James Moody: Geek in Paradise

From The Official SBS Blog

Today Microsoft is announcing the Windows Essential Server Solutions family of products.  The family includes Windows Small Business Server 2008, formerly known as code name "Cougar" and Windows Essential Business Server 2008, formerly known as code name "Centro".

Windows Small Business Server 2008 is built upon Windows Server 2008 and includes:

• Windows Exchange Server 2007
• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
• Enhanced Remote Web Workplace
• One-year trial subscription to Microsoft Forefront Security for Exchange Server Small Business Edition
• One-year trial subscription to the new Windows Live OneCare for Server

SBS 2008 Premium also includes SQL Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 to run on a second server.

Windows Essential Business Server 2008 is built upon Windows Server 2008 and includes:

• Exchange Server 2007
• Forefront Security for Exchange Server
• System Center Essentials 2007
• Next version of Internet Security and Acceleration Server

Windows Essential Business Server 2008 Premium Edition includes SQL Server 2008 technology.

Of interest, is the trial subscriptions to Forefront Security for Exchange and OneCare for Server. I hadn’t seen those mentioned in any of the talk covering what SBS 2008 would include, so it comes as quite a surprise to me. What better way to get people to make the swap than to include a free year with each purchase. I imagine most consultants already have their preferred vendors in place (ExchangeDefender, Symantec/Trend, etc.) so it will be interesting to see the uptake on ForeFront and OneCare.

I do like the addition of Server 2008 into the SBS 2008 Premium product as more and more clients are hopping on the Terminal Services wagon with great enthusiasm. I know the majority of the small business owners I’ve pitched to, have had the "yes" look when I cover the fact that they would be able to work from home. When I see that look, even though they may not say yes then, I can pretty much guarantee a call back within a few days with the go-ahead. Inclusion of Server 2008 is a great move imho as long as the price point is within tolerance.

Of course, both products are 64-bit only, which for me, comes at a great time for the clients I have are due for a new server this year anyway. This will make the new hardware sell easier since they need new hardware for the new OS.

Official Press Release

Tags: Microsoft Small Business Server 2008 Essential Business Server 2008 Server 2008 ForeFront OneCare

Head on over to Heroes Happen Here and get yourself registered to attend the launch event for Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008. The event is being held in Honolulu, HI on April 30th for those of us in the islands. You mainlanders will have to go to the above site to see when yours takes place.

There are several different tracks planned:

1. Data Platform IT Pro
2. Developer
3. Infrastructure IT Pro
4. Partner
5. Technology or Business Decision Maker

I’ve signed up for the Partner Track, for which they don’t have a synopsis laid out for yet. Hopefully they get that updated within the next few weeks so I have an idea of what to expect going in.

I enjoyed last year’s Vista/Office 2007 launch event as well as the TS2 Seminar held a little while back, so I’m anxious to see how this one turns out. I’d like to see them sneak in some info on SBS 2008 "Cougar" as well.

Charles Van Heusen of the TS2 team has a write-up on SBS 2008 "Cougar" to fill in the gaps a little more to help tide us over until more information is released.

Hope to see you there!

Tags: Microsoft Server 2008 Visual Studio 2008 SQL Server 2008 Launch Event SBS 2008 "Cougar"

Continuing onwards, Microsoft today released the beta of Hyper-V, their virtualization solution to the masses. You can only get it in the x64 version of Server 2008 Enterprise, so if you managed to grab the wrong version, you’ll have to go back to the Server 2008 download page and download the x64 package that contains Hyper-V exclusively.

Looking forward to getting my hands on this personally.

Tags: Microsoft Server 2008 Hyper-V Virtualization

Wow. Quite a few Service Packs released this week by Microsoft, both RC and Final versions for a few products.

We’ll start with the Final Office 2007 SP1 release, which can be found at the Microsoft Download site. I’m running this Service Pack now and I can definitely tell a major difference in how fast Business Contact Manager operates. BCM was fast when I first started using it due to the small amount of contacts, but over the past year has slowed quite a bit as the contacts and what I track with it have gone up. It’s pretty much back to how it started. I like. A description of the SP can be found here. Take note at the bottom of that page that there are separate downloads for Visio, Project, Sharepoint Designer and the Language Pack.

Next on tap is Windows Vista SP1 RC. I haven’t had the chance to get this installed as of yet, but there have been several that have and love it, especially the network speed increase. I’ll get around to it eventually once I wrap a few projects up. An overview can be found at the Microsoft Download site. This is a time bombed version which will end on June 30, 2008. Installing the final SP1 will of course, remove the time bomb. Long has written up a handy tutorial for testing SP1 RC on a new partition without going through a bunch of rigamarole. <3 Vista’s tools.

Windows Server 2008 got a new facelift as well with a new build. Time for me to blow out my old Virtual PC installation and start anew. I’ve been running it alongside my SBS 2003 machine and it’s been perfect except for some niggling usbperf errors that I can’t seem to discover the cause of. Maybe the new build takes care of it!?

Finally, we have Windows XP SP3 near-final RC. I’ll need to fire up a Virtual PC installation to test this as I have no more XP machines here. All Vista in the abode and loving it.

Enjoy all the update goodness!

Tags: Microsoft Service Pack Release Candidate Office 2007 SP1 Vista Server 2008 XP SP3 Network