Weblog.BassQ.nl

source; http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsserver/archive/2010/07/12/available-for-download-windows-server-2008-r2-sp1-beta.aspx

We’re at the sold out Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in Washington D.C. talking to our partners about the public beta release today of Service Pack 1 for Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7. We managed to get this puppy out the door a few weeks early, so take advantage and download the code to evaluate the new features and benefits that SP1 can provide for server and desktop installations. The final version of SP1 is due out in the first half of next year.

For partners, we think there is great opportunity here to continue evangelizing the benefits that Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7 already deliver while noting for customers that it only gets better when final code for SP1 is released. For example, if you’re a distributor, there’s a great opportunity to grow your business by selling more server and desktop licenses with virtualization solutions based on Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7. If you’re a VAR, you can improve software and solutions sales built on Microsoft software, including Windows Server 2008 R2, with offerings that utilize virtualization and integration with Windows 7.  If you’re an ISV, you can increase your sales and reduce development time by building apps and solutions for the virtualized environment on Windows Server 2008 R2. And if you are a hardware partner, you can increase sales by creating solutions for customers, in particular in the area of desktop virtualization with solutions that take advantage of Microsoft RemoteFX. For partner-related news around RemoteFX, please check out Max’s blog.

The two most important developments in SP1 for Windows Server 2008 R2 are:

Dynamic memory lets Hyper-V administrators pool available memory on a physical host and dynamically distribute it to any virtual machine(s) running on that host. So as the workloads on that physical workload change, requiring more or less memory, Dynamic Memory will let administrators change the memory allocation to their VMs without service interruption. For a deeper look at Dynamic Memory check here.

RemoteFX enhances Microsoft desktop virtualization. RemoteFX lets Windows Server 2008 R2 administrators provide an even richer and user-transparent desktop virtualization experience. RemoteFX delivers rich content, independent of any graphics stack, to server-hosted virtual and session-based desktops, allowing them to support any screen content, including full-motion video, portable graphics stacks such as Silverlight, and 3D applications. Because it can use virtualized graphics on the server and advanced codecs , RemoteFX can deliver those experiences to a much wider array of target devices, including standard desktops and laptops but also an emerging slew of thin clients. You’ll also be able to forward the USB ports of the local client to the virtual machine being accessed on the device – just like you can forward the local printer over RDP today.

Make sure you check out the new SP1 Beta Resource page on Microsoft.com as well as the TechNet SP1 page — and don’t forget to grab the download here.

Source; http://blogs.technet.com/b/systemcenter/archive/2010/07/01/citrix-connector-for-system-center-configuration-manager-2007.aspx

Microsoft have recently jointly released the Citrix connector for ConfigMgr 2007.  Through this release, the ConfigMgr SDK has been used to extend and support the management of application services through XenApp.  Very cool indeed.

Here is the announcement. Links are below.

Citrix® XenApp™ 6 introduces integration with Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2007 R2 giving organizations a single, integrated view and management of all applications across the enterprise including on-demand apps by XenApp. The Citrix XenApp Connector leverages the Configuration Manager console to deploy and publish applications and updates to XenApp servers with zero disruption to users and extends the reach of Configuration Manager applications to a broader set of users, devices and access scenarios

Some resources for you:

• Jointly authored whitepaper is available here
• A Video Demo can be viewed here

The poster is a great visual tool to help in the understanding of the key features and components of the Hyper-V in Windows Server 2008 R2.  It highlights key Hyper-V components including:

• Architecture
• Virtual Networking
• Virtual Machine Snapshots
• Live Migration
• Storage Interfaces
• Storage Types
• Storage Location and Paths
• Import and Export

This large-format poster provides practical visual depictions of the Windows Hypervisor, live migration process, cluster shared volumes architecture, VMQ data paths, disk storage I/O path, and much more.

Download here ; http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=5567b22a-8c47-4840-a88d-23146fd93151

Print, and Enjoy!

On Edge.technet.com of the Microsoft Technet site are a lot of great video’s made by Microsoft themself.

Because you probebly don’t hevae the time to see and find them all i made a great collection! Have fun!

