But this picture is awesome. Is it an omen? Or just a funny joke put up AFTER?

When I press the On/Off button, the Scroll Lock and Num Lock LEDs briefly illuminate, then turn off.  The Power LED (looks like a “Z” rotated 45 deg ccw) illuminates, and remains illuminated if I don’t do anything.  From this point on, nothing happens. There is no spin up or activity from the fan.

Connect the AC adapter and the AC power LED turns on. And of course the AC power LED turns off if I disconnect it. The Battery power LED turns on if the battery is in place, and turns off if the battery is removed. Either way the laptop gets power, the sequence is the same.

The symptoms are I try and turn on my laptop computer, a Lenovo Thinkpad T61p, and it won’t start. I hit the power button and get nothing. No beeps, error codes, POST, BIOS, nada. Nothing on the LCD screen. The LCD isn’t blank or black, it is just off. No initial flash of any kind on the display. It just doesn’t attempt to boot up.

Now comes the Lenovo will not boot frequent fix ritual:

1. Take out the battery
2. Hit the power button 10 times in a row
3. On the 10th time, hold the power button down for 30 seconds
4. Put the battery back in and start it up!

When that fails, you repeat it a few more times while on hold for a technician to order a new motherboard. All in hopes of an immediate fix.

Now News America Marketing will tell you all sorts of reasons they need you to install all of these components and applications to get their coupons to print on your printer. Such as they want to protect their advertisers and sponsors from you printing way too many coupons. What about the millions of coupons that get printed and stuffed into inserts and never get redeemed? What about that value of only $0.001 printed on the bottom? Isn’t this why people don’t counterfit pennies? It isn’t worth the risks, time, trouble and most important, it itsn’t worth it in terms of the money gained?

Now one most important thing News America Marketing will not tell you is how to UNINSTALL their piece of spyware, adware or malware. Call it what you want, but if you can’t get it 100% off of your computer in every way shape or form with a reasonable effort, something is not right.

This product is categorized as “adware” because it is “software that brings targeted ads to your computer, after you provide initial consent for this task.” Finding it on your computer means that your computer is infected with Adware and crucial data could be endangered or even lost.

A few concerns about this - what level of IIS is in this private plug-in? Can it provide security or does it just dish out a directory for full public content review? I prefer to keep my html and code as secure as I can. Since I am not a black ha guru, I look for the web server and the web applications I run to provide me with a level of security. AND more importantly, security updates.

Taking the hugly popular WordPress to an IIS server requires a few items. Can WordPress run on a Windows Home Server? If so, which versions?

Is there a blog software that runs on Windows Home Server? And hopefully not Community Server. A someone who wasted a lot fo time with CS in its early versions, I have a bad impression on their ability to implement features. They implemented a lot of hype and vaporware controls with nothing under the hood. Just ask any CS admin who needed to bulk delete posts using the UI.

As I continue to look for more information, I will post an update.

Microsoft Windows Home Server looks very cool for the home use of backing up video and audio files and home computers. But will it do any good for a family that has a website hosted externally already? Can Windows Home Server replace a GoDaddy hosted UNIX or Windows webserver account and save the family those recurring monthly costs?

Ask any questions, and look here for more details to be added covering each section to help you study, prepare, pass this certification, and more importantly, be successful in your career with Windows 7.

Is Microsoft AD enterprise ready?

This is a question that usually comes out from IT staff more concerned with religion then technology, cost savings and ROI. A better question is “My reuirements are A, B and C. Can Microsoft Active Directory meet the requirements for my business?” Unless you are talking requirements, you are probably in a religous discussion. Just like politics and offensive content, religion should be kept out of the workplace and especially out of IT discussions.

Do you spell requirements with an W or an N?

How do you spell requirements in your organization? With a W or an N? Is it a Want or is it a Need? I want to know your Needs and meet them as a consultant. As an employee I want to know what your Needs are and meet them. As a CIO, IT Director or manager, I want to know why my internal customers Needs are and meet them. None of us can handle someones Wants if we cannot meet your Needs. And if we meet your Needs

Do you have AD deployed today?

Then why do you have any other directories? Why are you running servers, paying for licensing, operating costs in the data center and taking up staff resource hours on duplicate technology? Can they be collapsed into using AD? If not, why do you continue to use them? Is the cost of supporting these additional directories enough to fund the effort to move towards a single directory and SIngle Sign On (SSO)?

Eliminate duplicate directories to reduce your IT costs

SUN, Novell, LDAP, LDAPS, RADIUS, and a list of other directories can all be collapsed into a single environment for your organization to work within for streamlined security, management, troubleshooting, and support costs. Why do you need to pay someone to be the Novell NDS expert when you have 5 people on the team that are AD experts? Start to take a hard look at what your people are doing in support time and also in end user complexity. A single directory makes all of that cheaper and easier.

End user training costs with multiple directories includes multiple passwords, password synchronization, what to do when your passwords are not synched up properly, and why your password can only be letters and 7 characters in length because of system omega that we have been using for the past 3 decades.

How do you reduce your IT costs today? By eliminating your duplicate costs for directory technology, reallocating staff resources, reporvisioning assets and achieving hard dollar savings on licensing and maintenance support contracts.

How do I deploy MS08-068 to my organization?

