Software RAID-1 in Windows server has a pitfall worth remembering: redundancy is working only when Windows is booted and is up & running. When machine is booting, it loads the OS from whichever drive is selected as first in the boot order in BIOS. If failing drive happens to be the first - the one from which Windows Server boots up, then two things needs to be done:
- BIOS settings have to be changed so that healthy secondary drive is used for booting, and
- Secondary Plex has to be selected as a default boot drive in Windows Startup & Recovery configuration.

Having Hyper-V adds even one more step. Hyper-V does something as the boot time, and is apparently enabled only on the first drive in the boot sequence. After you have made healthy secondary drive the first in boot sequence, secondary drive's boot routine needs to be manually adjusted to include loading Hyper-V, or you will get the dreaded, useless "Virtual machine could not be started because the hypervisor is not running" error when starting a virtual machine. To update your newly-selected boot drive for loading Hyper-V, run a Command Prompt as Administrator and execute following command:

bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype auto

Reboot the server again - this time your secondary drive is bootable as far as BIOS concerned, secondary plex is used to boot windows, and Hyper-V is made to be loaded from the secondary drive too.

Update: here's a very good walk-through of setting up BIOS on Intel chipset motherboard for OCZ SSD RAID array.

Since I was about to clean up my system anyway, I decided not only to install Windows 7, but also bite the bullet and get two SSD drives and put them into striped RAID configuration. I did it last weekend and yes, rumors are true: the performance boost you get from SSDs, especially from RAID-0 SSDs is by far the most noticeable and exciting in a generation. (From this point on, spindle hard drives are entering their twilight years, and pretty soon they will be where CRT displays are now.) It's kind of perverse, but perf improvement is so drastic that it now takes less time for Windows to boot than for the motherboard to finish the POST!

Here are points that might be useful for those trying to do similar setup.

- Not every SSD drive can be used in RAID configuration. At this point you need to stick with SSD drives having Indilinx controller. 60GB MLC drives like OCZ Vertex, Corsair Extreme, and OCZ Agility (the one I got, see the review) - are all reasonably priced and will work well with mainstream motherboards-based RAID controllers, like Intel Matrix RAID. Two of these drives cost just a little over what single 128GB drive costs, but two 64GB drives give you two controllers, twice the amount of on the drive cache, and connection to two separate SATA channels, all of which delivers much better performance than a single 128GB drive for about the same amount of money.

- Windows 7 does have Intel Matrix RAID driver, so no need to do the F6 thing to load it during windows installation.

- If you are putting your drives into a desktop machine, you will need mounting brackets to fit 2.5" drives into 3.5" bays.

- Since both Windows 7 and SSD drives are relatively new products, load the latest BIOS for your motherboard before you even connect your drives for the first time. It's also a good idea to get a relatively recent motherboard and ensure your mobo does indeed have RAID functionality. For example, if your motherboard has Intel chipset, letter "R" in ICH10R "south bridge" chip name seems to indicate presence of RAID support.

- If your motherboard has Intel Matrix RAID, change BIOS settings to make sure you put your on-board SATA controller into RAID mode. It actually should be called AHCI+RAID, because RAID is still AHCI. Non-RAID SATA drives may still be used when SATA controller in RAID mode with no problem at all.

- Even though Windows 7 comes ready for SSD drives, tweaks like disabling SSD drive indexing will improve either drives' longevity or system performance. Also, Windows 7 may not see the RAID group as 100% SSD. What it means is that when Win7 realizes there is an SSD drive in the system, it's supposed to automatically turn off superfetch and disk defragmentation. In my case it did turn off disk defrag for my SSD RAID volume, but didn't turn off superfetch - maybe because I have a couple of regular hard drives also connected (although not members of the RAID array).

- If you wonder whether ATA Trim command (that helps to maintain SSD drives' performance) is going to work in RAID configuration, then the answer is not yet. Currently, the choices for SSDs connected to Intel matrix raid controller are either RAID, or TRIM, but not both together. The reason for that is Intel Matrix Storage Manager (MSM) driver does not pass through TRIM command - only MS SATA and IDE drivers for Windows 7 do. So for TRIM one needs to use Microsoft drivers, which do not support MSM RAID. So if you do RAID, you will need to use Intel MSM driver, and wait for some future version of MSM that can support TRIM in at least in RAID-0 and RAID-1 configurations.

- Next version of OCZ firmware for Agility and Vertex SSD drives is expected to have background "garbage collection" built in, which is supposed to reset NAND cells while drives are idling.

Here's a very good post about SSDs on Windows 7, plus an absolute must-read article about most popular SSD drives from AnandTech.com.

