It seems this happens to me periodically that I have to rebuild my demo laptop. Usually I play around with my laptop with different OS options, different attempts to optimise all of the dependant apps and ensure that I get my email and other apps working on it without interfering with my demo.
This time I have gone through about 3 iterations, and ended up with 3 options.
Right now I am leaning towards Windows 7, but I have a bit of work to make the actual demo work quicker on that platform. If I can't succeed, I will have to fall back to Vista or XP, as much as I like the look and feel of Windows 7. The other advantage is of course the wow factor that Windows 7 has at the moment, but I also don't want this to detract from the actual presentation.
My standard platform for demo is running a VM as Windows Server. When I run the demo, I have a kill button that gets rid of everything unimportant to the demo to conserve resources. I fit the laptop with as much RAM, the fastest storage and go through all the possible OS hacks I can find to speed it up. I basically want to get to a demo that only has what I want the customer to see. I think of this as the Zen of Demo systems ;-)
I am sure some other options exist such as using UBUNTU and VMware, but I am not convinced that my customers would be distracted by less usual platforms, and it would probably raise more questions than I want. I want the demo system to not distract but to appeal to the general product audience.
This time I have gone through about 3 iterations, and ended up with 3 options.
- Windows 7
- Windows Vista
- Mac OS X( !?) - maybe not, my Macbook is ancient...
Right now I am leaning towards Windows 7, but I have a bit of work to make the actual demo work quicker on that platform. If I can't succeed, I will have to fall back to Vista or XP, as much as I like the look and feel of Windows 7. The other advantage is of course the wow factor that Windows 7 has at the moment, but I also don't want this to detract from the actual presentation.
My standard platform for demo is running a VM as Windows Server. When I run the demo, I have a kill button that gets rid of everything unimportant to the demo to conserve resources. I fit the laptop with as much RAM, the fastest storage and go through all the possible OS hacks I can find to speed it up. I basically want to get to a demo that only has what I want the customer to see. I think of this as the Zen of Demo systems ;-)
I am sure some other options exist such as using UBUNTU and VMware, but I am not convinced that my customers would be distracted by less usual platforms, and it would probably raise more questions than I want. I want the demo system to not distract but to appeal to the general product audience.
Comments
This has allowed me to put my demo server out there in the "Cloud" and access it from the Windows 7 client, which seems to work really well.
If you want to compare notes, drop me a line.
On a more philosophical approach to demo systems, I made 3 posts a while back on Demo Systems :-)
http://www.murrayfife.com/Ramblings/tabid/56/EntryId/3/The-Art-of-the-Demo-System-Part-I.aspx
http://www.murrayfife.com/Ramblings/tabid/56/EntryId/6/The-Art-of-the-Demo-System-Part-II.aspx
http://www.murrayfife.com/Ramblings/tabid/56/EntryId/5/The-Art-of-the-Demo-System-Part-III.aspx