Office365 new plans announced

Greetings !

Yesterday Microsoft announced a few major changes in their Industry leading Cloud Service Office365 . I will highlight some of those changes which to me appear most exciting .

1) Office365 E1 Enterprise Plan

This Plan was available at USD 8 per user per month and it consisted of :

MS Exchange for Messaging

MS SharePoint for Collaboration and Public website

MS Lync for Communication

What’s new is that without changing the price , Office Web Apps are now bundled in this plan. This means that that if you subscribe to this plan , you can also get the Web edition of MS Office consisting of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote . So you can edit any Office document using any browser . How cool is that ! Great Value and a BIG Thumbs Up from me.

2) Office365 Mid Business Plan

This is a new member of the Office365 family . It is meant for Companies upto 300 users . The plan price is USD 15 per user per month and you get:

MS Exchange for Messaging

MS SharePoint for Collaboration and Public website

MS Lync for Communication

Office Web Apps

MS Office Professional Plus

To understand what you will get in Office Professional Plus, click here .

You can download the copy of MS Office on your PC and use it. Also you can install it on upto 5 devices . Besides, you will always get the latest edition . To know more about MS Office as a Service, click here .

I believe Ofice365 Mid Business has “winner “ written all over it .

I shall come back with other changes in Office365 later.

with warm regards

Suresh Ramani

www.TechGyan.com

Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007

Nokia Lumia 920 The Best Smartphone in the World

Greetings !

 

Yesterday I was invited for a preview of new Windows Phone 8 models being launched by Nokia next week in India.  There are 2 models being launched   :

 

a) The Lumia 920

b) The Lumia 820

 

This post will focus on 920 as it is truly a mind blowing phone !

 

The event began with the Nokia representative gives some details of the Lumia Sales. Nokia has sold more than 100,000 Lumia units only during the 4 days of Diwali in November . That's pretty decent ! They also cracked the largest Corporate deal involving 4500 Lumia devices . Very Impressive . Makes me wonder about the crap dished out by experts saying that Lumia sales are very poor!  These experts can be really biased ! And they are biased against Windows Platform for sure!

 

Next we were given some hardware specs of the models . I have summarized some of these in this post below. We were told of various awards won by Nokia Lumia 920 . These have also been summarized below.

 

Pricing:

 

The indicative pricing of the models which will be released next week are:

 

Lumia 920 @ Rs. 37000/=

 

Lumia 820 @ Rs. 27000/=

 

Demos

We then saw some jaw dropping demos:

 

a) Camera quality vs. Samsung Galaxy  for night picture

No comparison here . Lumia was miles ahead

 

b) Optical Image Stabilization

The video shot with 920 was rock steady. The one with Samsung Galaxy was wobbly.

 

c) Nokia Lens by which one can remove unwanted objects from the picture.

 

d) Great Sound

 

Given below is the summary of the hardware specs

 

Specifications:

Lumia 920 has many things which are better or You don't have at all with iPhone 5 or Samsung Galaxy S3:

 1. The best screen - 2.4x faster than Samsung S3's screen and 5.4x faster than iPhone 5's screen (tested with Lagom test). Super sensitive and bright screen that can be used with gloves or finger nails.  It's the first smartphone in the world to deliver a full 60 frames-per-second (FPS) without any blurring.

2. It has 3pcs HAAC (High Amplitude Audio Capture) microphones and so the recorded audio is distortion free also at the loudest music performances and it can record also very low bass sound vs its rivals has nonHAAC mics and so the recorded audio at music concert recordings is mostly distorted and they can't capture low bass sound.

3. Nokia Lumia 920 is the first smartphone which has pentaband LTE support.

4. Nokia Lumia 920 is the first smartphone with OIS (Optical Image Stabilization) system which makes it possible to get better photos in the low light and makes more stable videos. Floating-lens PureView camera with optical image stabilization

5. Nokia Lumia 920 is the first smartphone with integrated wireless charging.

6. WP8 is smooth, efficient and simple. MS Word & Excel seamlessly integrated.

7. Free Apps: City Lens, Nokia Drive, Nokia Maps, Nokia Music, Smartshoot etc. Augmented reality City Lens is very cool.

8. Aluminium cover of iPhone 5 and Samsung S3 gets broken easier than Lumia 920's polycarbonate cover - polycarbonate is used for example with bulletproof windows

9. Premium GPS that can be used also without internet!

10. NFC ( Near Field Communications)

11. Rich sound recording in vids

12. Wireless Purity Pro headphones

 

 

The awards:

 

Before that , lets see some images. First lets see the Windows UI vs. Apple UI . Clearly the Apple iPhone UI looks very tired as compared to super sleek LIVE Tiles of Microsoft.

