Building a new VM server Part 1: Intro and Hardware

[sc:hardware-category ]At the moment, my servers at home consist of two VMWare host servers and several VMs on each. The hardware specs are:

  • Server 1: Quad core 3.2 ghz AMD processor with 8 gig of RAM. 3 250g disks (OS and VM partitions) and 1 2tb drive for file storage.
  • Server 2: Dual core 2.2 ghz AMD processor with 8 gig of RAM. 3 250g disks (OS and VM partitions) and 1 2tb drive for file storage.

Both servers run Windows Server 2008 R2 with VMWare Server 2.0.2 for the Hypervisor.

The file storage disk is currently shared and replicated between the two Windows servers using DFS for redundancy.

The current workload for these servers has pretty much stretched them to their limits and it’s time to upgrade to something with a little more oomph.

And so…

The Plan

My mandatory upgrade criteria includes:

  • At least 4 cores
  • 16 gig of RAM
  • Standard ATX form factor
  • AMD based

On the nice to have list includes:

  • Remote KVM management
  • Two processor slots

I usually build my home servers from standard PC motherboards, but currently most of those top out at 16 gig of RAM so I’ve had to expand my search a little bit.

I’ve been using AMD processors for many years now and my preference to keep them now has more to do with ensuring all the VM guests transition smoothly more than anything else.  However this may break this time as it looks like I’ll be moving to the Opteron processor.

VMWare server will likely be making an exit at this time as VMWare seems to have pretty much abandoned updating the product and the limitations on how many processors it can support.  Which leaves me choosing between ESXi (now renamed VMWare vSphere Hypervisor), MS’s Hyper-V or the various Linux based virtualization solutions.

The Motherboard and Hardware

After looking around quite a bit, I’ve settled on the ASUS KCMA-D8 motherboard, some of the reasons are:

  • Standard ATX form factor
  • Standard ATX power supply
  • Support for greater than 16g RAM
  • Remote KVM support with optional module
  • 2 processor support with 4 or 6 cores

Of course finding the MB and buying the MB turns out to be two completely different things.  The vendor I was looking to purchase it from turns out to not have ANY CPU heat sink and fan that supports the Opteron 4100 series processors.  I’ve had to order the heat sink and fan from a vendor I have never used before however it turns out they were a very good choice and I’ve received all the parts without incident.

So the server components are as follows:

  • MB: KCMA-D8
  • KVM Option: ASMB4-iKVM
  • RAM: 4 x KVR1333D3E9S/4GHB (16g total)
  • CPU: 2 x AMD Opteron 4122 2.20 GHz
  • CPU Fan: 2 x Dynatron F555

I picked up a basic mid-tower case and power supply from the local computer shop and I’ll be using disks from the existing server when I finally move everything over to the new system.

Currently my disk configuration on the VM’s is spread out over two disks.  Each Windows VM has at least two virtual disks on separate physical disks to allow for backups to reside on a separate disk in case of hardware failure.

I expect to change this to instead use disk mirroring to support redundancy in case of hardware failure.  My current thought is to use the built in Windows RAID support, but the D8 motherboard does support hardware raid on the SAS ports.  There is conflicting statements in the manual if the SATA ports are supported but it would seem likely they are, however, using the built in Windows raid functionality will allow me to change motherboards without have to rebuild the entire raid disk set.

After assembling the components on the motherboard I hit my first snag with the hardware build.  The KCMA-D8 motherboard is a standard ATX form factor, however it uses pretty much every inch of the ATX spec and the generic mid-tower case need a little TLC with a pair of tin snips to remove some of the 5.25 drive bays.  The mid-tower case won’t work for a long term solution as with the motherboard installed, only two of the five 3.5 drive bays are available.  I’ve ordered a large tower case that claims it’s “silent”, so we’ll see how that works.

After getting everything installed in the case and hooking up a keyboard and mouse, the second hardware issue came up.  The F555 heat sinks have a high speed fan on them, which sounds kind of like a front load washer running at full steam inside of the case, times two for the dual processors Smile.

The MB has several fan settings, from full to whisper mode, however they seem to have no effect on the fan speed, which runs at a constant 5000 rpm.  By accident it turns out I had plugged one of the fans in to a case connector instead of the cpu connector, which ran the fan at ~3000 rpm.  This had the effect of making the system livable, however it was still too loud to be a long term solution.

