Wednesday, September 01, 2004
Virtual PC for Mac Version 7 has finally been released. I have used Virtual PC on the Mac before and, in general, I haven't been very impressed with the performance. Yes, I realize that the software is emulating a x86 architecture on a PowerPC processor - a feat of software engineering which should be applauded even if it is slow. But that doesn't change the fact that versions 5 and 6 were...well...slow.
Version 7 promises to improve performance - especially with graphics handling. A new feature called "Fast Save" will save the state of your virtual machine in the background so that you can continue to work. Did I mention that it supports the G5 now? Mac users have been screaming for this since they were waiting for the backordered G5 PowerMacs to ship months ago. But no demo version? Come on, folks, we can do better than that... Can you really expect someone to shell out $129 without even seeing the thing first?
http://www.microsoft.com/mac/products/virtualpc/virtualpc.aspx?pid=virtualpc
I don't have a Windows Media Center Edition box in my living room. I've talked about it before here. However, I think the concept is cool and the idea of this central "device" or "platform" or whatever you want to call "it" would be neat to see come to fruition. HAI Home Control (they make security and home automation products) has put built software that snaps into Windows MCE and allows the user to control their products directly from the MCE interface on your TV:
Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 was released to manufacturing last week (I believe) and it's a great improvement over the previous version. If you need a tool for managing your Windows servers and applications, this is definitely worth taking a look at. And I'm not just saying that because I work for the company... ;-)
Here's a collection of MOM 2005 links I've found or seen posted elsewhere. Mostly for my own reference, but it may be interesting to others as well...
MOM 2005 120 Day Evaluation (54 MB)
http://www.microsoft.com/Mom/downloads/eval/default.mspx
MOM 2005 Overview Demo
http://www.microsoft.com/mom/evaluation/demo/mom2k5.mspx
MOM 2005 Online labs
https://microsoft.granitepillar.com/mom2005/
MOM 2005 Technical Walkthroughs (46 MB)
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2E6DF7CE-B591-4B65-B2A6-A943899B246C&displaylang=en
MOM 2005 Webcasts
http://www.microsoft.com/management/training/webcasts.mspx#MOM
MOM 2005 Reviewer's Guide
http://www.microsoft.com/mom/evaluation/reviewers/default.mspx
MOM 2005 on Technet
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/mom/mom2005/default.mspx