@JaredBusch said:
@garak0410 said:
Cute...as a theatre degree holder, and with all respect to Frozen, I find the music in Frozen VERY overrated...LOL.
You were not the target market. They nailed the target market.
I totally agree with that and it does have my girl singing some classical sounding theatre music...with her eyes closed a few times during the movie, she totally loves Les Miserables and sings it a lot... 
Cute...as a theatre degree holder, and with all respect to Frozen, I find the music in Frozen VERY overrated...LOL.
@scottalanmiller said:
This is me for sure...a game Hoarder...I plan on playing them when I retire some day...LOL
@garak0410 said:
I can honestly say I've never used an iPad Air, so I cannot compare. We use Mac's at church for multimedia and I just don't see what the hype is.
I just like the idea of having the option to TOUCH but also mouse and keyboard. Basically boils down to that. My review copy of my Alienware gaming laptop arrives today with Windows 7 and no touch screen. I'll try to be unbiased about not having touch in my review.
I received my AlienWare yesterday. What a beast:
Intel Core i7 4700MQ 2.4 GHz
16.0 GB DDR3L SDRAM
1024.0 GB 5400.0 rpm Hard Drive, 80 GB Solid-State Drive
14.0-Inch Screen with NVIDIA GeForce GTX 765M with 2GB GDDR5
This thing could replace my desktop if I didn't run Windows Media Center to extend and stream in my home.
The Surface Pro 3 is more fun to use but this thing is a power horse. Halfway thought that this could be my go to device with an 8" tablet being my, well, tablet. But it is heavy, bulky and more suited for games and it will actually stream with Steam from my main PC quite well. Was very impressed.
But back to the Surface Pro 3...really can't go wrong with it, So much, well, "sexier" and easier to transport.
Good topic as I can't get my place to move off of them too. We are POP3/IMAP. And we do not backups PST's. I did for a while but it was so slow, even doing it once a week.
@scottalanmiller said:
Five years is most definitely not too old for a server. In the enterprise space eight years is common and ten years isn't unheard of. At some point you pay too much in maintenance and that is really what makes the swing as long as everything else is still good.
I second his comment. Scott talked me into keeping our PowerEdge 2900 as a second virtual host and I am going to use it for development and application serving. We had some doubts about it not being up to the task but I turned on virtualization and it is working great. Though my RAID card says the battery needs replacement.
@ambarishrh said:
Also check MVA
http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/training-courses/getting-started-with-powershell-3-0-jump-start
I second this...very good jump start here.
@scottalanmiller said:
Apple can get everyone to leave Snow Leopard but Microsoft is still struggling to get people off of XP!!
Price perhaps? Or the fact that a lot of people got their very first computer with XP and they just don't want to leave it. Bill Gates may have put a computer in every home but they don't want to give it up.
I can honestly say I've never used an iPad Air, so I cannot compare. We use Mac's at church for multimedia and I just don't see what the hype is.
I just like the idea of having the option to TOUCH but also mouse and keyboard. Basically boils down to that. My review copy of my Alienware gaming laptop arrives today with Windows 7 and no touch screen. I'll try to be unbiased about not having touch in my review.
Received my Surface Pro 3 Friday. I've owned (and sold or passed down) Surface Pro and Pro 2 but that said, I will be objective to my initial thoughts and experiences:
Screen is amazing. It for sure is not being overhyped. It is very clear, bright and jumps out at you.
It is light compared to the other Pro's. Quite noticeable.
The 3:2 ratio does make it much more usable in portrait mode, though it still feels a little long and slightly awkward. It for sure is much easier to screen type in this mode.
Kickstand is fantastic. So nice to use it in many angles.
Desktop Games play well though do I dare say a few were choppier than Surface Pro 2. Time will tell there. It does get just as hot as the other Surface Pro's when playing desktop games and the innovative fan and cooling system kicks in and you can hear it. I fired up Gone Home, Skyrim, Tex Murphy Tesla Effect and a plethora of old classic GOG games and some emulators (Amiga Forever) and all ran fine. The graphic intensive games do need low settings to be playable. Age of Empires II HD ran at full resolution with no problems but again, makes system run hot. Desktop games will suck the battery 3x as fast...not sure if that is normal even on a gaming laptop.
