TechEd Europe 2012: Thursday's (day 3) quick thoughts

Same quick summary as previous days, I was dead beat so wrote it this morning enroute to day 4.

SWAG: Did a bit better with USB hub, 2 USB 4GB Sticks, and some other stuff. Oh yeah; I won a Nokia Lumia 900!!! At the Nokia booth after handing over the tile from the conference bag and clicking randomly on a screen. You can't beat that! Well, a Win8 tablet could have 😉

Weather: very nice and I had no issues with to hot conference rooms. Luckily no draft either.

Virtualization support in Win2012 for DCs: Nice and enlightning session! I did saw some tweets from another (related) session that it is still recommended to have a physical DC. I do think that's a point of discussion, frankly (but not going to elaborate here).

Exchange: Scott Schnolls session (HA Deep Dive EXL401) great as ever, but man! He is fast, a lot of complex info in a short time. But every sentence crucial. I'll have to watch this session again and again on @ch9. It could also be that I tweeted some stuff that needs more clarification or things I've misinterpreted. So, check that session out!

MEC: Yeah, the competitor with TechEd for new Exchange 15 info. Downside. Upside is that I am attending that conference as well! Oh, and every Exchange session ended with a sheet pointing out that MEC was happening. Yeah, yeah, done that, bought the T-shirt… (right, MEC organization: I WANT A COMMEMORATIVE T-SHIRT. Or even several. You've been warned!)

Networking: still the best part of this TechEd. Talking, meeting and tweeting with peers is just invaluable. Thank you TechEd!

Twitter: for me Twitter is THE way to network with people. Almost all peers I got to know via this medium. I just received word (via twitter) that I also won the #twitterarmy contest organized via @rodtrent. Cool! Thank you. Expect the twitter storm to end now, but it'll fire up before, during and short after the Microsoft Exchange Conference in Orlando later this year 😉

Office party: Got the invite and possibly would have been a great substitute for the missing country drinks (WHY U Y NO HAVE COUNTRY DRINKS???). But alas, I was too tired and after a nice dinner with peers, I decided to go home.

Nokia: Did I mention I've won a Nokia Lumia 900? I already have a Lumia 800, but that's my work phone. My personal phone is a HTC Desire Android phone (which I very much dislike). Now I'm double WP'ed 🙂 Funny thing though, a lot of reactions refer to the fact the device is not getting WP8 and just WP7.8. Well, I DON'T CARE IN THIS CASE! 😀

Well, now the last day at TechEd Europe!