After checking the temperature of the CPU while running and their thresholds, I pulled the stock fans off of the CPU heat sinks and installed a low speed 80mm case fan on each.  These run virtually silently and after stressing the server for a bit, it looks like I loose about 5-10 degrees of cooling, still well within the thermal limits for the AMD 4100 CPUs.

The only issue I’ve found with the motherboard so far is the extremely basic video card that is on board, it’s pretty much just a frame buffer, no 2d or 3d acceleration at all.  Screen redraws are slow and painful to watch, however dropping in a replacement video card means that the IP KVM no longer works.  Luckily the console isn’t used much so its a trade off I’ll have to live with as the KVM functionality is more important then the video performance on the server.

Next up in part 2… selecting a new hypervisor!

Notebooks, Tablets and other portable computers

[sc:hardware-category ]Over the years I have had many portable computers that I’ve used for both business and personal, from some of the first laptops (that would have crushed your lap) to more recent netbooks, each has served a purpose.

I’m going to start at what I call generation one of the modern age of my portable computing life.  Everything before a few years ago was really too long ago to worry about and in general doesn’t reflect the reality that we now have in portable devices.

Generation One

A few years ago, netbooks took the world by storm (yes, it’s been that long already), starting with ASUS and Acer, these Intel Atom based systems, were woefully underpowered, but they showed us what portable computers might become with they’re long battery life, small displays and alternative operating systems (many based on Linux).

However they also showed us what kind of limitations might also crop up.

At the time of my first netbook (an Acer Aspire One [AAO]), I was using a 15 inch laptop I’d had for a few years for my personal use, a PlayStation Portable for my portable entertainment device and a Windows Mobile 5 personal phone.  At work, the only portable device I had was Blackberry.

The AAO replaced the laptop for 99% of my daily portable computing needs, with it’s tiny 8.9 inch display running Windows XP, it was fine for some quick note taking, e-mail and web browsing.  For anything more, it was a nightmare.  The keyboard was too small, the display was too small, the RAM was too small and the processor was too small.  It was just too small.

In contrast, the PSP was too big and too small.  As an MP3 player it was awkward and overkill, sure it played movies, but the display was too small.  I will say though that it was a perfect game system, I just didn’t really use it as that.

And finally the Windows Mobile 5 phone, an HTC 6800, was just too small period, but it was all that was out there at the time.

This first generation had quite a bit of overlap between the devices and none of them really did a good job for me.  But this is just the first generation

Generation Two

If the netbook showed us the limitations of size, then the Acer Aspire 751 showed me the importance of getting it the right size.

The 751 was not a netbook by the traditional definition, it had an 11.6 inch display but still packed the same old Intel Atom.  While still extremely handicapped by the Atom, it did support a much better video chip and was good enough that I managed to run Windows 7 on it for a while, before eventually reverting back to XP.  The 751 showed me how just a few extra inches could elevate the netbook to being something truly useful.

The 751 replaced my old 15 inch notebook completely, I haven’t ever gone back to it since.  However the 751 itself was a very short lived solution as within a few months Acer released the Timeline 1810, which while sharing the same form factor, replaced the Atom with a ULV 7100 series dual core processor.  This firmly moved my notebook away from the netbook roots and in to the ultra portable range of systems.

The PSP on the other had been replaced by a Zune HD, again, size proved to be the defining characteristic that brought my media player from being wrong at everything, to being just so right.  The Zune HD had a small display but provided more storage, better battery life and more features than the PSP could hope to support.

At this point I also upgraded to a Windows Mobile 6.5 device.  Like the others, size does matter.  The 6800 had a tiny display and was pretty bulky.  The Samsung Omnia II on the other hand had a larger display and was a much sleeker design.  This combination made it a very good choice.

This second generation of portable systems proved that getting the size right for each category of device was the key to making them work on a daily basis.

Generation Three

You may have noticed that each of the previous generations above have had three categories of devices in them:

  1. A creation/editing device (the notebooks)
  2. A consumption device (the media player)
  3. A communications device (the phone)

Too me, this is pretty much the holy trinity of portable devices, each one could have overlap (the phone can play music, the notebook could play music and video, etc.), but their primary functions define they’re size and shape.  Yes there are other portable devices, GPS, cameras, etc.  But these are dedicated devices that really only have one role.

