Vista performance is something that I often discuss with customers that I meet. Therefore, let me recommend good use of one hour and suggest that you watch this webcast from the Springboard series of Vista Resources.
Springboard Series Virtual Roundtable
Under the Hood: Windows Vista Performance...Need Answers? 
Join Mark Russinovich and a panel of industry experts for a LIVE virtual roundtable to explore your top of mind performance issues, common misconfigurations, and tips on how to fix them. From boot times and applets to disk performance and battery life, find out how to optimize Windows Vista and what you can do to improve overall system performance.
Watch the event!
As reported HERE Novembers Technet magazine is available. And as you can see below there’s quit a few interesting articles to read.
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FEATURE ARTICLES
Monitoring Windows Server 2008 with OpsMgr 2007
As you deploy Windows Server 2008 into your environment, you’ll need a way to manage and monitor its health, performance, and availability. Fortunately, you can use the existing System Center tools you are already familiar with. See how you can use OpsMgr 2007 to manage your Windows Server 2008 assets.
Using Configuration Manager with Windows Server 2008
The release of System Center Configuration Manager SP1 added full support for managing Windows Server 2008 systems, including such new features as server core. Get a quick overview of deploying the ConfigMgr agent and using ConfigMgr to manage Windows Server 2008 systems throughout your organization.
Granular Targeting in Operations Manager 2007
For every monitoring object you build, you must also decide what target to use. Choosing the correct target is critical, but knowing how to go about choosing the correct target is not always clear. Steve Rachui explores various options for correct targeting in OpsMgr and provides guidance for choosing the appropriate method for each scenario.
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Presentation Virtualization with Enhanced Terminal Services
Virtualization isn’t limited to virtual machines and the virtualization of operating systems. Terminal Services has been abstracting the presentation layer of remotely run applications and desktops for years. Take a close look at key improvements to Terminal Services in Windows Server 2008 and get some tips for using these new features.
Tracking Changes in Your Enterprise Database
SQL Server 2008 introduces two new features that allow you to track changes more easily and efficiently. Paul Randal examines the new Change Tracking and Change Data Capture features and discusses the implications these features will have for database administrators.
As Keith writes - Microsoft® Hyper-V™ Server 2008 is a stand-alone product that provides a simplified, reliable, cost-effective and optimized virtualization solution enabling organizations to improve server utilization and reduce costs. It allows organizations to consolidate workloads onto a single physical server and is a good solution for organizations who want a basic and simplified virtualization solution for consolidating servers as well as for development and test environments. Low utilization infrastructure workloads, departmental applications and simple branch office workloads are also candidates to virtualise using Hyper-V Server 2008.
Hyper-V Server 2008 is a cost-effective solution that is convenient because it plugs into existing IT infrastructures enabling companies to reduce costs, improve utilization and provision new servers. It allows IT professionals to leverage existing patching, provisioning, management and support tools and processes. IT Professionals can continue to leverage their individual skills and the collective knowledge of Microsoft tools, minimizing the learning curve to manage Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008. In addition, with Microsoft providing comprehensive support for Microsoft applications and heterogeneous guest operating systems support, customers can virtualise with confidence and peace of mind.
Go get it @ http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=6067CB24-06CC-483A-AF92-B919F699C3A0&displaylang=en
Now you may be a bit confused as to what Hyper-V Server is so please looks HERE to compare versions or HERE to see an overview of each version of Hyper-V server.
I came across this webcast recently and thought that it might be useful to you. The Webcast is basically a 12 minute demonstration of technologies such as Read only domain controller, BitLocker and fine Grained Password Policies in Windows Server 2008. Something that’s often of interest to those of you I meet.
View the Webcast from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-gb/windowsserver/2008/cc441413.aspx. You can stream it using Silverlight or download a WMV file.
[Supporting materials for this post can be found here ]
In the spirit of writing in this blog about subjects that I often get asked about, an overview of Core IO is well overdue! Infrastructure Optimisation is a maturity model based upon some work done by ‘a well known analyst’ (sorry legal reasons mean that I have to use that phrase – from now on I’ll use ‘wka’ just to save on typing!) on maturity models. Microsoft took the wka’s model and simplified it somewhat. Initially we took out the people and process elements leaving only generic technology enablers which caused me some issues as technology without process is useless… Anyhow later revisions have included both people and security process elements.
The picture below shows the three different IO models that we have, one for each of infrastructure, Business Productivity, and one for Application Platform. Within each model there are core areas that are then broken down again into competencies.
As you can see for Core IO the areas of focus are:
- Identity and Access Management
- Desktop, Device and Server Management
- Security and Networking
- Data Protection and Recovery
Now this is a ‘maturity’ model so besides the area of competency we need a way of measuring competence. In IO this is done using four steps, Basic, Standardised, Rationalised, and Dynamic.
