Hey everyone!

It has been a little while since I have been blogging on here... so lets start with the 2 exciting announcements during my hiatus.

Surface Pro 3!!!!!!! That's almost enough said, but I want to touch on some cool features that jumped out at me.

• Increased screen size – The Surface Pro 3 has a 12” ClearType Full HD screen with 2160 x 1440 resolution. This is 38% bigger than the Surface Pro 2, with 50% more pixels
• Continuous kickstand – You can now have the kickstand at any angle you wish (from 0-150 degrees). Gone are the days of two, or even one position for the kickstand
• Amazingly thin and light – The new Surface weighs under a kilogram (1.76 lbs.) and is around 90mm thin (0.36 inches)

These features are merely the tip of the features and capabilities iceberg, however in my mind this makes the Surface Pro 3 a complete laptop replacement. To check out some of the cool new apps and accessories you can visit the Surface Blog.

Yesterday (US-PDT time) Satya Nadella and Marc Benioff (salesforce.com CEO) announced a new global strategic partnership. The terms of this partnership have not been disclosed, however in a nut shell the partnership drives solutions to connect the salesforce.com CRM apps and platform to Microsoft Office and Windows. The planned solutions include; Salesforce for Windows and Windows Phone 8.1, Salesforce for Office 365, OneDrive and SharePoint as storage options for Salesforce and more!! It is definitely worth keeping an eye out for additional news around the partnership in the next few days.

While I have your attention, here are some relatively new resources to explore;

• New book: Training Guide: Administering Windows Server 2012 R2
• Free ebook: Introducing Microsoft Azure HDInsight
• MVA - SQL Server in Azure Virtual Machines - Jump Start
• MVA - Preparing for the Windows 8.1 MCSA

That's it from me - Happy Friday!!

P@

Hi all,

We have now reach a mid-point in the Transforming the Datacentre TechNet Live series. If you missed any or would like to share with your colleagues, I have linked to them below.

• Session 1: ‘Transforming the Datacentre’ Series introduction - watch online
• Session 2: Windows Server 2012 R2 – Server Virtualisation - watch online
• Session 3: Windows Server 2012 R2 – Storage Overview - watch online
• Session 4: Windows Server 2012 R2 – Rethink Networking - watch online
• Session 5: Windows Server 2012 R2 – Access and Information Protection - watch online

The 6th session recording (Windows Server 2012 R2 – Server Manageability and Automation) will be up very very soon. I'll comment on this post with the link when it is live.

You can also register for the remaining 6 sessions here.

Cheers,  

P@

Hi everyone,

It's Friday again! It has been a busy week in the IT Pro space across the globe. With TechEd North America came a variety of announcements and exciting sessions.  

Microsoft Azure updates;

• Microsoft Antimalware and security partnerships - during the week we announced the public preview of the Microsoft Antimalware partnerships with Trend Micro and Symantec. What does this mean for you? This partnership allows for a very simple way to have a VM running anti-virus and gives the option of which solution to use when creating a VM.
• Microsoft Azure Site Recovery - the new Azure Hyper-V Recovery Manager will be in public preview next month. The new features will enable the replication of VMs from a primary site directly to Azure, instead of a second site. This is definitely something worth exploring in June when it becomes publically available in preview.
• Azure Files - this new Azure service will allow for a VM in an Azure datacenter to mount a shared file system using the SMB protocol.
• Azure Compute-intensive VMs - we have announced the general availability of A8 and A9 instances for VMs in Azure. These new instances provide faster processors, faster interconnectivity, more virtual cores and more! So basically allowing for compute-intensive and network-intensive applications to run in Microsoft Azure.

These are just a handful of the announcements that jumped out at me (there are of course loads and loads more). I suggest you watch the TechEd North America Keynote, the variety of other TechEd videos and read the blog posts around the announcements for a deeper understanding.

If you watched Satya Nadella deliver his webcast back in late March, you will know that he announced the release of the Microsoft Enterprise Mobility Suite. I am yet to blog about this, but it is truly kick-ass! Essentially, it is our comprehensive cloud solution for Consumerisation of IT and BYOD challenges. The EMS discount makes it the most cost effective way to acquire hybrid identity management through Azure AD Premium, mobile device management through Windows InTune and information protection through Azure Rights Management. Check out the EMS website for whitepapers, free trials, pricing and more!

Today Jeffa presented the 6th session in the 'Transforming the Datacenter' TechNet Live series. This means you can still register for any of the remaining 6 sessions here. If you have missed any and would like to get a recording, let me know. We will work on getting recording links out to all that registered to any of the first 6 sessions. Thankyou for those who have attended an online session so far! 

As always, feel free to comment any questions you have.

Have a great weekend!

P@

Hi everyone!

The TechNet Evaluation competition is now over. Tony Jones from Rangeville in Queensland will be taking home a brand new Xbox One and Nokia Lumia 1520 bundle.

The competition may be over, however this doesn't mean that the Evaluation Center itself is closed. Keep visiting the TechNet Evaluation Center to check out the latest releases of Windows Server, System Center, Hyper-V Server and many more. The *NEW* evaluations are hard to miss.

Happy trialling :)

P@

Happy Friday everyone!!

It is great to be back on board after a little break...... Very refreshed, but I have a lot to call out so ill try be concise.

Announcements;

• Azure AD Premium is now available - Azure Active Directory allows for single sign on to a variety of 3rd party cloud services (e.g. Box and Salesforce.com) and Microsoft services (e.g. Dynamics CRM and Office 365). With the introduction of AD Premium, Azure users will be entitled to a handful of additional powerful features that suit a larger enterprise. I'd suggest you check out the blog posts from the Active Directory team to get a full view of the AD Premium capabilities.
• System Center 2012 SP1 and System Center 2012 R2 updates - you can now download the latest update rollups for SC 2012 SP1 and SC 2012 R2. These updates provide a variety of little amendments to System Center components and are available from the Microsoft Update Catalog. 
• Microsoft Azure SQL Databases - SQL Databases on Azure now have a 99.95% SLA, can support up to 500GB, have a self-service restore capability and have new Active Geo Replication support. See what Scott Guthrie (Executive Vice President Microsoft Cloud and Enterprise group) has to say and watch a quick update from build.

Events and Training;

• An IT Pro Guide to DevOps - Virtual event on May 7. Register now!
• Windows 8.1 Security in Depth - Virtual event on May 8. Register now!
• Moving to Hybrid Cloud with Microsoft Azure - virtual event May 21-22. Register now! 

We are now 4 down in the 'Transforming the Datacentre' TechNet Live series. There are 8 riveting technical chats to come. Register today for the ones that suit you! 

Have a great weekend.

P@