Windows Server 2008 R2: Remote Desktop Services – The Series (P1)
Windows Server 2008 R2: Remote Desktop Services – The Series (P2)
Windows Server 2008 R2- Remote Desktop Services – The Series (P3)
Windows Server 2008 R2- Remote Desktop Services – The Series (P4)
Windows Server 2008 R2- Remote Desktop Services – The Series (P5)

Part 1 Master Your Environment with System Center Configuration Manager 2007
Part 2 Master Your Environment with System Center Configuration Manager 2007
Part 3 Master Your Environment with System Center Configuration Manager 2007
Part 4 Master Your Environment with System Center Configuration Manager 2007

Hyper-V R2- Failover & Live Migration
Hyper-V R2- Making Highly Available VMs
Hyper-V R2- Making Highly Available VMs
Hyper-V R2- Dynamic Storage
Hyper-V R2- USB over Network with Fabulatech
Hyper-V R2- Introducing Cluster Shared Volumes
Hyper-V R2- Building a Hyper-V R2 Cluster
Hyper-V R2- Initial Installation & Configuration

Demo 1 – Hyper-V Live Migration
Demo 2 – Boot From VHD
Demo 3 – Windows PowerShell 2.0 Remoting
Demo 4 – Active Directory Enhancements

Microsoft Deployment Toolkit – building install media for Windows 7
Windows XP Migration to Windows 7 RC using MDT Beta 1 – Part 1- The OS Install
Windows XP Migration to Windows 7 RC using MDT 2010 Beta 1 – Part 2- How To Build It…

Open Source Software (OSS) on Windows Server 2008

Exchange 2010 Demo: Read and Reply State
Exchange 2010 Demo: Conversation View
Exchange 2010 Demo: Move Conversation
Exchange 2010 Demo: Nickname Cache
Exchange 2010 Demo: UM Card

Interview with Kristian Andaker on Transitions to Exchange Server 2010
Interview with Kristian Andaker on Exchange 2010 OWA
Interview with Matt Gossage on Exchange Server 2010 and Storage
Interview with Scott Schnoll on Exchange 2010 High Availability
Interview with Scott Schnoll on Backup Strategy in Exchange 2010
Interview with Becky Benfield on Exchange 2010 Site Resiliency at Tech Ed 2009

IIS Media Services 4.0 is an integrated HTTP-based media delivery platform

IIS Media Services 4.0 is a set of media-related extensions for Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 7 and higher.  IIS Media Services provides an integrated HTTP-based media delivery platform, and includes:

• Smooth Streaming. Enables adaptive streaming of on-demand media files for Smooth Streaming-compatible clients, including Microsoft® Silverlight™.
• Live Smooth Streaming. Enables adaptive streaming of live media broadcasts for Smooth Streaming-compatible clients. A new Live Smooth Streaming feature in IIS Media Services 4.0 Beta 1 enables delivery of live media broadcasts to Apple® mobile digital devices.
• Transform Manager. Enables conversion of on-demand media files to Smooth Streaming presentations for Smooth Streaming-compatible clients and enables conversion of Smooth Streaming presentations to MPEG-2 TS segments that can be played by Apple devices.
• Advanced Logging. Provides rich, real-time client- and server-side logging.
• Bit Rate Throttling. Meters the speed at which media is delivered to a player.
• Web Playlists. Enables secure sequencing and server-side control of media content.

You can also download two additional IIS extensions related to IIS Media Services 4.0:

• Advanced Logging, with real-time client- and server-side logging
• Application Request Routing (ARR), providing HTTP proxying and caching
• Transform Manager, runs encoding tasks to convert media files to on-demand Smooth Streams for Silverlight clients and Apple mobile digital devices.

Download details IIS Media Services 4.0 – 32-bit

Download details IIS Media Services 4.0 – 64-bit

Overview
In a previous blog post, I described 5 different ways to implement Windows Server Failover Clustering with Hyper-V. Those options included: Parent-based Failover Clustering with two physical servers, Child-based Failover Clustering with two physical servers, Mixed Physical/Virtual Failover Clustering, Failover Clustering with two child partitions on one physical server and Standalone demo laptop with Virtual iSCSI SAN.

However, I failed to mention in that post the option to use CIFS/SMB file server share as your option for Failover Clustering storage. This scenario is so unique (with differences in flexibility, cost and performance),  that I would argue it constitutes a sixth method. Here’s how you can do it.

Before and After Diagrams
As I did with the previous blog post, let me describe the scenario using two diagrams. First, here is a diagram describing the scenario before a failure:

Now, here’s a diagram describing the scenario after a failure in SPTNODE1:

As you can see, we use a file server (called SPTSERVER1) for storing the Hyper-V files. The idea is to store the configuration files, the VHD itself and the VHD snapshots in the \\SPTSERVER1\VMSHARE\VM1 folder. As we do when using a SAN for shared storage, the surviving node will take over and start the VM in case of a failure. We can also use the very same scenario for Quick Migration, making the VM move orderly from one node to another by saving the state to the file share and instructing to other node to take over and restore the VM.

