This announcement is great news for anyone interested in building a Live Migration-capable Hyper-V lab on the cheap. However – before you write this off as just another low-end freebie, please take a look at the scalability limits. With the proper planning and hardware this would be acceptable for light production deployments. Heck, it looks like Microsoft Support will even take calls on it.

I don’t know what else to say but… enjoy!

Q: I own Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter Edition for each physical processor in my Hyper-V host, which provides unlimited guest virtual machine (VM) rights. What license key do I use to activate the individual guest VM if we aren’t using a KMS server?

A: Go to the Microsoft Volume License Service Center and locate the Product Keys section. Find your specific enrollment (there may be more than one) and look in the Product column for a product titled “Windows Srv 2008R2 Data Ctr/Itanium - MAK C”. The key should be listed to the right of the product title. Use this key to activate Windows Server 2008 R2 Web, Standard, and Enterprise Edition guest VMs via MAK.

Note: The above scenario applies to Microsoft Volume License customers. OEM and retail scenarios may differ – so please consult your Microsoft rep or reseller for details. As with all things related to licensing and product use rights – please refer to the Microsoft Product Use Rights (PUR) document for more information.

As you can see there are plenty of Forefront products represented… along with Exchange 2010, SharePoint 2010, and System Center Configuration Manager 2007 R2. I have a previous version of the BRS demo environment running on my 2nd laptop and its quite handy when ramping knowledge on the Forefront products – or conducting demos for my customers. I haven’t downloaded the new BRS demo yet (it was just released today), but if it’s like previous versions there will be a 120 or 180-day time limit after you spin up the VMs. Enjoy! --Jeff

PS. If you’re a Visio Stencil junkie like me you’ll want to check out the Component Poster stencil download. Now you can create your own posters for internal or 3rd party applications. Thanks --Jeff

Obviously the site’s success depends on the contributions of vendors and RDS administrators. So… check out the screen shot below and please join the party.

* For those of you who don’t stay up-to-date on Microsoft product names and acronyms, RDS was formerly known as Terminal Services

Here are a couple screen shots of the Word 2010 guide showing where to find everyone’s favorite utility: Envelopes and Labels…

Word 2003 View

Word 2010 View

The interactive guides are small Silverlight applications that run inside Internet Explorer. At this point the Download Center offers guides for all Office 2010 applications except Access, Outlook, and SharePoint Workspace. For those of you still running Office 2007 – check out similar guides by searching the Download Center for “interactive command reference”… or by clicking here.

Thanks --Jeff

Now… back to the topic at hand: Why Upgrade to Office 2010? Hopefully the TechEd 2010 sessions below will give you (and Mark Minasi) some answers.

IT Pro Sessions

• Microsoft Office 2010: Under the Hood Investments for Hardware and Performance
• Microsoft Access 2010 and IT: The War Is Over
• Advances in Microsoft Office Client Security: Keeping Enterprise Data Safe
• Microsoft Visio 2010: The IT Pro Love Story Continues

Developer Sessions

• Microsoft Office 2010: Developing the Next Wave of Productivity Solutions
• Developing Office Business Applications with Microsoft Office 2010 and Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010
• Outlook Social Connector: Deployment and Development Overview

There’s plenty more evidence available to address the “why upgrade?” question. As always, if you want to discuss this or any other topic in more detail please drop me a line. My e-mail alias is jcent. Thanks --Jeff

Free Training Options Available to Everyone

• Product Sites on Microsoft.com: Many of the product-specific sites on Microsoft.com include free training materials. Unfortunately not all sites are organized in a similar fashion… leading you to do some hunting and clicking. I’ve included two examples below to give you a head start.
  • Office 2010 Training
  • Windows 7 How-To Videos
• TechNet Virtual Labs: I’m a kinesthetic learner… so I tend to gravitate toward labs and demos. If this sounds like you… TechNet offers a ton of virtual labs where you can get your hands dirty using our software in a hosted virtual machine environment. Check out the main TechNet Virtual Labs landing page for a complete list organized by product family.
• Microsoft Event Resources: TechEd and the Microsoft Management Summit are our yearly US IT Pro events. While you need to be a paying attendee to access the event web site (and an archive of all sessions) you can often view keynotes and select breakout sessions for free. I’ve included links to each event home page below. UPDATE: I just learned that TechEd 2010 North America content is freely available using the link below. This is a huge change from previous years and hopefully something other event teams will adopt as a standard practice.
  • Microsoft Management Summit (MMS)
  • TechEd
• Microsoft Events and Webcasts: Make sure to bookmark or subscribe to the RSS feed for our Events and Webcasts page. This page is a clearinghouse for almost all customer-facing Microsoft events (online and in-person). While not an official training site… this is still a great resource to increase your Microsoft knowledge.
• Microsoft Learning Snacks: Officially called “Microsoft Silverlight Learning Snacks”, these are short interactive presentations on current Microsoft products and technologies. They are also a great way for the Silverlight team to show off their technology. ;) Anyway – if you only have 10 or 20 minutes to spare and want a quick dose of 200-300 level knowledge… head over to the Learning Snacks site.
• Productivity Hub: This is a unique collection of training resources (docs, videos, and podcasts) for Windows 7, IE8, Office, and SharePoint. What makes the Hub unique is that it’s delivered as a pre-built SharePoint site collection with a Web 2.0 twist. The Hub uses SharePoint social networking capabilities to encourage students to further their learning experience by posting to blogs, discussion boards and wikis. The Productivity Hub content is refreshed on a quarterly basis and available on the Microsoft Download Center. Very cool stuff!