If this is an issue for your organization, you need to step back and fix a major problem outside of this patch. Applying patches, security updates and hotfixes should be a general reactive task that your IT department can do without any major concerns. Are you using Microsoft Systems Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) 2007, Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS), or Microsoft Windows Software Update Services (WSUS)? If not, how are you applying patches and hotfixes to your organization? Logon scripts alone? Or even worse, manual updates?

This update has some critical fixes in it, and that is a problem. The script kiddies are hard at work writing copycat spam emails, bogus downloads, and free office worker web based games so your employees without knowing it are going to be downloaded Trojans and viruses to target these exploits. It is a race to get to the door first. You to close it, them to sneak in through it. Don’t put your organization, or your career at risk. Make patching a business priority and one that just happens all the time without major concerns. The more severe the alert, the faster it happens.

What is your patch management SLA?

Do you have Service Level Agreements for the application owners of Microsoft Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003 and Server 2008? How soon after a Critical, Important or Advisory update comes out do you have to apply these hotfixes? Are you the application owner? That was is the timeline you have given your own team to roll out these patches and hotfixes?

Is your IT organization vulnerable to MS08-068?

Are there users who VPN in, work from home, or travel with laptops? Are they getting updated quickly? These users have access to the Internet without the benefit of your corporate firewalls. Patch them right away. Now what about the user on the road, how long can they go unpatched before they no longer are given access back onto the corporate network? Do you have a defense perimeter to quarantine out of date laptops from getting to corporate resources?

If you were looking for specific details on MS08-068, as the CIO, IT Director or manager, let me give you all the details you need to know and what you need to ask your team today:

• How many notices did Microsoft release?
• For each of them, are we impacted?
• For each that we are impacted, what is the level of the alert?
• What is the SLA for us to get the update out at that level?
• When will be get the update out?
• Does that meet or exceed the SLA?
• When will we notify our customers that we are going to be pushing this update?
• Do we need to do a change control request (CCR)?
• Do we need to do an expedited change control request (ECCR)?
• And finally, when the deadline is due, ask “Are we good?

These updates happen all of the time. It is how Microsoft and every other software developer keeps their software up to date, fixes things and adds new features and benefits. If your organization is in crisis today, fix the root problem and make your organization more efficient at handling patch updates.

Well that means I can use Groove for anything? No - do not use Groove to share large files with employees, customers or contractors. If you have 10 users connected to a shared Groove folder and you put a single 100Mb file in that folder, it is sent to all 10 users. 1Gb of data is sent around. If you then make a small change to that 100Mb file, it is sent back to the server and another 1Gb of data is sent around.

Do not use ZIP files with Groove
Due to the reasons spelled out about, when working with Microsoft Groove, list all of the documents, make your changes, and let Groove handle the compression and synchronization. Do not take groups of files, compress them into a single .ZIP and then place them in a Groove folder. If you unzip the files, make a single change, rezip the folder, and put the new .ZIP file on the server, it will replicate the entire contents. And users will not be able to easily see the changes.

The rule to remember when using Groove is let Groove so what it does best - replicate and synchronize so you can collaborate. Don’t try and over push the system by sharing out mega size documents that you are still working on. Multiple smaller documents works much better than a single large file or even worse a ZIP file

Comfort - These things sit on your head, the can make your ears comfortable or painful, fit around and over your eyeglass frames, or press them into the sides of your heads leaving marks.

Price - unless you are going to keep them at home, and you do not have any children or animals running around the house, you will be buying a new pair soon.

Durability - Unlike high quality headset microphones found in ham radio, recording or professional call centers, home consumer units break. Alot. They break with busted headpieces, mic booms, and more often then the other causes, pulled and frayed wires. Do not expect a lot of durability. And unless you are a hobby ham radio operator or electrician on the side, expect to throw the broken headsets away.

Connector - Do you want the old style RCA jacks or do you want a USB connector? I recommend the USB connector since you can use them on a computer with an open USB jack. The USB units function as a sound card, the headset and the microphone all in one unit. Of course this increases the price and weight.

Weight - You need to try these things on your head and make sure that you are comfortable with them on. Once you put them on, you will probably be leaving them on for hours at a time while on listening to music, on a Vonage call, VOIP, LiveMeeting, conference calls, TeamSpeak, Ventrillo and video gaming.

Microphone features - first does it have a mic at all? Don’t assume that it does. Many models drop the mic and are sold right next to the headset and microphone models. Don’t pick up the wrong package and find out after you drove home.

Mute button - this is a must have feature and something you should check for right away. Does it have a common blue light on, blinking light muted feature? Is there a clear switch for Mute on and Mute off? You do not want to blow your IT career by thinking you are on mute and having your sounds, jokes or remarks carried over to the other participants.

There are other features such as premium stereo sound, surround sound and a variety of other audio features. They serve to rebranda common or standard feature for marketing fluff, or add very little benefit for the average user while raising the manufactures profit margins and your costs.

The headset above were purchased at Staples in Audubon, NJ. They were $24.99. The downside? RCA jacks not USB. But since the computer on my desk has a pair of front mounted RCA jacks, and I will not be travelling with this headet, that works out fine. What were my other options? The runners-up were $39.99 and $49.99 for USB connections and USB and premium headset with extra fluff in the ear pieces. I went cheap because I know the kids will do something with them long before their normal life should have them in the trashcan.

As I took the picture above, I took them off of our three year old and told her not to play with them. My wife just laughed at me.