Since today the Surface RT is available in the following countries : Austria, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Switzerland and the Netherlands! Since I’m from the Netherlands (altough I already own a Surface RT) I was wondering in which retail stores (besides the Microsoft online store) it would become available.

Bas Paumen (Business Group Lead Windows at Microsoft NL) told me that it will also be on sale at the Mediamarkt, Saturn, Dixons and MyCom. At the moment they’re not all offering the Surface RT, but that will probably change in the next couple of days/weeks.’

Surface Pro
I’m not sure when, but the Surface Pro will also come to the Netherlands (and probably to the other new Surface countries). When I visited the Surface Pro page on Microsoft.com it was saying ‘coming soon’….so let’s hope we don’t have to wait very long before the Surface Pro can be bought in a Dutch retail store!

Today Major Nelson announced a list of 40 new apps coming to XBOX 360 before Spring 2013! Because I live in the Netherlands not all Apps will become available here. Please check out the blog post at MajorNelson.com for the entire list

For some of the Apps it’s not sure if they will be available in the Netherlands, but the following Apps certainly will appear on a Dutch Xbox near you:

• RTL XL (already available)
  watch missed RTL (4, 5, 7, 8) programs
• SkyDrive (available on December 11th)
  SkyDrive is the place to store your files so you can access them from virtually any device. With SkyDrive for Xbox, you can easily view your photos and videos on your TV. You can also play slideshows and view photos and videos shared with you. For more information, visit the Inside SkyDrive blog
• Karaoke (available on December 11th)
  Karaoke provides access to more than 8,000 songs from the latest hits to the oldies but goodies, available on Xbox LIVE. Your avatar will go on stage and sing with a full complement of stage props and back band. Use SmartGlass to play/stop/pause, browse the database and lyrics or to add songs to the playlist. Songs don’t require any download and will playback immediately via streaming for a robust karaoke experience.
• Eredivisie Live
  watch live soccer games from the Dutch soccer league
• LiveSport.tv (not available yet?)
  watch sports
• Pathe Thuis
  watch/rent movies
• SBS
  you can probably watch missed SBS (6 / Net 5 / Veronica) programs, but there is no info about the app yet
• Ziggo
  watch live tv with your Ziggo subscription, just like the iOS and Android App. In the near future Video on Demand will be added to the App. The Ziggo Company Twitter account told me that recording live tv will also become available in a later stadium.

Screenshot of the Ziggo App	Twitter conversation in with Ziggo
Screenshot of RTL XL App

Update (Oct 12th) : It looks like the Prometric Candidate History pages are having some troubles showing anything, so no results today.
Update #2 (Oct 12th) : It looks like it is fixed, but not if you live in the Netherlands and the ISP ‘Ziggo’ (like me).

We just have to wait a few more days before we know the answer to the question. Somewhere around October 16th the results of the four remaining Windows Server 2012 Beta’s should be available, at least if my sources were right. I think they the results could even be there a bit faster.

Earlier today I received a question from my good friend (and MVP) Elias Mereb, asking me if I already received any news about the results of the 70-413, 70-414, 70-415 and the 70-416. He received ‘proof’ that the results are starting to show on Prometric.com!

I checked my status immediately, but (as always) they were al four still saying ‘Tested’. I certainly will start asking my contacts later today if the results should pop-up any moment, so we can start F5-ing on Prometric.com.

Even if I pass all four of them, I still have to pass the 70-412, which I failed (sadly enough). I probably will attend the 412 somewhere later this (or next) month.

What about you? Do you see the results of (any of) the four exams yet? Please let me know in the comments!

We just have to wait a few more days before we know the answer to the question. Somewhere around October 16th the results of the four remaining Windows Server 2012 Beta’s should be available, at least if my sources were right. I think they the results could even be there a bit faster.

Earlier today I received a question from my good friend (and MVP) Elias Mereb, asking me if I already received any news about the results of the 70-413, 70-414, 70-415 and the 70-416. He received ‘proof’ that the results are starting to show on Prometric.com!

I checked my status immediately, but (as always) they were al four still saying ‘Tested’. I certainly will start asking my contacts later today if the results should pop-up any moment, so we can start F5-ing on Prometric.com.

Even if I pass all four of them, I still have to pass the 70-412, which I failed (sadly enough). I probably will attend the 412 somewhere later this (or next) month.

What about you? Do you see the results of (any of) the four exams yet? Please let me know in the comments!

On October 5th Steven Sinofsky announced that the built-in Apps for Windows 8 will receive an update. The strange thing is that he announced that the Bing App would be the first one, but strangely enough I already received an update for the SkyDrive App. For now I don’t see an update for the Bing App arriving, but the day (Saturday) isn’t over yet…

Check out the differences below (click on the image for a larger view).