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There are many ways to implement Windows Server Failover Clustering with Hyper-V. I could actually find five unique methods to do it. Some of them will actually not give you a fully fault-tolerant solution, but most of them actually make sense in specific scenarios (even if only for demonstrations). In any case, just trying to understand and differentiate them will probably be a good exercise.

1 – Parent-based Failover Clustering with two physical servers
In this first scenario, probably the most common one, you implement Windows Server 2008 Failover Clustering at the Hyper-V Parent (Host) level. You will need some shared storage, like a Fibre-Channel or iSCSI SAN.

Here is a diagram describing the scenario before a failure:

Here is a diagram describing the scenario after a failure:

As you can see, this can survive the failure of one of the physical servers. In fact, if you have a redundant network and storage infrastructure (not shown above), you can have a truly highly available solution.

Additional details about this solution (including screenshots on how to configure it) are available at http://blogs.technet.com/josebda/archive/2008/04/14/snw-demo-windows-server-2008-core-hyper-v-and-failover-clustering-with-screenshots.aspx

(continue reading…)

I am pleased to announce the availability of the Remote Desktop Load Simulation Toolset.   Many customers have asked us to provide the specific number and type of servers to use for Remote Desktop Services scalability.  This is a difficult question to answer without more complete information given the variation in use cases and the impact on server loading.

To help answer that question, the RDS team created a toolset to create and measure load when using Remote Desktop Services.  We believe this toolset will also be useful for customers that wish to conduct their own scalability testing.

It’s important to note that this is one tool to help answer this question, but not the only one.  In addition to using this toolset, measuring and understanding your own environment and usage cases is very important.

The Remote Desktop Load Simulation Toolset is now available for download at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=c3f5f040-ab7b-4ec6-9ed3-1698105510ad&displaylang=en

If you’ve got servers still running Windows 2000 Server in your enterprise, your robot will be blaring this warning ever more urgently the closer we get to July 13, 2010.  That’s the end-of-support date for the Windows 2000 Server platform. Servers still running Windows 2000 after this date will be doing so without security hotfixes, patches or service packs. But there is more,

There are two important events that will happen to the support policy for Windows 2000 after June 30th of this year.

First, support for both IE 5.01 SP3 and IE 6 SP1 on Windows 2000 SP3 will expire. Users running IE 5.01 or IE 6 SP1 on Windows 2000 should upgrade to Windows 2000 SP4 in order to continue to receive security updates.

Second, Windows 2000 SP4 moves from mainstream to extended support. The key difference between mainstream support and extended support which I think is most relevant to this audience is this quote from the lifecycle site: “Microsoft will not accept requests for warranty support, design changes, or new features during the Extended support phase.” We will of course continue to keep our Windows 2000 SP4 customers secure with security updates through the life of Windows 2000 (through 2010). There are a few other differences between the two support models which you can read about at the lifecycle site. You may also want to read my previous post about Windows’ lifecycle.

It should be no surprise that we do not plan on releasing IE7 for Windows 2000. One reason is where we are in the Windows 2000 lifecycle. Another is that some of the security work in IE7 relies on operating system functionality in XPSP2 that is non-trivial to port back to Windows 2000.

Please note that these lifecycle changes are only for IE on Windows 2000. For questions about other versions of IE (IE for PocketPC, IE for Mac), please consult the lifecycle site for the latest expiration dates.

That said, migrating servers is no one’s idea of a party. If you’re worried about your migration project generating migraines, make sure you leverage all the resources Microsoft is making available to Windows 2000 Server end of lifers:

Your first stop should be the Windows 2000 End-of-Support Solution Center, a new site loaded with migration planning and technical tools. Check out the Windows Server 2008 R2 Upgrade Paths as well as the Windows Server Migration Tools, the Assessment and Planning Toolkit and the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit. The site also has great guidance on migration planning as well as technical guidance on migrating specific server roles.

Look for more tools and guidance around Windows 2000 Server end of life in the coming months, both here and on www.microsoft.com/windowsserver.