 

 

 

Now lets see the 920 in full glory. Its looks absolutely gorgeous !

 

 

 

 Awards Won By Nokia Lumia 920

 

The Top Smartphone of 2012, V3, UK

Top rated product on Amazon based on Customer reviews

The Best Mobile Phone of 2012, Readers Choice Award, Gizmodo, Australia.

iF Award for Outstanding Design, International Forum Design, Germany

Mobil Award for Best Smartphone Design, Mobile Magazine, Denmark

Best Smartphones of 2012, The Next Web, USA

Top Score Award, Mobil, Sweden

The Best High End Smartphones for the Holidays, CNET, USA

Best Productivity Phone, Best Camera Phone, Best Mapping Phone, Best Windows Phone, Runner up, Arstechnic, USA

Top 25 Tech of 2012, Mashable, USA

Top Smartphone of the Year, Mybroadband, South Africa

Best AT&T Smartphones of 2012, BGR, USA

 

 

I am totally convinced that over next few months, Windows Phone 8 will keep gaining marketshare and in particular, the Lumia range will be a big Winner . Willing to bet ?

with warm regards

 

Suresh Ramani

www.TechGyan.com

 

Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007

Windows 8 for Business

Greetings !

Just before the year ended , we did a wonderful event on "Windows 8 for Business" on December 27, 2012 , at the ITC Grand Central .

First , Mr Satabdee Hait  of Microsoft started the proceedings by doing a detailed presentation cum demo on Windows 8 features specially those which are meant for business. He spoke about the following features:

• Direct Access
• Hyper V
• Windows to Go
• SkyDrive
• SkyDrive Pro

and many more.

Next it was my turn . I focused on the Microsoft Ecosystem and its advantages over the Apple and Google Ecosystems. And of course I spent some time on showing how comfortable it was to use on my old laptop which had no touch . Some of the business benefits I spoke about were :

1)  Much faster boot up time
2)  20% more battery life
3)  Live Tile User Interface
4)  Great apps for Windows 8

After the formal part was over , we cut the cake welcoming Windows 8 . After that we took a few Group pictures. These have been put up on the events page of Facebook at  https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151389583268530.488937.118067228529&type=1

There was also a small Nokia Counter where we had latest Windows 8 based Lumia Smartphones on display . Many Customers showed interest in the devices on display.

All in all , the Customers were hopefully clear that Windows 8 is THE BEST EVER Operating System for a Business User.

with warm regards
Suresh Ramani www.TechGyan.com
Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007

 

 
 
 



Google Apps vs. Office365

 

Greetings !

With Cloud Computing gaining momentum with every passing day , one question which the Customers have is how should they start their journey on the Cloud. Their first question is which applications to consider shifting first to the Cloud.

The easy answer is to first shift Email, Collaboration & Communication to the Cloud . The benefits of shifting these applications to the Cloud are HUGE as compared to an On Premise Model.

Next question is which Solution is the BEST ?

Frankly , for Cloud based Email and Collaboration , there are only 2 vendors that matter : Google Apps from Google and Office365 from Microsoft.

I have created a short 4 minute video which compares Google Apps with Office365 . This will help you in your evaluation. Please click here for the same: http://youtu.be/GKacjb08aCI

For a more detailed feature by feature comparison between Google Apps and MS Exchange , I have created a 20 minute video . Click here http://youtu.be/HL5LdfF6ThI

I would love to hear on on these videos,

with warm regards
Suresh Ramani

www.TechGyan.com
Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007

Windows 8 promo offers for Consumers

 

Greetings !

Last week I had posted some details on the Windows 8 .  Today I will tell you about some exciting promotions announced by Microsoft around Windows 8 .

There are 2 great offers from Microsoft on Windows 8:

1) Windows Upgrade   Offer

If you have purchased Windows 7 after June 30, then you can upgrade to Windows 8 at just Rs. 699/-

2) Great Deal Offer 

You get Windows 8 at just Rs. 1999/=

 

For detailed Terms and Conditions , click here.

with warm regards
Suresh Ramani

www.TechGyan.com
Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007

Windows 8 is here

 

Greetings !

