Best of the blogs: The Web is rife with negative reviews of the 64-bit version of Windows Vista, as Randall Kennedy points out. “So I was understandably curious how my own transition would unfold,” he writes in 64-bits of smooth sailing. Six days and the recreation of his runtime environment later and Mr. Kennedy only came across 2 incompatibilities: an unsigned device driver and the Office Web Components from Office 2003. “The overall runtime experience has been far superior to 32-bit Vista. For example, multitasking — especially under heavy loads with SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio 2005 and several VMware virtual machines chewing-up the available RAM — is much smoother under Vista 64-bit.” There are downsides, of course. Sustainable IT: Thin clients are not only slimmer than those fat desktops hogging cubicle corners, they’re also more eco-friendly. Verizon, for instance, slashed its energy consumption 30 percent by replacing PCs with Sun Ray clients, Ted Samson reports in Thinking green? Think thin. “That will translate to a savings of $1 million per year, once the company rolls out thin clients in its remaining data centers.” Verizon is not the only success story, and thin client options abound. From the Test Center: Walking a different path than most, Oakley Networks SureView helps enterprises get at the root cause of insider threats. “Rather than take the all-or-nothing approach, the system’s designers fundamentally believe that bad behavior is perpetrated by certain individuals in specific situations and should be addressed accordingly,” Mike Heck writes. While it does not offer message blocking, the new version brings more trigger responses, improved agent management, and better reporting. “SureView 4.0 is a very good solution for targeted investigations.” And, it has Mr. Heck looking forward to version 5.0, slated for later this year. Read the full review. Software Development