Windows Embedded signage platform sports Core i5 CPU

American Industrial Systems (AIS) announced a digital signage device that runs Windows Embedded Standard 7 on a 2.4GHz Intel Core i5-520M processor. The DSK-i5XPC includes DisplayPort, DVI-D, HDMI, and VGA video outputs, a 2.5-inch hard disk drive, and 802.11a/b/g/n wireless networking, the company says.

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AIS' new DSK-i5xPC appears more or less identical to the Winmate DSEK-10 that was announced last month, though we can't say whether the device is actually manufactured by Winmate. In any case, the DSK-i5XPC again offers a platform that has been "validated" by Microsoft and Intel, and was said to "address the [digital signage] market's need for a more streamlined, high-performance, and highly reliable solution."

Like the Winmate version, the American Industrial Systems device will ship with Microsoft's Windows Embedded Standard 7. A preinstalled OS image -- in a 120-day evaluation version optimized for digital signage usage -- is included along with a recovery DVD, AIS says.

The AIS DSK-i5XPC

According to AIS, the DSK-i5XPC uses Intel's Core i5-520M, one of the embedded-specific CPUs launched by the chipmaker in January. The CPU has a base clock speed of 2.4GHz and Turbo Boost speed of 2.93GHz, dual cores, and a 35-Watt TDP. It's teamed here, as intended, with Intel's QM57 Express chipset.

AIS says the DSK-i5XPC has 4GB of DDR3 memory, supplied via two SODIMM sockets, plus a 2.5-inch SATA hard disk drive of unspecified capacity. Intel-supplied components also provide gigabit Ethernet and 802.11a/b/g/n wireless networking, the latter via a Mini PCI Express module (WiMax is orderable, the company says).

Ports on the DSK-i5XPC
(Click to enlarge)

The DSK-i5XPC's front panel (pictured above) includes audio jacks (mic in, line in, line out) and two USB 2.0 ports, says AIS. The rear panel (also above), meanwhile, has two more USB 2.0 ports, the gigabit Ethernet port, and four video outputs: DisplayPort, DVI-D, HDMI, and VGA. (The company does not cite potential resolutions nor how many of these outputs may be used at once.)

Features and specifications listed by AIS for the DSK-i5XPC include:

* Processor -- Intel Core i5 520-M clocked at 2.4GHz
* Chipset -- Intel QM57 Express
* Memory -- 4GB of DDR3 RAM via two SODIMM slots
* Storage -- 2.5-inch SATA hard disk drive
* Expansion -- Mini PCI slot (occupied by WLAN card)
* Networking:
o LAN -- 1 x gigabit Ethernet
o WLAN -- 802.11a/b/g/n
o WiMAX (optional)
* Other I/O:
o 4 x USB 2.0 (2 front, 2 rear)
o Audio -- mic in, line in, line out
o DisplayPort
o DVI-D
o HDMI
o VGA
* Power -- 12VDC via external AC adapter
* Operating temperature -- 32 to 104 deg. F (0 to 40 deg. C)
* Dimensions -- 7.24 x 4.92 x 1.96 inches (184 x 125 x 50mm)

Yahoo, Facebook and Google to IETF: Where are the IPv6 users?

Meeting of Internet standards body indicates shift in IPv6 debate from content to carriers

QUEBEC CITY -- Where are the users? That's what popular websites including Yahoo, Google and Facebook are asking the Internet engineering community when they are questioned about their long-range plans to deploy IPv6.

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These popular websites -- and tens of thousands of others -- participated in a successful, 24-hour trial of IPv6 on June 8 dubbed World IPv6 Day. Sponsored by the Internet Society, World IPv6 Day was a large-scale experiment designed to test the readiness of IPv6 to replace IPv4, which has been the Internet's main communications protocol since its inception 40 years ago.

The Internet's largest players are providing detailed analysis about their experiences on World IPv6 Day and they are discussing next steps for IPv6 deployment at a meeting of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) being held here this week.

BACKGROUND: World IPv6 Day: Tech industry's most-watched event since Y2K

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What's evident at the IETF meeting is a shift in focus on the IPv6 debate from content to carriers. The Internet engineering community appears to be ratcheting up the pressure on ISPs, particularly residential broadband providers, to enable IPv6 to home users as the next step to IPv6 deployment.

"The focus is absolutely on the access networks," said IETF Chairman Russ Housley. "What World IPv6 Day showed is individuals who wanted to participate from home could not get IPv6 support from their ISPs. They had to set up their own [IPv6-over-IPv4] tunnels, and the average user doesn't have the knowledge to do that."

Yahoo said it deployed dual-stack IPv6 and IPv4 proxy servers at seven locations worldwide and created a special infrastructure to improve the performance of the 6to4 tunneling protocol for World IPv6 Day. Yahoo also modified its geolocation and ad-targeting code to be IPv6 aware, and it over-provisioned its IPv6 servers as an extra precaution.

