At an event in Hollywood, Microsoft unveiled Surface: PCs built to be the ultimate stage for Windows. Company executives showed two Windows tablets and accessories that feature significant advances in industrial design and attention to detail. Surface is designed to seamlessly transition between consumption and creation, without compromise. It delivers the power of amazing software with Windows and the feel of premium hardware in one exciting experience.

There  will be two models of Surface  available: one running an ARM processor featuring Windows RT, and one with a third-generation Intel Core processor featuring Windows 8 Pro.

Additional information / specification on two models

Surface for Windows RT

• OS: Windows RT
• Light(1): 676 g
• Thin(2): 9.3 mm
• Clear: 10.6” ClearType HD Display
• Energized: 31.5 W-h
• Connected: microSD, USB 2.0, Micro HD Video, 2×2 MIMO antennae
• Productive: Office ‘15’ Apps, Touch Cover, Type Cover
• Practical: VaporMg Case & Stand
• Configurable: 32 GB, 64 GB

Surface for Windows 8 Pro

• OS: Windows 8 Pro
• Light(1): 903 g
• Thin(2): 13.5 mm
• Clear: 10.6” ClearType Full HD Display
• Energized: 42 W-h
• Connected: microSDXC, USB 3.0, Mini DisplayPort Video, 2×2 MIMO antennae
• Productive: Touch Cover, Type Cover, Pen with Palm Block
• Practical: VaporMg Case & Stand
• Configurable: 64 GB, 128 GB

More information on official Microsoft site.

Windows Server 8 beta is now available for download.

In Windows Server 8 there are many many new features especially in virtualization category. Besides many new virtualization enhancements Windows Server 8 also features great network capabilities, storage management capabilities and much much more.

Windows 8 Consumer Preview (beta) is now available for download. Microsoft already published 65 page document containing explanation of Windows 8 features. So now you can try out many exciting features including new Metro UI, Windows To Go, client Hyper-V…

Download Windows 8 Consumer Preview – beta !

Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAP) 6.0 has been released and it can be downloaded from here:

• Download the MAP Toolkit 6.0

As I wrote in one of my previous articles, MAP is powerful inventory, assessment and reporting tool that can securely assess IT environments for various platform migrations and virtualization capabilities. This tool is now especially beneficial for organizations planning a move to cloud. Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Toolkit 6.0 includes assessment capabilities to evaluate workloads for both public and private cloud platforms. With MAP 6.0, organizations now have the ability to identify workloads and estimate the infrastructure size and resources needed for both Windows Azure and Hyper-V Cloud Fast Track. Also, new to MAP 6.0, is an Office 365 client assessment, enhanced VMware inventory, and Oracle schema discovery and reporting. Expanded assessment and discovery capabilities from MAP help organizations simplify planning for their next migration project.

Anyhow, MAP 6.0 includes many new features and benefits:

• Windows Azure migration portfolio analysis
• Hyper-V Fast Track on boarding
• Expanded heterogeneous server environment inventory
• Office 365 readiness
• Windows Internet Explorer 9 migration assessment
• Oracle schema discovery

Analyze application portfolios for a move to the Windows Azure Platform.

For organizations considering a move to the public cloud, the application evaluation process for migration involves many tools and considerations. The MAP 6.0 Windows Azure migration portfolio analysis feature makes the process easier by providing the ability to quantify and label applications and services in an organization’s IT environment for Windows Azure migration consideration.

The Windows Azure migration portfolio analysis helps organizations:

• Catalog all of the applications in their environment
• Estimate the needed capacity to run their applications on the Windows Azure platform
• Evaluate applications based on migration difficulty
• Stack rank applications in terms of migration suitability
• Obtain a TCO-ROI analysis for the application

Accelerate private cloud planning with Hyper-V Cloud Fast Track on boarding.

Organizations can plan their private cloud with Hyper-V Cloud Fast Track on boarding, a new assessment available with MAP 6.0.This assessment provides consolidation guidance and validated configurations with preconfigured Hyper-V Fast Track infrastructures, including computing power, network and storage architectures. Get a quick analysis of server consolidation on Hyper-V Cloud Fast Track infrastructures to help accelerate planning of physical to virtual (“P2V”) migration to Hyper-V Cloud Fast Track. Each assessment also provides guidance on the next steps forward in using Hyper-V Cloud Fast Track.

Identify migration opportunities with heterogeneous server environment inventory.

MAP has expanded its heterogeneous server environment inventory to include VMware Server, vSphere and VMware vCenter. Inventory and reporting of the number of servers and guests deployed and managed by VMware infrastructure helps organizations identify migration opportunities and accelerates the migration planning process. Because SQL Server, SharePoint and Exchange run better on Hyper-V, MAP 6.0 has the added capability of identifying Microsoft workloads deployed on VMware guests.

Assess client environments for Office 365 readiness.

For organizations considering a move to the cloud with Microsoft’s award-winning business productivity solutions, MAP 6.0 can help make the planning process easier and faster. MAP 6.0 includes an Office 365 client assessment which evaluates the compatibility of Office suites deployed in their environment with Office 365, via a hardware and software readiness assessment. This assessment helps organizations quickly determine which client computers in their environment are ready to use Office 365. The tool obtains machine level detail about why a given computer is not capable of using Office 365, and identifies whether the Office suites currently being used in your environment are compatible with Office 365.

Determine readiness for migration to Windows 7 and Windows Internet Explorer 9.

