I’ve written before about installing a Windows Image version of Vista onto a MacBook Pro using imagex.exe so I figured I’d write an updated post on doing the same with the Air.  It’s fairly straightforward, and I’ve found what I think is the fastest (or at least sure fire) way to get it done.  Here’s how:

• Create a partition for Windows using Bootcamp (I created a 55GB one since I’m going to use Windows 90% of the time)
• Reboot from the standard Vista install DVD.  Format the partition you created and complete a normal Vista install.  You’ll need to do this so the boot sector is written properly.  I’ve tried stopping right after you format it, and have even killed it right after the file copy starts (neither worked) so I’m guessing the boot loader gets written at the end of the process.
• When you reboot be sure to press and hold the mouse button after the Mac bootup “ding” sound.  When the disk ejects quickly put in your WinPE DVD with imagex.exe and the image you’d like to install.  You may have to boot back into OS X first.  If so restart the Bootcamp assistant and choose install Windows.
• Pay close attention as it boots so you can “press any key” to get WinPE going.
• Once you boot into WinPE you’ll need to reformat the disk (which doesn’t mess with the boot sector).  So run the following commands:
  diskpart
  select disk 0
  select partition 3
  format fs=ntfs quick
  assign letter=c
  quit
• Now you’re ready to put the image on the machine.  For this you’ll run:
  imagex /apply IMAGENAME.wim 1 c:
• Now go get a cup of coffee (or several) while it puts the image in place.  When that’s done reboot and go get dinner (and then maybe breakfast) as Vista starts up the installer for the image.

That should do it.  If you’re not experienced with imaging technologies like this, and you work in a corporate environment you should start reading about it.  We may only have 11 employees but given the amount of times I’ve used my image (easily 100+ times) the amount of time it has saved me is staggering.  Also the added benefit of all my users being on the exact same platform with the exact same tweaks is, well, huge.

Nope, that isn’t a typo in the subject, I’m running andLinux, a new distribution of Linux that I read about today. I use the term distribution loosely, it’s much different than that. In short rather than using emulation like say Parallels does (where one OS is running on top of the other) andLinux loads the Linux kernel beside the Windows one, like any other program. So in essence Linux (Ubuntu based) applications can run natively on top of Windows. And it works. It works VERY well.

So here’s what I’m doing right now. I’m writing this blog post inside Firefox. Firefox running inside the Linux kernel. It’s running on my XP desktop which I can’t see because that’s running inside Parallels on my MacBook Pro. But you can’t really tell. It just works. Linux apps work. Windows apps work. OS X apps work. No rebooting. No switching windows. No switching displays. It just works. Oh and did I mention that I just ran a simple installer to get it all going? Yeah, when I say it works I mean it really works.

So holy shit is this cool but how useful is it? Well so far I don’t think very (or rather not for that many). There are very few people that have a must have application for each major platform. It will be huge for software testers for sure, being able to test on multiple platforms all at once and all on one machine. Oh and did I mention the performance is great. Everything I’ve done has been very usable.

It really is amazing where virtualization technologies are heading, and while this isn’t virtualization in the traditional sense it’s easiest to think of it that way. Each day we inch away from the importance of the operating system. I’m looking forward to that inch changing to a crawl…

This week Jason decided he wanted the MacBook Air so he went out and got one (don’t you just love impuslive VCs?). Being a fairly huge Lenovo/Thinkpad fan I semi-tried to talk him out of it and into the X61 which is also an ultra portable (we have several X series laptops already). Since I knew he was excited about the Air (hell it is an Apple product remember) and since I know that Apple makes great hardware (come on the are a hardware company) I didn’t argue with him too much at all. Man am I glad I didn’t.

I’ve been working on the Air for a few days now getting it all setup. I have it dual booting OS X and Vista, and it’s doing it quite nicely. Vista is plenty snappy (this is the lower end 1.6 with the 80 standard drive). And yes, it is so amazing because of how thin it is. But that’s not it. What’s amazing about it is that you know it’s thin, but you don’t get how thin. Like many Apple products you have to touch it, feel it, hold it. When you do you instantly appreciate that it isn’t thin – it’s anorexic! When I told a friend it was roughly the thickness of a DVD case he didn’t believe me. “Then it must be a flimsy piece of shit” he quickly said but see, that’s the truly astonishing part, it isn’t. Not even a little bit. The Air is so solid you’d swear it was built from Adamantium. It doesn’t flex or move in your hands at all, it’s ever bit as stable as the MacBook Pro. The keyboard is responsive (even if it is missing a bunch of “special” keys) and the screen is wonderfully bright. The backlight keyboard is very easy to see in low light (I do think I prefer the color of the MBP keyboard vs. this black one).

The Air is however not without faults. First: expansion. The biggest oversight of the Air is no 3G wireless data. See that I can forgive, there will always be things down the road you want to add (yes it should have 3G now). Sure it’s got WiFi but ONLY WiFi, not even Ethernet. So if you want to add 3G to it (which of course Jason does) you have to use a USB dongle. But of course the USB port (there is after all only 1) is in a little flip down door that is so small you can’t plug the dongle in. So you have to use an extension cord. So guess what, your tiny USB 3G dongle is now almost as large as the whole fucking laptop. Brilliant huh? There’s also this stupid Mac keyboard, missing all the “techie” keys like PrtScn, etc. (which yes, I do actually use). It also assumes I either need volume up or F12, not both. Since to use both I have to add a key to the mix (the function key). Likewise with page down, home, end, etc. This isn’t specific to the Air, rather a design fault on all Apple laptops. Then there’s the price. Roughly $2,000 for this thing is quite a lot given it’s relative lack of power. Since you don’t care about that given you’re using this as an email type device (you’re not editing video on it that’s for sure!) generally I’m fine with paying for the miniturazation but the asking price is quite steep.