Apps. Yes...sometimes it IS about the apps. There simply needs to be more and useful "Modern' apps. This is a whole other subject but it still needs killer apps despite making some headway.
Pen - Pen works well. I love the OneNote button (and I defaulted mine to the desktop OneNote so I could do Ink to Text on the spot.) Maybe it is me but doesn't seem as good as the pen on the Surface Pro or SP2. Again, time will tell there.
Keyboard. Still has the feel of the last touch cover, the backlighting is nice and I love the option to press it against the SP3 and make it sturdier for laps. It does feel quite sturdy though still not as stable as a laptop. The touchpad is SO MUCH BETTER. Actually useable now.
Other Notes - I loaded the desktop app Sony Movie Studio Platinum and it says it was "touch ready" and I have to say they are absolutely right. Finally, a touch friendly video editor that has power to it. Was very surprised by this, even if Adobe Premiere elements is my favorite video editor.
Does it replace a laptop? Count me in the group that says "I am not sure." Though I liked the 8" size of the Dell Venue Pro and I think that may be a sweet spot for tablets, I think this will be my device of choice, I love the screen and the scaled desktop works well and I've not encountered any problems with legacy apps. I am going to test some intensive video rendering soon and will see if it can, pardon the pun, handle the heat. If desktop games made it pretty hot, I can imagine video rendering would be just as harsh.
I am confident I'll be using this as my main machine for quite some time.
@scottalanmiller said:
@garak0410 said:
@scottalanmiller Thanks...kind of a bummer as I used TechNet for a lot of extensive testing and demoing...I guess having the 180 trials should be plenty of time to try...can always reinstall for a fresh 180 days too...
It was only 90 days back in the NT 4 era when I was doing that!
I am pretty certain the new time frame is 180 days...it was to "soften" the blow on us loyal TechNet users.
@scottalanmiller Thanks...kind of a bummer as I used TechNet for a lot of extensive testing and demoing...I guess having the 180 trials should be plenty of time to try...can always reinstall for a fresh 180 days too...
Has anyone heard anything official as to what will happen with the TechNet keys when its subscription service finally stops soon? Will the software just deactivate or will it just have problems activating if you try to reinstall. Not that I am advocating for using it for free forever but I do have as few testing virtuals that I use often and didn't know what would happen to them.
Thanks...
Brian
A classic Windows 98 Moment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKtGXPfabLQ
@Bill-Kindle said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@ITcrackerjack said:
@scottalanmiller So having worked in large enterprise, how many copies of those emails would you suspect exist somewhere? How stinky is this pile of poo for you?
Really stinky. This should be a one in a million risk scenario.
COUGH BS *COUGH
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2014/06/20/lois-lerner-emailois-lerner-emails-ways-and-means/11044465/
I think this for sure is an apolitical event we can all agree on...biggest load of baloney we've ever heard...
@david.wiese said:
@garak0410 feel free to send to surface pro to me. I will get use out of it since mine hasn't been approved yet.
Well, mine is work issued so we would either return or pass down...and just arrived. I am sure I'll use it a lot. Funny, all the talk about the fan and how it wont really fire up unless you are doing desktop graphic intensive stuff...fan is quite audible and all I am doing is getting the firmware update that was pushed out yesterday.
I've not done anything but pair the pen (yet it won't write...might be in firmware) and download updates. The size is nice and screen is vibrant. Will give it a good try after updates.
I always wanted a copy of OS/2 to virtualize. Tried a few times and never could get it virtualized. Just for nostalgic reasons...
@Bill-Kindle said:
Yeah I would like one, but not for what they are charging for them now. 799 for a basically a Windows 8.1 tablet. No.
Judging by my experience with the Dell Venue Pro 2 (64GB), I may find myself using the Alienware laptop and the Venue Pro more than the Surface Pro 3. The 8" form factor almost seems perfect to me. Time will tell...
@scottalanmiller Sending Arkansas greetings to the meetup!
@ITcrackerjack said:
"Earlier this week, Ways and Means Republicans said as many as six IRS employees involved in the scandal also lost email in computer crashes, including the former chief of staff for the acting IRS commissioner."
Convenient... They sure have a lot of "computer crashes".
I heard this on the news the other day and I just had to laugh out loud. Beyond a RAID set problem, I've not had a hard drive crash on a workstation in my 3 1/.2 years here.