Last week has been pretty eventful for Microsoft . They had 3 big announcements :

a) Launch of Windows Surface

b) Launch of Windows 8

c) Launch of Windows Phone 8

I will focus mainly on Windows 8 and to a lesser extent on Surface as it is not available in India .

People are asking various questions. So let me talk about the product in form of FAQ:

1) What is the difference between Windows RT and Windows Pro

Windows RT is the brand new Operating System from Microsoft. It has significantly faster boot time . It is optimized for Touch. Important point to note is that only applications from the Microsoft App Store can be used on a RT device. It will power devices based on ARM processor like Surface RT . Another interesting this is that all RT devices will come pre loaded with MS Office Home & Student Edition. So you can use this MS Office at Home, in School, etc. But you cannot use it at Work from Licensing point of view as it is Home and Student Edition.

Windows 8 Pro on the other hand is the upgrade from Windows 7. So all your legacy applications will work on Windows Pro . You can also use the apps available on Windows App Store . Some apps will not work on Windows RT . So these will not be available to RT devices for download. Only for Win Pro devices.

2) What is the use of having Modern Tiles for a Business User

A Business User , especially the  Mobile User like Sales person or   Top Management  can use the LIVE Tiles on their touch enabled  laptops/ Tablets or Convertibles  and they will simply see a jump in their productivity .

Another interesting scenario is that you use the legacy application in Desktop mode ( classic mode) and then use the same data and do analytics using a app for say Business Intelligence  in LIVE Tiles.

And if you have no use at all for LIVE Tiles, then you can continue to use Desktop mode with keyboard and mouse . Here the advantage is that you have faster boot time as compared to Windows 7 . And there are features like Windows to Go which allow you to boot from any PC with your Windows 8 on a pen drive. Wow !

3) What is the BIG STORY about Windows 8

The BIG STORY is unification of User Interface across XBox Gaming Console ; Smartphone ; Tablet ; Laptop ; Desktop; Workstation.

And with Unification of User Interface comes Unification of your Data which will be on Microsoft Cloud. So if you use any device , you access the same Data. That’s HUGE…

4) Where can I get Surface Tablet

Surface is only available from Microsoft Store or Online in 5 Countries. So Indian Customer has to wait. But you can always buy any device from multiple vendors who are ready  with their devices.

5) What kind of devices will I get for Windows 8 and when will they be available

There is a plethora of devices available with Windows 8. There are broadly in 3 types:

a) Windows RT based on ARM

b) Intel Atom

c) Intel or AMD Processor

Various form factors are available and shipping today . Some are shown below:

                     

The above device on left is from Acer . On right is the same device but with the screen removed and being used as a well designed Tablet. Cool !

                   

The above is RT based Asus device with detachable screen  . Very light weight

 

                           

The above is Toshiba Device on the right . And the same device is in my hand on the left with the screen sliding in and converting into a Tablet

The above picture is a DELL  Device appearing as a Tablet . The same unit becomes a Laptop when you slide out the screen.. Based on Windows 8 Pro.

So there is a great choice available. There were a few devices from Lenovo and HP too . The Lenovo Ideapad Yoga   is one great device which is very flexible. And HP also has a few innovative devices for the Business User.

So all in all , Windows 8 is a totally new direction for Microsoft and Windows . The LIVE Tiles will take a few days to get used to. But it is a fantastic Interface . I have been using that Interface on my Windows Phone for past 8 months and I simply love it .

My feeling is that Consumers will love it from day one. Business user will adopt it slowly . So the real Business adoption will happen only after one year .

 

with warm regards
Suresh Ramani

www.TechGyan.com
Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007

Cloud Computing … IT Just Works

Greetings !
A lot of vendors are offering Cloud Services as a cheaper option to the On Premise Solution . In my opinion, the biggest advantage of Cloud Computing is that you get a Solution which is very reliable , hassle free . In short it just works !  So this was the theme of a video which was prepared recently : Cloud Computing…. It Just Works !.
This short 3 minute video explains Cloud Computing and then goes on to say why the Microsoft Cloud Service Office365 is better than Google Apps . It also features Testimonials of our Customers who are using Cloud Services like Exchange Online , SharePoint Online , Lync Online and MS Office on subscription .

The video is available on the Microsoft website  . To watch the same, click here .

This video is also uploaded on our YouTube Channel . Click here for the same .

I would love to get your feedback on this video.

with warm regards
Suresh Ramani www.TechGyan.com
Microsoft MVP 2009
Microsoft Worldwide Partner of the Year 2011 & 2007