Friday, January 28, 2011

Imagine Wimax


I just got my wimax modem from Imagine and that wimax song is stuck in my head!

I am very impressed with how easy it was to setup. The setup wizard was so simple , colorful and quick.

My only complaint is that the motorolla router supplied doesnt have Wireless N

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Microsoft Infrastructure Planning Guides

Download the complete Microsoft Infrastructure Planning Guides HERE

These guides are amazing as well as the Viso Diagrams that are included.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Script to Remove HP Proliant Support Pack in VM

My colleague Kevin Greene first alerted me about this script last year. I could not find it for a while on the web. So i decided to post the link here so I can easily retrieve this invaluable script when I need it.

I recently did a physical to virtual conversion using SCVMM and when complete there is no need for the HP Proliant Support Pack to be installed on the VM, so I ran this script and it quickly removes all the unnecessary files etc..

HP Proliant Support Pack Cleaner v1.2

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Microsoft Online Services You Tube Channel

Microsoft Online Services You Tube Channel

A lot of the BPOS customers I have worked with have their own IT department and administrators. A lot of the time these administrators can ask me questions on how to do certain things. There is nearly always a video posted on the MS Online Services youtube channel. So its a great site to bookmark and even subscribe to.

There are currently 66 videos available.

Monday, January 17, 2011

Free Remote Control Software



I have been using join me recently.It is so quick , simple and has a friendly interface.

Check it out https://join.me/

System Center Technet Virtual Labs

It's simple: no complex setup or installation is required to try out System Center running in the full-featured TechNet Virtual Lab. You get a downloadable manual and a 90-minute block of time for each module. You can sign up for additional 90-minute blocks any time

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/virtuallabs/bb539977

Friday, January 14, 2011

Office 365 Single Sign on through Active Directory Federation Sharing


With Office 365 , Users will be able to use their Windows Active Directory accounts to sign in to their Microsoft Online Services like Exchange online, SharePoint Online and Lync Online.

I am currently testing this sign on method and I much prefer it to the BPOS SSO Tool.

I am not a fan of the current BPOS SSO method as it is not seemless where as Office 365 method is.

Exchange On Premise - Exchange Online Migration

As Ireland's broadband is not great, It is normally impossible to migrate a 20 user and upwards site over a weekend.

As the Irish Market is mostly SMB the majority of businesses have standard ADSL Connections with a 512kbps upload speed. Most businesses do not need a large upload speed but the upload speed is critical when migrating to Exchange online.

A 2gb mailbox took 5 hours to migrate over a 512kbps connection.

The reason I am posting this is to help people plan a migration properly.

Each time I have done a 40 user and upwards exchange on premise to exchange online migration I have had the benefit of having a minimum of 20Mbps Fiber Synchronous connection , which makes a hugh difference.But not every one will have a synchronous 20Mbps Fiber connection and may have to do with a standard dsl connection.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Spam protection for BPOS - Forefront online for Exchange

Spam protection is a standard built in feature of BPOS and normally it is forgotten about, its just there in the background.

But how do you administer your organisation's anti-spam policies etc...?

Simply go to this url https://admin.messaging.microsoft.com , This brings you to Forefront Online for Exchange.

Log in with your admin user name for your BPOS Subscription and query Microsoft for your password.

And here are some videos to teach you how to administer Forefront Online for Exchange


Forefront Online Protection for Exchange: Administration Center 101
Forefront Online Protection for Exchange: Administration Center 102
Forefront Online Protection for Exchange: Administration Center 103
Forefront Online Protection for Exchange: Administration Center 104

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Sonicwall Firmware 5.8.0.0-27o

Sonicwall Firmware 5.8.0.0-27o was released on 31st December and has some interesting new features , Primarily - real time application control.

APPLICATION INTELLIGENCE,CONTROL & VISUALISATION OVERVIEW

The application filtering feature has also been incorporated into the content filtering service. So policies can be defined by application as well as content and applied to groups, and use schedules eg. relax rules for lunch.

Here is a PDF GUIDE for using the Sonicwall Content Filtering Service for version 5.8 firmware and upwards.

Finally here is a link which will allow you to browse the gui of a demo sonicwall appliance with the latest firmware.

Hyper-V Broken VHD - AVHD Chain

I first posted about broken vhd - avhd chains in December 2009, And since then I have helped many people throughout the world in recovering their data and made some friends along the way.

I have recovered data for people in france, germany , uk, australia, usa, brazil

A guy called Dave Loughner from Innovative Solutions in New York pointed out a great utility for recovering data from avhd & vhds.

It is Disk Digger and only cost $14.99, Best money you will ever spend if your really stuck. Dave tried about 30 recovery products before coming across Disk Digger.

As of writing this www.diskdigger.org is down but you can download it here

Also a point to note. The disk digger solution is absolutely the last resort as nothing is as good as merging all avhds and having a healthy server at the end.Using disk digger will get you back up to 50% of your data but not all.

System Center Road Map - 2012

Microsoft System Center Road Map -2011

Managing VMware ESX with System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2

Here is a great article from Janique Carbone on virtualizationadmin.com on managing VMware ESX with SCVMM.

However there is much better support in SCVMM vNext and also in Opalis.