Source; http://blogs.technet.com/windowsserver/archive/2010/01/14/windows-2000-server-approaching-end-of-life.aspx

Source: http://blogs.technet.com/softgrid/archive/2009/11/19/announcing-app-v-4-6-rc-and-integration-with-office-2010-beta.aspx

First of all, we are excited to announce the availability of App-V 4.6 RC! In August we announced the App-V 4.6 Beta. Since then we have taken in lots of customer feedback and continue to refine the App-V 4.6 release so that we can deliver a great product!  We invite you to check out the RC release by registering and downloading the App-V 4.6 RC release via Microsoft Connect, where you can also submit feedback directly to the team.

We’re not done though, in addition we’d like to share some great news and also announce our integration with Office 2010 Beta:

Microsoft Office 2010 Beta, Ready to be Sequenced With the Microsoft Office 2010 Beta Deployment Kit for App-V

As you know the Office team just completed a major milestone Microsoft Office 2010 Beta, congrats to the team!  Throughout the process of building Office 2010 the App-V and Office teams have been working very closely to make sequencing Office 2010 Beta possible with App-V 4.6 RC!  We have taken the feedback and requests from post-Office 2007 and App-V 4.5 releases, and have been hard at work implementing a solid integration experience for Office when App-V 4.6 releases in H1 2010.

So what’s Different when using Microsoft Office 2010 Beta and App-V 4.6 RC together?

Office 2010 has introduced a new piracy protection initiative, the Software Protection Platform (SPP) service.  This service uses a machine’s hardware characteristics and product key to activate the installation, which is performed during the first Office application launch.

Since the Office 2010 product activation is linked to the hardware on which Office is originally installed, customers who wish to deploy Office 2010 using App-V must physically install the SPP service on the sequencer machine before beginning the sequencing process – and on any client machines that will stream and run Office 2010.

Our engineering teams have collaborated to address the top customer issues that people were running into when virtualizing past versions of Office.   As a result, Office 2010 has a much more integrated user experience.  The Office 2010 integration delivers key productivity enhancements and a seamless user experience by enabling the following::

· Microsoft SharePoint Integration – You can open, edit, and save Microsoft Office documents using Microsoft SharePoint.

· Microsoft Outlook Fast Search – You can use Microsoft Windows Desktop Search to find specific messages in your inbox.

· MAPI Proxy – You can connect to your inbox using Microsoft Outlook Send To functionality.

· Microsoft Office Document Indexing – You can index your documents so that you can use Microsoft Windows Search to locate files.

· Virtual Mail Control Panel icon – You can use the Email icon in Control Panel to perform advance mail configuration.

· URL protocol handler – You can configure links in the browser and specify the appropriate associated Microsoft Office application.

· Send to Microsoft OneNote Printer driver – You can print documents to Microsoft OneNote.

To help customers facilitate this process, we have created the Microsoft Office 2010 Deployment Kit for App-V (Beta). The Deployment Kit contains both the required SPP licensing component and Office 2010 integration features.

And what’s even more exciting, you can get your hands on it now.

How Do I Sequence Microsoft Office 2010 Beta for App-V 4.6 RC?

1. Download Office 2010 Beta here

2. Download the Microsoft Office 2010 Deployment Kit for App-V (Beta)

3. Download App-V 4.6 RC on Microsoft Connect

4. Read the App-V recipe for sequencing Office 2010 Beta on Microsoft Connect.

For detailed information on whether your environment meets the requirements of Office 2010 and App-V 4.6 RC, please refer to the App-V recipe.

Please note: We are providing a recipe to support the sequencing and testing of these pre-release products on Microsoft Connect.  Please provide feedback via Microsoft Connect, by choosing FEEDBACK once logged into the App-V 4.6 Program.

We look forward to hearing about your App-V 4.6 RC and Office 2010 experience!

Source; http://blogs.technet.com/virtualization/archive/2009/12/10/Offline-Virtual-Machine-Servicing-Tool-v2.1-.aspx

Virtualization affects how we plan, build, deploy, operate, and service workloads. Customers are creating large libraries of virtual machines containing various configurations. The patch-state of these virtual machines are not always known. Ensuring that offline virtual machines are properly patched and won’t become vulnerable the instant they come online is critical.

I am therefore very pleased to state that the Offline Virtual Machine Servicing Tool v2.1 has now been released!

Congratulations to the Solution Accelerator team for this release!

The Offline Virtual Machine Servicing Tool 2.1 has free, tested guidance and automated tools to help customers keep their virtualized machines updated, without introducing vulnerabilities into their IT infrastructure.

The tool combines the Windows Workflow programming model with the Windows PowerShell interface to automatically bring groups of virtual machines online, service them with the latest security updates, and return them to an offline state.

