HPC Pack Beta1 was recently announced at the Super-Computing convention in Reno (i.e. "SC'07"). Executing on release milestones with hard dates, as with the convention date, is always a project management night-mare. The task illustrates the classic struggle between time, resources, and features. Generally, features are sacrificed and resources are increased (i.e. the product team works overtime).

Such is the case with HPC Server 2008 beta1. Yes, there are missing features and certain features that present a nice "Easter Egg" surprise for those willing to give the product a spin. Otherwise, the beta generally accomplishes what beta's are supposed to accomplish. That is, the user community is given a good idea of where the product is headed along with an opportunity to provide feedback that will ultimately positively influence the product.

With this perspective, it seems appropriate to keep a running-list of observations that might help you get past some of the features that were first scattered amongst the resources and subsequently gathered into beta1...