Bladewatch.com

Dell.com

Reconnect – a partnership between Dell and Goodwill Industries International that lets consumers drop off used computers for no-cost recycling— is getting its game on with support from Microsoft.

Dell and Goodwill® announced today that in addition to collecting PCs and computer accessories, the 1,900-plus Goodwill locations participating in Reconnect will now for the first time collect Microsoft entertainment products including Xbox, Zune and accompanying accessories for free recycling. With its commitment and contributions to Reconnect, Microsoft joins Dell’s efforts to make electronics recycling free and convenient for consumers.

“The world consumes more electronic products every year, so it’s important to dispose of or recycle these items responsibly,” said Brian Tobey, Corporate Vice President at Microsoft. “Recycling of our consumer hardware products is a major part of Microsoft’s commitment to minimizing our environmental impact and that of our customers. The Reconnect program helps consumers easily and properly recycle these products at the end of their use, and our effort to strengthen and expand this program is a natural extension of our commitment to environmental sustainability.”

An article talking about Dell and GoodWill Industries International making it easier to recycle computer and consumer electronics which has to be a good thing from an environmental standpoint.

Finextra

The bank says the apps for the iPhone and iPad – which is set to launch in Spain next month – tap the “interactivity and usability” features of the Apple products.

The apps – targeted at both consumer and business customers – let users check up on accounts and cards, make transfers, deal shares and file signatures.

It’s always great to see organizations find ways of reaching out their customer either with new technology, with social networking, or in the case above developing applications for mobile devices. The more accessible and customizable we can make the user experience, the more we can differentiate and hopefully earn revenue from the end user community. That my transactions are all available at the click of a button, that I have multiple streams for communication and dialogue makes me feel closer to that business, the more chances there are to maintain the customer dialogue, the chance for further revnues and meeting customer expectation – Natwest’s iPhone application is a brilliant example of that, I feel informed and I don’t have to use their telephone banking system, take up someone’s time asking for a mini statement or balance, very cool.

HP

I got the 9am flight to Frankfurt (thanks to HP) in order to attend their Technology@Work event, it’s a great opportunity to meet up with HP, to see what they are talking about, what updates they have and have a dialogue on a one to one basis.

The Technology@Work event also allows customers and end users to discover new and existing products, as well as meet HP’s partners to discuss challenges and opportunities.

I’ve arrived at the hotel and am now off to registration. You can read up more about the Technology@Work event here.

Microsoft.com

Version: 2.0

This bulletin summary lists security bulletins released for April 2010.

With the release of the bulletins for April 2010, this bulletin summary replaces the bulletin advance notification originally issued April 8, 2010. For more information about the bulletin advance notification service, see Microsoft Security Bulletin Advance Notification.

For information about how to receive automatic notifications whenever Microsoft security bulletins are issued, visit Microsoft Technical Security Notifications.

Microsoft is hosting a webcast to address customer questions on these bulletins on April 14, 2010, at 11:00 AM Pacific Time (US & Canada). Register now for the April Security Bulletin Webcast. After this date, this webcast is available on-demand. For more information, see Microsoft Security Bulletin Summaries and Webcasts.

Microsoft also provides information to help customers prioritize monthly security updates with any non-security, high-priority updates that are being released on the same day as the monthly security updates. Please see the section, Other Information.

A reminder that Microsoft released patches for April affecting the Windows operating system, remember applying the patches and security hot fixes is one of the first things that a service provider or vendor will ask when logging a call.

Verari

San Diego, Calif. – March 16, 2010 – Verari Technologies™, a premier developer of independent blade-based computing and storage platforms for conventional and modular data centers, today announced that its blade-based server products including Verari’s award-winning FOREST Containers, BladeRack® 2 Series platforms, and select rackmount servers, will now support the next generation of Intel’s intelligent server processors. The combination offers customers unparalleled performance, density, and energy savings for data center consolidation efforts.

“Utilizing the new Intel Xeon processor 5600 series in our platforms can enable some customers to reduce their data center operational costs by up to 90% and dramatically improve their data center efficiency in the process,” said David Driggers, CEO, Verari Technologies. “When it comes to power, cooling and space efficiency, Verari is already leading the pack. When coupled with the new Intel Xeon processor 5600 series, a great data center consolidation package just got that much better.”

It’s great to see the next generation of Verari servers and blades using the new Intel Xeon 5600 processor, I’ll need to read up more about them, any innovation and competition in the server space has to be a good thing.

http://www.newswiretoday.com/news/68929/

Tabor Communications, Inc. announced the launch of a new internet portal and weekly email newsletter titled HPC in the Cloud (HPCintheCloud.com), dedicated to covering Enterprise & Scientific large scale cloud computing. The portal will provide technology decision-makers and stakeholders (spanning government, academia, and industry) with the most accurate and current information on developments happening in the specific point where Cloud Computing and High Performance Computing (HPC) intersect.

“General cloud computing is quite pervasive throughout IT, but many of the issues for deploying large scale cloud computing are significantly more complex and are impacting acceptance. HPC in the Cloud is the communication channel — the bridge that will facilitate and thus accelerate acceptance and advance adoption of cloud technologies in HPC and large-scale computing,” said Tom Tabor, Publisher of HPC in the Cloud. “HPC in the Cloud will focus on the opportunity where HPC and cloud computing intersect and work to distill community to find the common threads among the ideas that spring from the front lines of this important technology paradigm.”

This new internet portal does sound interesting, anything we can do to discuss the issues, the benefits and the announcements around HPC technology, I’m off to check out more.

HP.com

Firmware Dependency:
This update also requires version 1.12.0.0 of the “hpqilo2.sys” (health) device driver.

Problems Fixed:
Fixed an issue prompting Windows ID 57 “Communication Timeout” errors in the Windows Event Viewer. Issue was caused when iLO was extremely busy servicing Virtual Media requests and an “hpqilo2.sys” (health) driver IPMI request timed out. This caused the iLO 2 FW and the “hpqilo2.sys” driver lose synchronization between the incoming request and the outgoing response. The visible indicator of this issue is multiple “ID 57″ errors logged in the Windows Event Viewer by the hpqilo2.sys driver. This update also requires version 1.12.0.0 of the “hpqilo2.sys” (health) device driver.

Fixed an issue that could cause iLO 2 UHCI controller to halt after detecting a PCI timeout error on HP DL385 G5p and HP DL385 G6 servers. Symptoms of this issue are: 1) iLO 2 Virtual Keyboard/Mouse stop responding, 2) Windows Server 2003 hangs when shutting down, 3) Windows Server 2003 suddenly stops responding.

Fixed an issue introduced in iLO 2 v1.81 where the iLO 2 Virtual Keyboard/Mouse could fail to initialize when installing Linux or VMWare ESX 4.0.

Upgrading the drivers/firmware is one of the first thing vendors will ask when logging a call, and can bring enhanced functionality or fixes to resolve known issues. Do check it out, I’m off to download it and apply in the bladewatch lab.