The third generation of portable devices is where things start to diverge from the trinity.  The reality is that the consumption and communications devices are very close to the same form factor, and with smart phones becoming the norm, convergence of these devices makes a lot of sense.  There will still always be demand for separate devices as sometimes you just want an MP3 player, but these will become more and more of niche (which is not news to anyone).

Currently I am using my Timeline 1810 as my notebook, however a new generation of ultraportable notebooks is just starting to show up, with more power and better graphics cards this group of notebooks seems to be a growing choice for many people.

My “convergence” device is of course my HTC HD7, which has replaced my old Omnia II as well as my Zune HD.

And so we come to the dilemma, what do we fill in the missing spot with?  Or do we?

Tablets

Most people will tell you that the tablet will become the third pillar of portable computing (or the only one depending upon how zealous they are Winking smile), but I’m not so sure.  The previous pillars provided some overlap in functionality, but their form factors or cost clearly delineated them, it was only when the cost and functionality of the smart phones caught up to the media players did it become practical for them to converge.

I recently picked up a low end Android tablet to play with, like the first netbooks, it was slow and virtually useless, but it gave me a pretty good idea of what I might use a tablet for.

But first, I’ll tell what I won’t be using a tablet for:

  • Content editing, the virtual keyboard makes this practically impossible to do over any period of time, having to hold the device and thumb type or set it flat (or even on an angle) makes these devices incredibly tiresome to use.
  • Watching video,  the last thing I want to do is to have to hold my TV for two hours while I watch a movie.  A notebook or, you know, a TV is a much better solution for this.
  • Listening to music.  they’re just too darn big to carry around all the time.  You can’t put it in your pocket or clip it to your belt.
  • Taking photos.  Lets face it, even the cheapest digital camera beats all phones/tablets/computers/etc. for image quality.  There’s just no replacing a real lens on a camera and that takes too much space.
  • Reading books.  The displays on these systems have come quite a long way, but they just don’t compare to dedicated e-books or, your know, actual books on paper.  They’re also quite heavy and I found them to be uncomfortable over a few hours of reading.
  • Gaming.  Much has been made of gaming on phones and it makes quite a bit of sense for small, quick games to be the primary kind of game phone on these kinds of portable devices, however tablets tend to be overkill for those games and the more complex games will be virtually unplayable without dedicated controls.

So what can would I do with it?

  • Secondary web browsing.  The kind of browsing you do while doing something else, like watching a TV show and you see an actor/actress you can’t name for the life of you so you go to IMDB to look up who it is.  This kind of consumption can also be done on your phone, but the larger display on the tablet will make it a nicer experience.
  • Secondary E-Mail.  It’s never going to replace your real e-mail client, but just like your phone, it will be a useful tool for short messages and the larger display will make it easier to use than your phone.
  • Secondary social media.  Again, just like the above it just not good enough to replace your other systems for this either.
  • Reading books.  Ok, I know, I had this one on the list above as well.  While I might not use it to ready a whole book, cover to cover, I think it might be useful as a reference device, with technical material.

So what is a tablet but a glorified smart phone?  Not much, that’s what.  In fact it seems to be defined by secondary tasks instead of primary ones.

And this is where the tablets fall short.  There is no compelling reason for them to exist, no killer app that justifies them.  Much like netbooks seem to have been a fad that eventually provided the motivation to hardware manufactures to create reasonably priced ultraportable, I expect tablets to spur on the next evolution in portable computing, like the netbook, showing us the limitations and benefits of the technology.

I have two experiences with other people to share around tablets:

  • I had a conversation recently with a friend of mine who was thinking of buying an iPad. Their logic was that they spend a lot of time on public transit and they wanted to replace their e-reader with the iPad to expand their entertainment options and reduce the number of devices they carried around (at the time 2 Blackberries, an MP3 player and the e-book).  I pointed out in fact that while they could combine the MP3 and e-book in to the iPad, that in fact they would be carrying a much heavier/larger device around.  Instead I suggested upgrading her Blackberry to a phone that could replace the MP3 player, thus reducing the overall carry load.  The new cell phone would still expand their entertainment options, but be smaller and lighter than the tablet.
  • I read online a few weeks ago a story that talked about how the author had been on a plane and was seated beside a couple with an iPad.  The author noted that while the iPad seemed to be passed back and forth between the couple, neither seemed to be doing anything for more than a few minutes on it.  On a recent flight, I experienced the exact same thing.  A couple passing the iPad between them, doing a crossword, then a game, then reading.  But never for more than a few minutes each.  After half an hour or so, it was put away and I didn’t see it again.  I think the novelty wore off.

