The good news is that Windows XP Service Pack 3 can make your XP-loaded computer
run
faster. The bad news is...well, as many of you know by now, there's been
a lot of bad news. Or maybe you don't know, because your computer keeps
rebooting
endlessly or just blue screens when you try to install SP3. (Redmond is
deflecting
blame for the problems already.)
Yeah, we know; service packs are tricky, and we should expect some snafus with
installing them. And these problems probably aren't affecting the majority of
SP3 installs and might really not be Microsoft's fault.
But still. It's an XP service pack! XP! You know, the tried and true operating
system that we all love, the one that's been around as long as most of us care
to remember, the one that we're all hanging onto while shunning Vista. And it's
a service pack, not a new product -- and not just any service pack, but an SP
that Microsoft delayed
for what seemed like forever so that it would be just right when it came out.
Well, so much for all that. Yet again, another release from Microsoft causes
headaches for partners and customers -- and this one should've been fairly straightforward.
We're not pointing the finger of blame here, just venting a bit on behalf of
all the folks who are struggling to get SP3 to work properly, or at all. Really,
this stuff gets ridiculous after a while, doesn't it?
Of course, if we were conspiracy-minded, we might believe that Microsoft sabotages
XP SP3 in order to get users to dump XP altogether and move to Vista. But, of
course, we don't believe that because it's a completely ridiculous notion. Still,
it's fun to imagine that SP3's woes might be linked to something more sinister
than snafus with chip makers' products or some other OEM-related issue. In any
case, it can take your mind off of all those reboots, at least for a few minutes.
Have any XP SP3 horror stories? Share them at [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/13/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
If you can't get XP SP3 to work, at least take some solace in the fact that
it's a
light
Patch Tuesday this month.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/13/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
In case you're wondering what's going on here, welcome to a special edition
of RCPU dedicated to unified communications. UC is one of those categories everybody
loves to talk (and write) about, but the truth is that there still seems to
be a lot of confusion about what exactly it is and who's doing what in it.
We're not here to explain all that -- not today, anyway -- but simply to point
out that for all the hype it gets, UC is still very much an emerging space with
a jumble of vendors, many very large, competing for both partners and customers.
Strictly speaking, we're not even the ones pointing that out; analyst firm Infonetics
Research is, with a survey of customers that shows that no
vendor has stepped up as a UC leader...yet.
Who will grab the brass ring? It's way too early to say for a lot of reasons.
Microsoft and Cisco seem like the two most likely candidates for market domination,
but each is taking a technological approach that's very
different from the other's, so there's the strong possibility that somebody
could lose big time. More likely, though, they'll carve up the market and edge
out (or absorb) lesser competitors the way big vendors usually do.
Before any of that happens, though, companies (and partners) are going to have
to figure out exactly what they're going to do with UC. IDC says that UC
is still misunderstood, like a surly teen or a tortured artist...or, more
likely, like a technology that hasn't been around that long and doesn't yet
entirely make sense to its market.
The big analyst firm (and RCPU's neighbor in suburban Boston) is going to have
a conference in New York in June to try to sort out this UC thing, but we're
guessing that we're at least a couple of years away from UC shaking out as a
market and even as a clear value proposition to most companies. In the meantime,
the best partners can do is probably to watch trends in the technology, follow
what vendors are coming out with and, of course, talk to their customers about
what they need as far as communications capabilities go.
In other words, if you don't know exactly what you're doing with UC right now,
don't panic...yet. Things are still shaking out, and you haven't yet been lost
in the shuffle. The whole thing is still a little bit of a mess.
What's your UC strategy? Do you have one yet? Have you bought into a vendor's
world view? Send your answers to [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/09/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
Dig with us, if you will, a paragraph from
this
press release from Cisco and Nokia:
"To meet the market demands for seamless mobile convergence solutions,
more than 95 reseller partners have received dual certification from Cisco
and Nokia on the combined mobile unified communication solution. Certified
channel partners include Telindus, Computacenter, Dimension Data, E2E, Lutech
NextiraOne Italia, Touchbase, and T-systems."
What's that? Dimension Data? We know that Dimension Data is a big-shot in the
Microsoft partner program...and here it is turning up in a Cisco press release.
It just goes to show that UC vendors are battling now for great partners, and
that great partners should be able to figure out a way to take advantage of
vendors' -- possibly multiple vendors' -- overtures.
UC is one of the few categories of technology that still has a Wild West feel.
Let's enjoy it (and profit from it) while it lasts.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/09/2008 at 1:22 PM1 comments
Gartner's U.K. operation, old chap, maintains that UC should not be about reducing
IT costs. Yes, you read that correctly. The lads (and lasses) at the big analyst
firm think that UC
should
be about "business agility" and gets into some of the capabilities
that it feels can help businesses achieve that goal.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/09/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
The VMware program just keeps getting better. Check out the press release
here.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/08/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
Really, the title of this entry says it all, but you can read more
here.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/08/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
The company that's based in New England and misspells the name of a Massachusetts
town in its name has a new version of its network-management software. An almost
overwhelming feature list is
here.
And, yes, English readers, we know that you had a
town
called Ipswich first.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/07/2008 at 1:22 PM1 comments
So, supposedly this Xobni company has a tool that improves Outlook. We're listening
-- as are a lot of other people, including the austere
New York Times,
which gives Xobni and its young founders the
full
feature-story treatment.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/07/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
Another short RCPU today, as duty calls at the mothership. It doesn't really
matter, though, because we're in a news trough. About all there is to talk about
is Microsoft flailing around looking to buy a Web company like a nerdy guy trying
to find a dance partner at a junior high cotillion.
Now that Microsoft has backed
off of Yahoo, Redmond is whispering
in AOL's ear. Yes, that's right -- AOL. Please try to contain your laughter.
This is a professional environment, mostly.
It's surely all a bid to make
Yahoo jealous, though -- and it
might be working. Whatever. We figure that Microsoft and Yahoo will end
up together at some point, just as the nerdy guy and the pretty girl usually
do in the movies. Of course, those movies never show what happens next, and
that could be the ugly part for Microsoft and Yahoo if they do hook up.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/07/2008 at 1:22 PM1 comments
It'll let you run your Intel-based Mac run Windows (and Linux), although why
you'd want your
Mac
to run Windows, we really don't know.
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/07/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments
FYI: You're in for some exceptionally short RCPUs this week because your editor
is still on (or, perhaps, over) deadline for
RCP the magazine. We'll
resume normal service next week (hopefully) with plenty of verbosity.
In the meantime, thank goodness we can put this Microsoft-Yahoo thing to bed...at
least, for now. With Microsoft having dropped
its bid for Yahoo (over the weekend -- nice one, Redmond), it's all over
but the shouting and the endless speculation
and analysis.
Fine with us. We stopped following the gritty details of this non-deal weeks
-- uh, oh dear, months -- ago, when it became obvious to us that partners didn't
care much about it and that all the "insider" dribble spilled in print
and posted on the Web was pretty
much meaningless.
So Microsoft is still way behind Google in search and all of its various revenue
streams. OK, fine. Nothing has changed there, and it probably wasn't going to,
anyway. We're more concerned about issues such as Microsoft's SaaS efforts,
which seem to be progressing, and the big server rollout that could put lots
of dough in partner pockets.
In fact, the only reason this entry is leading off RCPU is because it's dominating
tech news today to the extent that there's almost nothing else to write about.
So, consider this the Seinfeld of RCPU entries -- it's an entry about nothing.
And nothing is exactly what all the Microsoft-Yahoo talk led to.
Have a thought on Microsoft's Web future? Send it to [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on 05/06/2008 at 1:22 PM0 comments