Out of the blue I got this message from iTunes today:

iTunes has detected an iPod in recovery mode.  You must restore this iPod before it can be used with iTunes.

Fair enough, foo happens, life goes on.  Or so I thought.  When you restore your iPod and reboot it, the same message comes back!  Over and over.

The solution, it turns out according to the collective wisdom of the blogs, is to change the drive letter of your iPod in Computer Manager.

Mine had, for reasons not yet understood, changed from J: to H: - which was in use as a network-mapped home drive.  This conflict was being reported in iTunes as an iPod in Recovery Mode.

It seems like all I do these days is download iTunes updates, and the messages are not getting any better when it goes belly-up.

Apple, this is turning into a one way relationship!

Listening To:  Zephyr Timbre, Absrtakt Fusion

Previously I had been using the (formally "Katmai") SQL Server 2008 CTPs that were distributed through MSDN as VHD files ready for Virtual PC.  But today with the arrival of the November CTP (CTP 5) DVD I actually got around to the installation.

I had no problem with the hardware requirements and the install went successfully.  I screen caped the interesting bits as I went...

The Launcher.  First up there are some improvements to the install launcher with all the important stuff easy to find.

The Configuration Check screen is as you would expect based on SQL Server 2005.



An interesting thing to note about the Feature Selection screen is as you add and remove features the remaining steps adjust accordingly



I've skipped the Instace Configuration screen because it is just as you would expect, however the Service Accounts page has been improved with some secure defaults and it guides you towards secure choices. 



Again I have skipped the Instance Configuration because it is much as you would expect.  The Database Engine Configuration screen is again good at guiding you towards good choices.  Interestingly TempDB location is included which is nice.  Always good to have TempDB on seperate IO if possible.



Analysis Services Configuration is much the same as Database Engine Configuration, but nice to see SharePoint integrated mode is available on the Reporting Services Configuration step.  Historically this use to be some black magic.  I'm looking forward to testing out this option in Katmai in greater depth later.



The rest of the steps are much as you would expect based on SQL Server 2005 and not too interactive, so I have saved you the bandwidth. 

And there you have it!  Play time again for me

Listening To: Air - Premiers Symptomes

Sydney had some very heavy storms today, on the back of what is an unseasonal string of storms.  The drains outside my new home office were at capacity for the first time and with the rain coming down…

It flooded

However by and large things went well.  First thing was to cut mains power to the room as a puddle was forming under my rack.  A laptop was on hand and the LAN infrastructure was on power protection, so all the machines that matter shut down cleanly. 

What did I learn?

• My SQL Server (Proliant ML530, 2x Xeons, 3Gb, Ultra3 RAID) takes the longest to shut down so should be shut down first.  Tacitly I knew this, but didn’t connect the dots at the time (with the UPS ticking away)
• Power packs, in fact mains power in general should be off the floor.  I am gonna make a policy about this.  Again it could have been a lot worse but it was a distraction with the clock ticking.  Command hooks are cheap and I will be making some CapEx 3M’s way shortly.
• The floor is a bad place to stack paperwork.  Nothing important was lost but Rob and Coronel has a date with the hair dryer
• One of my UPSes goes Red with plenty of juice to spare.  Might need to do more testing.