Tag Archives: Microsoft

ThinkPad X1 and Windows 8

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ThinkPad X1 Windows 8

In the last days I got my new machine for work, a Lenovo ThinkPad X1. As usual I always want to work with the latest and greates technology, that’s why I have chosen to set up the ThinkPad X1 with Windows 8.

ThinkPad X1 Windows 8

Even in Developer Preview state Windows 8 runs very stable and brings a lot of cool new features which I can use for my daily work. I love the new PowerShell versions and Internet Explorer 10. But the best and the biggest feature for me, is the integration of Hyper-V 3 in Windows 8. So I don’t have to use VMware Workstation or VirtualBox to run virtual machines on my notebook for testing or presentations. I also can simply use the VHD (or VHDX) format to play with virtual machines or even boot them via boot from VHD.

ThinkPad X1 Windows 8

The downside of the Windows 8 Developer Preview is missing .NET framework 3.5, but I think the Windows 8 beta, which should be released by the end of February, should fix this.

ThinkPad X1 Windows 8

Maybe some people have realized that I am a big fan of business style notebooks. And what would be better business design than the ThinkPad series. Lenovo tried to combine good old ThinkPad values with new design features, and in my opinion succeeded. I really like the ThinkPad design in this very slim chassis. It looks elegant and business “high-class”.

The build quality of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 is like you would expect it from a ThinkPad. It feels great and very robust. Keith Combs describes it in his review ”The ThinkPad X1 is build like a tank.  It’s probably the most solid notebook I’ve ever had in my hands.” and I have to agree with him.

ThinkPad X1 Windows 8

More information on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 here.

 

My new Nokia Lumia 800 – Windows Phone

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Nokia Lumia 800

Last week I got my Nokia Lumia 800 and even I already have read a lot of articles and reviews about it, I am impressed about the beautiful design and the build quality.

The first problem noticed was the battery life. My HTC Titan had something like two days of battery life and the battery of my Lumia 800 was empty after just one day. At the same day I also got the Windows Phone update (7.10.8107.79) and I deactivated the Exchange Push for my work mail account. Now the battery life seems to be the same or better than on my HTC Titan.

Nokia Lumia 800

Now the Lumia 800 (3.7-inch screen) cloud be a bit bigger for me (the Lumia 900 with a 4.3-inch Screen could be perfect). I also miss the Internet Sharing feature, but there should be an update soon to activate this feature.
Overall I really like the Nokia Lumia 800 and it will be my main phone for the next months.

Nokia Lumia 800

 

Microsoft Cloud for SMB

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MicrosoftCloudforSMB

Last year I did a little research project about Microsoft’s public cloud and how it cloud affect Small and Medium sized businesses. So I created a paper which should help Microsoft partners to decide how they can improve their services and solutions by using the Microsoft public cloud. I the paper I focused on Microsoft Office 365 and Windows Intune. This should be for the partner which do infrastructure solutions like Active Directory, Exchange and PC Management.

MicrosoftCloudforSMBdoc

You can download this paper from my Windows Live SkyDrive.
The paper includes a lot of text copied from Microsoft documents and websites, and research I did by myself. All the sources should be marked, but if you find anything which is not marked please feel free to contact me.

Starting something new

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logo_itnetx

Today is my first day at itnetx gmbh, a consulting and engineering company located in Bern/Switzerland. itnetx is focussed on Microsoft Technologies, especially Microsoft Private Cloud Solutions, Microsoft System Center and Microsoft Virtualization. In 2011 itnetx has been awarded by Microsoft Switzerland as “Microsoft Partner of the year – Datacenter”

Since this are my preferred Microsoft technologies, it seems like a perfect match.

microsoftpartneroftheyear2011

Install CentOS on Windows 8 Hyper-V

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For some courses at KTSI we need a CentOS to test some Linux spesific things like Apache and other stuff. The good thing, Windows 8 got Hyper-V and Hyper-V supports CentOS.

With Version 3.2 oft the Linux Integration Services Microsoft fixed also a bug which occurred in Windows 8.

  1. First download CentOS
  2. Download the Linux Integration Services Version 3.2 for Hyper-V
  3. Start Hyper-V Manager and create a new Virtual Machine
  4. Install CentOS 6.x
    centos hyper-v
  5. Reboot the virtual machine
  6. Login as root
    centos hyper-v
  7. Mount the Linux Integration Services ISO from step 2
  8. Now run the following commands in the virtual machine 
    sudo mount /dev/cdrom /media
sudo /media/install.sh

    centos hyper-v

  9. After you the Installation is completed you have to reboot the virtual machine again
    centos hyper-v
  10. done ;-)

 

Hyper-V 3: Import and Export VMs with PowerShell

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Hyper-V-Powershell02

Aidan Finn (Virtual Machine MVP) just made a blog post about Hyper-V & PowerShell in Windows Server 8 and how you can enable Hyper-V via PowerShell in Windows Server 8. So this gave me the idea about doing a little more with PowerShell and Hyper-V 3.

I already did a blog post about how you can attach multiple VHDs to a SCSI Controller with PowerShell in Windows Server 8. In this post I will show how easy you can export and import a lot of Virtual Machines.

First you can run a Get-VM Test*, to check which VMs you will export.


Get-VM Test*

Now you can export the Virtual Machines


Get-VM Test* | Export-VM -Path "C:\VMs"

Now I removed the Virtual Machines in Hyper-V with Powershell (You could also add the -confirm parameter so you don’t have to press “y” for each VM.


Get-VM Test* | Remove-VM

And now you can import the Virtual Machines again


Get-Childitem "C:\VMs" -Recurse *.xml | Import-VM

Hyper-V-Powershell01

I will post more about PowerShell in Windows 8 and Windows Server 8 (Hyper-V 3) in the next upcommig weeks. If you want know more about what new Hyper-V features and improvments are coming in Windows Server 8, you can read the following blog post: “Hyper-V: Version 3 kills them all”