Our Next Engineering Milestone: RTM

Today marks an important milestone in the Windows 7 project. The Windows 7 team is proud to share with you that a short while ago we have started to release Windows 7 to PC OEM and manufacturing partners. This means our next major milestone will be the availability of PCs loaded with Windows 7 and store shelves stocked with Windows 7 on October 22, 2009.

This is a milestone we could not have achieved without the broad participation across the PC Ecosystem we have talked so much about on this blog. Windows 7 is a product not just of Microsoft, but of a whole industry of partners of all kinds. Throughout the development of Windows 7 we’ve seen an incredible engagement from so many people that have contributed to making the Windows 7 engineering project one we, collectively, feel good about. The feedback and collaboration throughout the development of Windows 7 has been outstanding and valuable beyond measure. This work has created the kind of experience so many of you have talked about in this blog—the ability to use a broad range of PC hardware and peripherals with a great setup and out of box experience. On behalf of the Windows team and all of the successful installations and device connections, please let me extend an incredible “thank you” to all of our hardware partners who have done such excellent work.

Windows 7 has also been one of the most broadly and deeply tested releases of software we have ever had. Starting with a pre-beta in October of 2008 with a few thousand developers using Windows 7 at the earliest stages, through the Beta, and then the Release Candidate in May when we have had millions of people successfully running the product (and many on multiple PCs). As we have discussed in this forum, the ongoing depth usage of Windows 7 along with the breadth and variety of hardware and software configurations has provided (and will continue to provide) the key tools to make sure we continue to deliver ever-improving Operating System quality.

….more on http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/default.aspx

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Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Timelines Shared at Computex

TAIPEI, Taiwan — June 3, 2009 — Today during a keynote address at Computex 2009 in Taipei, Microsoft’s OEM Division Corporate Vice President Steve Guggenheimer revealed that the company is confident with the progress made with Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, and that as a result, Microsoft will deliver Release to Manufacturing (RTM) code to partners in the second half of July. Windows 7 will become generally available on Oct. 22, 2009, and Windows Server 2008 R2 will be broadly available at the same time.

Steve Guggenheimer, Microsoft’s Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) Division Corporate Vice President.

“As we’ve said many times, quality is our primary goal,” Guggenheimer said. “We announce each milestone once we’re confident of where we are in the development cycle and that it is ready to be shared with customers and partners. We’ve received great feedback from our partners who are looking forward to offering Windows 7 to their customers in time for the holidays.”

In addition to this, Guggenheimer announced that Microsoft will make available an upgrade option, so partners can offer customers the ability to purchase a Windows Vista-based PC and install Windows 7 when it’s ready.

“Microsoft has been working closely with partners to help our mutual customers be able to enjoy the many benefits of Windows 7,” he said. “With that in mind, we’re excited to say that there will be a Windows upgrade program available. Consumers can buy that new PC, whether for a student heading off to college or just because they need a new one, and know they’ll get Windows 7 as part of the deal.”

The actual start date for the program will be announced when it is ready for consumers, and partners are ready to provide details to customers.

Today’s keynote address is Guggenheimer’s second at Computex. The last time he spoke at the show, he had just taken over the helm of OEM, the division that works with hardware manufacturers worldwide to integrate Microsoft technologies and bring PCs, laptops, mobile handsets and other devices to life.

Although the economic realities of the past year have created new challenges for customers, partners and the IT industry, Guggenheimer says the power of innovation, through both software and broad collaboration with partners, will continue to benefit consumers, the industry and the economy at large.

“What we’re doing with Windows will continue to improve people’s lives so that that technology enables them to communicate better, make tasks simpler and new things possible,” he says. “Our partners in the hardware space, our competitors in software — the entire industry is doing incredible things.”

More on Microsoft PressPass Website >>

The VMware Cost-Per-Application Calculator compares the cost of virtualizing applications on VMware Infrastructure 3 versus other commodity virtualization offerings, like Microsoft Windows Server 2008 (Hyper-V). The calculator provides an accurate and simple methodology to determine and compare the deployment costs of virtualization solutions by 1) including both software and hardware infrastructure costs and 2) accounting for number of applications that a virtualization platform can run on each sever.

By leveraging the VMware Cost-Per-Application Calculator, you will see how VMware’s superior virtualization technology enables greater cost savings while at the same time greatly improves reliability and availability across your IT infrastructure.

Calculate your own VMware Cost-Per-Application

Summary:

Based on your inputs, the cost-per-application to virtualize 200 applications using VMware Infrastructure 3 Enterprise Edition is

$2,999 — 9% lower than with Microsoft Windows Server 2008 (Hyper-V) and System Center.