In the end…

I think portable computing is losing a pillar, that in fact we’re polarize back to two devices, the smartphone and the laptop.

The smartphone has moved up to take the functions of the media player and now I think we’ll see ultraportable move down to take the place of tablets.  This first and most obvious move will be to add touchscreens to the ultraportable, which has already started to happen, hang tight, the only think we know for sure is that it will all be different next year!

The HD7 case hunt

[sc:mobile-category ]When I purchased my HTC HD7 I knew it was a large phone and like all new phones on the market I didn’t expect to find many custom cases for it.  However, having too multiple stores in multiple countries now trying to find a vertical holster for it, I find myself reflecting on just how large the phone really is.

The Bell store

As I mentioned in a previous post, when I purchased the phone from Bell, they only had a single case in stock, a crappy plastic sleeve that I threw out a few days later.  However

I spent the next few weeks checking Bell’s website and only just the other day did they even list accessories for the HD7.

They now have a vertical holster, but it appears to be a generic one that I don’t give much hope for actually fitting the phone.

T Bo,oth

My second place to hit was T Booth, which didn’t have any holsters, but did have in stock the Otter case for it.  The is the current case I’m using on the phone and it’s quite a rugged case.  It’s quite nice, however it doesn’t have a bet clip and that limits its usefulness a bit.

Radio Shack

They had nothing but a $24 screen protector, geez…

Random hole in the wall cell phone case “superstore”

This place was packed with case wall to wall, but nothing that would even come close to holding the HD7, let alone with the Otter case on.

Fry’s Electronics (USA)

After failing to find anything in Canada, I knew I was going to the US in March, which gave me hope as the HD7 has been out in the US since the original October launch of Windows Phone 7.

Fry’s is a huge US electronics store (think FutureShop and BestBuy combined and then quadrupled) however even they didn’t have anything to fit the HD7 (They didn have a horizontal holster that calamined to support the HD7, but did really).

At this point I started to look in to plan B.  I figured a small digital camera case would probably work, however again I was stymied as they were either too small or too large.

Random hole in the wall cell phone case “superstore” (USA)

This place made the Canadian one look small, but again, same result, nothing even close to fitting the HD7.

3 Different camera stores (USA)

Same result as at Fry’s, too small, too big or just plain wrong.

And in summary…

I still don’t have a case for my phone, I guess I’ll have to go on line and hope to find something there.

The search continues.

5 Days with the HTC HD7 Windows Phone 7

[sc:mobile-category ]And so it began, last Thursday Bell launched the HD7 and with that my fate was sealed.

A trip to the local bell store found my credit card getting some exercise and a new adventure starting for me.

Here are my thoughts on the phone and the OS as I’ve experienced it so far.  But first a little look back…

The Past

For the last 16 months I’ve been using the very acceptable (for a Windows Mobile 6.5 device) Samsung Omnia II.  A little underpowered and definitely an OS that has been showing its age.  The phone worked, synchronization with Exchange was a great and the recently included ability to sync SMS messages to my Exchange mailbox was a joy.

However I have been looking for something a little more current then Windows Mobile and since the launch of Windows Phone have been eagerly awaiting a device to call my own.

I was very disappointed with the initial release of phones in Canada, as  all the operators left out the two best devices (the HD7 and the Dell Venue Pro).

Bell finally rectified this last week with the release of the HD7, and by all accounts Rogers will be getting the Venue Pro next month as well.  I was very tempted by the Venue Pro, but alas like most, my contract with Bell has a ways to go yet 😉

The  Hardware

I won’t bore you with unboxing pics or slick images of the phone itself, you can happily go to the HTC page to see what it looks like and what’s in the box.  Likewise, the Bell page will tell you the current pricing.

This is actually my second HTC phone, before my Samsung I had an HTC 6800, running Windows Mobile 5.  That phone worked quite well and was well built but would never have won any awards for design or style.  It was functional and that all it needed to be at the time.

Today, however, phone design has come a long way and HTC has done a good job with the HD7 within the limitations that Microsoft has given them.