What’s New?

Release 2.1 is a direct response to customer and Microsoft field requests to support the R2 wave. Offline Virtual Machine Servicing Tool 2.1 now supports the following products:
· Hyper-V-R2
· VMM 2008 R2
· SCCM 2007 SP2
· WSUS 3.0 SP2
· OVMST 2.1 also supports updates to Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 virtual machines.

Download here; Offline Virtual Machine Servicing Tool  2.1
More info; http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc501231.aspx

VMware and Microsoft are ramping up their virtualization games with relatively new releases. Scott Lowe compares and contrasts some of the major features in vSphere and Hyper-V R2.

Source: http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/datacenter/?p=1820

Microsoft was late to the virtualization game, but the company has made gains against its primary competitor in the virtualization marketplace, VMware. In recent months, both companies released major updates to their respective hypervisors: Microsoft’s Hyper-V R2 and VMware’s vSphere. In this look at the hypervisor products from both companies, I’ll compare and contrast some of the products’ more common features and capabilities. I do not, however, make recommendations about which product might be right for your organization.

Table A compares items in four editions of vSphere and three available editions of Hyper-V R2. Below the table, I explain each of the comparison items. (Product note: With the release of vSphere, VMware has released an Enterprise Plus edition of its hypervisor product. Enterprise Plus provides an expanded set of capabilities that were not present in older product versions. Customers have to upgrade from Enterprise to Enterprise Plus in order to obtain these capabilities.)

Table A

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This poster provides a visual reference for understanding key technologies in Windows Server 2008 R2. It focuses on Active Directory Domain Services, Hyper-V, Internet Information Services, Remote Desktop Services (including Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)), BranchCache, and DirectAccess technologies. In addition, updates to core file services and server management are illustrated. You can use this poster in conjunction with the previously published Windows Server 2008 Component Posters.

Download here as PDF: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=64a5cc28-f8a1-4b30-a4a2-455c65bda8d7

Following quickly on the heels of the Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 launches (they have PowerShell 2.0 built in), Microsoft has released version 2.0 for all flavors of Windows since XP:

Windows Management Framework, which includes Windows PowerShell 2.0, WinRM 2.0, and BITS 4.0, was officially released to the world this morning. By providing a consistent management interface across the various flavors of Windows, we are making our platform that much more attractive to deploy. IT Professionals can now easily manage their Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, and Windows Server 2008 R2 machines through PowerShell remoting – that’s a huge win!

PowerShell v2 has finally been released for ‘legacy’ OSes (Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008)! I’m saying legacy OSes because the latest OSes are Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. You could also say the out-of-band releases have been released. This happened somewhere in the end of October 2009.

If you are having a hard time finding those, that’s because it is in included in the Windows Management Framework.

The Windows Management Framework includes:

• Windows Remote Management (WinRM) v2.0
• Windows PowerShell v2.0
• Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) v4.0

Read more about it here.

Windows Management Framework Core (WinRM 2.0 and Windows PowerShell 2.0)

• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows Server 2008 package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=863e7d01-fb1b-4d3e-b07d-766a0a2def0b)
• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows Server 2008 x64 Edition package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=d37e25cf-db05-4b23-a852-cdf865d81b82)
• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows Server 2003 package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=f002462b-c8f2-417a-92a3-287f5f81407e)
• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows Server 2003 x64 Edition package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=909bbcf1-bd78-4e03-8c83-69434717e551)
• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows Vista package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=f2fa1227-9a34-4e29-aa03-62f5c00e16f2)
• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows Vista x64-based systems package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=0f73efa2-f8d6-45f3-a8f8-5cdc205b119a)
• Download the Windows Management Framework Core for Windows XP package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=60cb5b6c-6532-45e0-ab0f-a94ae9ababf5)

Windows Management Framework BITS (BITS 4.0)

• Download the Windows Management Framework BITS for Windows Server 2008 package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=e77925a9-58a2-428b-bb4f-714d49d0b889)
• Download the Windows Management Framework BITS for Windows Server 2008 x64 Edition package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=e749f4cd-74db-404a-bc30-765137cd3804)
• Download the Windows Management Framework BITS for Windows Vista package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=d7ae9660-bb13-4f0c-816b-85de3980ec1b)
• Download the Windows Management Framework BITS for Windows Vista x64-based systems package now. (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=173c8a2d-b264-49ca-8d35-b6f234cbdaeb)