VMware, Cost per Application, Calculator, Microsoft, VMware Infrastructure

Via: www.theinquirer.de

Die Radarüberwachung hat einen Notruf des FlightSim aufgefangen:
Piloten wurden abgeschossen, Maschine trudelt in unbekannter Höhe.
Mayday!

Seit 2007 schießt Microsoft ein Entwicklungsstudio nach dem anderen
ab. Nicht jene der Konkurrenz, sondern die eigenen: Erst kamen die FASA
Studios (Crimson Skies, MechWarrior 4, Shadowrun) dran, dann die
beliebten Ensemble Studios (Age of Empires), gefolgt von Carbonated
Games (Hexic HD, Uno). Die Halo-Macher Bungie wurden aus dem Konzern in
die Wildnis abgedrängt und nun fegt es die Aces Game Studios aus dem
Himmel. Das habe Microsoft der Gamersite IGN bestätigt.
27 Jahre hatte der Flight Simulator die digitale Lufthoheit über die
zivilen Flieger inne (eigentlich 29 Jahre, die subLogic-Zeit auf dem
Apple II mitgerechnet). Es war das Herzstück von Microsofts
Entertainment-Bemühungen. Ganz offensichtlich hat jemand in der
Chefetage die Entscheidung getroffen, sich von den Games komplett zu
trennen (nicht, dass man noch à la Sega damit mehr Geld macht als mit
der Hardware). Vielleicht auch der Vorbote eines Komplettabschieds von
der Entertainment-Bühne? Bye bye Sidewinder? Tschüss X-Box??
Jedenfalls müssen über 100 Leute bei Aces mit dem Fallschirm abspringen
und sich ein anderes Zielgebiet suchen. Damit wäre übrigens auch der
“Train Simulator” gestorben, der zu Weihnachten in Version 2 kommen
sollte. An der FlightSim-Marke werde Microsoft nach eigenen
Beteuerungen festhalten. Man wolle weiterhin Flugspiele anbieten, habe
aber keine konkreten Entwicklungen anzukündigen. Klingt nach letzten
Ruderkorrekturen, um noch ein paar Flugmeilen aus dem FlightSim
herauszukitzeln. Um es mit Pille zu sagen: Lass es Jim, es ist tot. (rm)

IGN

Aces-Blog-Post

Microsoft, Flight Simulator

Microsoft verkündete heute die Fertigstellung seines System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) 2008 und beendet damit die immerhin sechs Monate währende Beta-Phase der Entwicklung. Ab 1. November soll das Produkt als Box-Version in den Sprachen Deutsch, Englisch, Französisch, Italienisch, Spanisch, Japanisch, Chinesisch und Koreanisch erhältlich sein.

SCVMM 2008 liefert ein Managementsystem zum zentralen Verwalten und Steuern von Hosts und darauf laufenden virtuellen Maschinen. Die unterstützten Virtualisierungsplattformen kommen aus den Häusern Microsoft und VMware: Virtual Server, Hyper-V, VMware Server, VMware ESX and VMware GSX. Kompatibilität mit Xen ist nicht implementiert. Stattdessen deklariert Microsoft die Verträglichkeit mit dem Xen-Hypervisor als mögliche zukünftige Ergänzung.

Der SCVMM 2008 bringt einen Virtual Machine Manager Server mit, den der Anwender per Windows Powershell sowie darauf aufbauender GUI (Administrator’s Console) oder über ein Web-Portal bedienen kann. Mit dieser Technik stehen sämtliche über die GUI zugänglichen Konfigurationsdienste vollständig skriptfähig zur Verfügung. Die Verwaltung der Host- und VM-spezifischen Daten übernimmt ein MS SQL Server 2005. Laut Hersteller ist die Lösung für die Verwaltung großer virtueller Datacenter mit hunderten von Hosts und tausenden von VMs ausgelegt und stellt zentrales Management und Monitoring auch standortübergreifend platzierter Hosts bereit.

Voraussetzung für den Einsatz von SCVMM 2008 ist ein Server-System mit x64-kompatibler CPU ab 2,8 GHz, 2 GByte RAM, 200 GByte freiem Festplattenplatz und mit installiertem Microsoft Server 2008 (64 Bit) inklusive Hyper-V. Falls der Kunde kein MS SQL 2005 besitzt, installiert SCVMM automatisch MS SQL 2005 Express. Das Produkt wird pro Maschine lizenziert (Managed Server). Eine Lizenz kostet 695 US-Dollar. Eine voll funktionsfähige, 180 Tage lauffähige Testversion steht im Web zum Download bereit.