Pulling the phone from the box provided a good solid feel, while not heavy the phone feels solid and well made.  To install the SIM card requires removal of the back, which is perhaps the flimsiest piece of the device.  A very light weight plastic cover that snaps in to place.  However, when in place the lightness of the cover is not apparent and so I really don’t mind.

The only issue with the hardware design I have is that the back plate only goes 3/4 of the way down the device, where it is then divided in to a separate piece that does not come off.  At this joint, there is a small gap and you can actually see the SIM card at times.  But this is minor and I don’t really look at the back of the phone all that much 😉

The other significant item on the hardware front is the kickstand, which props the phone up in a landscape mode to let you watch video etc.  When I first heard about this, I was concerned about the stability of such a thing but I have to admit I am impressed with how stable it is.

One other thing that, for the first few days bugged me, is the power/volume/camera buttons.  They feel a little squishy and don’t have a hard ‘click’ at the end to tell when they have been depressed.  It took a bit of getting use to but it seems fine now.

The HD7 is of course a very LARGE phone, which is one of the reasons I bought it in the first place.   It might not appeal to everyone though.

I’ll note here that the camera is like every HTC camera I’ve ever used, it does the job, but I wouldn’t want to show anyone else any photo’s I’ve taken.  Even a cheap point and shoot digital camera will run circles around it.

I did have one hardware glitch on the first day, the battery meter seems to have been miscalibrated somehow, it appeared that I would only get about 12 hours of standby time from the phone, however taking the battery out and re-inserting it seems to have reset the battery meter and the problem has not come back yet.

Also of note is that the Bell phone comes with a 16g SD card.  Which isn’t bad but the HD7 has no way to replace it without voiding the warranty.

The final item here is that Bell ONLY had a single case in stock, it was a black slip on plastic case and to say it was useless is an understatement.  Every time I put the phone in my pocket with the case on it triggered the power button and the phone would cycle on and off every few minutes.  Don’t bother with the case from Bell, even the screen protector that came with the case didn’t go on cleanly and bubbled all over the place, it’s just a waste of money.

Windows Phone 7

Over the years I have looked at most smart phones to see which one would be the best.  Each time it seemed the defining feature for me was synchronizing with my Exchange mailbox.  The first phone I attempted to sync to my mailbox was an old Razer.  To say it was a spectacular failure would be an understatement.  The Razer just wasn’t smart enough to handle all the different calendar item’s and contact details let alone mail.

I’ve looked at several other smart phones, but each time I came back to Windows Mobile as each contender just didn’t quite fit the bill (Android’s belief that folder hierarchies don’t matter and everything should be a tag, Blackberries requirement for a BES server, etc.)

Microsoft obviously does a very good job of syncing to Exchange.  And Windows Phone 7 is no exception to this.

From my experience with my Zune HD, I knew pretty much what to expect from WP7 and as such was not surprised by anything during the setup.

First and foremost, let me just say that using WP7 brings a smile to my face every time.  It’s just fun to swipe around and see the transitions and animations that MS has baked in to the OS.  It is an experience that seems to get better all the time.  Of course in a few months that joy may become sorrow as the novelty wears off, but I get the same feeling from my Zune HD and I’ve had it for over a year.

WP7 is fast and responsive on the phone, it does so much right that what it does wrong seems to pale in comparison.

The Good:

  • WP7 is fast and responsive
  • The live tiles make quick information available at a glance
  • You can uninstall ALL the crapware your carrier installed on your phone without asking 😉
  • Outlook is awesome, it looks great and sync’s everything you would expect to/from multiple different account types.
  • The software keyboard is quite good, I suspect with the big display it makes it better than on some of the smaller WP7 devices that exist.
  • The SMS app is fun, seeing the conversation in speech bubbles makes a striking (if not original) design.
  • The Calendar is functional and supports everything you would expect.
  • The people hub is cool.  Getting all your status updates in one place did seem like a bad idea at first, but once you use it, it makes sense.
  • Internet Explorer.  Ok this one was a big surprise, after abandoning IE on Windows Mobile for Opera I was concerned about IE in WP7, but so far it’s not too bad.  No Opera of course, but functional.
  • Music and Video hub borrows heavily from the Zune HD and that’s a good thing 😉
  • Maps, its Bing maps and it’s cool.
  • Pictures is a nice, fits with the rest of the OS and works well.
  • The Facebook integration is well done, seamless but doesn’t get in the way.  One caveat here is that for users with lots of “friends” it pulls all your Facebook contacts, no way to control it.  However there is a standalone Facebook app if you don’t like the WP7 integration.