On World IPv6 Day, Yahoo served IPv6 content to more than 2.2 million users, representing a peak of 0.229% of the overall traffic on 30 different Yahoo-affiliated sites. Yahoo hailed World IPv6 Day as a success but turned off IPv6 support after the event.

"IPv6 is not a wide deployment," said Igor Gashinsky, a principal architect with Yahoo. "That was a lot of work for 0.229%. We need more IPv6 access. Can we break single digits, please, and then we can talk about leaving it on?"

Similarly, Facebook served content to more than 1 million IPv6 users on World IPv6 Day. But this represented only a small fraction -- 0.2% -- of Facebook users that are IPv6 capable. Of those Facebook users, 0.16% had native IPv6 access and the other 0.04% used 6to4 tunneling.

"There are some people who are very, very passionate about IPv6 ... but it's difficult for most people to understand," said Donn Lee, a member of Facebook's network engineering team. "It's very much a concept of, 'I have restored my Internet connection.' That's what the user cares about. The user doesn't care about if it's IPv6 or IPv4."

The IETF created IPv6 a decade ago because the Internet is running out of addresses using IPv4. The free pool of unassigned IPv4 addresses expired in February, and in April the Asia Pacific region ran out of all but a few IPv4 addresses being held in reserve for startups. The American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN), which doles out IP addresses to network operators in North America, says it will deplete its supply of IPv4 addresses this fall.

How big is Microsoft gambling with Windows 8?

Although Windows 8 will run all traditional 32-bit or 64-bit software that now runs on Windows 7, Microsoft will also push developers to craft apps using HTML5, JavaScript and other Web-standard technologies, in a way aping the kind of online apps that Google markets.

Others were even more bullish on Windows 8's chances, and saw the transition as not so much a gamble by Microsoft, but the very best choice available.

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"It would be a risk not to do what they're doing," said Sarah Rotman Epps, an analyst with Forrester Research. "I see a risk by doing nothing."

Epps ticked off three elements to Windows 8 she believes are critical to the operating system's future relevance, including bringing Windows to devices powered by ARM's low-powered processor architecture, the touch-first model and the stress on new applications written with HTML5.

Continuing coverage: Windows 8

"Those three elements of Windows 8 support the behavior changes taking place in PC use," Epps said. "I don't see the PC as going away, but the PC is going to change."

And from her point of view, Windows 8 is the right move by Microsoft to stay abreast of those changes.

"Windows 8 will help stave off the defections from both Microsoft's partners and its customers," Epps argued. "Microsoft is transforming Windows as its defense against defection."

Directions on Microsoft's Miller seconded Epps, to a point.

"I think what they did was to play the best hand that they had," Miller said, referring to Microsoft's need to retain the desktop OS market while tossing its hat in the tablet ring. "This is as good an opportunity as they have, and one of the boldest strokes they've taken in a long, long time."

Gartner's Silver chimed in, too. "Microsoft needs to remain relevant on the desktop, but it's not really just about the desktop anymore, is it?" said Silver.

But with so few details known about Windows 8, and so many questions unanswered, skepticism remained a theme among analysts.

"I'm more positive about this release now than I was before, but lots of questions remain," said Miller.

"Until they can tell us how legacy apps will run on Windows 8 on ARM, I'll have to be bearish on their chances," said Gillen. "That's my biggest concern....Will legacy software run on ARM, [and] if so, how? So far, we don't have any idea, and it's not because we haven't asked."

That's not the only question analysts have that Microsoft hasn't answered about Windows 8. For Miller, the toughest chore Microsoft has is just explaining its Windows 8 strategy in a clear, concise way that everyone can understand.

"Microsoft's biggest challenge between now and RTM [release to manufacturing] will be to clarify for press and analysts the idea of 'two modes' -- touch and the desktop -- of Windows 8," Miller said.

Microsoft's Gamble: Metro UI as the New Face of Windows

The tile-based Metro user interface that runs on Windows Phones will soon be the look and feel of all devices in Microsoft's ecosystem. Is this smart streamlining or a foolish consistency?

At its Worldwide Partner Conference last week, Microsoft strongly implied that the Metro user interface that adorns its Windows Phones will become the standard design across the PC, phone and Xbox 360 when Windows 8 arrives.

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Microsoft did not formally announced this as such, but showed an image at WPC 2011 (below) that has the tile-friendly Metro design plastered on a laptop, a tablet, a smartphone and on an HD television via Xbox 360.

At WPC, CEO Steve Ballmer referred to the image above and alluded to Metro as the new face of Windows.

"We're moving in a great direction in terms of a common and coherent design language and user interface across phone, slate, PC and TV."

