News and Views of a Technical Nomad

Jul

30

Well, I managed to build my second Mini-ITX system before I had to leave for my new contract.

The new box which is built around a Phylon 7F2WE-2G motherboard which has a VIA C7 2000Mhz CPU with 1GB of RAM and a 40GB SATA Hard Drive is now operational and is running all my databases, including the MySQL database that runs this weblog and my Orders of Battle database.

Performance is a lot better than my first Mini-ITX system which acts as my Domain Server and seems to be about on a par with the Pentium 4 system it replaced. While the VIA CPU is probably slightly slower than the Pentium 4, the extra memory and the SATA Hard Drive make up for it.

I intend to use the old Pentium system as a test machine to run beta software such as Longhorn and Orcas.

That leaves one system to replace, the Web Server, which I will do in due course.

LogicSupply once again provided all the components which were used to build the system.

Jul

15

Following on the success of my new Mini-ITX machine in its new role as a DNS/DHCP server; I have decided to see whether a Mini-ITX box can act as a Server in a more demanding role: as a database server!

Therefore, I have just ordered a new Mini-ITX box from Logic Supply which should arrive next week. I have once again ordered the Morex 3677 case which is pretty compact, but have ordered a faster VIA board, the Phylon 7F2WE-2G which runs a 2GHz VIA C7 CPU which should be a lot faster than the C3 machine I built last month. This new machine will also have 1 GB of RAM and a SATA Hard Drive instead of a flash drive which should also help performance.

It will be quite interesting to compare the performance with my current machine which is a Pentium IV with 512 MB RAM and an IDE Hard Disk.

This will occupy my time while I wait for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows!

For all you Harry Potter fans out there, I strongly recommend the new HP film; in my humble opinion, it’s by far the best film yet!!

Jul

12

Microsoft has announced pricing for users of its online version of Dynamics CRM called CRM Live which is obviously aimed at users of Salesforce.com and Siebel CRM OnDemand:

CRM Live faces an uphill challenge, entering the market years after Salesforce and RightNow. Though Microsoft is making a significant development investment in its SaaS strategy, CRM Live will begin its life partially by attacking Salesforce and RightNow on price. The Enterprise Edition of the software will be available for $59 per user per month, about half the industry average, while the Professional Edition will list for $44 per user per month and available at the promotional price of $39 per user per month in 2008. The existence of entrenched competitors mean low prices may be a necessary step for Microsoft.

CRM Live enters the arena as Microsoft readies a new generation of its CRM product line, and will use the same code base, code-named Titan, as the on-premises software and partner-hosted software. Titan — and CRM Live — are scheduled for release later this year, but Microsoft will begin to add early-adoption program customers to the Live service, hosted from a Microsoft data center in Virginia, starting in the fall. Users will be able to access CRM Live either through their Web browser or through Microsoft Outlook.

Source : Information Week

Needless to say, Saleforce.com are not too impressed:

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, however, shows no signs of shaking in his boots.

Benioff said Microsoft customers are already paying prices similar to what Microsoft announced today for hosted CRM software through partners. “These ‘new’ prices are their market prices today — there is no difference,” said Benioff in an e-mail interview. “When you have an inferior product you have to have an inferior price. That is why Zune is priced below iPod. And why Windows CE is priced below BlackBerry. And why Microsoft CRM is priced below Salesforce.com.”

“Microsoft CRM still lacks many of the key features customers demand today, which is why Gartner ranks them below both Salesforce and Siebel on the 2007 [Gartner] Magic Quadrant out last week,” Benioff said.

Read the whole thing as they say!

Source : Information Week

Jul

12

It seems that 27 February 2008 will be a day to look forward to…

Microsoft said it will launch the product, which it has previously said would be finalised before the end of the year, at an event in Los Angeles on 27 February. The company will also launch Visual Studio 2008 and SQL Server 2008 at the same event.

Source: ZD Net

While that is obviously interesting, further research reveals that SQL Server 2008 is not expected to actually be ready until mid-2008; so the actual “launch” is not really a launch!!

Bringing an end to months of speculation, Microsoft on Tuesday announced it will jointly launch Windows Server 2008, Visual Studio 2008 and SQL Server 2008 next February 27. However, Microsoft is using a creative interpretation of the word “launch,” since not all of the products will actually be ready to ship.

While Windows Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 will be set loose by the end of this calendar year, SQL Server 2008 (code-named Katmai) isn’t due until mid-2008 — Microsoft has committed only to releasing it during its 2008 fiscal year, which ends June 30, 2008. That plan remains in effect, the Feb. 27 launch date notwithstanding, according to company executives.

Source : Channel Web Network

More information on SQL Server 2008 can be found at Microsoft here.

Jul

1

It is being reported that the next release of Visual Studio which was codenamed Orcas has been officially named Visual Studio 2008 and will support .NET Framework 3.5.

One of the new features of this next release is that it will support multiple versions of .NET Framework so that the developer can pick which version of the Framework to compile to. This feature will not target versions 1.0 and 1.1 however.

Another new feature will be increased support, including intellisense, for Javascript; which is my opinion is way overdue.

ScottGu’s Blog, as always, has loads of useful info on this. Have a look-see here.ÂÂ

Jul

1

VIA have once again pushed the Mini-ITX envelope and have just announced a new series of Mini-ITX motherboards: the EPIA LT series, which have a “maximum” power consumption of less than 20W.

Epiacenter has the facts:

Boasting VIA’s market-leading ultra low power consumption VIA C7 processors at 1.5GHz and fanless 1GHz, the VIA EPIA LT-Series platform provides exceptional performance per watt and a feature set that creates high standards in connectivity. Supporting up to 1GB of 533MHz DDR2 memory, the VIA CX700 drives a plethora of connection options including dual LVDS support and two 10/100 fast Ethernet modules, with a Gigabit option, 2 SATA connectors and up to 6 USB2.0 ports.

A complete digital multi-media experience is guaranteed with VIA UniChrome Pro II IGP, featuring MPEG-2 video decoding acceleration and 2D/3D graphics, plus a built-in HDTV encoder up to 1080i for MPEG-2 HD DVD playback, while the VIA Vinyl Multi-channel HD audio chip also provides an exceptional listening experience. Additionally, the boards will support the forthcoming MFX module for greater system security, energy efficiency and data protection, featuring key storage, wake-up and event logging functions.

The VIA EPIA LT Mini-ITX mainboard is compatible with Microsoft Windows 2000/XP, XPe, CE, and Linux, as well as being fully compatible with all Mini-ITX, FlexATX and MicroATX chassis and associated accessories, including the new 120W DC-DC converter for VIA EPIA Mini-ITX mainboards, giving developers an array of tools to create innovative and flexible digital media devices.
 

blog search directory Directory of Computers/Tech Blogs British Expat Blog Directory.