print Screen button on the keyboard, which makes it difficult to take a screenshot. There are a couple of workarounds...

If you are planning on running Windows Vista on a MacBook Pro... I just picked one of the new ones up, and Vista is VERY snappy on it... Windows Experience for the MBP with the following hardware: 2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7500 Santa Rosa chipset 2GB DDR2 667MHz RAM 160GB 5400 RPM HD 128MB NVIDIA GeForce...

Parental Controls on Windows Vista are a great way to take charge of how your kiddoes use the computer.  You can restrict time limitations, the ratings of games they are allowed to play, block or allow specific programs, block or allow specific websites, and get activity reports on what they have...

When you log into or out of Windows Vista, you will receive the following message as Windows starts up or shuts down various services, applies settings, runs logon scripts, etc. If you enjoy knowing WHAT it is that Windows is doing, you can make Windows display much more verbose status information: This...

Well, I was just going to write a post on one of the coolest features in Windows Server 2008 - Multicast Deployments (aka the ability to image multiple machines in parallel). However, I see that TechNet Magazine covered it last month! http://www.microsoft.com/technet/technetmag/issues/2007/05/DesktopFiles...

Part deux in my "strange experiences while installing Vista" series :) As mentioned earlier , I installed a clean copy of Vista after replacing the Motherboard and Video Card. The first time I booted up, my Windows Experience Index bottlenecked on the Video Card. Although I have an ATI Radeon X1950 Pro...

I installed a clean copy of Vista recently, after replacing my Motherboard, Video Card, and Processor ( detailed here ). As my last post focused on my Experience Index, I didn't cover the two strange issues I ran into. I will cover them (and their solutions) in two posts. The first problem I ran into...

In my previous post , I mentioned that TechNet Magazine has their past issues available in HTML Help format (.chm) here .  If you navigate to that page (with a fully patched Vista or Windows XP box) and open one of the referenced files from directly within IE, you will get something that looks a...

Approximately 6 months ago, my computer started spontaneously rebooting, and I decided to replace the motherboard and Processor. After researching processors online, I decided that the best bang-for-the-buck would be to pick up an Intel Core2 Duo 1.86GHz processor (I am not a gamer, but this is a quite...

Just saw the following over on the Computerworld article: Teach XP and Vista to play nice on networks And the Windows Vista Network Map -- which may be the best networking feature Microsoft has ever introduced into Windows -- won't work properly with XP PCs. They won't show up properly on the network...