Microsoft News – 20 January 2015

I’ve let the news build up a little bit. I think the holiday lull is starting to lift.

Hyper-V

Hyper-V Script to move everything off of a physical disk: Drain anything that is located on a particular disk.
Announcing DSC resources to deploy Hyper-V converged virtual network: This is an interesting third-party offer. I am wary of deep integrations such as this because I am worried about lock-ins that prevent upgrades when/if there are significant changes from Microsoft.

You are invited to participate in the Windows Server 2003 Modernization offering: The Partner Technical Services team is excited to share a new initiative focused on helping you migrate from Windows Server 2003 before end of support.
Work Folders for iOS – iPad App Release: Great add-on for iOS, giving businesses their own version of DropBox based on WS2012 R2 file servers and Workplace Join.
Win2012R2: STOP 0x133 and STOP 0x9E caused by too many NBLs in a DPC: Microsoft has been seeing an increase in STOP 0x133 (on non-clustered) and 0x9E (on clustered) cases, where the root cause is that there are too many NBLs indicated in a DPC. This causes the DPC watchdog timer to expire, resulting in mentioned STOP errors.
Announcing Message Analyzer 1.2: I really dislike this replacement for NetMon. It’s too difficult to use, even after you’ve sat through a briefing. My advice to Microsoft: start from scratch … again.

Windows 10: What We Know So Far: I’ll give a hoot about Cortana when it works outside of 4 or so countries. Microsoft should either fix that limitation or move the developers to something more important than a gadget feature.

Configuring VMM logical switch with bandwidth limit virtual port: Enable VM QoS.
Monitoring Text and CSV log files in System Center Operations Manager: Very useful.
Cluster overcommit algorithm in System Center 2012 R2 Virtual Machine Manager: This article describes four approaches for the System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) cluster overcommit algorithm in Microsoft System Center 2012 R2 Virtual Machine Manager.

Try ExpressRoute Free of Charge with this Promotion: Microsoft launched a promotional offer for Azure ExpressRoute, making it easier to get started with fast, private network connections between your on-premises environment and Azure.
New Application Insights functionality on Azure Websites with the Application Insights Website extension: This feature is designed to help development teams get 360° views of their applications across Availability, Performance and Usage with fast & powerful troubleshooting, diagnostics and usage insights.
Saving Money with Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines: In this article I will look at some methods you can employ to save money when you deploy virtual machines into Microsoft Azure.
Microsoft Azure App Enables Workplace Join Connections for Android Devices: Give controlled Android users access to on-premises resources with a hybrid cloud service.
Azure AD Workplace Join, now with Android Support: The official announcement.
Connect servers directly to Operational Insights: Easy to set up from-the-cloud server management.
How to easily spin up an Azure AD Premium Trial: So you’d like to demo Azure AD to your customers or want to get the feel of it? Perhaps you have Azure via MSDN and would like to spin it up on the fly for a demo environment?

Participate in the Office 365 Practice Accelerator for SMB offering: A new initiative focused on helping Microsoft partners learn the fundamental deployment principles and processes that lead to repeatable successful deployments of O365 for Small and Medium customers.

Enrolling iOS Devices Via Apple Configurator In Microsoft Intune: A step-by-step. Been a while since I did this, but it was easier than enrolling Windows Phone!

#GlobalAzure Bootcamp 2015: The 2015 #GlobalAzure Bootcamp kicks off on April 25th and you can participate and organize a location too!

Paul Thurrott’s last post on WinSuperSite.com: It’s the end of an era for that important site. But Paul continues tomorrow on thurrott.com.
Blue Whale Web Partners with Paul Thurrott to Launch Thurrott.com Technology News Site: So I am now a work colleague of Paul Thurrott!!! Thurrott.com has launched as a sister site of Petri.com and Paul is also writing news articles for the site.