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CES: Gates touts the home server (CNET coverage)

I can finally let go the part-time IT administrator at the house (that would be me): Bill Gates is showing off the new Windows Home Server. CNET has coverage today of “a consumer device to serve as a central storage place for digital photos, music and other media. The first products are due out later this year from Hewlett-Packard and others. The goal is to get devices that can cost less than $500.”


CNET has an interview with Bill and asks why people will want (or need) to have a server in their home (or even a small business). One challenge has been that the technology, maintenance and upkeep of a server were beyond the abilities of regular consumers, and CNET digs right into that question:



Click for galleryQ: One of the things you are talking about at CES is a new home server? Why does the average home need a server?


Gates: If you have got multiple PCs, then you want files that are available all the time no matter which PCs are turned on or off, and you’d also like to have a server that when you just add just add storage it automatically takes advantage of that. You don’t have to think about drive names or moving files around.


In fact you get redundancy so that even if you have physical failures you have recoverability.


Does that mean that every home is going to need a server administrator?
Gates: No it’s important to look hard at what the focus of that device has been, which is the easy setup and no ongoing need to worry about it at all. Remote access has been hard to set up. We’ve focused in on that. Making it so that it is all recoverable has been hard. Adding storage has been hard. We feel great about what we’ve done in this product. We think it is a real leadership product. Homes with multiple PCs will find it very attractive.

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“For DST, do I just adjust my clock in the control panel?”

As I mentioned earlier — and just in time for the upcoming changes to daylight saving time that affects many products and services — we have a newly renovated DST 2007 website. (http://www.microsoft.com/dst2007 in case the hyperlink fails.) My posts sparked this question from a reader:



“When I travel, I just change the clock in the Control Panel. So shouldn’t I just change the clock when the new DST rules kick in?” 


No, no, no…


First off, for current Windows XP systems, an update is available for your computer for machines that subscribe to Automatic Update. So your PC will automatically compensate for the new DST changes. (The exception to the rule: older computers with Windows 95/98/ME, where you may choose to not use DST and manually set the clock on the new DST ‘spring forward’ and ‘fall back’ dates.) 


But when you travel, you should change the time zone to the city or area (or country) you’re visiting. If you just set your system clock to the local time, then your actual time will be off (not to mention the jet lag).


For example, let’s say I’m in Redmond, and I fly to New York. My PC is normally set to the Pacific Time Zone (which is GMT -8:00hrs). the Pacific Time Zone (which is GMT -8:00hrs). If I just set my clock to the local time in Manhattan (by right clicking on the clock display, or through the “Date and Time Properties” control panel), which is three hours later than Seattle (GMT -5:00hrs), my clock will appear correct but I’ll be three hours late for all my meetings because my time zone is still set to Pacific.


What’s worse, let’s say it’s 11:00pm Pacific when I make the change: if I move the clock ahead to 2:00am and don’t adjust the date, by clock will be a day behind as I’ve adjucted the clock before the date advances.


If I set just the time zone to Eastern, then all will be fine: my clock will be correct for NYC, and any meetings I have on my computer (or that I schedule in Outlook) will be correct. Here’s more help and tips on time zones, Daylight Saving Time, and e-mail in Windows XP. Now, that won’t fix being late for meetings due to other reasons…


The Office team has a good article describing how to use and set time zones here — you can not only adjust your master time zone when you travel, but you can add a second time zone to be displayed in the Outlook 2007 calendar (handy if you work regularly with a particular international city). From the article…



Dual time zone“You can add and display a second time zone in Outlook, which can be useful when you are scheduling meetings or conference calls with people who are working in other time zones. When you add a second time zone, the current time in the primary time zone is highlighted with a color gradient to make it easier to see.


“If two time zones are shown, the meeting organizer’s time zone is used as the reference point. If you organize a meeting and display free/busy time for invitees from other time zones, their busy times are adjusted so that they are displayed correctly in your time zone. The second time zone is visible only when you view the calendar in day or week view.”


 


The article also notes that start and end times for Outlook Calendar items are stored in the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) format… I’ve heard people refer to GMT, UT and UTC all as the same thing, but they’re not. Interestingly enough, it’s Universal Time (UT) which replaced GMT, not UTC. Somewhat depressing, as I enjoy listening to the broadcasters on BBC World News (on NPR, often on my drive home) talk about the current time in GMT: “UT” just doesn’t create the same feeling. 😉


This from the Wiki…



“(UT is) a timescale based on the rotation of the Earth. It is a modern continuation of the Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), i.e., the mean solar time on the meridian of Greenwich, England, which is the conventional 0-meridian for geographic longitude. GMT is sometimes used, incorrectly, as a synonym for UTC. The old GMT has been split, in effect into UTC and UT1.”


More information:



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New updated page for coming Daylight Saving Time (DST) 2007 changes

As I noted here and here previously, the kick off for daylight saving time (DST) is changing this spring (2007). The start and end dates for the United States will transition to comply with the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (a US gov’t web site link). In short, DST dates in the United States will start three weeks earlier (2:00 A.M. on the second Sunday in March) and will end one week later (2:00 A.M. on the first Sunday in November).


In general, computer systems should be updated to reflect the new DST rules. For most customers, this means applying software patches to select Microsoft products, including various releases of the Microsoft Windows servers and operating systems, Microsoft Office and other applications. In a few important cases, customers must take more considered action, as outlined on our newly renovated DST 2007 website. (http://www.microsoft.com/dst2007) This public page on the Microsoft.com site will be revised regularly to include new product updates, compatibility information and links to Knowledge Base articles.


At the office and at home, my machines that subscribe to Automatic Update (which is all of our Window XP machines at home) received the Windows update, and my Windows Vista machines was just updated, too. 


Many Microsoft applications derive date and time information from the system clock, which “reads” the date and time information from the underlying operating system that it resides, so the changes need only be made to that underlying system. So you may not need to update many applications on your PC – check with your vendor to see if an update is required. For Microsoft products, many updates will be released through a combination of channels including Knowledge Base articles, Windows Update, Microsoft Update, Windows Server Update Services (WSUS), and the Microsoft Download Center.


Want to find out the accurate time in the US? Go to http://www.time.gov/ and select your time zone.


Select a time zone



“This public service is cooperatively provided by the two time agencies of the United States: a Department of Commerce agency, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and its military counterpart, the U. S. Naval Observatory (USNO). Readings from the clocks of these agencies contribute to world time, called Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). The time maintained by both agencies should never differ by more than 0.000 0001 seconds from UTC (see recent comparisons).”


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Of interest: Black eyed peas on New Year’s… or rotten herring?

My family in the South believe in eating black eyed peas on New Year’s day to bring luck for the new year. A good recipe for New Year’s Day Black-eyed Peas can be found here, ‘though this year I’ll be making Black-Eyed Pea and Ham Hock soup.


Better than the Swedish Surströmming my crazy and wonderful friends in Sweden introduced me to many years ago. Washed down with liberal amounts of Aqua Vit, of course.


Happy New Year!

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FYI: Xbox 360 extended warranties go into effect after the first year

I mentioned earlier that the Xbox 360 now has a one year warranty. I also read on the Xbox forums that there was a little confusion WRT how extended warranties purchased by customers would be recognized.


Well, I received a confirmation today from the Xbox team that, for customers who purchased an extended warranty on their Xbox 360, the warranty extension they purchased (the one- or two-year extension, I think) will take effect after the first year. So, my understanding is that customers who purchased a two-year extended warranty will now be covered for a total of three years from the date of purchase.


I believe that the Xbox team will make this more clear on the web site and the warranty pages in the near future. Hope this helps.


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