The not so bad/not so good:

  • The phone app seems to be pretty bare bones, it works but it could use some more options.  Several missing items related to the phone seem like strange omissions.  My old cell phone auto forwarded after 15 seconds to a VOIP line I have, this functionality is required by GSM and you can manually set it up through the phone, but there is no GUI for it.
  • Sometimes selecting an item seems to miss once in a while, I don’t know if this is just me, the HD7 or WP7.  I’ll have to wait a while and see if my accuracy increases over time on this one.
  • On the HD7, there doesn’t seem to be any way to disable the vibration every time you hit one of the three softkeys on the phone.  It’s not too bad, but looking around the net seems to indicate that this option is per device, not enforce through WP7.
  • I really haven’t delved much in to the games and I don’t have an Xbox Live account so this goes here just because.
  • Multitasking.  Much has been said about WP7’s lack of third party multitasking, but so far it hasn’t been much of an issue.  MS has announced it will support this by the end of 2011 so we’ll see how it goes from here.
  • The calendar only has three views; agenda, day, month.  A multi month or yearly view would be nice.
  • Something I’ve done many times with the phone is to be swiping down or selecting an item near the bottom right of the screen and accidentally hit the search button.  It might have been nice to have a slight ridge or something to differentiate the screen from the buttons, but I don’t think any of the WP7 phones have this so it might be a MS requirement.
  • The information bar at the top of the phone auto hides, it gives WP7 a cleaner look, but an option might be nice to always display it.
  • The people live tile flashes micro photos from your contacts, however many of these photo’s for me are out dated and of no interest, allowing a config item to limit which photo’s to use or even a way to turn off the live title completely would be nice.
  • Access to pretty much any MS service (including the marketplace) requires a LiveID.  Easy enough to get, but just “yet another account” to add to your collection.

The Bad:

  • Ok, the screen lock is fine, but come on a REQUIRED 4 number unlock code, what are we still in the 80’s?
  • No SMS sync.  Exchange 2010 introduced SMS sync with Windows Mobile 6.5, which made all your text messages appear in an Exchange folder.  It also allowed you to send SMS messages from your desktop through Outlook.  I really do miss this feature.
  • Copy/Paste.  Everyone should know by now that it’s not here, but all reports seem to indicate a March 8th service pack that will add it.  Yeah!
  • Network/Bluetooth config.  To turn on or off either you have to go through the settings program.  It’s buried deep and it’s something that seems like it’s ripe for a live tile.
  • Ringtones.  Hope you like what comes with the phone as there’s currently no way to load new ones.
  • The Marketplace.  From the phone it’s a mess of an app, it’s a little better through the Zune desktop software but either way MS needs to work on this to make it easier to find apps you actually want.
  • Getting the MAC address.  Ok anyone who has locked down their local WiFi network with MAC address filtering knows they need to know the MAC address of new devices so they can permit it to use the network.  Microsoft has omitted this information from anywhere on the phone so you have to open up your network, let the phone connect, find the DHCP or log information to then reveal the MAC address of the phone.  I’d suggest writing it down somewhere you won’t lose it for next time 😉
  • This isn’t a knock against WP7 as WM6 lack it too, but there is still no way for ActiveSync to sync the notes folder on your Exchange mailbox.  Come on, how hard is this really?
  • Other then the  information bar at the top of the display, there is nowhere to find out signal strength or battery level.  And the info bar only gives a graphical representation, no numeric values.

Summary

The real question though is would I recommend the phone to my friends?  With Windows Mobile 6.5, the answer was a resounding NO.  Windows Phone 7 makes it an easy recommendation to anyone who wants a phone that makes a statement about what it means to be user friendly.

Anyone who watches Microsoft product lifecycles can tell you that they usually take 3 versions of any product to “get it right”.  The first version works, just barely.  The second is feature complete and the third is the one everyone wants.  This time they’ve moved quickly to try and break the cycle, while not completely successful,  WP7 is very close I’d call it a version 2.5.  Hopefully by the end of the year, with multiple service packs on the way, perhaps they’ll get to version 3 faster than ever.