Free Training Options Available to Volume License Customers

• Software Assurance Training Benefits: Software Assurance (SA) includes benefits such as new product version rights, 24x7 telephone support, and many more beyond the scope of this post. However, the two SA benefits listed below are focused on training end-users and IT staff.
  • SA Training Vouchers: Check with your organization’s SA benefits administrator to see if you have unused SA training vouchers. These vouchers can be used with a Microsoft Certified Learning Partner for traditional classroom training. The MS Learning team created a Class Locator portal to help you locate a certified partner in your area and find the right training courses. Note -- when searching for a training center be sure to click  the “Software Assurance vouchers only” check-box.
  • SA eLearning: As the name implies, this eLearning benefit allows you to consume select eLearning courses from the full Microsoft eLearning catalog. You need to contact your organization’s SA benefits administrator to gain access to these courses. However, you can search the eLearning catalog without a username or password. Make sure to filter your search using the offer type “SA Applications, SA Servers, and SA Systems”.

Pre-Paid or For-Fee Training Options Available to Microsoft Premier Customers

• Background – Microsoft Premier Support: Microsoft Premier Support offers various paid support offerings based on customer need. Premier offerings typically include priority 24x7 business-critical phone support, rapid access to onsite support engineers, plus access to an extensive catalog of proactive services. Another benefit of subscribing to Premier Support is access to a Technical Account Manager (TAM) who manages the overall support experience (both reactive and proactive). To learn more check out the Premier Support page on Microsoft.com.
• Microsoft Premier Open Enrollment Workshops and Online Workshop Webcasts: Check with your TAM for a current list of live and online workshops. If you’re a Premier customer you probably already receive these via e-mail. The number of contract hours consumed varies by workshop and delivery method (live vs. online).
• Other Premier Services: While Premier Support is often associated with reactive support (i.e. 1-800-ITS-BROKE) – it’s actually proactive services that provide the best long-term value to your company. To that end Premier Support can host Chalk Talks, Architectural Design Sessions, Performance Reviews, and literally dozens of other proactive services. Built into each engagement is a strong focus on knowledge transfer – which in my opinion is the best kind of training.

For-Fee Training Available to Everyone

• Microsoft Press Books: Let’s face it… nothing beats a 2000 page Resource Kit for demonstrating your geek cred. The Microsoft Press Books site includes a catalog of print and e-books for online delivery or shipment.
• Microsoft Online Training: Workshops, Clinics, Individual Courses, and Training Collections… all of these offerings can be accessed via the Training Catalog landing page.
• Microsoft Event DVD Store: Complete archives of recent TechEd and MMS conference keynotes and breakout sessions are available to anyone with a credit card. However, event attendees will pay much less by logging on with a valid attendee username/password. Head on over to the Event DVD Store to browse the event catalog.

Whew! That’s a lot of training. Ping me via e-mail if you have questions or need help with any of the resources listed above. My alias is jcent. Have a great weekend! --Jeff

Before directing your employees to the site above, make sure your Software Assurance Benefits Administrator has activated the HUP benefit through the Volume Licensing Services Center. Once activated, the ordering process is drop-dead simple from an employee perspective. They get the program code from your company intranet or possibly a “Welcome to XYZ Company” e-mail on their first day of work…. then they log on to the site and enter the program code along with a valid work e-mail address... and BAM! – they’re moments away from an Office 2010 Professional Plus download.

Aside from being a great benefit for the employee ($10 for Professional Plus vs. $150 for the low-end Home & Student), many companies promote HUP prior to, or during an Office version upgrade. Bottom line – if you’re eligible for Office HUP and not actively using it, please take another look. Feel free to contact me directly if you have questions. Thanks --Jeff

Have a great holiday weekend. Back online next Tuesday. Thanks for reading. --Jeff