Organizations can simplify their migration to Windows 7 and Windows Internet Explorer 9 with MAP 6.0. The MAP Internet Explorer migration assessment—now updated for Internet Explorer 9 migration—inventories an organization’s environment and reports on deployed web browsers, Microsoft ActiveX controls, and add-ons, and then generates a migration assessment report and proposal for easier migration to Windows 7 and Internet Explorer 9.

Discover heterogeneous database instances for migration to SQL Server.

MAP 5.5 included heterogeneous database inventory and reporting capability to help organizations accelerate migration to SQL Server from MySQL, Oracle, and Sybase instances. MAP 6.0 adds to this capability with Oracle schema discovery and reporting of the size and use of each schema. Reporting also provides an estimate of the complexity of migration and suggests candidates for migration to SQL Server. Organizations can use this information to determine the total cost of ownership in maintaining Oracle and the potential ROI from switching to SQL Server.

Download the MAP Toolkit 6.0

CentOS supported under Hyper-V

Hyper-V, Microsoft’s virtualization technology, now supports CentOS Linux distribution. CentOS is actually community-supported, mainly free software operating system based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). It exists to provide a free enterprise class computing platform and strives to maintain 100% binary compatibility with its upstream distribution. CentOS stands for Community ENTerprise Operating System

Which versions are supported?

Hyper-V now supports following CentOS versions:

• CentOS 5.2 (x86,x64)
• CentOS 5.3 (x86,x64)
• CentOS 5.4 (x86,x64)
• CentOS 5.5 (x86,x64)
• CentOS 5.6 (x86,x64)

It is also good to know that Microsoft already supports Hyper-V environments that include Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Suse Linux Enterprise Server.

What does the support actually mean? Does it mean that I can’t run other Linux distributions on Hyper-V?

No, it actually means that you can run different Linux distributions, but they are not officially supported.  So for example if you try  OpenSuse, Fedora or Ubuntu under Hyper-V you’ll see that Hyper-V can run them also. So the difference is that Microsoft has thoroughly tested above mentioned distributions like CentOS, Red Hat Enterprise Linux while Fedora or some others are not tested and thus they’re not officially supported. Also it means that for supported distributions you can call up Microsoft Support and they will troubleshoot the problem. To conclude it isn’t  recommended to run unsupported distributions in your production because if some problems occur you’re stuck on your own without any support.

Forefront Endpoint Protection (FEP) 2012 beta is here and it can be downloaded from Microsoft download center. As you probably know Forefront Endpoint Protection is Microsoft endpoint security product for businesses. Microsoft also has free consumer antimalware, virus and spyware product called Microsoft Security Essentials. Ok, so coming back to Forefront Endpoint Protection (FEP) 2012 beta, which can now be managed using System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) 2012 beta which is also available for download from here.

Forefront Endpoint Protection 2012 continues to deliver on the promise of Forefront Endpoint Protection 2010, simplifying and improving endpoint protection while also greatly reducing infrastructure costs. There are also some improvements and new features in Forefront Endpoint Protection 2012 beta.

What’s new?

1. Support for System Center Configuration Manager 2012
2. Improved real-time alerts and reports
3. Role-based management
4. User-centric reports (post beta)
5. Easy migration from FEP 2010/Configuration Manager 2007
6. Support for FEP 2010 client agents

As for Forefront Endpoint Protection 2010, you’re all probably aware that Microsoft has included its licenses into Core Client Access Licence (CAL) model. So if your company already has Core CAL, you are eligible to use Forefront Endpoint Protection without additional costs.

Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 with SP1 can be downloaded from Microsoft download site. As you all probably know Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 is actually kind of Windows Server 2008 R2 core version (command line only) with only Hyper-V role enabled. This is free version of  Microsoft command line only hypervisor, and should not be mistaken with Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V which is  Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V role enabled. Hyper-V server actually comes with a lot of possible features so it can easily be used in many enterprise scenarios. Among others Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 Sp1 contains following features:

1. Dynamic Memory

2. Support for RemoteFX

3. Host Clustering

4. Live Migration

5. Large Memory support (Host OS) =1TB

6. Support for up to 8 Processors (Host OS)

For all others supported features and comparisons between versions see following picture:

Download Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 SP1.

When Windows 7 was  first released its share started growing day after day, so it was just a matter of time when it will be the most used operating system. Now in US Windows 7 has passed Windows XP usage share. According  to data from an Irish Web analytics company, Windows 7′s average daily share in April was 32.2%, besting XP’s average of 30.7%. However, on worldwide level, stats are a bit different: Windows 7 is on second place with share around 30% and Windows XP is still on first place with share around 40%.

Of course it’s just a matter of time when Windows will come to the throne on worldwide level.

• SCVMM 2012 VHD
• SCVMM 2012 installation

Just a quick and short post about this warning and what are possible solutions to get rid of it. So the warning happens sometimes when you setup SSL for example on Windows Sharepoint Services (WSS) site. After that, anytime you open the site,  or navigate back and forth this warning pop-out.

Cause

This happens because some of links on your site point to http instead to https. So if you have some links, pictures or something else that is having http in link you have that warning. Also, what I personally experienced is that this error happened because of using specific Windows Sharepoint Services theme (Basic theme).

How to solve the problem?

Change Sharepoint theme. Go to Site actions> Site settings > Look and feel > Site theme  and change theme to default.

Check if anything (links, pics…) on your site is still using http links. Change those to https or start using relative path instead of absolute. Absolute link is –> http://example.com/img.jpg and relative (in Sharepoint)  is –> _layouts/images/  or //www.example.com/img.jpg

Change browser settings:

1. Tools > Internet options
2. Security tab > Custom level
3. Scroll down to “Display mixed content” and select Enable
4. Click Yes on  Security warning pop-up

Hope that solves your problem.

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