New updates in the OS world.

New OSX update 10.5.7 today. Lots of security and internal fixes. You can download via Software Update.
Currently Downloading Windows 7 RC1. If its half as good as the beta (which it will be) this Windows could be the best yet.
Haven't downloaded the newest ubuntu (9.04) but plan to soon and will be testing after my Windows 7 tests.

I will post my reviews by the end of the week.

Virtual Box for OSX numlock problems

It's come to my attention that alot of people are unsure of how to implement the numlock feature on a windows guest. While in windows guest hold [shift] and press [clear] this will toggle numlock on and off. Hope that helps! I have also posted this information on the VirtualBox Forums.

Updates*

It's been a while since I last updated. If you didn't already know, VirtualBox has released an update that officially supports Windows 7 beta. This is great news and I'm happy to report that everything is running great in it.

My MacBook Pro took a dive last week. The Logic board had to be replaced. I am happy to report that the operation was a success and I am back on track. I'll try to get something new posted as soon as I can.

Windows 7 beta first impressions

Beta...get it

At first Windows 7 can be deceiving. It looks very similar to Vista. It is important to remember that even though this is essentially an upgrade to Vista it behaves completely differently. Even in beta this version of windows is faster cleaner and more stable than in a virtual machine then Vista is running natively.

Looks alot like Vista to me.

The first thing I noticed is that the task bar has been drastically condensed. It only shows icons for the program thats open. Kinda like OSX. If you mouse over these icons you get a nice interactive visual effect and a list of all the tabs I have open [IE]. (Had Aero been on, it would have given me a preview of each window.) If I right-click the icon it has my history and favorites listed.

Previews have been adjusted a bit from Vista.

Some changes here as well.

The most important change that we will all be very excited about is the updates to paint and wordpad. Im just joking, however, they do look better dont they.

Paint and Wordpad for life!

All in all I am very happy with this release and I am excited to see how it progresses through the beta. This runs so well now that I am confident that this will help Microsoft shake off the Vista mistake rather quickly. (Like XP did to Millenium.) I have not tested it yet with gaming because VirtualBox does not support Direct3D yet. If anyone has tested this please let me know how it does.

Installing Windows 7 beta in VirtualBox 2.1.0

The first thing you will want to do is get a copy of Windows 7 beta from Microsoft and VirtualBox* 2.1.0 from Sun.

*I recommend VirtualBox over the others because in my experience it is the fastest, widest available across many operating systems and free.

Once you have the iso downloaded and your key, open VirtualBox.

Create a new virtual Machine. You can name it whatever you like. This will be how you differentiate several different machines if you are using more than one.
Set the OS Type to Windows/Other Windows.

You will need to set the RAM to at least 1024 MB or 1GB. You can set it higher but be wary because VirtualBox will lock this ram from your main system to be used by the virtual machine while it is open.

Create your "vdi" or virtual hard disk. This is just a file that will represent the hard drive of the virtual machine. Windows 7 needs a 20GB min hard drive.

Mount either your burned dvd or the iso file in the settings of the virtual machine. Then click "OK"

Select your new virtual machine and click "Start". It may take a moment but soon you will see an install screen similar to the Vista installer. When the option comes up, be sure to select "custom" installation. This will let you select your virtual hard drive as the installation hard drive. Afetr this it's pretty much hands free except you will also be asked for your key. During some points it may seem that it's frozen but it should be fine.

Once Installation is complete you will need to install the VirtualBox guest additions. You will need to right click the file on the "cd" and set it to Windows Vista compatability mode and run as administrator. Once this installs, restart your virtual machine.

There you have it a fully functional virtual machine running Windows 7.

I will soon be posting my first impressions of this impressive os.

Welcome to my tech blog. Please check back here for resources regarding new software/hardware reviews as well as other news and things I feel are important to share with the tech community. Here are the specs of the computer I will be using for my testing (as of 1/09):

Computer:
17" Apple MacBook Pro
2.5GHz Intel Core 2
4GB 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM
GeForce 8600GT 512MB GDDR3

Primary OS:
Mac OS X 10.5.7 "Leopard"

Secondary OS:
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic x64 (Boot Camp)
Microsoft Windows XP Pro (VirtualBox)