And there are also a few ‘New features’  available with this update:

• Search within SkyDrive
• Rename and move folders and files
• New first-run experience (see the upper right screenshot)
• Custom sort order

I also discovered a feature from which I’m not sure if it was already available in the ‘old version’. Please leave a comment if you have also found it in the old one…

I couldn’t find the Custom sort order yet, but the Search within SkyDrive also didn’t work just right after the update (indexing?). If you have found the feature, please let me know through the comments!

Just a few weeks ago Microsoft has released MDT 2012 Update 1, with full support for Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8. Microsoft did also release the Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (ADK) for Windows 8, the replacement for the good old WAIK. With the RTM of Window Server 2012 I decided to upgrade my Deployment environment to the latest version. When I did some initial deployments of Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 everything worked just fine, but when I tried to deploy Windows Server 2008 R2 (non-VL version) or Windows 7, I ran into a small problem.

The Issue
Just after the deployment I had to enter the Product Key.

At first I thought I made a mistake during the built proces, but after I asked a question at the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit Forum. Because the first responses suggested that there was something wrong with my Deployment Share. After some suggestions and a start from scratch (the first time I imported and upgraded the ‘old’ deployment shares), also not importing the ‘old’ deployment shares, the answer came from Michael Niehaus:

“MDT 2012 Update 1 switched from using SETUP.EXE to instead use ImageX to apply the image.  As a result, if you use retail or OEM media, you’ll get a prompt because the product.ini file isn’t being read any more (SETUP.EXE did that, ImageX doesn’t).

Fortunately the fix is pretty simple:  Look up the correct setup (generic) key in the product.ini file on your media and specify it in the unattend.xml (second location).  After you do that, it won’t prompt any more.

This won’t happen with volume license media.”

So that’s probably also the people who responded earlier didn’t have the same issue, they were using volume license media!

The Solution
So, to fix the issue had to specify the (generic) product key (from the product.ini in the Sources folder)

Open the unattend.xml (in the correct Control  Task Sequence folder) and enter the product key at the second   start-tag.

Now you can just restart the Task Sequence and you won’t be asked for a product key during the deployment!

After I published my earlier blogpost about Upgrade your Hotmail account to the new Outlook.com I received a question via Twitter if I could tell what happened with @NaomideBoer her upgrade to Outlook.com. She didn’t only wanted her inbox to be upgraded to the new Outlook.com look, but she also wanted to change her e-mail address to something new.

I also tried the ‘Rename your e-mail address’ procedure and it worked just fine. This easily can occur when there have ben some hick ups in the renaming proces, or we just used a slightly different method…

In the following steps I will explain how you can migrate your e-mail from yourname@hotmail.com to yourname@outlook.com, be honest a @outlook.com e-mail address looks much more professional….

• Step 1 : Go to http://mail.live.com (or http://www.outlook.com) and logon with your current Microsoft Account (read: Hotmail address or Windows Live ID)

  

• Step 2 : Click on the radar-button and select More mail settings.

  

• Step 3: Click on Rename your email address.

  

• Step 4 : Enter your new e-mail (Microsoft Account) and, if you wish, select something other then Outlook.com and press Save

  

• Step 5 : You’re automatically logged out. Enter your new credentials and press Sign in.

  

• Step 6 : After you’re logged in you will be asked where you want old e-mail to be delivered. You can choose to create a new folder, or let it be delivered in your Inbox.

  After that click Done or click Skip this step right away.

  

You’re e-mail address has been migrated from @hotmail.com to @outlook.com.

Thanks to @IngmarVerheij for letting me help @NaomideBoer.

Gisteren heeft Microsoft de preview versie van de nieuwe Outlook.com gelanceerd, die uiteindelijk de ‘oude’ Hotmail.com zal vervangen. Als je geen nieuwe Outlook.com e-mailadres wilt maken, kun je ook je bestaande Hotmail (of Live) e-mailadres ‘migreren’ naar de nieuwe Metro style Outlook.com. Volg hiervoor gewoon onderstaande stappen.

• Stap 1 : Logon in op Hotmail/Live mail via http://mail.live.com

• Stap 2 Selecteer Upgrade to Outlook.comuit de Opties

• Stap 3 Selecteer Upgrade to Outlook om het upgradeproces te starten (dit duurt maar een paar seconden).

Klaar…de volgende keer als je inlogt zul je gelijk de nieuwe Outlook.com interface zien.

Opmerking : Als je wilt kun je weer terug naar de ‘oude’ Hotmail interface. Vervang daarbij stap 2 met het volgende :

Totdat I arrived at TechEd Europe to attend the Windows 8 and Server 2012 beta exams. Between the two I was able to shoot a short video, so you (all my peers who are unable to attend) can all get an idea of what’s going on at the Center of IT!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DcBrSwzKYzw

De komende week zal ik TechEd Europe bezoeken, wat dit jaar weer eens in Amsterdam gehouden wordt. Waar mogelijk zal ik proberen te bloggen vanaf het event. Mogelijk zal ik ook video”s plaatsen, maar dat hangt geheel af van de bandbreedte die er in de RAI zal zijn.

Hou m’n blog dus in de gaten…