By Stu on January 6th, 2010
Ok, got the new PC and been prepping it for dev use… Gone swimmingly so far. Now I want to experiment with Virtual PC for Windows 7 (my old PC was not capable of doing this). The only problem is that I have no experience with running a virtual machine and I have had a horrible time finding a walk through. So here is the beginner guide by a beginner for Virtual PC.
- You need to know if you can run Virtual PC. Download and run this application. It will test your computer for processor compatibility.
By Stu on December 31st, 2009
Here is the benchmarks of the new computer verses my old Gateway and my wife’s HP dv9000 laptop. Click the image to get a large view. I used PassMarks’ Performance Test (x64) and the Windows Experience Index to generate the following results.
You can click on the images to get a large image to make it more readable.
Windows Experience Index
New PC (5.9) vs Old PC (2.0) Windows Experience Index. The old PC’s rating comes from the Intel integrated graphics. It is funny that the new PC’s slowest performance rating was the highest on the old PC.
By Stu on December 21st, 2009
So I migrated over the weekend to Windows 7 64 bit over the weekend… So far it is has been a pretty good experience, the install was fast and from a clean install. Since I was on Vista 32 bit (x86) then I had to format the drive and start fresh. No big deal, I have a Windows Home Server, so I just did a standard backup and also moved the important files over to the server.
30-40 minutes later I was finished… Got Microsoft Office, Visual Studio, SQL Express 2008 and even Live Essentials all on the x64 environment. Have to say that was the easiest install I have ever done in the last 20 years of building computers and install operating systems!
I have been getting used to Win7 and needed to do a simple bit of math, so I just pushed the calculator button on my keyboard (Microsoft Natural Ergonomic 4000)….. Then wow a new version of the Calculator (screen shot on the right). Nice looking, definitely must be WPF! Now where it gets nice is in all the new functions. Below is the screen shots….
By Stu on January 14th, 2009
I have gone through the installation of Windows 7 Beta. Like the millions of others, I have notice a nice improvement on the speed of installation. Boot up is fairly fast and is faster than my Vista Laptop. Though to be fair, it is running SQL Express, IIS 7 and a whole host of applications.
What is really impressing is the responsiveness of the UI. Internet Explorer 8 Beta (IE 
is very quick and is rendering web pages better than IE 7. I currently use Fire Fox 3, but that is just due to render speed of IE7 on several of my most visited websites.
By Stu on January 8th, 2009
Steve Ballmer introduced some new things at CES 2009.
- Windows 7 Beta will be available for consumer review Friday.
- Windows Live Essentials is out of beta and will be available for download.
- The Xbox 360 had a great 2008.
- Verizon and Sprint will be offering Live Search on their phones.
- Dell will be the first PC manufacturer pre-installing Live Search and Live Essentials on “most” of their new computers.
- 20 Million Windows Mobile phone sold in the last year.
- 30 Windows Mobile Phones brought to market last year.
Ok, got the new PC and been prepping it for dev use… Gone swimmingly so far. Now I want to experiment with Virtual PC for Windows 7 (my old PC was not capable of doing this). The only problem is that I have no experience with running a virtual machine and I have had a horrible time finding a walk through. So here is the beginner guide by a beginner for Virtual PC.