This was not surprising, as Microsoft has already displayed the Metro UI within Windows 8 at All Things Digital's D9 conference in late May. But it was almost startling to see the myriad Metro-based devices together in one image. Windows is soon going to look … different.

As for the Metro design itself, it grows on you. Aesthetically, the tile-based look is not going to win any awards, but it does organize lots of information simply and efficiently.

Nevertheless, it's still a bold move for the software giant in that Metro will be a different interface experience for traditional Windows PC users. In addition, even though Metro has been somewhat successful as a small-screen UI on Windows Phone 7, it has no history as a big-screen PC interface design. Users will be able to opt out of Metro and run a traditional desktop interface with Windows 8, but Metro on a PC will introduce confusion.

ZDNet blogger Adrian Kingsley-Hughes had these strong words for Metro in a blog post: "Shoving the same UI on devices that are used in different ways is either lazy or hubristic … and it disturbs me."

You could argue that Microsoft is fixing something that isn't broken. But although the Windows 7 PC experience is not broken, the rapidly approaching post-PC era will demand that the Windows experience be more fluid and flexible. And right now, Windows is fragmented.

Currently, Microsoft has: successful client OS Windows 7 running on traditional PCs and netbooks, a struggling Windows Phone with a completely different UI than Windows 7, and no tablets to speak of other than "Windows 7 tablets", which run about as smoothly as a broken-down lawnmower. So Microsoft will surely need streamlined branding and a consistent look and feel as Windows expands outside of the traditional PC.

Sure, it's a risk to trust an unproven small-screen UI as the one size that fits all. But as PC sales continue to dwindle, Windows needs to be seen as one OS that floats around every device. A common interface will help create that important perception.

What do you think of the Metro UI as the new face of Windows? Love it or hate it?

Should CIOs have a foreign policy?

With business operations entangled in the unpredictable and sometimes volatile global scene, the answer is a resounding 'yes' (and the more detailed, the better).

Computerworld - In July 2005, a series of suicide bomb attacks in London's transit system killed 56 people and threw the city into a state of confusion. The U.S.-based CEO of a multinational financial company with offices in London posed what to him seemed a simple and essential question: "Are all our people OK?"

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In fact, a significantly global operation is likely to be affected by local disruptions -- somewhere -- on a very regular basis.

"There are events happening almost constantly at any time in different parts of the world, whether a bombing in Jakarta or an uprising in Egypt or an earthquake in Japan," says Michael Shea, executive vice president for IT at International SOS, a company that provides medical and security services to travelers and has operations in 70 countries. With so many locations -- many of them in emerging markets and other politically or economically unstable areas -- operating through a crisis is business as usual. "We have to activate one of our business continuity plans about every three to four weeks," Shea says.

Even if you have few operations in unstable areas, it's wise to consider what events could disrupt your overseas operations, affect your overseas data or threaten your overseas employees. A well-thought-out foreign policy should be part of every CIO's toolkit. But how can you effectively prepare for whatever disasters the world might throw at you? Here are some ideas that might help.
Don't Plan for Everything Everywhere

In omnia paratus --"Ready for anything!" This might seem like a good approach to protecting your IT operations from all perils overseas. And indeed, some IT leaders take the position that, since there's no way to predict what might happen next in any geographic location, the best strategy is to be ready to meet absolutely any threat anywhere it may arise.

There's only one problem with this approach: It's impossible to do. "Trying to prepare for everything everywhere leads you down one of two paths, neither of which is good," says Dan Blum, an analyst at Gartner. "One path is saying that whatever you're doing will have to be good enough, since you can't know everything. The other is the path of being too paranoid and exhausting yourself chasing phantoms, and no organization can do that for very long. CIOs or chief information security officers who attempt to create and maintain the same very high level of preparedness everywhere will find their credibility eroding and their influence declining over time."

On the other hand, it can be very hard to see even a short distance into the future. Consider Orange Business Services, the business communication arm of one of Europe's largest mobile providers. The company has four major support centers in Egypt. One day last winter, Paul Joyce, senior vice president of international customer service and operations, paid a routine site visit to the company's facility near Cairo. With protests sweeping through nearby Tunisia, Joyce asked the company's local staffers whether they anticipated civil unrest in Egypt as well.

Microsoft revs dump-XP campaign, says 'time to move on'

Reminds users that the most popular OS on the planet has about 1,000 days to live

Computerworld - Microsoft on Monday made its most aggressive move yet to convince customers to drop Windows XP and adopt Windows 7, telling them that there were only 1,000 days of support life left in the older operating system.

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Stephen Rose, IT community manager for the Windows commercial team, noted the 1,000 days remaining for Windows XP support in a post to a Microsoft blog.

"Windows XP had an amazing run and millions of PC users are grateful for it. But it's time to move on," Rose said, adding that the operating system exits security support in "less than 1,000 days."

