We started off hearing about Windows 7 and how successful it has been since its release, we also heard that the IE9 Beta had already hit and exceeded 20million downloads.

Sinofsky introduced us to the Microsoft Surface 2.0 which has been manufactured by Samsung. The first thing we noticed about the device is that it is an awful lot thinner than the first generation but the significant difference was no camera’s inside to track inputs.

Microsoft Surface 2.0 is going to be one of Microsoft’s showcase products for 2011. Designed  to allow multiple users to ‘manipulate’ digital content; Surface can be used for anything from banking through to EPOS for retail stores. Microsoft state that Surface 2.0 will ‘make content more engaging, stimulate users, make learning more fun and transform shopping experiences’.

The new version of Surface is 4” thick and now uses a ‘PixelSense’ technology. PixelSense is where every pixel is an infrared sensor therefore making the form factor a lot thinner, and giving potential buyers the ability to wall-mount the product.

PixelSense can not only support multi-input at one given time but Sinofsky held a piece of paper saying ‘I can see!’ placed it on the Gorilla Glass surface of the computer and it interpreted it.

Sinofsky stated that the hardware was powered by Windows 7, a multi-core processor and an AMD graphics processor.

Microsoft confirmed their first customer of Microsoft Surface 2.0 as Royal Bank of Canada and gave a demonstration of NFC with the product.

Microsoft says the Samsung SUR40 ‘Surface 2.0′ will be available in 23 countries worldwide later this year. There’s been no confirmation of pricing yet but with the original version 1 of Surface costing $12,500, I hope that it’s cheaper.

-Via Microsoft

You can do a lot of cool things with hosted Microsoft Exchange. Here are a few:

•        Set up accounts for meeting rooms. Each one will have its own calendar and you can see when they’re free or busy. To book the room, just ‘invite’ it to the meeting like any other participant. No more double booking.

•        Using Outlook to access the Exchange Server? It will cache a copy of your diary, email archives and so on locally, so you have a copy available even if you are not online. This is really handy if you are going to a meeting by car and you need to check the details and address.

•        Exchange Server works well with many Smartphones, including the iPhone but it is also compatible with Blackberry devices. Using hosted Exchange Server means that you don’t have to buy a dedicated Blackberry server as well, although additional costs are involved.

 Email anywhere

•        With Hosted Exchange Server your local coffee shop or internet café can be an emergency backup office. If your office internet connection fails or you have a fire or burglary, you can set up anywhere that has an internet connection (maybe using a Wi-Fi hotspot) and still have access to your email and business information.

•        If you employ temporary staff or have rapid staff turnover, adding a new user to the system takes minutes and is done by our dedicated support team. As soon as they leave, you can delete the account. You only pay for the users you have in any given month. If you need to take on 40 temps for a big project, they can all have email addresses for as long as they need.

 Change plans on the hop

•        Re-book a delayed flight at the airport using your SmartPhone to email your travel agent or personal assistant.

•        Pick up your email at 30,000 feet using wireless networking and satellite internet connections on certain airlines. Or at zero feet if you’re travelling on some trains which also have wireless internet connections.

•        Use the ‘Plan a meeting’ wizard in Outlook 2003/2007 to find a time when all the invitees are free to attend. No need to ring them all up to check their diaries.

•        Many people still keep a desk diary and carry a portable one with them, relying on their secretary to co-ordinate the two and deal with any double bookings. With a compatible Smartphone, you can update your diary as soon as you make a new appointment and your secretary can see the changes as soon as you make them.

Some benefits:

1. Lower costs with Pay-as-You-go
Subscribing to a SaaS application removes the overhead associated with implementing conventional software. Traditonal software implementation would involve purchasing and maintaining servers, housing them securely, and installing and maintaining the software. The upfront investment in hardware, specialist IT skills and the software itself can be huge – whereas using a SaaS provider means paying a PAYG subscription.
– This point is particulary prevalent in these financial times, business is still going but large upfront cash investments are best avoided

2. Quicker deployment
Since a SaaS provider (or hosting company) will already have the infrastructure waiting and be able to speedly deploy new instances of the software a business could be up and running in a far shorter time that if they decided to implement it themselves.

3. Greater Security
As a SaaS provider, client data security and system security is of the highest priority. Should either of these be compromised the whole business is at risk and so it is given a serious amount of attention. For example, at SpiderGroup we have our infrastructure ‘Penetration tested’ by external agencies to ensure we’re up to stratch.

4. Better reliability
As with security, up-time or reliability is at the top of the priority list of any SaaS provider. With qualified, in house engineers montoring the systems 24hrs a day if a problem occurs it can be dealt with immediately – not when it has started to affect the software.

A couple of the software applications we provide on the SaaS model are:

Microsoft Exchange Server (£15.00 per mnth)
This is all your Outlook data – Email/Diary/Contacts which allows them to sync to your mobile and be able to share colleagues diaries.

Microsoft Windows SharePoint (£15.00 per mnth with Exchange)
This gives a business online file storage, backup and other information management tools.