The Microsoft MVP Summit: 2010

By on February 10, 2010 in News

Next week is the Microsoft MVP summit (my first, and hopefully not my last!) in the Seattle area of the state of Washington.  Terry is not going this year; perhaps he wishes to be around home and be part of the developments surrounding child #1?  Just remember, Terry, kids are like kittens and puppies: they grow up to be …  icon wink The Microsoft MVP Summit: 2010

Anyway, moving right along, going to this summit is going to be like going to CES to me.  Sitting in (boring?) meetings all day is only part of the reason I am going.  The other part (like CES) is meeting all those more famous (than I) MVP’s that I read and hear about, but have never met.  As well as meeting those Microsoft employee’s I have exchanged emails with over the past year, but have never met.  That should be a good time!

Which now brings me to the most important aspect of We Got Served, the reader.  You!  We have had a few power packs between last year and now.  But the BIG news, of course, is the leaked CTP4 and the renewed interest in Vail.

How much of the map to a Vail beta and release will be revealed is unknown.  I have a few questions to ask, but this is YOUR opportunity to add a comment or 2 below to ask questions you would like answers to.  I can pose the questions to the MS-WHS powers-that-be.  How many they will answer and/or how many answers they will let me share with you is quite uncertain.  Actually, if I can’t share with you, they probably won’t share with me either!

I just hope the aforementioned leak does not throw a wrench into communication.

What actually goes on at an MVP summit?  Registration, keynotes and various sessions.  Some of those sessions are optional, some directed toward “your award expertise”.  Expertise?  I’m just one of those people who know just enoungh about some things to be dangerous.  Regarding the actual sessions, that is about all I can say as most of what goes on are covered by NDA’s.  I think…

But once again, let me stress that this is your opportunity to (hopefully) get the ear of some the Microsoft WHS hierarchy.  Leave a question in a comment below and I will present them to Microsoft.  The answers I receive may consist of:

  • silence from MS
  • here is an answer, but I can’t share
  • here is an answer, and I can share

At least I *should* be able to share that type of information!

Or if you simply want me to pass along a comment, I will be happy to do that also.


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About Jim Clark

Hello. I’m from the heartland of the U.S. Lots of corn and beans, although Iowa is a lot more than just farmland. It also has a few computer enthusiasts (no, not me!). I’ve been around PCs since I got my 1st PC XT aloooong time ago. WGS is one of the first sites I found centered around WHS. And the best. Every once in awhile, I do get away from the KB and enjoy time with and my wife and our 4 kids. And I do have a day job.
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  • http://intensedebate.com/people/tezzer Terry Walsh

    Two trips to the US in December and January, plus impending baby duties (12 weeks to go!) means that I'm sitting this summit out, unfortunately!

    Hope you all have a great summit and looking forward to reading whatever you can share here in the UK!

  • Rychek

    One question that is on many a WHS user's mind is what has been done in Vail to mitigate video streaming degradation due to demigrator.exe bandwidth usage?

  • Bryan

    What about Zune and tv tuner integration?

  • Rick

    I would really like to see better Windows Media Center integration. If you are serving all of your files from the server, you should be able to use your xbox to connect to your sever as a WMC server.

  • http://www.muzzas.co.uk james Murray

    I would like to see WHS ADDINN for Sky Drive

  • Earle

    How 'bout an upgrade version of Vail? Sure would be a nice gesture to the WHS enthusiast community…

  • mmaestro

    Probably not something that they'll be able to answer, because I suspect it's not that kind of summit, but when are they going to start marketing some of this stuff? I don't think most consumers are even aware that WHS or Zune exist!

  • Boontonflyer

    Have seen comments in "leaked items" that the next version of WHS will require a minimum of 2 GHz processor speed. If that is the case that would preclude a great number of existing WHS's (home built and Vendor built) that either have lower frequency processors OR have lower frequency processors that are socketless (ie soldered in). Most of these are probably Atom 230's (1.66 GHz). This would apparently preclude this portion of the existing WHS base from upgrading to the new WHS software.
    Would like to know if you can get some feeling for MS's position on this issue.

    Thanks,

    Paul

  • fasthair

    HI Jim,____I’ve got a one or three.____1: Will there be a public beta of Vail? I think that will be the answer number 2 : ) I think part of the success of Windows 7 is because of the public beta. Not only because it flushed out bugs and made the release the great product it is but it generated tons of desire for the new OS.____2: Will we see Media Center in Vail? I’m sure that will be answer number 2 also : ( A lot of great things are in Vail now, server backup, media streaming via the web ect… But let’s face it, this is the most requested feature people want and ask for. Plus you add in the fact people and Microsoft want WHS to be the media hub of the house this just seems like a no brainer to me. ____3: What if any plans are there for the upgrade path to Vail? I think I know the answer to this one too. None. Honestly though this is a very low priority for me. ____4: How do you install add-ins with CTP4? : ) I know I know… answer number 1…____If you happen to get snowed in in my town give me a yell and we’ll go knock back a few colds and find some good dead cow to eat. Enjoy your trip!!!____fasthair

    • http://intensedebate.com/people/Jim_Clark Jim_Clark

      iirc, I fly from CR to Minneapolis to Seattle. 6:30AM flight! It was either leave at that time and get there at a reasonable time (is 11:00AM reasonable?) or leave later (and pay more!) and not get in 'till 7-8PM. Which means I bypass Des Moines!

