So, I was talking with someone recently and noticed they had an SD card sticking in the SD slot on these Lenovo Laptops.    Specifically noticing that I asked him about it to which he replied, that he leveraged that to improve performance by utilizing ReadyBoost! I thought to myself “Wow, that’s a great idea, since it’s just a slot taking up space and often not being used! Why not do this myself!”   So I started offloading my data from this device and then while waiting for it to finish I impatiently went and checked my details for kicking off ReadyBoost and lo and behold, I get this image!    For those of you who know me, you know that I run my Lenovo T61p with Win7 and 2008R2Ent from BootfromVHD images which reside on an SSD.

Apparently, My SSD is so fast (even though it’s running from a VHD) that I cannot gain value from ReadyBoost!

Frankly, that’s pretty damn cool from where I’m standing! :)

What? Seriously? Are you seriously trying to tell me that Calculator is cooler than just ‘watch me add, watch me divide! ooh, scientific view? whatevah!”

Seriously though, it is!  I didn’t even give it a second glance until someone I’m working with here launched it and the world started to shift before my eyes! (Our unspoken voices have been heard?!?)

While on the surface it looks like it always did “oh blah, calc”

When you start to look under the covers, things start to shift and change!@

Sure, Programmer Mode is kind of cool, and even Statistics

But once you turn on Unit Conversion or Date Calculation, we enter near zOMFG territory!

What is the killer? the true Zed in zOMFG?!?! It’s the Worksheets! THIS IS CALC DAMNIT!

So, whoa, wow and check it out! I wonder if they’ve drastically changed any other ‘core’ functionality that we all take for granted!

If you like me simply did the install without any care for the Product Key and you’re getting closer to that ‘doh! I’m going to deactivate soon!’ well, look no further, because it took me a few searches on Microsoft to find this Key Generator of sorts!

Simply visit this site: Windows 7 Release Candidate

Then simply select your Processor type and Language, and you’ll be prompted for your LiveID.

In my case, that meant copying/pasting the URL into IE, and logging in equaled my Product Key

So, get out there, generate your keys and get your Win7 set and running… until 2010 ;)

I know there has been a lot of banter, talk and discussion around Windows 7, and the this, thats and the other.  Well, let me tell you.  Wow, it’s fricking easy.  So simple, your own mother can do it!   What? No, it can’t be that easy!

I’m a technical person, deeply technical.. so technical I’ll sometimes make things take many times longer than it should to get done, as I not only understand it in massive depth, but also try to make sure we’re subscribing to the simplest path to that solution, so it’s worth it for a little bit up front for long term viability.

Want to setup WIN7 on your own? Want it to be an easy journey? How about on a NetBook? I opt’d to go for this video.    I did find some great videos on edge.technet.net however, in the threads which followed, they frankly left too open to interpretation of people ‘confused’ of how it was done, and confusion is not what I seek.

So, instead I direct you to uniquefree who produced this video!  I followed it to see how viable it worked, 15 minutes later, I had a brand new NetBook running Win7.

So, props are given where they’re due.   No external app downloads required, if you have the iso extracted, just copy the files in the same fashion he advises with Xcopy and you’re done.  Install complete and ready to go.   Can’t go wrong!

Welcome to AmeriTeach, where Education, wine and cheese come to meet! (They had wine and cheese tasting, mixed with the finest in Technology solutions and training!)

If the sign is any indicator.. if you can find AmeriTeach, you’re definitely going to find winners, like Shannon Bray above.

The room was packed to the gills while people attended, watched and competed in Are You Certifiable!   Chris Rue and Joanne Lin put on a spectacular show while Elise Eckel on the keyboard ran the spinner!    While not every person who plays the game gets all the answers right, everyone walks away from the game a winner! Both in prizes they earn just for playing, as well as the education they walk away with and the knowledge for years to come!

Joey Snow does have a way of getting people interested in Win7! While giving his presentation on Win7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, someone in the crowd even started an install of Win7! (Okay, that was me, and I did an in-place upgrade of Windows Vista! … On my production machine! ;))   Sometimes though, when presenters are naughty like Tjeerd, they have to be put into the naughty room behind bars.   Shameful Tjeerd, Shameful!

One of the best parts about this presentation and all presentations for that matter is the community interaction.   The gentleman on the left provided some excellent questions and all around insight from his perspective, to be followed by Shannon Bray who went indepth.

Shannon Bray, a Senior Solutions Architect for Qortex is an IT Professional Extraordinaire! He holds his MCT, MCPD, MCTS and more so than that, he also holds a wealth of industry knowledge and experience (@noidentity29 on twitter!) !   During Liberty’s session on Certification, Shannon was able to provide insight into Hiring Managers and Certification.   Like many hiring managers, Shannon looks for Certification as proof of not only your knowledge of technology but your investment in yourself, while you may not have the Certification of what they’re hiring for, merely having a certification shows that you raise yourself above the rest and you’re one who is worth investing in.    We all appreciate Shannon’s insight directly from the field as I see it from hiring managers quite often.    Having skills and having those skills validated is something which stands out on resumes and furthermore allows you to stand out in the industry.

I’d like to thank again the fine folks of AmeriTeach for organizing this great event and the turn out was amazing.    The attendance was stellar and everyone had a wonderful time while attending various sessions, drinking wine, eating cheese and winning swag!   Thanks AmeriTeach and thank you Denver Colorado for being so hospitable!