We’ve published a new topic in the TN Library that lists new Hyper-V videos in LIFO order. Check it out at: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee731912(WS.10).aspx

If you are interested in sorting these by number of views as of today:

1. Hyper-V Architecture Demonstration Video
2. Getting to Know Hyper-V with Felipe Ayora
3. Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 Bare Metal to Live Migration in about an hour!
4. Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Installation
5. Virtual Machine Migration Test Wizard
6. Hypervisor is not running error: How to fix
7. Hyper-V R2: Building a Hyper-V R2 Cluster
8. Ben Armstrong on Hyper-V Snapshot Common Issues
9. Hyper-V R2: Making Highly Available VMs
10. Hyper-V R2: Introducing Cluster Shared Volumes

The Appliance Test Drive — VHD Test Drive Program page has some updates:

Including a link to the free Microsoft Windows 7 90-Day Eval VHD and the Run IT on a Virtual Hard Disk – Test Drive Program, where you can download

Microsoft Windows 7 Enterprise

This download lets you evaluate Windows 7. Windows 7 has many new features and file management enhancements -- like Jump Lists and improved taskbar previews -- all to help speed you through everyday tasks. Windows 7 is designed for faster and more reliable performance. Your PC just works the way you want it to! With 64-bit support, you can take full advantage of the latest generation of powerful PCs and processors. New features like HomeGroup, an updated Windows Media Center and Windows Touch make new things possible.

Exchange Server 2010 RC for Windows Server 2008

Download this fully configured virtual machine of the latest release of Exchange Server 2010 RC. Evaluate the new capabilities of Exchange Server 2010 RC, which helps you achieve new levels of reliability and performance by delivering features that help to simplify your administration, protect your communications, and delight your users by meeting their demands for greater business mobility.

SQL Server 2008 Enterprise Evaluation for Windows Server 2008

Start evaluating SQL Server 2008 Enterprise today. SQL Server 2008 Enterprise provides a trusted, productive, and intelligent data platform that enables you to run your most demanding mission-critical applications, reduce time and cost of development and management of applications, and deliver actionable insight to your entire organization.

Did you know there is an arrow in the FedEx logo? Now that it has been pointed out, will you ever NOT see it?

This is an example used in Ric Merrifield’s Rethink: A Business Manifesto for Cutting Costs and Boosting Innovation to illustrate how changing your viewpoint is a necessary, but not sufficient, step to innovation.

His bottom-line advice, once you have figured out your Hedgehog; start with the small, safe projects. Tackling the part of the diagram that drives your profit is high-risk, if you make a mistake, it’ll be painful.

Rethinking how to decouple “what” you are doing from “how” you are doing it will tempt you to judge people/yourself for the waste you come to see with your new viewpoint. That’s not productive, guard against it. Let it go and move on.

Remember Hamlet’s idiom: “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”

Is it a woman’s face? Or a saxophone player?

Twitter. IT Pros. Seems like vinegar and oil? Perhaps not. We’ve started a twitter feed to notify you when new stuff publishes into the IT Pro Library on TechNet for Windows Server.

Come check it out at http://twitter.com/WinSrv

Tell them Professor Windows sent you. “Friend” us or “Follow” us or subscribe to the RSS feed – whatever the “social” thing to do is. Let us know by leaving comments here how we can make it most useful to you.

Aaron Czechowski’s blog: ConfigMgr Software Updates on an Isolated Network

Jeff Gilbert’s blog:

http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/jgilbert/archive/2008/10/19/synchronizing-non-internet-connected-software-update-points.aspx

http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/jgilbert/archive/2008/10/28/getting-required-updates-on-non-internet-connected-sups-part-1.aspx

http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/jgilbert/archive/2008/10/29/getting-required-updates-on-non-internet-connected-sups-part-2.aspx

Like I said in Magnificent Desolation, I would not want the job of selecting the Bing homepage image each day, because it the decision is fraught.

Whoever you are, keep up the good work!

Here’s how to set the Bing image as your desktop wallpaper.

My team is investigating the use of video as a content type for IT Pros. We are compiling best practices and tips/tricks for creating this kind of content, but we need your feedback. Thoughts/comments?

DO

1. Have some lighting. It should be good enough to distinguish what’s important (for example, a person’s face if they are talking), but no more.
2. Help the viewer understand whether or not the content is for them. Start with an intro, some text around the video, or both, that helps the user decide if the video is for them. If your video requires expert-level knowledge, say so up front. If your video is about only ONE version of a product or technology, say so up front.
3. Rehearse sufficiently and prepare your screens sufficiently so that the user is not distracted by typos or confused by work arounds. For example, see the comments on this video.
4. Keep it as short as possible. ~ 5 minutes seems to be a sweet spot, and should allow you to dodge the random insertion of commercials into your video by MSN. We don’t control this, but when you get hit and send feedback, we have had some success getting them removed. No promises tho.
5. Talk like a real person. In written text, we place a premium on clarity and brevity. This is not only for ease of reading, but because it lowers text localization costs. However, if you read it out loud, it doesn’t sound “natural” – like people talking. Just talk on the video in a natural way. Humans respond to other humans speaking in a way that is quite different than reading. Trying to “pretty up” your speech usually does not work anyway unless you have had public speaking or acting training. If you have had special training, by all means use it.

