microsoft

Add System Restore to Server 2003

Download the file http://www.windowsreference.com/files/AddSystemRestore.zip and extract it

Double click on AddSystemRestoreEntries.reg (This will add some values to the registry). Click on Yes to continue

Then insert a Windows XP CD to your CDROM drive. Right click on sr.inf and click on install

Reboot the computer

Now you can find the System Restore utility from START–>All Programs–>Accessories–> System Tools –> System Restore

“Windows 7″ is only Three Days Away!

Everyone ready to buy and install the latest and greatest Operating system since Windows XP? Based on the below stats(see insert), i think it is. I for one give Windows 7 a big thumbs up. I haven’t had this good of an experience with anything before retail as I have had with Windows 7 RC2. In fact, even though as an MSDN subscriber I am not going to install the latest copy of Windows 7, its just not needed at this point(for me personally). If you my readers can give me a few reasons why,(other than testing App-V; which I will most likely be able to download and install here anyways) then I might have to bite the bullet and start over once again. Its not like I haven’t re-installed my PC about a hundred times in the last 5 years! What is one more reload right?

Insert from Business Standard

“Microsoft, despite claims to the contrary, has not had much success with Vista which was launched in 2006. Analysts estimate that just one fifth of the world’s 1.2 billion computers use Vista. About four fifths use Windows XP (launched in 2001), introduced eight years ago, or even older Windows operating systems. XP is eight years old, but still runs on 70 per cent of all the Windows PCs across the globe. Microsoft will end active support for XP by 2014, and extended support by 2017.” Read the full story here.

Sysinternals Suite Updates

New Updates to the Sysinternals Suite

Process Monitor v2.7
This update to Process Monitor, a system monitoring utility, adds a new option to the process tree dialog that direct it to show just the timeline for displayed events, uses kernel-based thread profiling on Vista and higher for better performance, and includes a number of minor fixes and enhancements.

ProcDump v1.5
ProcDump now includes a new switch that enables the creation of a process dump upon process termination, which can help with troubleshooting unexpected process termination. It also fixes a bug where the -ma switch wouldn’t generate a full dump when combined with -r , the Windows 7-specific process reflection switch.

If you want to download these apps go to the Systinternals Live Site or go here for the whole updated package.

Posted in August that is Definitely worth a read.

Mark’s Blog: The Case of the Temporary Registry Profiles
In the latest post in Mark’s “Case of the Unexplained” series, he documents a perplexing case affecting many Microsoft and Citrix customers that Microsoft Customer Support Services solved with the use of Process Monitor’s boot logging and stack trace features.

Palm Desktop Calendar Sync to Outlook Calendar

Well I found out the hard way that there is an easy way to do this. Mind you the easiest is to change your syncing from Palm Device to Palm Desktop to sync between Palm Device and Outlook, the rest takes care of itself.

Although, lets say you do not have access to your old palm device, what then? Well Yahoo allows you to sync from Palm Desktop exported files(dba) but trying to do so via the website didn’t work for me.

Intellisync for Yahoo did the trick, I’m not going to get into details, other than, you install the app, select, sync from Palm Desktop to Yahoo (you must have a valid yahoo account), then change the settings again to sync from Yahoo to Oultook.

When syncing to Yahoo, make sure you set the time zone on your yahoo calendar to the right zone, or all your appointments will be off.

Read up on Intellisync for Yahoo here.

Office 2010

Yes, yes, old news, but i came upon an article on CNET where they preview Office 2010. Included in this article is a video review of Microsoft’s, latest Office suite. One comment that I smirked at was the fact that one of the editors installed it a while ago and stated, “I wish Outlook/Office 2010 tech preview would do something weird and dumb so I could write about it. Sadly, it just works.” check out the video review here. Also check out the screen shots, if you haven’t already. There is also a newer review that you can check out, that’s where i got the “it just works” tag-line from

NS

Microsoft and SQL Server 2008 R2

I’m not a huge SQL Guru by any means, but I do have a few clients with SQL Servers hosting their data, which is critical to their business, so I am letting everyone know that Microsoft delivers SQL Server 2008 R2. I have attached some inserts for you to read. Then you can goto the full article

“The updated database software lets businesses build their own business intelligence capabilities. It includes a new version of its report-making software, Report Builder 3.0, that can incorporate maps.

“Report Builder 3.0 supports geospatial visualization to produce new insights and discoveries by combining geospatial data with business information,” according to Microsoft.”

“New wizards enable administrators to quickly set up a multi-server management environment in minutes–no professional services required,”

And now onto the originating blog post.

More news on Project Natal for Xbox 360

CNET got up close and personal with Xbox 360 Project Natal, the CNET editor went to Redmond and got to try out Project Natal himself. Here is an isert from the article…

“Although Microsoft demonstrated Natal at this year’s E3 trade show, the software maker hasn’t said when the technology will be available. The company has said that Natal, which incorporates face, voice, and gesture recognition technologies, will be sold as an add-on to the current Xbox 360 console.”

Check out the full story here. Also check out Microsoft’s Official page. The video is pretty impressive… there is also a YouTube portal to all the Project Natal videos here.

Enjoy!

NS

Virtualization in General

Hey there folks, well I know 80% of the worlds population have an idea of what virtualization is, what it does, and why we all should get on the bandwagon… but there are some out there that still do not have a clue what VMware, Microsoft, and Citrix are doing with virtualization. Since there are those with questions, I thought I would provide some links for those people.

The first link I am providing is from one of my favorite resources in the world. Petri IT Knowledgebase by Daniel Petri, I wont get into why this is an important resource as many of my readers will already know. The link is for an article that David Davis wrote about Server Virtualization, here’s an insert from the beginning of the article…

“There are many types of virtualization- server, network, storage, and more. In this article, we will demystify these complex terms, explain what they can do for you, and name specific products that provide these functions. So prepare for the smoke to be cleared…” read the rest here.

The second link is a to a video that might be helpful to some readers, and maybe a waste of 3 minutes for some, hey at least its only 3 minutes! “Information Technology Explained in 3 Minutes of Less : What is Virtualization” check it out here.

Anyways, if I help shed some light on virtualization for at least a couple people I’ll be happy!

NS

Sysinternals Updates

There have been a lot of updates since i last blogged about this awesome set of tools, among those are updates to ProcDump, Autoruns, and PsLogList. The full details are here.

Another thing to mention is that Mark and David released the 5th Edition of their book, titled, “Windows Internals 5th Edition” You can check out the details herealso. Here is a small insert from their site.

Delve inside Windows architecture and internals:

• Understand how the core system and management mechanisms work—from the object manager to services to the registry
• Explore internal system data structures using tools like the kernel debugger
• Grasp the scheduler’s priority and CPU placement algorithms
• Go inside the Windows security model to see how it authorizes access to data
• Understand how Windows manages physical and virtual memory
• Tour the Windows networking stack from top to bottom— including APIs, protocol drivers, and network adapter drivers
• Troubleshoot file-system access problems and system boot problems
• Learn how to analyze crashes

Windows 7 “Family Pack”?

Yeah you heard me, Microsoft is rumouredto have said that you may purchase one Family License copy of Windows 7 to install on, and up to 3 PC’s, that will be used in the same household. This may make it much more appealing to upgrade all PC’s at one time. Windows 7 is still slated for an October release, the 22nd to be more precise. I’ve been running my evaluation copy of Windows 7 ever since it was available and I am very pleased with the results.