All-in-all the Air is a staggeringly good laptop. I emailed Jason this morning and told him I had to have one. I really think I do. Which is a shame since I got a MacBook Pro about 2 months ago. It just may have to go up on eBay soon. It just might. So if you’re considering a small laptop anytime soon look hard at the Air. Then again don’t, it’s so small you might not see it if you squint.

Recently I’ve been considering migrating many of my users back to XP (and have already done that for a few and my personal laptop).  As there are a few Vista features that I miss (I do like some of the changes to Explorer) I figured I’d see if I could do any tweaking to get Vista running a little better. 

The first and main thing I’ve done is turn off all the Vista GUI add-ons.  It’s pretty amazing the difference it makes and since it basically looks like XP I don’t really care.  So to do this here’s all you have to do:

• Right click on the Computer icon either in your Start Menu or on your desktop and choose “Properties”
• Click on “Advanced system settings” over in the upper left
• On the “Advanced” tab click on “Settings” under the “Performance” section (at the top)
• Select “Adjust for best performance” and click OK

That should do it, after a few seconds Vista will revert back to a much more XP look and feel.  While I do miss some of the eye candy the boost in speed I’ve gotten is well worth it.  If you do give this a try I’d love to hear how it goes for you, can you feel a difference?

Oh Microsoft what are you doing these days? I’m trying to defend you, I’m trying really hard. I do all I can to stave off the Mac Attck that’s going on in my office. Of our 5 partners 4 of them own Mac’s. And they all like them. A lot. You know what they don’t like, Vista

They tell me “but my Mac never crashes and boots in a flash”. I can only counter with “your Mac can’t do X or Y and Vista does” (please don’t start a flame war over that, I’m trying to be general here). They grunt at me and sulk away, unhappy that not only are they right where they started but that their IT guy has to tell them this is just how it is. That really sucks for me now doesn’t it? Yet I defend you still. Sure there are a lot of great things about Vista, but there really is no killer application that demands it. I moved us to Vista very quickly so we could all play with the “latest and greatest”. Could it be that after a year it’s biting us in the ass?

Lately I’ve patiently waited for Vista Service Pack 1. This is currently in beta testing and while I’m curious to see how it will be I’ve avoided the temptation to get an early copy. Beta service packs generally aren’t a fun thing to play with. Then this morning I see an article with tests showing that XP is almost 3 times as fast as Vista running the latest beta service packs. Three times. Then Jason emails me the article, obviously pointing out to me that “look, see I told you Vista is fucking slow”. You know what, he’s right. Microsoft what are you doing? You’re making me look stupid, that’s what. Look, I understand that Vista is a much richer experience and therefore is going to require some additional overhead. We’ve had that sort of thing with every Windows release. But XP IS THREE TIMES FASTER?!? I also know these are the beta service packs so for now I’m going to give you a final benefit of the doubt. But you’re really going to have to pull it together and pull it together very quickly!

So please, please don’t make me look any worse. Make life easier for me. Me, one of your biggest supporters. Don’t make me move to OS X or Linux. I won’t. I can’t. But I just might have to…

One of the great things in Windows Vista (yes there are a few) is the new imaging format that Microsoft introduced, and with that the imaging tool imagex.exe. In short this tool allows you to boot from a special WinPE boot disk to both capture the image and to deploy it to new machines. I won’t go into the details of creating these disks or images, but rather how to use these tools to deploy a Vista image to a MacBook Pro running Leopard and Bootcamp.

First you’ll use the Bootcamp utility in Leopard to create the partition for Vista. I chose a 32GB partition as Vista isn’t going to be the primary OS on this box. After creating the partition reboot using your WinPE disk (I created a DVD that held WinPE and the actual image file – WinPE doesn’t have the network drivers for the MacBook Pro so no loading over the network). Once you get booted into WinPE you’ll need to reformat the drive as NTFS (but don’t change ANYTHING else). You can do this with diskpart:

——————–
(at a command prompt inside WinPE)
diskpart
select disk 0
select partition 3
format fs=ntfs quick
exit
——————–

Once you’re done there you’re now ready to blow the image onto the machine. The general syntax for this is:

——————–
imagex /apply IMAGENAME.wim 1 c:
——————–

For my image it took about 12 minutes to install and be ready to go. When it’s done you’ll need to eject the CD/DVD. To do this as the machine is booting (just as you see the gray Apple screen) press and hold the mouse button until it ejects. Once it ejects you’ll probably boot back into Leopard. Once in Leopard go to System Preferences – Start Up Disk, choose your Windows install and reboot. But there is now a new issue…

For some reason when the image loads it won’t be bootable. So we’ll need an original Vista DVD to fix this. Boot from the Vista DVD and once you get to the installer (after choosing your language) choose Repair my Computer. On my box when I did this it never listed any Vista installs to repair, don’t worry about this it should still work. Once you get to the repair options choose Fix Startup Problems (or something like that). This will run for a few minutes letting you know that it might have fixed things (and hopefully it did). Power down and as you boot back up be sure to press the mouse button again to eject the DVD. You should now boot into Vista for the first time (depending on your image this should be the Vista startup environment). Complete your Vista install as normal (remember the Leopard DVD has the Vista drivers on it so don’t forget to install those).

So I now have Brad’s MacBook Pro happily dual booting between Leopard and my Vista Business image. A huge time saver for me now that I don’t have to manually install Vista and all his apps. Next up, getting Parallels and/or VMWare Fusion to open the Bootcamp partition so I can use the same Vista install inside Leopard, hope that’s easier than this was…