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Microsoft is said to be launching a new Surface, codenamed Cardinal. The new device will be a one-box desktop PC—i.e., an all-in-one (AiO), as popularlized by Apple’s iMac. The avian-themed rumor seems credible and well-sourced. And an October hardware event would fit with Microsoft’s previous form. But beyond that, everything is mere speculation. None of which stops us from some amusing Friday musing…

Learn how to perform geo-load balancing for deployments in different Azure regions using Traffic Manager profiles in Azure Resource Manager (ARM) or Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) subscriptions.

In today’s Ask the Admin, I’ll explain how to use linked Azure Resource Manager (ARM) templates to facilitate complex deployment options.

As expected, Apple unleashed a new generation of mobile smart devices on Wednesday. The firm announced the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus smartphones, plus the Apple Watch Series 2 and some related accessories.

In today’s Ask the Admin, I’ll show you how to create an ARM template in Visual Studio for deploying Azure virtual machines (VMs). Having used VS to deploy resources in Azure, this is the way I now recommend you work with Azure templates.

Migration of legacy archives like Enterprise Vault are often left as the last part of the journey from on-premises servers to Office 365. A wide range of third-party migration tools are available, but many complex twists and turns await the unwary as they cope with journal reports, archive mailboxes, splitting and explosions, and the sheer amount of data to be migrated. It’s an interesting problem to solve.

As Brad noted yesterday, Microsoft will take on the Slack team collaboration solution by leveraging its in-house Skype capabilities to create a new product called Skype Teams. This is just one of three obvious tactics the software giant could have employed, and it suggests, I think, a new-found confidence in Skype.

Microsoft Azure and Office 365 hosted in the UK for the first time. Redmond just opened up three new data centers in England and Wales, arranged in two Azure regions. This brings the number of Regions to 28 globally. Among the launch customers are Aston Martin, a regional health authority, and the Ministry of Defence [sic]. This should give a boost to Microsoft’s data-sovereignty story…

Microsoft is working on a Slack competitor, internally called Skype Teams, that will be a new productivity tool for the company that features improved file sharing and threaded conversations.

PowerShell sensei Jeff Hicks continues his look at working with data in PowerShell and introduces us to classes in PowerShell v5.

On Friday, over 80 technology firms, media organizations, civil liberties groups, and others filed legal briefs supporting Microsoft’s challenge to secret U.S. government orders. Amazon, Apple, and Google are among those supporting Microsoft, as are firms as diverse as Fox News and the A.C.L.U.

In today’s Ask the Admin, following on from a previous article on how to change the interface language for a user account, I’ll show you how to change the default interface language in Windows 10 for new users, the welcome screen and system accounts.