Month: October 2011

Updates for SharePoint Foundation 2010

If you are running SharePoint Foundation 2010 on Windows Home Server, this post is for you.

Microsoft has released some updates for SharePoint that you may or may not have seen through Windows Update. If you have not updated, then I would advise that you do, as the base version of SharePoint Foundation can be woefully out of date.

The updates that you will want to install (as of October 26, 2011):

– SharePoint Foundation Service Pack 1 – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=0F56EBFB-183F-4F4D-9D41-DF1E5ACEB893

– June 2011 Cumulative Update (must be installed after Service Pack 1 and after installation reboot before installing next update) – Click here

– August 2011 Cumulative Update – Click here

NOTE: After each update, you must re-run the SharePoint 2010 Products Configuration Wizard to apply the update to your installation. This means you must run wizard three times before your installation is fully patched.

Update to Installing SharePoint Foundation 2010 on Windows Home Server

Tonight, I have released an update to the how-to guide, Installing SharePoint Foundation 2010 on Windows Home Server.

The guide can be found here. Please note even though the post says first draft, the PDF link and the Scribd document have been updated.

The following updates have been included:

– Grammatical errors have been addressed

– Corrected directions to prevent users from seeing an error message similar to the one below. When asked for credentials during the SharePoint database creation process, they must be entered in the form of servernameusername.

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Technorati Tags: Microsoft,Windows,Office,Windows Home Server,Windows Home Server 2011,SharePoint

Here’s an APPortunity to Go Mango!

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Microsoft has a really cool new promotion running that I thought I’d let everyone know about.

It’s called GO Mango!, and it’s designed for you phone developers out there to design and develop apps for Windows Phone 7.

For every app you submit, you’ll receive an entry to win a Samsung Series 7 Slate, and for every five apps you submit, you can win free advertising for one app of your choice.

If you have not developed for Windows Phone before, here’s a link to the Windows Phone SDK, http://bit.ly/GoMango.

To participate in this promotion, you need two things. The first, an app that you’ve developed, and the second is the ever important promo code. For this promotion, the code is 8UCVN.

Fill out the form located at http://bit.ly/MangoOffer, include the promo code, and submit your app today!

Fix for servers with Exchange 2007 / 2010 and Internet Explorer 9 installed

If you are a Small Business Server 2008 or 2011 user, you have Internet Explorer 9 installed on your server, and you try to close the Exchange Management Console, you may encounter an error similar to the one listed below.

You must close all dialog boxes before you can close Exchange Management Console

Microsoft has released a fix for this issue and I’ve included the download links below. In order to install this fix, you must have the latest updates installed from Microsoft Update as of October 11th, 2011. If you have not updated your server(s), do so before installing this patch.

If you are not experiencing this issue, it is advised that you don’t install this patch, as it has not been as thoroughly tested, and is planned to be rolled up into a future Internet Explorer update.

For Windows Server 2008 / Small Business Server 2008 systems – click here

For Windows Server 2008 R2 / Small Business Server 2011 systems – click here

Microsoft Knowledge Base Article #: 2624899

A server for the home or small business

After having used such servers as the HP MediaSmart Server, the HP Proliant MicroServer, and various Dell servers, I decided to set out to see if I could build my own server for a reasonable cost with features I desired.

The intent of this build is to showcase a server that can be used in the home with Windows Home Server 2011 (yes, this build is somewhat overkill), and in home based / small businesses, with Small Business Server 2011 Essentials or Small Business Server 2011 Standard.

My requirements were as follows:

· Total cost could not exceed $1500. (Ideally, I wanted to stay at or below $1000.)

· All parts used must be server grade. By that I mean, must have 3-5 year warranty depending on part, and similar to parts used by the major server manufacturers.

· Must support future expandability. Must support large amounts of memory and case used must support addition of multiple hard drives.

· With Windows 8 and Windows 8 Server on the horizon, processor support for Second Level Address Translation (SLAT) and hardware virtualization were key to this build.

So what parts did I use?

· Antec VSK-2450 Mid Tower Case

· Intel Server Board S1200BTS

· Intel Xeon Processor E3-1230 (3.2GHz, 8MB Cache)

· Kingston 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 ECC RAM

· Western Digital RE4 Enterprise 1.0TB Hard Drive

Specs as configured:

· Intel Server Board S1200BTS

· 16GB ECC DDR3 RAM

· (1) 1.0TB Western Digital RE4 Enterprise Hard Drive

· Intel Xeon E3-1230 Processor

How does this build stack up to my requirements?

· Total cost: $1050+tax. I bought all the parts I needed from a local vendor instead of online and was willing to pay a bit more because of it. It is entirely possible to find these parts for cheaper online, but if you can, support your local businesses.

· Warranties on all parts are at least three years. Western Digital’s warranty is five years on enterprise hard drives, and on memory Kingston has a lifetime warranty.

· From an expandability standpoint, the case allows for up to 6 hard drives, the motherboard allows for 6 SATA connections, and the motherboard supports a maximum of 32GB of RAM.

· The processor used in this build supports hardware virtualization and SLAT, or as Intel calls it, Extended Page Tables. When looking for an Intel-based processor to be used for virtualization I suggest ensuring that it supports Intel-VT and Extended Page Tables. The Intel ARK tool, http://ark.intel.com, is a great resource for that type of information.

In the coming weeks, I’ll be showcasing more about what this server can do.