ATTO benchmarks:
Take a look a all-important 4KB transfer rates (most common case for non-server scenarios) - it does astonishing 178MB/s writes and 180MB/s reads:

Compare it with 53MB/s writes and 35MB/s reads of $440-worth, fastest 120GB MLC drive - OCZ Vertex Turbo:


...or with arguably the best SSD drive there is - $800 Intel X-25E SLC drive - it does 104MB/s writes and 120MB/s reads on 4KB block size:

I was happy with the phone (despite its sub-par sound quality in both Skype and regular line modes) primarily because it has Skype contacts right on the handset screen and because I got it deeply discounted. Recently I noticed that the device fails during Skype conversations, displaying "no PC" icon as if it had its USB cable disconnected from the PC. However, the unit can be brought back up by a simple power-off, power-on cycle of the phone's base. I would tolerate these problems if they happened once in a while, but with this device 90% of my Skype conversations were cut short, so the phone is going back to Thompson for replacement. Replacement procedure has both bright and dark spots. The good part, reps pick up the phone right away, without having you to go through the maze of phone menu. The bad part, the phone you have to dial is not toll-free, and I was told that the turnaround time could 4 to 6 weeks, depending on replacement units availability.

Update - May 26, 2009: It's been about six weeks since I sent in the phone for replacement. And because I have not received a new unit, I contacted Thompson and they said it's been about four weeks since they received the item from me, and that I will have to wait for about 2 more weeks before they send the replacement in. Overall, if you need to have a warranted item replaced by Thomson, prepare to wait for 2+ months for it.

Update - June 30, 2009: I finally got the replacement. Seems to be working so far, but it took more than two months from the time I sent the phone back till I got the replacement. Be prepared to this kind of "warranty" when you you get GE/Thompson consumer electronics.

Setting up D-Link DPH-50U Skype VoIP adapter on my 32-bit Vista system took waaaay longer than I expected. Here's some hints that will make this task more manageable:

• Latest Skype version (4.0) does not support speed-dialing, which is required by the adapter to make outgoing calls to Skype users through the phone handset. You will need to download Skype version 3.8 to be able to make outbound calls to Skype accounts.
  
  
• Don't even bother to use printed quick installation guide and the driver from the provided CD - things didn't work and installation in reality didn't match the sequence listed in the doc.
  Get the latest driver from D-Link web site and use this manual to guide you through the software and hardware installation process.
  
  
• Finally, in order to make this whole thing work I had to manually adjust sound devices settings in Skype and point them to VoIPxxxxx devices.

I have AT&T U-Verse service for a few months now and it's been OK, with the exception of Harmony 688 remotes not being able to control Cisco (formerly Scientific Atlanta) IPTV set-top boxes. I made a couple of half-hearted attempts to troubleshoot the issue, but with no success. (I'm probably getting old, because I used to feel challenged by little problems like that, but now I am simply getting annoyed.) Anyway, in the end I didn't get used to dealing with multiple remotes, so today I finally pulled myself together and fixed the problem.

The issue was solved, more or less, by explicitly downloading and installing new firmware in both Harmony remotes. The reason I was not successful in my previous attempts was the fact that before Harmony got acquired by Logitech, firmware would get checked every time a remote is connected to the computer, and if newer version was available, Harmony software would suggest installing it. Conditioned by that earlier behavior I never bothered to check explicitly whether newer version of the firmware was available. So here you have it: if you have the same issue, go to the Harmony Software home page click Download, and then Firmware, with your remote connected.

Another interesting issue was that the set of Harmony-provided commands for IPN330HD (PVR-less STB) remote, didn't have the "Recorded TV" command for it, even though native remote has "Recorded TV" button. I made Harmony remote "learn" the command, but it never worked for some reason. I could probably get it to work by fiddling with command timing and repeat frequencies, but instead I simply reprogrammed the remote to use IPN430MC command set. IPN430MC is a PVR, and seems to be completely compatible with IPN330HD remote commands. If you're confused about how non-PVR STB can deliver recorded TV, the answer is AT&T UVerse delivers TV programs recorded on the PVR to all STBs in the house over the local network, just like Windows Media Center Extender deliver recorded TV from the main MCE PC. (MCE still does not record cable HD content, which is the reason why I am using U-Verse PVR now.) But I digress. If you want "Recorded TV" button on your Harmony remote to work for IPN330HD, reprogram your remote as if you had one more IPN430MC instead of IPN330HD.

The last thing to mention is that Harmony command timing seems to be a bit off compared to the native remote. I noticed that STBs sometimes miss commands, or respond in strange ways, but weirdness goes away if I press Harmony buttons briefly. Hold them longer, and the STB gets confused.

