Windows Server 2008 CTP Released

Windows Server 2008 CTP Released

The next Community Technology Preview (CTP) for Windows Server 2008 has been released, making it appear increasingly likely that the successor to Windows Server 2003 will be shipped early next year. The CTP release, announced on Microsoft's Windows Server Division blog, comes almost exactly two months after the beta 3 release of what was then called Longhorn Server. "The June 2007 CTP is another step toward Release Candidate and ultimately RTM [release to manufacturing], which remains on track to hit before the end of 2007," the blog author wrote.

(Sorry about the Longhorn logo but I couldn't find an appropriate Server 2008 equivalent). Read the rest at RedmondMag.com.

Seagate bumps Barracuda range to one terabyte

Seagate bumps Barracuda range to one terabyte

Seagate has announced new members of its Barracuda hard drive family that squeeze 1T of data onto four platters using perpendicular recording. Two models have been announced so far. The Barracuda ES.2 is intended for enterprise applications including networked storage, disk-to-disk backup, and rich media content storage. It is designed for 24x7 use with a mean time between failures of 1.2 million hours. Other features likely to appeal to the market include sustained performance even in densely-packed systems thanks to Seagate's 'Rotational Vibration Feed Forward' system, energy efficiency (the company claims a 55 percent reduction in watts per gigabyte), and the choice of SATA or SAS interfaces.

Read the rest of this story at ITWire.com.

Register by June 30 to Save 40% on First Windows Server 2008 Exam (Worldwide)

Register by June 30 to Save 40% on First Windows Server 2008 Exam (Worldwide)

Register by June 30, 2007, to receive a 40% savings voucher for use on your upgrade path from Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2008 certification. The transition exams (one for MCSA and one for MCSE) and the 40% savings offer are both intended to recognize your investment and expertise in our current technology and help you in your transition to the latest releases available from Microsoft.

Go and get your Voucher

Other important links:

http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=7002445

http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=7002446

Limiting wireless clients to secured access points

Limiting wireless clients to secured access points

Question: I am attempting to enable all my wireless users to ONLY connect to WEP or WAP enabled WLAN's. I do not even want them to be able to see unsecured ones if possible, but would like them only to connect to secured ones. Do you think this is even possible and if so how easy is it to implement?

Read the answer at NetworkWorld.com.

Microsoft's Beginner Developer Center

Microsoft's Beginner Developer Center

Welcome to the Beginner Developer Learning Center - a centralized learning environment specifically targeted to beginning programmers. Here you'll find a rich array of learning content that starts with the very basics, and guides you through step-by-step to becoming a fully-fledged developer! No experience or programming knowledge required - so dive right in!

Want to become a Microsoft software developer but don't know where to begin? Start at msdn.microsoft.com.

AdvancedTCA: A new open standard

AdvancedTCA: A new open standard

(Advanced Telecom Computing Architecture) A carrier grade backplane and interconnect specification developed by PICMG and defined under the PICMG 3.x standards. Designed for industrial strength telecom equipment and datacenter servers, AdvancedTCA cards are 14" high (8U) and may reside in single slot cabinets or cabinets up to 23" wide that hold 16 cards. AdvancedTCA (ATCA) provides point-to-point, dual star and mesh topologies for Ethernet, Fibre Channel, InfiniBand, StarFabric, PCI Express and Serial RapidIO channels up to a total bandwidth of 2.5 Tbps. The first implementations of AdvancedTCA appeared in 2003.

Continue reading the introduction to this technology at TechWeb.com.

You can also take a look at some MicroTCA Tutorials.

Microsoft agrees to Vista search changes

Microsoft agrees to Vista search changes

Microsoft will alter Windows Vista to allow users to more easily use third-party desktop search programs such as Google Desktop. The concession comes as a response to Google's complaint under the 2002 consent decree that ended the US government's antitrust action against Microsoft. Although a Federal assistant attorney general had discouraged state attorneys general from acting on Google's complaint, it seems his intervention fell on deaf ears.

Read the full story at iTWire.

IT Academia Across the Pond

IT Academia Across the Pond

Since their inception, our CertMag.com discussion boards have benefited from regular commentary by a member named “wagnerk” who joined the forums in November 2005. He offers reliably good advice for fledgling IT professionals and informed opinions on other issues in the industry.

So, for our first Academic Connection feature, we reached out to “wagnerk” to learn what the college experience was like for such a seasoned IT pro.

“Wagnerk” is Ken Wagner, an IT network manager at a secondary school in the United Kingdom. He has a bachelor’s degree from University College Northampton; is certified in A+, Network+, Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP), Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technician (MCDST), Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator (MCSA) and Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE); and is an IC3 authorized instructor. “There are more, but this is the main bulk of it,” he said.

Wagner took night...

Microsoft's tabletop touch screen

Microsoft's tabletop touch screen

At the end of May Microsoft launched a new product category: Surface Computing. Surface computing has been in development in the Microsoft labs for some five years under the code-name "Milan". At its core, Milan is a PC running Windows Vista, but forget the keyboard and mouse. Milan uses a 30-inch touch-sensitive display in a table-like form factor that enables multiple users to navigate the system's interface.

"With Surface, we are creating more intuitive ways for people to interact with technology," Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer said. "We see this as a multibillion dollar category, and we envision a time when surface computing technologies will be pervasive, from tabletops and counters to the hallway mirror. Surface is the first step in realizing that vision."

Read more HERE

VMware Workstation 6 virtually trounces the competition

VMware Workstation 6 virtually trounces the competition

Newly released VMware Workstation 6 has lots of new features and improvements to ease collaboration between the host and guest operating systems. Add to that improved support for USB devices and rock solid performance and VMware Workstation 6 easily outshines competition and justifies its $189 price tag. Workstation is virtualization software that can run several guest OSes on a single computer's host OS. With Workstation you can create lots of virtual hardware, including hard disks, CD-ROM drives, and multiprocessor CPUs, irrespective of the hardware on your host machine. If you are a software developer, Workstation can virtualize several machines for developing and debugging your project. Virtual machines (VM) can also be used for testing and demoing software.

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