The 10-year-old XP actually has a little longer to live than that: Microsoft has promised to patch XP through April 8, 2014, 1,002 days from Monday.

"Bottom line, PCs running Windows XP will be vulnerable to security threats" after that date, said Rose. "Furthermore, many third-party software providers are not planning to extend support for their applications running on Windows XP, which translates to even more complexity, security risks, and ultimately, added management costs for your IT department."

According to usage statistics and research firm surveys, Microsoft has its work cut out for it in moving users off XP.

Web metrics firm Net Applications now has Windows 7's usage share at 27%, for example, but XP still powers 51% of the world's personal computers. If the trends of each over the past three months continue, Windows 7 usage won't surpass that of XP until the second quarter of 2012.

Businesses are even more reliant on Windows XP, said Forrester Research, when it recently estimated the aging operating system's share at 60% of enterprise PCs.

Monday's blog post wasn't the first time Microsoft has portrayed XP as yesterday's OS. Earlier this year, executives on the Internet Explorer team called XP the "lowest common denominator" as they explained why the OS wouldn't run IE9 or any future browsers.

And the company has taken firm steps to kill off other products it considers obsolete. Since mid-2009, Microsoft has urged users to give up IE6, the browser that shipped shortly before XP. Four months ago, it upped the ante by launching a deathwatch website that highlights IE6's dwindling usage share.

The push to abandon XP coincided with the opening of Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference, the company's annual reseller meeting. CEO Steve Ballmer kicked off WPC by celebrating another Windows 7 milestone: selling 400 million licenses for the OS.

Tami Reller, head of product marketing for the Windows group, cited that number to compare Windows 7's uptake with XP's in the same span of time.

"That is three times the pace of Windows XP," Reller said.

Vista's Incredible Vanishing Act

Microsoft is so anxious to kill of Windows Vista, it made the OS vanish. Now it wants you to do the same.

Steve Ballmer pulled off a great trick the other day. He made Windows Vista completely vanish. Well, he'd like to, but he needs your help to make it go away like the bad idea it was.

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I've seen some impressive keynotes, but few can top the sight of the Staples Center filled to capacity for the opening keynote in Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference. With a small stage in the middle, CEO Steve Ballmer addressed a crowd typically only seen for Lakers games and concerts by major stars (and I don't think he needed a microphone to be heard, either).

It was a bit of a letdown that we got no preview of Windows 8. That, we were told, will come at the Build show in September. Instead, the message from Tami Reller, CFO and corporate vice president of the Windows division, was simple: Dump Windows XP.

It's rather comical that for the second time in a year, Microsoft has launched an initiative to get people to stop using one of its products. But like IE 6, XP stayed on the market too long and became too deeply embedded to get rid of it that easily.

Reller offered both a carrot and a stick as incentives to migrate. The carrot Reller offered was savings. She cited the example of the city of Miami, which saved $90 per year for each of its 2,500 PCs just from improved power management. The stick was that Windows XP will hit the end-of-life stage, where Microsoft will not provide any more fixes, in about 1,000 days.

She said that of the 1.2 billion Windows licenses worldwide, 400 million were Windows 7 and the rest were Windows XP, which immediately begged the question of where's Vista? I can't fault them for wanting to forget Vista ever happened but it's still a large portion of the ecosystem.

The fact is, Vista is in limbo, which is as good as dead in this business. On the one hand, it's an abandoned operating system that customers and Microsoft alike want nothing to do with it. On the other hand, it routinely falls into the same bucket as Windows 7 because it uses the same device driver and app model. You often see this in device drivers: Windows XP or Vista/7.

As reviled as Vista was by consumers, it has gained significant share. It was on the market for three years and on average, about 200 to 300 million PCs are sold every year. Many shunned Vista but a lot did not. Steam, the online games sales software, does some interesting analytics. Now I'll preface this by saying its profile is of home users/gamers, not enterprises. That said, as of May, 32-bit and 64-bit Vista combined accounts for 24 percent of systems running Steam software. Windows 7 64-bit topped the list at 38 percent.

There are other places where XP is embedded and not easily replaced: emerging markets, where XP is an advanced operating system; netbooks, which ran XP until Windows 7 shipped; and companies delaying a rollout for one reason or another. It could be they have custom apps that are still not certified on Windows 7 or maybe they plan to make Windows 7 part of a bigger app rollout (along with Office 2010. for instance) and it's taking longer to stage.

I realize that the migration away from XP is likely slowed due to the economy and people won't replace an XP or Vista machine until it finally dies. The bottom line is, you XP and Vista users are rapidly being abandoned. Mainstream support for XP is over, end-of-life is in 2014. Mainstream Vista support ends in April 2012 and end-of-life is April 2017, but really, you want to get off XP and Vista a lot sooner than that.