Mike D’s Virtualization Blog: Quick Migration for VMware – The Power of PowerShell

Quick Migration for VMware – The Power of PowerShell

Earlier this year VMware released the VMware Infrastructure Toolkit (for Windows). This was a new PowerShell interface for VMware Infrastructure 3. I’m a big fan of the power and simplicity of PowerShell so I thought I’d try to create something with the script and show it off during my talk at VMworld on Deploying VMware in a Microsoft Shop. The question is what do I create? Well, there has been some great debate of Microsoft’s Quick Migration and VMware’s VMotion and are they equal or not, do they solve the same problems, etc. This post isn’t to go back into that debate. One of the things that was also brought up over and over again in the debate was the fact that Quick Migration was free and came with Hyper-V since it was based on Microsoft Clustering whereas VMware VMotion was only available in the most expensive Enterprise SKU of VMware Infrastructure. So there it was – I need to create Quick Migration for the lower priced and free VMware solutions. I went off, built my little script, and showed it off at VMworld. There was a GREAT response to it so I’m posting it here for others to use or improve upon however you see fit.

The script works just like Microsoft Quick Migration – the virtual disk is stored on shared storage, the VM is suspended to disk, and the VM is then resumed on the destination. Presto! Here’s a quick video:

Click To Play

To set this up in your environment you’ll need a few things:

1. 2 VMware Infrastructure 3 hosts
2. Windows PowerShell (and all of the pre-requirements for that if needed)
3. VMware Infrastructure Toolkit (for Windows)
4. The VM Migrator script from me
5. A VM you want to migrate – it doesn’t matter what the guest OS is

Once you’ve got all of that you’re ready to go. Assuming you have Microsoft PowerShell installed and the VMware Toolkit installed on top of that you should be ready to run the script. PowerShell has some built-in security so you might have to either (a) answer yes when it prompts you to run unsigned scripts, (b) sign this script and make it yours, or (c) Set-ExecutionPolicy unrestricted. After you’ve got all of that sorted out just run the script by opening a new PowerShell window, changing to the path of the file, and running it using ./vmmigrator-1.0.ps1. The script will prompt you for the VirtualCenter address and an appropriate username and password to connect to it. You’ll next prompted for which VM you want to migrate and where you want to migrate it to. The script does some rudimentary checking for network, datastore, and connected devices before it will let you migrate.

Some last minute notes:

* I’m not a developer or scripter by trade. This thing can probably be improved a lot. Feel free to do just that.
* You can post the script or your modifications wherever you want. I just ask for a courtesy link back to here as well.
* Unfortunately the free ESXi has a VERY limited API set enabled in the current 3.5 U2 release. This script won’t work with it. I’ve brought this to the product manager’s attention and I’m hoping we can open the API set up to everything shortly. Not really sure why it was restricted in the first place. For now you’ll need at least the Foundation SKU of Virtual Infrastructure.

Some future things I’d like to do with this:

* I say the script requires shared storage right now but actually it doesn’t. The PowerShell cmdlet that does the migration actually does a “Relocate VM” which will move the storage for the VM from one internal datastore to another. That process is SLOW but it does work. Right now the script is hard coded to keep things on the same datastore. With some slight modifications it can do a Quick Migration with 2 standalone hosts. I’ll probably make a version 2 that will do that.
* I’d like to integrate this into PowerGUI so you can just right-click on a VM in Virtual Center and run this script which will do a Quick Migration to a host of your choice. That project is a little further down my to-do list.

I hope you enjoy the script. Feel free to leave comments to let me know if this is useful or not.

We wouldn’t be doing our jobs at VMware if we didn’t regularly compare our products with the competition to ensure our customers get the best technology and user experience possible. In keeping with that practice, we recently set up Microsoft’s Hyper-V to get a first hand look. We made sure to follow Microsoft’s documentation and best practices guidance to get a fair comparison and to understand exactly what a Hyper-V user experiences as he or she attempts to deploy and configure Microsoft’s new product.

One key best practice we heard Microsoft’s Hyper-V team stress in sessions at June’s TechEd conference and again last week at VMworld was a strong recommendation to run Hyper-V using the Server Core variant of Windows Server 2008. Using the smaller Server Core as the Hyper-V parent partition, instead of a full blown instance of Windows Server 2008, strips out Windows features and services not needed to run Hyper-V. With Server Core, Microsoft is attempting to minimize the attack surface and patching requirements for Windows to make it a safer platform for virtual machines. I would agree that as Hyper-V requires a general purpose operating system, you might as well make it as small as possible. The Server Core concept seems like a good idea. So, following Microsoft’s recommendations, we deployed Hyper-V with Server Core.