      Coming back is thru Denver, so who knows… If I were diverted to DM, want to pick me at Midnight?? :D

      • fasthair

        Midnight? depends on how much swag you can pass along and how many of the above questions you can answer :)

        fasthair

  • http://twitter.com/welchwerks @welchwerks

    O how i like that upgrade idea !!! WHS 2.0 (Vail) how about integrating sharepoint add-in as well

    my upgraded EX470 can handle it , i swear!!

  • Mike

    I would love more details on what the media center functionality might be – ideally at least I want to be able to stream to any PC in the house and over the internet (maybe to a mobile device).

    I would also like to know what some of the differences between the two versions will be? And will we be charged a premium for the premium version? Honestly, $100 was enough for WHS version 1 …

    Having WHS be the central point to send and receive email would be great – I don’t know if there are any plans for that, but having email clients just connect to WHS would be cool. I would love to be able to stream applications from WHS too – but I doubt that there are any plans for that …

    Lastly how do Microsoft envisage that users will migrate WHS data to Vail?

  • Tom

    Is there any sign of a fix for the 64-bit connector on Win7 repeatedly announcing "passwords do not match" ?
    I've tried all the suggestions – none work in my case

  • Mike

    Also how about a 64 bit restore CD?

    Backup linux PCs? Yeah you can hope eh?

    Live mesh integration? Live mesh for linux (or at least ubuntu)? :p

    • Tom

      Hi Mike – I have no probs with live mesh on my WHS – admittedly, I only use it to sync my IE favourites across all my pcs and my WHS

      • http://www.thenolands.com Chris Noland

        you should use xmarks (old foxmarks) for bookmarks sync, it works really good

  • http://www.thenolands.com Chris Noland

    I really would like to know when Vail is coming out and what are the main new features planned. This better be so far down the pipeline that new changes are really small… so I don't want to ask for anything just time lines and what do they have cooked up. This said I doubt they are going to announce the planned date that you guys can communicate :-(

  • Andrew Edney

    Hi Jim

    Have a great time and enjoy your first summit.

    Just remember that pertty much the entire summit is covered by your NDA – 3 people were kicked out last year for talking about stuff!

    Have fun mate.

    Andrew

    • http://intensedebate.com/people/Jim_Clark Jim_Clark

      NDA: pretty much stated right up front. I completely respect the right of MS to hold us to NDAs on what may not even be *wet* cement yet. As bloggers, we also have a duty inform our readers (when allowed to do so) of general direction.

      When many readers are sitting on a fence on current purchases because they are concerned about future compatibility, I feel an obligation to point this out to MS. It is simply unfortunate that the specifics may simply not be nailed down enough to provide useful info to the readership.

      And, yes, I do hope to have a good time! Even after my wife looks at me and asks me "How much is this going to cost US?" :)

      • http://usingwindowshomeserver.com Andrew Edney

        Jim

        I dont disagree with you at all on what you are saying, but having been to 2 summits in the past and spent several days each time with the WHS team we have never been able to talk about anything straight away – in fact there has been stuff we are STILL not allowed to talk about.

        I just wanted to warn you to be careful, even little things last year in the general sessions got those 3 MVPs kicked out of the MVP program for tweeting!

        Andrew

        • http://intensedebate.com/people/Jim_Clark Jim_Clark

          I know, as a newbie, I have a lot to learn! :) hmm. Tweets? The only thing I tweet are my posts here, so that should not get me in trouble.

          During a post writeup, I usually have enough time to question myself on how to state certain things. ;)

  • http://usingwindowshomeserver.com Andrew Edney

    :-)

    just have fun mate – you will soon figure out what you can and cant say, and it will mainly, if not all be cant unfortunately.

    if in doubt, ask the team and/or your MVP lead, that way you are covered if someone gets stroppy :-)

    Andrew

  • http://www.myjvk.com Jeremy

    I have a general question… does Microsoft see the Home Server as the media hub of the house? I envision throwing one of those new cable card tuners into my server and sharing the tuners on the network. Will Microsoft enable this functionality in the future? Also one other question, will Microsoft more aggressively market the WHS product in the future? Thanks for the opprotunity to feed you questions… good luck!