DON’T

1. Over-produce. You don’t need Hollywood-level lighting or sound or script development. Spend your time on content quality rather than “extra” levels of “production value.”
2. Neglect to establish context. Anticipate the FAQs for your video, and answer them up front. Who are you? What is the video about? What do you expect the viewer to get out of watching it? How long is it? What pre-reqs are required to make use of what you are demonstrating/discussing?
3. Stray from the point.

SteveOLAP leaves a great comment on this video that kind of sums it up:

We’ve published a new topic in the TN Library that lists new Hyper-V videos in LIFO order. Check it out at: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee731912(WS.10).aspx

If you are interested in sorting these by number of views as of today:

1. Hyper-V Architecture Demonstration Video
2. Getting to Know Hyper-V with Felipe Ayora
3. Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 Bare Metal to Live Migration in about an hour!
4. Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Installation
5. Virtual Machine Migration Test Wizard
6. Hypervisor is not running error: How to fix
7. Hyper-V R2: Building a Hyper-V R2 Cluster
8. Ben Armstrong on Hyper-V Snapshot Common Issues
9. Hyper-V R2: Making Highly Available VMs
10. Hyper-V R2: Introducing Cluster Shared Volumes

Let us know what you think about these, what’s working for your, what’s not? What subjects would you like to see covered next?

Also check out TechNet Edge videos for the IT Pro.

We’ve published a new video on import/export in Hyper-V R2 on MSN Showcase (which has changed it’s URL and redirect, so, kinda hard to find if you go to the old URL video.msn.com).

Update 11_20_09: Not everyone will need to reinstall the Guest OS, if you are confident the OS in your VM is supported (probably most of you) , skip to install integration services. 

Also, because we have more than 1 releases version of Hyper-V now, it is possible for the integration services on the VM to be out of sync with the Hyper-V version. This article on TechNet discusses the various combinations and outlines what the support story is for each.

OP:

Some customers seem to be having trouble when they open up device manager in a VM and see that some devices are listed as “unknown device.” From the Troubleshooting Hyper-V topic on TechNet:

Cause: Device Manager does not recognize devices that are optimized for use in virtual machines and run using Hyper-V until integration services are installed. The unknown devices that are identified in Device Manager differ depending on the guest operating system and may include: VMBus, Microsoft VMBus HID Miniport, Microsoft VMBus Network Adapter, and storvsc miniport.

Note

Some optimized devices are not available for certain guest operating systems. When a device is not supported on a guest operating system, the device will not work. You cannot install the device driver manually to try to make the device work. For a list of the devices that are available on each supported guest operating system, see http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=128037.

Solution: If the guest operating system is supported, integration services are available for that operating system. After you install the integration services, Device Manager will recognize the devices that are available for that guest operating system.

To install the guest operating system

1. Open Hyper-V Manager. Click Start, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Hyper-V Manager.

2. Connect to the virtual machine. From the Virtual Machines section of the results pane, using one of the following methods:

   • Right-click the name of the virtual machine and click Connect.
   • Select name of the virtual machine. In the Action pane, click Connect.

3. The Virtual Machine Connection tool opens.

4. From the Action menu in the Virtual Machine Connection window, click Start.

5. The virtual machine starts, searches the startup devices, and loads the installation package.

6. Proceed through the installation.

Note

Depending on the operating system being installed, the mouse pointer may change to a small dot when you move the mouse cursor over the image of the setup window. If this occurs, click anywhere in the virtual machine window. This action "captures" the mouse so that keyboard and mouse input is sent to the virtual machine. To return the input to the physical computer, press CTRL+ALT+LEFT ARROW and then move the mouse pointer outside of the virtual machine window.

Hyper-V includes a software package for supported guest operating systems that improves integration between the physical computer and the virtual machine. This package is referred to as integration services. Newer versions of supported Windows operating systems include the integration services and do not require installation after you install the guest operating system. For more information about which operating systems are supported and which of those require you to install integration services, see the deployment content for Hyper-V at the Windows Server 2008 Technical Library (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=128037).

Note

The following instructions assume that you are installing an operating system for which the software package is available and installation is required.

To install integration services

1. Connect to the virtual machine. From the Virtual Machines section of the results pane, using one of the following methods:

   • Right-click the name of the virtual machine and click Connect.
   • Select the name of the virtual machine. In the Action pane, click Connect.

2. The Virtual Machine Connection tool opens.

3. From the Action menu of Virtual Machine Connection, click Insert Integration Services Setup Disk. This action loads the setup disk in the virtual DVD drive.

4. Depending on the operating system being installed, you may need to start the installation manually. Click anywhere in the guest operating system window and navigate to the CD drive. Use the method that is appropriate for the guest operating system to start the installation package from the CD drive.

