In case...

In case Matt finds this blog, yes, it's my blog. HAH! Anyways...

Okay, got my MSDN thing at work today. So now I have the CDs to run all the software (which is pretty cool, I can now run Virtual PC and test out network configs, test the website on Win98 with IE5, etc..)

Still working on Mom's computer - it's a halfbreed Compaq setup. The repair disks? Well, they don't work, somewhere on them is a bad file that verified just fine when I made them but now makes the setup almost worthless. I had to wipe the HD, try the Compaq setup, then, when it reboots, stick the drive in my computer, copy over a retail WinXP setup on top of the compaq winxp folder, then resume setup on her hardware. It's a half breed setup, and it didn't like it - some files are still missing, and I had to call Microsoft and have them give me a new install ID (it's the same hardware, but I think they've got a flag in the WinXP setups for OEMs that is different from retail, so it looked like a compaq but didn't smell like one, or something like that).

At work we're going to deploy Novell - I'm quite happy with them and their Linux direction, and I think my boss will be happy to actually have a support contract we can use (unlike Microsoft). I wouldn't be surprised if I was able to get Microsoft mostly out of the network (except possibly the SQL Server stuff) within 2 years, but things can change - we'll see.