Server Core — “The Windows You Know”??

One aim in evaluating Hyper-V was to test its end-user experience, as Microsoft execs repeated over and over at their Sept. 8 virtualization event that Hyper-V would be eagerly adopted because it uses, “the Windows you know.” The insinuation is that Hyper-V is easy — and of course that somehow VMware is not. Microsoft is claiming that with Hyper-V there is no added learning required, no training, no classrooms, because you already know Windows, you can jump right into Hyper-V. They are also claiming that VMware ESX requires you to take the time to learn a whole new system. But is this accurate? Is the recommended Server Core flavor of Windows 2008 really, “the Windows you know”? Is it easier than ESX? We wanted to find out.

Windows Server Core = MS-DOS 2008

If you haven’t seen Server Core yet, here’s the UI in its entirety. It doesn’t look like the Windows I know, in fact it looks like DOS! Are we stepping back in time? Who knows DOS anymore? Actually, it makes you wonder why Microsoft didn’t just call it MS-DOS 2008, especially since anyone using Server Core will need to resurrect some long lost command line skills to get any work done.

Is Hyper-V with Recommended Server Core, In Fact, Easy?

So, how does the Hyper-V and DOS — err, I mean Server Core — combination stack up when compared to the user experience of VMware ESXi? To try it out, we did side-by-side installations of Microsoft Server Core/Hyper-V and VMware ESXi 3.5 on identical servers. To let you see the details of each setup process, we recorded the entire sequence in a pair of videos.

This first video shows every step required to install Hyper-V and ESXi on a fresh machine.  We kept count of the elapsed time, reboots, mouse clicks and keystrokes each product needed and it clearly shows the huge advantage the truly thin and OS-free ESXi architecture has in installation speed and simplicity.  ESXi goes from bare-metal to fully installed in one-third the time, half the mouse clicks, hundreds fewer keystrokes and just one reboot vs. seven compared to Hyper-V.  The simplicity of the ESXi wizard-driven installation is striking compared to the arduous process needed to first get the Server Core OS installed and then configure Hyper-V in a command line environment.

Our second video starts where the first left off and takes Hyper-V and ESXi through the steps needed to configure two iSCSI datastores for VM use.  iSCSI setup is a standard task for any virtualization user that wants to take advantage of shared storage for VM migration and high availability.  ESXi’s Windows-based Virtual Infrastructure client makes the iSCSI setup quick and easy.  For Hyper-V, the “Windows you know” is nowhere to be seen.  Instead, working with Server Core requires you to key in a long sequence of obscure commands to configure iSCSI initiators and targets, partitions and file systems.  We generously showed the Hyper-V setup executed with no delays, although it took us hours of digging through Microsoft documents and knowledgebase articles to find the right commands to use when configuring iSCSI in Server Core.

Our Conclusion: Server Core plus Hyper-V is for Experts Only

VMware has put great effort into making ESXi the easiest and fastest hypervisor to install and configure and these videos clearly show the results.  Getting the OS out of the hypervisor plays a big part in the streamlined simplicity of ESXi as there is no general purpose OS to configure and manage and the reliability and security issues accompanying the tens of millions of lines of code an OS brings along are eliminated.  Microsoft’s OS-centric Hyper-V architecture adds many steps to the setup and puts their users in a quandary: either A) they install Hyper-V on a full Windows Server 2008 OS and deal with the frequent patching and security fixes Windows requires; or, B) they follow Microsoft’s best practice guidelines and suffer with the limitations of Server Core.  As the videos show, the tradeoffs with Server Core are daunting — Windows administrators will find their familiar GUI tools are missing and they’ll be left to spend a lot of quality time with search engines tracking down documentation on Microsoft’s obscure command line utilities.

Take a look at the side-by-side comparison videos and let us know if you agree that ESXi provides a far faster and easier (or maybe we should say, “moister and chewier“) setup experience.  Better yet, try ESXi and Hyper-V with Server Core on your own machines and tell us how it went.

Via: VMware: Virtual Reality: Hyper-V with Server Core — Too Dry and Crunchy for our Taste

Technorati-Tags: Vmware, Microsoft, virtualization, Hyper-V, ESXi, Experts, Windows 2008, server Core

Microsoft hat im Rahmen seines Server Virtualization Validation Program den ESX-Hypervisor von VMware validiert. Damit bekommen ESX-Anwender jetzt auch Support von Microsoft.