5. After the installation finishes, all integration services are available for use.

Additional considerations

• By default, membership in the local Administrators group, or equivalent, is the minimum required to complete this procedure. However, an administrator can use Authorization Manager to modify the authorization policy so that a user or group of users can complete this procedure. For more information, see Using Authorization Manager for Hyper-V Security (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=142886).
• The use of Virtual Machine Connection within a Remote Desktop Services session is not supported unless integration services are installed.
• Integration services for supported Linux operating systems are not included with an installation of Hyper-V. They are distributed through the Microsoft Connect Web site and are identified as Linux Integration Components for Microsoft Hyper-V. For more information, see http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=102024.

Localization is a hugely important activity those of working on IT Pro content development.

So is this whole “community/Web 2.0” thing. For example, we’ve just started a WinSrv Twitter account where we “tweet” links to new and updated Windows Server IT Pro and Dev content.

There is a new effort in this area we need your help and feedback on. Check out this page

http://technet.microsoft.com/ja-jp/library/dd979531(WS.10).aspx

What’s going on here is that we publish a page of technical content in English, run it through Machine Translation (MT), post the MT side-by-side with the English, and then rely on you, dear multi-lingual reader, to use the wiki-like functionality on that page to help improve the MT translation.

Is this going to work?  Have a bi-lingual look through the pilot topics and let us know.

Leave comments here, or send feedback/suggestions to mtpilot@microsoft.com

or  tonyso@microsoft.com and I’ll route to the correct team.

IO XKCD 1K words…cause his pictures say it all…

BTW, among the ultra-coolness of XKCD:

• Re-use policy: http://xkcd.com/license.html 
• Searchable! Try searching on organic fuel

There’s an interesting experiment in community just started over at TechNet/MSDN called the Community Machine Translation Pilot.

The first member of the community is the machine translation (MT) service (thanks Microsoft research!).

The MT service (not HAL 9000, I just like the image as a referent to a non_human team member)  takes an article, for example

Hyper-V: Using Live Migration with Cluster Shared Volumes in Windows Server 2008 R2, runs MT on the text, and then displays it side-by-side with the English language text, like this (English next to Japanese):

Next come volunteers who are bilingual to improve the MT text. You can tell then some text has been “improved” by a human, it’s highlighted like this:

Then comes… you. What do you think of this pilot? Leave feedback.

Others are extending this idea:

• Yair Alan Griver has an intriguing blog post on combining MT with Blogs.
• The Microsoft Translator Official Team Blog is also thinking about combining MT with IM.

There is an interesting IT Pro content development over  in KBs. When I go to a KB that does not apply to my current OS, I get this:

This is frequent scenario for IT Pros because security best practice is to NOT browse the web from your server. So, if there is a problem on a server, many IT Pros research what to do about it from their client machine. This also helps consumers find the right content even though a search engine may have returned a KB with some vague matching keywords.

Wouldn’t it be great if this kind of detection could be made to work for you across other TechNet/MSDN content?

Leave feedback.

Customers often ask “Given a hardware load-out X, how many Ys can I get/run/host?”

The frustrating answer always starts with “…it depends…”. We caveat this way not because we want to frustrate, but because it is true. Many teams will go on to say “We have tested the following in our labs and gotten the displayed results…”

1 X = thingy

2 X = more thingies

3X = many more thingies

While accurate, not super-helpful.

The truth is that to do good perf planning for Hyper-V you have to run some tests.

Run them using your actual production load (converted to Virtual Machines) in a test environment.

TIP: you can download the free VHD version of SCVMM, then run it as a VM to convert your production machines to “test” virtual machines.

Then play with your assumptions and tweak things higher and lower and to your design tolerance and actually observe how perf goes.

Add an overhead/forgot-to-test percentage, done. 

So, how to do that for Hyper-V? Here are some perf testing resources to help you:

• Performance and capacity requirements for Hyper-V
• Hyper-V Performance FAQ
• Measuring Performance on Hyper-V
• Checklist: Measuring Performance on Hyper-V
• Performance Tuning Guidelines for Windows Server 2008
• Performance Testing Guide for Windows Paper
• Optimizing Hyper-V performance: Advanced fine-tuning
• Hyper-V Support, Performance and Load Tools
• Hyper-V How To: Set Up a Virtualization Test Lab using Windows Server 2008 Cluster, Hyper-V and simulated iSCSI...
• Hyper-V Server Sizing: How Much Memory for the Host? 
• VM Perftuning: Minimize VM background processing
• Hyper-V How To: Balance VM I/O
• Monitoring Hyper-V Performance
• How to get Processor Utilization for Hyper-V via WMI 
• Hyper-V Performance Counters – Part one of many - The overview
• Hyper-V Performance Counters – Part two of many – “Hyper-V Hypervisor” counter set
• Hyper-V Performance Counters – Part three of many – “Hyper-V Hypervisor Logical Processors” counter set
• Hyper-V Performance Counters – Part four of many – “Hyper-V Hypervisor Virtual Processor” and “Hyper-V Hypervisor Root Virtual Processor” counter set
• Hyper-V Performance Counters - Part five of many - "Hyper-VM VM Vid Numa Node