Finally, we have the model that shows the functional areas that you can rate yourself against:
I’m not sure how well these will come out but the full picture is available in the slide deck on my SkyDrive.
In essence these competency models give you a mechanism for determining the maturity of your IT operation in a given area. If you choose to follow the model then it gives you a path through which you can achieve greater agility, automation, reliability and ultimately save cost. Now when discussing this with customers a few things always fly to the top:
1) How can I show that following Core IO will save me money? a fair question, especially if you are looking for help with a business case. Well there is strong third party evidence that moving from Standardised to Rationalised can save you. For example;
- Organizations can reduce annual IT labour costs by improving their infrastructure
optimization levels. The total savings of moving from Basic to Rationalized optimization can reduce IT costs by $513 per PC. - Organizations can also reduce annual IT labour costs by up to $226 per PC by adopting
best practices.
I’ve put a number of IDC Whitepapers onto the SkyDrive which run into the details on this. If you want financial detail then read the paper ‘PC TCO Best Practices’, or read the other papers for details on how improving certain areas will deliver TCO benefits.
2) “We know all this, and what we should be doing but we don’t know in what order to do it!” on the face of it this question is rather harder to answer and some pointed questions need to be asked and answered…If this comment means that there’s no rocket science in the IO model and that you would love to be doing the ‘dynamic’ things but don’t know where to start or how to justify the budget then what needed is an approach or ‘strategy’. This could turn into a long answer so I won’t let it. The short answer is to find a ‘good’ partner who can help you plot the path from here to wherever you want to be, the long answer I’ll try to put into some other thoughts but if writing business cases were easy then there would be a Word add-in for it! Either way, equipped with the information above a business case can be made and then' it’s a matter of producing an implementation plan that suits your business needs. One thing I do observe though is that often customers will spend a fortune on one area of technology (VMotion anyone?!) which is really in Dynamic whilst neglecting some fairly basic areas (server patching anyone?) and this creates an unbalanced IT portfolio. The way to recognise this is that after significant investment you still have a lot of manual processes, your users still report most of your issues, or you still feel that you spend as much time fire fighting as you do determining future strategies.
3) Who has done this successfully already? We are in luck here. There’s a lot of case studies, with numbers, on the web site here. I thought that I would include a few for you in this post.
 | AUSTAR United Communications See how this subscription TV provider standardized all of its desktops with the most up-to-date software, while reducing the time required to deploy applications and patches from several hours to 30 minutes. Read more |
 | City of Edinburg Council Find out how using the Core IO model helped the City of Edinburgh save £6.4 million with a payback period of 14 months. Read more |
 | EDF Energy Learn how this British energy company improved helpdesk first-time fix rates from 35 percent to 62 percent while reducing its IT maintenance costs by 15 percent. Read more |
 | HSBC Mexico Read how Optimization has helped HSBC deploy solutions to branch offices and ATMs in 2 days. IT is no longer considered a bottleneck. Read more |
 | TÜV NORD Group Discover how TUV NORD used the Business Productivity Infrastructure Optimization (BPIO) model to lower TCO by 37 percent. Read more |
So, there’s plenty gone before you! This slide summarises the HSBC example above. They took 2 years to go from Basic to Standard, and then just one year to go from Standard to Rationalised.
In addition to the Case studies there are also the latest analyst reports on the web site giving you the latest data.
4) What’s the industry data for IO? Well again the IO Web site is the best resource.
On here you can view the latest results that have been shared with Microsoft.
5) How do I find out more? Well there are some really good resources on Microsoft.com here. As you can see there’s specific guidance on Desktops, Servers, Branch, and Virtualisation.
You can also speak to your account manager at Microsoft who can help you.
Additionally, why not take the time to complete this assessment – and find out where you sit on the IO ‘curve’
don’t forget my presentation and supporting documents for this subject can be found on my SkyDrive at this location
I’ve spoken to many of you about Data Protection Manager (DPM) but normally at a high level. This technet webcast will give you a detailed look at protecting SQL Server specifically. The webcast happened live last week but if you follow the ‘registration’ links you’ll get to the page below and you can view the webcast online or download the video for offline usage.
The webcast can be accessed here!