Die Zertifizierung bezieht sich auf VMware ESX 3.5 Update 2. VMware-Kunden können also Windows-Server und andere Microsoft-Anwendungen virtualisiert auf Basis des Hypervisors nutzen und bekommen Zugriff auf kooperativen Support von Microsoft und VMware. Voraussetzung ist ein gültiger Supportplan. Dann unterstützt Microsoft etwa Exchange Server, SQL Server sowie Sharepoint im virtualisierten Betrieb.

Im Rahmen des Virtualization Validation Program können Softwareanbieter ihre Virtualisierungslösungen auf Windows Server testen und validieren. Läuft dies erfolgreich ab, gewährt Microsoft Support. Früher hingegen waren Kunden häufig gezwungen, Probleme in einer physischen Umgebung zu reproduzieren, bevor sie Unterstützung durch den Hersteller erhielten.

Auch Novell beteiligt sich an dem Programm, allerdings umgekehrt: Hier wird garantiert, dass Windows Server 2003 und 2008 als Gast unter Suse Linux Enterprise Server laufen.

Via: http://www.golem.de

Technorati-Tags: Microsoft, ESX, support,

A virtual hard disk may become unusable, or the iSCSI Software Target may stop responding when you run Windows Unified Data Storage Server 2003 or Windows Storage Server R2

Falls dann die ESX Server die Vernindung nicht wieder herstellen können hilft diese Vorgehensweise:

Configure a host(s), f.e. esx1 and esx2 with the appropriate IQN name (i used iqn.1998-01.com.vmware:esx1 for example) and add the freshly configured devices/disks

- DO NOT configure the software iSCSI configuration via the VI client, but use the tips in Mike’s Service Console guide.

• Create a VMKernel switch (via Add networking)
• Remember to set the default gateway for the newly created VMKernel switch
• Use the commandline to enable the vmhba40 (Software iSCSI initiator) and add the IP of your iSCSI target.
• Next, use the command esxcfg-swiscsi –e to enable it
• Use vmkiscsi-tool -D -a 192.168.2.210 vmhba40 to add the iSCSI target’s IP address
• Now try executing vmkiscsi-tool -l -T vmhba40 to see if it recognizes the iSCSI target. It will tell you “No targets are configured” if it does not see anything
• Now is the time to fire up your VI client & do a rescan (in Configuration => storage adaptors)
• Create a VMFS
• Done

Thanks to http://virtrix.blogspot.com/2006/07/iscsi-tutorial-for-esx-30-with.html

Man lernt halt nie aus.

Frontalangriff auf Google: Microsoft will für 44,6 Milliarden Dollar die zweitgrößte Internetsuchmaschine Yahoo übernehmen. Der Softwaregigant will damit zum Marktführer beim Geschäft mit Onlinewerbung werden. Yahoo-Aktien legten nach der Ankündigung im um 53 Prozent zu.
Redmond – Microsoft bietet 31 Dollar pro Yahoo-Aktie, was einen Aufschlag von 62 Prozent auf den Schlusskurs vom Donnerstag bedeutet, wie Microsoft mitteilte.
Microsoft und Yahoo konnten bisher bei der boomenden Internet- Werbung und im Suchmaschinengeschäft nicht zum Branchenführer Google aufschließen. Yahoo hatte erst am Dienstag einen erneuten Gewinneinbruch vermeldet und den Abbau von rund 1000 Stellen angekündigt.

Der Kauf soll im zweiten Halbjahr abgeschlossen werden. Die Kosteneinsparungen sollen bei mindestens einer Milliarde Dollar liegen, teilte Microsoft mit.

Via: http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/0,1518,532565,00.html

• Internet Explorer 5, 6 und 7,
• die XML Core Services 3, 4, 5 und 6
• Excel
• Windows Media Player
• GDI
• Virtual PC und Virtual Server
• VML

Eine Übersicht von Microsoft gibt es im Summary Bulletin Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary für August 2007.

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The cause is an defect in SVS layer.

Workaround for this cause: Deactivate all layers before installing any Microsoft Office 2007 components.

More information on

Microsoft Knowledge Base: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/933568  and

Altiris Knowledge Base: http://kb.altiris.com/article.asp?article=32661&p=3

Roman

Überblick WSUS 3.0

Download WSUS 3.0

Step-by-Step Guide WSUS 3.0

Release Notes WSUS 3.0

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