Barnaby's Canadian IT Pro WebLog : Vista

Great x64 Resource (and he's in Canada)

Barnaby_Jeans — Wed, 01 Feb 2006 07:34:01 GMT

After I published this blog post, I was pointed to a great resource from one of our MS MVP's The "Unofficial x64 FAQ" is maintained by Charlie Russel who is one of our MVP's living out in B.C.

If you are trying to figure out how to get Windows working with the latest devices, check out the site.

Great work Charlie.

ISA Client for 64-bit runs a short beta program

Barnaby_Jeans — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 20:06:00 GMT

From Volker Will's blog:

The ISA Server Team will release an update to the ISA Server 2004 Firewall Client. As part of the development process, they are running a short beta program to collect valuable feedback.
Highlights:

Support for the Microsoft Windows Vistaâ„¢ operating system (builds 5231 and later).

Support for the the 64-bit versions of the Microsoft Windows operating systems.

If you are interested in joining this beta program, please follow these instructions:

Go to http://beta.Microsoft.com

Sign in using your Passport account details

On the home page, click the link below the welcome message ("If you were issued a Guest ID by Microsoft, you can sign in by clicking here")

Enter the Guest ID: ISAFWC_x64

Choose "Survey" on the left side of the page

Complete and submit the survey.

[Via VolkerW's WebLog]

TechNet Tour - Edmonton and Winnipeg

Barnaby_Jeans — Wed, 12 Oct 2005 17:58:00 GMT

Last week I had the opportunity to visit both Edmonton and Winnipeg as part of the TechNet Innovations tour and User Group Tour. I had the opportunity to meet lots of great IT Pro's and answer lots of questions. For both the Edmonton Microsoft User Group and Winnipeg IT Pro User Group we had a great discussion about Microsoft Small Business Server. If you are an IT Pro in either Edmonton or Winnipeg, and are not already a member of the user group, you may want to check them out.

There were a couple of things that we talked about during the TechNet session; one of them was the TechNet Innovation Award. To quote the website:

The TechNet Canada Innovation Award is awarded to a Canadian IT Professional who is a bright star in the IT community. The Innovation Award is given in recognition of Canadian IT professionals who make a positive impact using Microsoft-based technology.

Well, now you can go ahead and nominate yourself or a fellow IT Pro for the award. Check out http://www.microsoft.com/canada/technet/innovationaward/ for more information. We also talked about the Discover TechNet quiz with the chance to win an XBox (and to see how well you know the team). Take a look at http://www.microsoft.com/canada/technet/discover/ before October 31st, 2005.

One of the recurring questions that I got asked was about the ClearPC demo boxes that we use. Well here is some more information on the configuration of the hardware:

ClearPC Secret Agent Briefcase - http://www.clearpc.ca/secretagent/
ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe Motherboard - http://usa.asus.com/products4.aspx?l1=3&l2=15&l3=0&model=375&modelmenu=1
- Dual Gig-E Lan
- Onboard Hardware SATA Raid Controller
AMD Athlon64 4000+ CPU
4 GB Ram
3 x Western Digital WD740 (10,000 RPM, SATA)
Various fans and lights

Depending on the demos that we are doing, these machines are either configured with Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2003 x64. For the upcoming SQL Launch, you might see these machines running SQL Server 64-bit on Windows Server 2003 x64.

Tags: [Microsoft] [SQLServer] [Launch2005] [Small Business Server] [TechNet] [Edmonton] [Winnipeg]

Self Guided Tour of Vista Beta 1

Barnaby_Jeans — Thu, 01 Sep 2005 19:33:00 GMT

If you weren't able to make is out to the Windows Vista Install Fest that Bruce ran last weekend, but you do have a copy of Vista Beta 1 (either via TechNet or MSDN), then you may want to take a look that the self guided tour document.

The guide is a pretty good overview of some of the new features in Vista including:

User Account Protection
Internet Explorer (IE) Security
Deployment Advancements (with XImage)
Desktop Management
Desktop Search
PC-to-PC Synchronization
Network Presentation

If you have just installed Vista Beta 1 and are not sure what to do next, head over to http://www.microsoft.com/technet/windowsvista/evaluate/sgtour.mspx to get the guide and start exploring.

Have fun...