I’m on the train to London this morning for a customer meeting. I got onto the train at 06.20 in Warrington, Cheshire and by 08.40 (and it’s rarely late) I’ll be in London Euston. Nothing special there – but what’s great is that when I got onto the train I plugged my Windows Mobile 3G phone into my laptop chose the ‘Internet Sharing’ function and I was on the ‘net. One of the first things to come down into my Blog reader was this post from Steve Clayton. Steve is working on our Software + Services initiative and was commenting on the possibility that with technologies such as Live Mesh to sync data onto all of our devices (phones, PC’s, Mac’s, TVs etc.) that it might be the end for the memory stick. Well that’s only any good IF you’ve got internet connectivity – so it’s a welcome bit of news that my Internet connection is getting increasingly good on this train journey (and most other train journeys for that matter). It used to be that the connection was down more than up – now it’s the opposite and with Outlook clients cached mode I rarely notice the ‘down’ times. So as I write and post this we are speeding through some green countryside somewhere on route to London :) Imagine WHEN the promise of always connected, ample bandwidth communications really arrives – how will that change our lives…
As you’ll know if you read my blog – I love Application Virtualisation. It solves so many problems with the packaging, deployment, and management of desktop and server based applications. Technet magazine has published a great introduction to Application Virtualisation and it’s worth the ten minutes it will take to read.
With Microsoft Application Virtualization, or App-V, desktop administration becomes a simpler, more automated process. For the administrator, App-V makes it easier 
for you to deploy, patch, update, and even terminate applications.
In regard to users, any user can sit down at any desktop and access his applications (with all his personal configuration settings). The applications are delivered on demand but run as if they were actually installed locally--there is no need to install the application components or alter the host device.
In the October issue of TechNet Magazine (which is packed with articles about virtualization), Anthony Kinney takes a close look at how App-V works and explains how you can deploy it in your organization.
Read the full article online now.
so the ad campaign has really started now. As reported yesterday the New York Times has some good quality analysis on the campaign – and I’ve read some low quality analysis…. But this is the trust of it – I’m a PC, there’s a BILLION others like me, and we interoperate and communicate freely, there’s hundreds of designs, models, brands, peripherals to choose from – I’ve got Choice!
Video: Pride
I’m a PC :) Are you?
So Steve has the scoop here, and apparently (I’m offline right now) the New York Times has the scoop.
I’m at a Microsoft internal conference in Florida this week and at lunchtime we had a preview of some Windows 7 Enterprise features (cool :) ), and also some of the Videos that are coming down the line – I’m *really* pleased that we are investing this money. Regardless of whether you like some of the videos or not the central point is that over 1 BILLION people use Windows around the world to connect, and I’ve not seen the video below but perhaps the point is that it’s secure….
Personally I find it funny when people make statements around Vista not being secure – it’s a fact that PC’s running Vista has had 60% less Malware than those running Windows XP SP2…for more FACTS see here. Everyone has patches – some companies prefer to batch up there patches which leave machines vulnerable to infection in the meantime Even Mac users have to patch :)
Picked this up from the Windows Server teams blog here. Seems like NAP has been highly recognised by Forrester. I think that NAP is something that interests almost every company that I talk to. And I think the real key to NAP is the management solutions that we already have through Windows Server 2008, Group Policy and SCCM 2007….
Microsoft’s Network Access Protection (NAP) solution was cited as a leader (the top category) in a recent independent report, “The Forrester Wave: Network Access Control, Q3 2008.” Microsoft was one of the many network access control (NAC) vendors invited to participate in the report.
Forrester placed a lot of emphasis on different access control scenarios for the evaluation and the different vendors were evaluated around twelve different scenarios as well as strengths across technology, strategy and market presence.
“Microsoft has the strongest NAC product for managed endpoints,” the report stated. The report goes on to state that even though its official product has only been shipping since the inception of Windows Server 2008, Microsoft has already established itself as a critical thought leader and contributor to the standardizations of NAC. “Microsoft has the overall highest score among the 12 scenarios we evaluated,” the report added.
Microsoft Network Access Protection ships with Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista and XP SP3, and has a framework that provides interoperability with over 100 different vendors. The NAP statement of health (SOH) has also been adopted as a standard by the Trusted Computing Group’s Trusted Network Connect (TNC).
More information about Microsoft NAP can be found here http://www.microsoft.com/nap
OK so I knew that this was Malware – AND I executed it on purpose to see which security system on my machine would pick it up, or I knew I faced a rebuild! Look what happened – I opened the e-mail just like my mother might do, double clicked on the attachment (a zip), double clicked on the ‘document’ with a .doc.exe (she wouldn’t know!) extension, and BANG up pops the Windows VISTA dialogue box to tell me that this file is infected and it’s blocking execution of the file. Vista – safe computing :)
Courtesy of a post on Liveside you can now download the beta installer for Live Wave 3. There's a couple of new apps as you can see in the sceenshot below installing onto my machine. Family safety beta and the Outlook connector are interesting additions. Download available here together with all the information you need on the new software.
This is amusing. Announced on the Virtualization teams blog and in the spirit of 'friendly competition' the Virtualisation product group have created this web site - www.VMwareCostsWayTooMuch.com.
Check this out - and ask yourself whether you would like the same results for a third of the price....
