Swiss IT Professional and TechNet Blog : Beta

What's New for SQL Server 2008 R2 Editions

mepprecht — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 22:52:39 GMT

At the PASS summit, the Editions of SQL Server 2008 R2 were announced. Pricing was also announced.

SQL Server 2008 R2 is planned for release in the first half of calendar year 2010
2 New Editions were announced: Datacenter and Parallel Data Warehouse
Application and Multi-Server Management
Support for up to 256 logical processors
Backup Compression will now also be a feature of SQL Server 2008 R2 standard edition

The November Community Technology Preview (CTP) of Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 is now also available

http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/2008/en/us/R2-editions.aspx

SQL Server 2008 R2 August CTP Availability

mepprecht — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 18:23:00 GMT

Interested in what new features will be in SQL Server 2008 R2, or maybe you want to test your existing application?

Today we announced that on from today, TechNet and MSDN subscribers will be able to download SQL Server 2008 R2 August CTP. If you are not a subscriber, you can download it from Wednesday 12 August from here.

What new features can I expect? Have a look here.

Windows 7 / Windows Server 2008 R2 Beta and RC Expiry Dates

mepprecht — Wed, 06 May 2009 17:00:00 GMT

All good Betas and Release Candidates need to expire some time. Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 are no exception.

	Beta	Release Candidate
Message: “Is Expiring”	17 June 2009	14 February 2010
Timebomb: Shutdown every 2 Hours	1 July 2009	1 March 2010
License Expires: Shutdown every 2 Hours and Black Desktop Background	1 August 2009	1 June 2010

Please upgrade before the expiry dates!

Windows 7 / Windows Server 2008 R2 Release Candidates available for Download

mepprecht — Wed, 06 May 2009 01:14:04 GMT

Windows 7 Release Candidate (RC) is available for immediate download to the general public from here. The RC is the Windows 7 Ultimate edition and is available in 32-bit and 64-bit versions in English, French, Japanese, German, and Spanish.

To learn more about Windows 7 from an IT professional perspective, check out the screencasts including our “What’s New in the RC” as well as our resources on Deployment, Application Compatibility, Security and Imaging.

Test drive Windows 7 RC today to see for yourself—and to show your colleagues, users, and customers—how Windows 7 delivers improved management, security, reliability, productivity and performance.

MSDN and TechNet subscribers can download it from the respective sites.

Windows Server 2008 R2 Release Candidate is also available on TechNet and from here.

Invitation to IT Pro Momentum

mepprecht — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 15:24:02 GMT

Wanting to do Projects with New Technologies? It sounds exciting, but does have an element of risk.

Why does one want to be an Early-Adopter of new Technology?

Generally, new technologies have new, and marked improvements in features. In most cases, real-world problems and requirements are solved by a new version of software, and sometimes things are just easier and faster than in the past.

How and we (Microsoft) help you?

The IT Pro Momentum Program was designed with that in mind. By Invite, you get access the the Project Portal where you can profile your projects, and have access to Exclusive Information, Training, Product Downloads and Support.

Is such a program for me?

It depends on how many of the following questions you can answer to your satisfaction:

Does new Technology Interest me?
Do I want, and need Support during the Evaluation of the various Products?
Am I not scared to try out the Products and Solutions (in a test environment at least) with Beta Products?
Do I want to give feedback about the Products to the Development Teams (bugs, features and new ideas), and also my experiences in deploying the product?

Target Audience

Targeted with this program are Small and Medium Sized Business (SME) and Microsoft Partners that do not have regular and dedicated contact/support from Microsoft. For Large Enterprises, other programs like TAP (Technology Adoption Program) and RDP (Rapid Deployment Program) are more suitable, but do not exclude you from IT Pro Momentum.

What will I as a participant get?

It depends on the stage of you Project.

Evaluation Phase
You get access to technical content and dedicated forums. You also have access to Online Trainings.
Planning Phase
You receive a 1 year subscription to TechNet Plus and access to the product setups.
Pilot Phase
You have the opportunity to request free help from Microsoft Support up to a a maximum of 1 year for the product you are Piloting to help you quickly solve issues that you have.
Deployment Phase
You project is virtually complete and here comes our ask of you.

What do we (Microsoft) gain from this?

Firstly, we want to hear from and about you and your Projects you are planning to, or currently working on, and help you where possible. For some, it may be very interesting to be profiled, either on a Blog or a Case Study, to show the world and your colleagues what you achieved. At the same time, share your experiences with the community and prove your competency.
Secondly, we have customers who have deployed, and are happily using our Products!

