I'm here in the Los Angeles Convention Center, and I'll be live blogging the first keynote today, hosted by Mike Nash, VP for Windows.

live updated blogginess after the jump

8:00am waiting for the keynote to start. The crowds are predictably lighter than the ones yesterday for the Gates keynote.

8:05-lights dim, same opening video from yesterday. Roger G. takes the stage, going over operations stuff for today. Mike's keynote is the one we're interested in.

8:10-semi amusing 'Coach' video about the peripherals talking to each other and working as a team. Certified for Windows Vista "Investing in the Customer Experience". Mike takes the stage, Technology Investments are on the slide. Mike thanks the developers for shipping.

8:15-Vista RTM had 20k drivers in the box, XP had 10k, Win2k had 350.

Vista supports 1.9 million devices, up from 1.5 at RTM. Windows Update has been shooting these out to users automatically. Mike name checks iTunes, "it now works with Vista".

Rick Bergman from AMD takes the stage for a DX10 Radeon 2900 demo, 65nm, HD video, DX10. Ruby demo real time. Ruby looks better than Bond did in the last Brosnan film.

8:28-Certified for Windows Vista and Works with Windows Vista logo program. Mike gently pushes the developers to make device drivers that are Certified for Vista, which is the 'better' and more compatible logo branding.

8:30am-Bill Laing takes the stage. Windows Server-Advancing your business. There's a huge 42U rack server sitting next to a Home server on the stage. I wonder if a comparison is coming. Video plays about the Marketing team naming of Windows Server. Heh, Windows Server Server Edition.

Bill highlights the life cycle of Server 2000, 2003, 2003 R2 and 2008. Extended support up to 10 years.

Hardware inflection points: 64-bit, Multicore, Virtualization, Power (electrical). All of these factors are affecting Server 2008. Server 2008 is the last 32-bit server Os. Server is optimized for multi-core processor, licensing is by socket, not core. This means you pay the same for a dual chip 4 core server as you would for a dual chip 8 core server. Virtualization helps reliability and uptime.

8:50-demo time. NEC Express 5800/1320. Big iron. Demo showing a server partition failing, and the hot spare replacing the failing unit. Hot spare came back in 3.8 seconds. Failed unit can be hot swapped.

9:00am Wrapping up. Tech Investments for Manageability, Security and Performance. IIS 7.0 web server is more customizable and manageable. Windows Server 2008 Beta 3 will be available today. The rest of the keynote is a bit too IT/enterprise for Gearlog, so I'll sign off now.

That's it! check pcmag.com/winhec for more coverage. Santo Domingo out.

Joel's Day 1 live blog post of Bill Gates' keynote.