While comparing two Intel quad-core CPUs, Q6600 and Q8200, it was hard to arrive at the decision because for some inexplicable reason Intel does not state the TDP of Q6600. I reviewed several sources, and values are all over the map, from clearly incorrect 65W, to what looks like actual value of 105 Watt.

Since both CPUs cost $190 at this point, the decision which one to get comes down to whether you'd rather have a VT (virtualization technology), twice (8MB) the L2 cache and a little higher 2.4GHz clock of Q6600, vs. faster 1333 MHz FSB and 10W less of power consumption of Q8200.

(Updated 7/4/2008). Unlike Windows XP or Windows Server 2003, changing a motherboard on a machine running Windows Vista (in my case Vista Ultimate x64 with Service Pack 1) is not mentioned in the Microsoft Knowledge Base article addressing the MoBo upgrade. I tried a couple of approaches described below, but the bottom line is that the same process worked for Windows Vista, with one important difference: Vista upgrade process takes many hours. Waiting for that first reboot - the point where you replace the board - took close to two hours! And then it took a few more hours to complete the upgrade process. In the end the machine booted up and most of applications seem to be working fine.

Applications that didn't fare well are:

• Daemon Tools
  Symptoms: When system is booting, a cryptic error message is displayed, complaining about Windows version or something. Worse, an attempt to uninstall Daemon Tools failed. However, deleting the folder with Daemon Tools made the problem go away.
  Solution: Uninstall Daemon Tools before upgrading the system, and reinstall it after upgrade is complete.
  
  
• Windows Mobile Device Center
  Symptoms: Connecting a smartphone caused Windows Mobile Device Center to crash.
  Solution: Repair Vista installation again. After I ran an upgrade installation of Vista again (overnight, because it takes untold hours to complete), this problem went away. Please note that unlike XP, Vista does not have a separate Repair Installation option. You must run Upgrade installation (for that start installation from Windows) in order to repair existing Vista installation.
  
  
• Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Dataset Editor
  Symptoms: Opening and XSD schema or a Dataset in Design mode in VS 2008 resulted in opening the file either as a text, or as XML.
  Solution: Please check this post.
  

Now a little more about how the first upgrade attempt went down.

Having to watch the upgrade screen for hours in order to intercept the first rebooting is no fun, and ironically can be mitigated by the bug on the "Vista x64 with SP1" DVD, which makes a rebooting process always stop indefinitely waiting for user input. This bug is a mixed blessing, because you can go about your normal life while waiting for the first reboot while the existentially-named "Gathering Files" step of the Vista upgrade sequence is running, but after you have replaced the main board you want the upgrade process do its reboots without your involvement, and that's where the bug turns from being a help to being a hassle. Anyway, you would be wise to allocate half-day for the motherboard upgrade on the Vista system, and by all means back up your system before the upgrade.

Failed Mobo upgrade approaches included uninstalling board-specific drivers before turning the PC off and replacing the motherboard. It didn't work at all - machine went into reboot loop. Attempts to boot in the Safe Mode stopped at BTHidMgr.sys, which I later found could be related to having Nero's InCD installed. I don't have InCD, but I do have Daemon Tools, which incidentally is the only application that stopped working after the upgrade. I never tried to remove Daemon Tools before trying the Vista upgrade path, so the next time I would recommend trying the quick "uninstall drivers, uninstall Daemon Tools/InCD, Reboot" approach first. Only if that does not work, get the huge bag of popcorn and do Vista upgrade.

Upgrading or replacing a motherboard on a machine running Windows Server 2003 (in my case it was Windows 2003 R2 Standard Edition with Service Pack 2 x64) is relatively straightforward, and more or less works as described in the MS Knowledge Base article: you start upgrade process by running Windows setup while old motherboard is in-place, and once upgrade process reboots the machine, you intercept it by turning the computer off and replacing the MoBo, and then allow upgrade process to continue. It worked alright, and wasn't too long a process.

What the KB article didn't mention is that after the upgrade a few things may be broken or missing. In my case there were two big things broken:

• IE was corrupted in a way that prevented downloading files by clicking a link. Page browsing still worked and "Save target as..." worked, but clicking a link that redirects to a file download resulted in the strange error message: "The requested look-up key was not found in any active activation". My way to fix it was to upgrade IE6 to IE7, but since IE7 download links were those redirect links that didn't work, I had to install FireFox, which had a link accessible via "Save target as", and then I used FireFox to download and install IE7.
  
  
• .NET Framework 2.0 has disappeared, wracking havoc making pretty much all applications (SQL Server Management console, ASP.NET apps in IIS) not working. Fixing it was not too bad though - I downloaded and installed .NET Framework 2.0 x64, then made a couple of runs of Windows Update to ensure the server won't try to reboot soon after being brought online, rebooted the machine just in case, and that was it.