Products and Technologies for the Year 2009 in IT Pro Momentum (Not product shipping dates and is subject to change)

How do I get invited (or have questions)?

Contact Michael Epprecht, IT Pro Evangelist, Microsoft Switzerland via e-mail or the Contact Form.
If you are not based in Switzerland or Lichtenstein, we will pass your request onto the responsible IT Pro Evangelist in your region if IT Pro Momentum is offered in your region.

Windows 7 Release Candidate availability

mepprecht — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 11:44:24 GMT

Windows 7 RC and Windows Server 2008 R2 RC (builds 7100) will be made available for download to TechNet and MSDN subscribers on 30 April 2009 and on 5 May 2009, will be available for general download.

Just remember, unless you download it from Microsoft, you can’t be guaranteed that it is the actual RC, and that nothing “extra” is included. Be safe, don’t download software from un-trusted sources.

Exchange Server 2010 Beta Available Now

mepprecht — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 22:45:11 GMT

Exchange Server 2010 Beta is now available for download on TechNet Subscriber Downloads and as a Public Beta here

You can also try it as an Online Trial here. In the Online Trial version, you do not have to install anything on your machines. The Trial in run on Virtualized Servers at Microsoft.

To see what is new in Exchange Server 2010, visit the Exchange Web Site

Windows 7 Beta Updates

mepprecht — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:54:13 GMT

Overnight, a few updates for Windows 7 Beta build 7000 have been released on Microsoft Update and Windows Update.

One of the updates is a patch for Internet Explorer 8, to give it some of the stability updates that have been released in Internet Explorer 8 Release Candidate (RC). The previously released IE 8 RC can not be installed on Windows 7 Beta. Windows 7 RC will have later version of Internet Explorer 8 in it when it is released. Further information on the IE 8 update can be found on the IEBlog.

The other updates (5 in total) are Windows 7 Test Updates, to verify that the various patching mechanisms work correctly. They do not fix anything, but will give the product team good telemetric data on the update experience. More information on the Microsoft Update Blog.

Whilst you are updating, you may notice a number of Optional Updates. These are generally updates to hardware drivers that 3rd party Manufacturers have released.

As part of the beta process, Microsoft does recommend you install all the updates so that good feedback can be collated on the improvements and the update processes.

Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7

mepprecht — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 14:37:52 GMT

The beta of the Remote Server Administration Tools, specifically for Windows 7 is available for download. The toolset for Windows Vista has been around a long time and is very popular among administrators.

For those who have never used it, you may ask yourself what does the toolset do?

Well, It enables administrators to manage roles and features that are installed on computers that are running Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2008, or Windows Server 2003, from a remote computer that is running Windows 7. Hyper-V Virtual Machine Manager (VirtMgmt.msc) is one of the most popular tools in the toolset. For Windows Server 2008 R2, you can manage server-core and full installations.

Windows 7 Beta

mepprecht — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 11:45:21 GMT

The Beta of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 have been released for TechNet and MSDN subscribers. It is available from here. For non-MSDN and TechNet subscribers, the beta of Windows 7 will be available on Friday 9 January 2009 from here.

Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 are based on the same code base, and are derived from Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. Microsoft has built a lot of functionality into the new releases, building on what foundation work was done in Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista. If an application runs well on Windows Vista, it will most likely run well on Windows 7.

For me, the improvements in Windows 7 are:

Considerable performance improvements in terms of boot, wake from sleep and user interface responsiveness. In some cases, the difference is dramatic. Even on older hardware and the new WebBooks, performance is really impressive. Installation is blazingly fast.
It is already extremely stable and I use it on my primary machines already.
Configurable User Access Control (UAC), leading to less pop-ups for when elevated rights are needed by an application
Simplified, yet very clever improvements, to the Task Bar and the Notification Tray areas
Internet Explorer 8
Bitlocker can protect removable storage also
Consistent Search from a user interface perspective, and you don’t even notice it when it is busy indexing your data. Searching e-mails, files and SharePoint is performed in one place
The concept of libraries of documents. Not everything has to be in My Documents to be shown in the Documents view

Please ensure that you download the beta from one of the Microsoft web sites and not from a 3rd party or peer-to-peer network. You know what you get from Microsoft, from other sources, you may have some extra non-Microsoft code included. The beta Expires 1 August 2009.

For more information, see the Windows Product Group Blog