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First I thought I could do an in-place upgrade of my Windows 8RC PC, turns out you can’t (not sure if it would have been wise anyway) so it was format disk time. I had hoped for a seamless install of Windows 8, but it hung after detecting devices. It seems it was the ‘old problem’ down to Lenovo/Nvidia Optimus graphics drivers issues. So I checked my bios settings which were set to Nvidia Optimus mode disabled (the only way I could get the RC to install), and changed it to Optimus mode enable and the install all worked without an issue. However though as a laptop it work find, including with a second external monitor. I did have to set Optimus back to disabled and run in discrete video mode if I wanted to use a projector. It seems the Optimus mode certainly gets confused with the Benq projector we have in the office, it will allow you to extend your desktop but not duplicate it. As soon as you switch back to discrete graphic mode all is OK (though you do lose the ability to run two external monitors) ...

If like me you listen to many podcasts, then swapping the PC your Phone7 syncs to collect the podcasta is a real pain. The problem being as far as I can see Zune has no podcast subscription export/import, so you are left with a lot of copy typing to re-enter them. Whilst rebuilding my PC with Windows 8 today I have at least found a work around On your old Pc open you ‘c:user[user]My Podcasts’ folder (shown in Windows Explorer as the ‘Podcast’ folder). You will see a folder for each podcast you are subscribed to Copy the whole folder to the same location on your new PC (I did via a USB drive as I was reformatting the disk on the same PC) Install Zune on the new PC Open Zune and look in the Collection>Podcasts, you should see all your podcast – but your are not subscribed yet In Zune, highlight and select all podcasts Right click and you should see a Subscribe option, select it. Zune now sorts itself out re-subscribing and checking for new programmes It gets a bit confused over what you have watched so might pull them down again. Also you might want to alter subscription settings for specific podcasts as it will default back to just 3 programmes. When you are happy with your settings just drag the podcasts onto your newly resync’d mobile device to finish the job. You might need to look at the podcasts that are on the device as seems it does not removed one previously there via Zune (again it seems unsure of what you have listened too) Not perfect but better than trying to removed load of site URLs ...

Overnight Visual Studio and TFS 2012 became available on MSDN for download; I really pleased to say that the ALM Rangers also SIM shipped all our 2012 guidance at the same time. I have been working on two of the Ranger project for the past year and have to say I have learnt a lot working with such a great crowd of Microsoft and external TFS experts. Some stuff I learnt was about the 2012 release it is true, but there was plenty on working with a a globally distributed team with a whole host of logistical and time constraints. ...

Whilst moving over to our new TFS 2012 installation I got the following error when a build tried to run tests TF900546: An unexpected error occurred while running the RunTests activity: ‘Unable to load one or more of the requested types. Retrieve the LoaderExceptions property for more information.’. This was a new one on me, and nothing of much use on the web other than a basic MSDN page. Turns out the immediate fix is to just restart the build controller. Initially I did this after switching to the default build process template, and setting it to NOT load any custom activities, but I seems a simple restart would have been enough as once I re-enabled all custom activities it still worked. ...

At last my Nokia Lumia 800 gets its firmware upgrade to allow tethering. The 8773 update seems to be made up of three updates, two operating system ones (which I managed to force down in the usual way), but this Nokia firmware one has taken weeks to get to me, forcing did not help. I had to wait. I don’t think I am alone in not being too impressed with the update process. The throttling/delaying update process is probably Ok for the man in the street, who just wants a working phone, but there should be an easier way to get updates if you want/need them ASAP for development purposes or are trying to run consistent versions for all phones in an organisation. ...

In my last post I discussed the process I needed to go through to get Typemock Isolator running under TFS 2012. In this process I used the Auto Deploy feature of Isolator. However this raised the question of how to manage the references within projects. You cannot just assume the Typemock assemblies are in the GAC, they are not on the build box using auto deploy. You could get all projects to reference the auto deployment location in source control. However, if you use build process templates across projects it might be you do not want to have production code referencing build tools in the build process are directly. ...

Update 23rd Aug 2012: This blog post was produced testing against the 2012RC, seems it does not work against the 2012 RTM release. I am seeing the error in my build logs _ TF900546: An unexpected error occurred while running the RunTests activity: ‘Executor process exited._ I am looking into this, expect to see a new blog post soon Update 24th Aug 2012: I have fixed the issues with TFS2012RTM, the links to zip containing a working version of the activity in this post should now work. For more details see my follow up part 2 post ...

I have been really pleased with Windows 8 RP on my Lenovo W520, I have had no major problems. I have seen the issues with slow start-up of networking after a sleep as others have seen, but nothing else. However today I tried to do a Lync audio call with Lync 2013 Beta and found I had no audio. Up to now I had just used the drivers Windows 8 installed which had seemed OK. It turns out I had to install the Conexant Audio Software 8.32.23.5 from the Lenovo site. Once I did this and Lync was restarted the audio leapt into life. As I remember I had a similar issue with Windows 7 and getting the audio to work correctly on my Lenovo base station. ...

Updated 30th Aug 2012: This post is specific to TFS/VS 2012 RC - for details on the RTM see this updated post Whilst moving over to our new TFS2012 system I have been editing build templates, pulling the best bits from the selection of templates we used in 2010 into one master build process to be used for most future projects. Doing this I have hit a couple of problems, turns out the cure is the same for both ...

I am pleased to say that Black Marble will be doing a session at the Leeds Sharp User group on the evening of the 30th of August on the [Samsung SUR40 with Microsoft PixelSense (what used to be call a Surface2)](http://www.blackmarble.co.uk/SectionDisplay.aspx?name=Specialisations&subsection=Samsung SUR40 (Surface 2)). Should be an interesting session as we will be bringing one of our rental units along for everyone to have a go on.