Overall entire process, although not completely seamless or worry-free, took only about an hour, not counting time required to physically replace the board.

Today we had an electricity outage cause by thunderstorm. While UPSes were still alive on both network segments connected via ZyXel PL-100 power line adapter, I tried connecting them into UPS and see what happens. Unfortunately it didn't work. When both adapters were connected to UPSes, Link led on both adapters was off. After power came back up, it changed nothing - no connection through UPSes. When I connected one adapter directly to the wall, and one through an APC-made UPS, Link leds came on, but computers still didn't see each other. As soon as I connected both adapters to the wall, connection was re-established.

The bottom-line: If you need network connection in your house to stay on during power interruptions, use wireless networking instead of power-line adapters.

Until recently I've been running MCE 2005 on Windows XP with Linksys Media Center Extender (MCX) connected to the XP box over 802.11a wireless network. That was a nice and stable setup, but with the technology moving forward it was time for an upgrade. I have successfully upgraded XP to Vista, and since Vista did not support "old" Media Center Extenders like the one I have, I had to get XBOX 360 - the only game in town when it comes to extenders supporting Windows Vista.

Cursory Google search revealed that even most basic and least expensive XBOX 360 version, the Core System, can run the extender application just fine by loading the MCX software from the Vista box over the network. Far more serious issue for me was how loud XBOX 360 is. The thing is that Media Center Extender box is located in the bedroom, and any fan noise from XBOX 360 would be very annoying. Linksys Media Center Extender was not just quiet - it was completely silent. It has no fans or motors at all. The price for the silence was that its CPU was underpowered and therefore it was mostly nothing but a dumb Remote Desktop terminal displaying the UI rendered on the XP box, with the exception of rendering the streaming media on the MCX box itself. XBOX 360 has a very powerful multi-core processor and therefore is easily fit to render all the fancy MCX UI right there, which makes UI of MCX running on XBOX 360 much more responsive compared the Linksys. The price of the performance, besides $300, is the fan and its noise. How much noise exactly? The whole reason I write this post is because after searching the "Internets" I was unable to tell whether the level of noise is acceptable or not. Some people complained that it's horrible, and some said it's OK. Well, here's the verdict: yes, the noise is bad and I can't believe Microsoft didn't find a solution to the noise problem, BUT the remedy is you can turn XBOX 360 completely off when you are not watching it! Noise level when you use the XBOX is not uncomfortable at all. The drawback is that it takes XBOX about 50 seconds to boot, load MCX application from the server, and launch the MCX UI when you turn the XBOX on (which BTW can all be done at once by pressing Mediacenter Green Button on the mediacenter remote). I don't mind paying the 50 second price for the complete silence of the turned off XBOX, while being able to enjoy fast and responsive UI of the XBOX setup.

Another quick note on the subject - the networking of the new extender. Linksys extender had both wireless and wired networking capabilities. I ran it over 802.11a (Wireless-A) network that is fast enough for streaming recoded TV and at the same time is not susceptible to interference from all the 2.4GHz devices like cordless phones and 802.11g (Wireless-G) networks of your neighbors. XBOX 360, however, has only wired networking capabilities, and since our house is not wired for Ethernet, I had to use ZyXel power line Ethernet adapter. I really like ZyXel power line adapters - they are great alternative to wiring your house or using wireless networks. When I was setting up extender piece on the Vista machine, MCE tested the network bandwidth and found the throughput not sufficient for streaming TV. I though it's strange because ZyXel PLA-100 adapter is supposed to be 85 marketing Mbit (about 45 real Mbit) - quite faster than 22 Mbit of the Wireless-A network that was working just fine. Sure enough, TV and video streaming ran absolutely smoothly over ZyXel PLA-100. However, whenever we get an HDTV set connected to the extender, we'll need to upgrade ZyXel adapters to speedier 200 marketing Mbit (hopefully about 100 real Mbit) PLA-400.

[June 12 UPDATE: The same day when I wrote this post I noticed that network performance of the setup has degraded to the point of recorded TV being unwatchable: picture would freeze or won't start playing back at all with the black screen, with "Network Issues" pop-up ever-present on the screen. I thought the problem is ZyXel PL-100. I replaced it with Viewsonic 802.11g access point connected to XBOX 360, and just like with PL-100 it worked flawlessly the first time I turned on the XBOX, but went down exactly the same way as the the power line adapter based network. Funny thing is that if I hit Fast Forward button on the MCE remote, FF works and produces absolutely smooth video! So at normal rate it crawls to the stop, but with fast forwarding there are no "Network Issues"? I was able to playback the same recorded shows over the same network connections using notebook and WIndows Media Player with no problems. I think Microsoft has a whole lot of explaining to do about its XBOX 360 "networking issues".