Microsoft kills off anti-Linux campaign

Microsoft has killed off its controversial "Get the Facts" anti-Linux campaign and replaced it with a new message called "Compare".

Get the Facts aimed to convince IT administrators that Windows Server offered a cheaper and more reliable alternative to open-source server products. It proved unpopular with the Linux community, who dubbed it "Get the FUD" (fear, uncertainty and doubt).

The new campaign, backed by a detailed website, is still aimed at persuading Linux users to think again and look at Microsoft's operating systems, applications and server products, but it takes a much gentler stance.

The goal of the revamped site is to offer "more in-depth information and customer-to-customer opinions about many of the issues IT administrators face", said a Microsoft spokeswoman. "It turns out people wanted third-party validation in addition to people's experiences making OS purchasing decisions, so in addition to customer case studies and research reports that compare platforms, the site will also offer guidance around best practices, web casts, etc," she said.

Compare will still contain much information aimed at persuading users of the value of Microsoft software over Linux, such as this whitepaper from analyst firm IDC, but without any overt anti-Linux message.

Microsoft already has a huge market lead over Linux, which has led industry observers to say that the company is stifling the development of open-source software. Earlier this month, Michael Warrilow from analyst firm Hydrasight said: "There's just too much of an installed base and experience around Windows, regardless of whether you think it's a good operating system or not".

Microsoft may be concerned about pushing out the competition completely, given that it has faced a succession of run-ins with the European Commission on antitrust charges. The Commission's next Microsoft ruling is set for 17 September.

For the time being, users can still get a flavour of the old message from Microsoft Canada.

Source: ZDNET UK

India Won't Endorse Microsoft's Office Standard

India has become the latest country to reject Microsoft’s global bid to provide an alternative standard for electronic office documents. India will now vote against Microsoft’s proposal at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) in Geneva, joining countries like China and Canada.

After a meeting of the Bureau of Indian Standards in New Delhi Thursday, its technical committee chairperson, Nita Verma, told the media: “We unanimously agree on the disapproval of OOXML [Open Office Extensible Mark Up Language] with comments. The same will be submitted to ISO.”

India’s deadline to give the ISO its decision is September. More than 120 countries will take part in the vote on Microsoft’s standard specifications for documents like word processors, spreadsheets and memos.

Microsoft’s rivals like IBM (nyse: IBM - news - people ), Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) and Sun Microsystems (nasdaq: SUNW - news - people ) are backing a different standard, the Open Document Format, which is already broadly accepted, and accuse Microsoft of pushing for a standard that is beset by a host of technical flaws that make it unviable. Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) officials say their standard, also known as Open XML, should be accepted on the grounds of allowing multiple formats in the industry.

“Multiple standards enable users to have choice among formats while facilitating greater flexibility and interoperability amongst diverse technology solutions that exist today,” Rakesh Bakshi, Microsoft’s director for legal and corporate affairs, commented in a statement e-mailed after the ruling.

“We respect the decision taken by the Bureau of Indian Standards appointed committee. At the same time, it is important to note that all the BIS members unanimously support the need for multiple standards,” Bakshi said, adding that Microsoft would work with BIS on the issue.

At the Indian committee meeting, only Infosys Technologies (nasdaq: INFY - news - people ) and Delhi-based CSI supported Microsoft’s stance.

In a recent note, global technology advisory firm Gartner said: “Both document formats will likely be used. … Many governments are investigating ODF, and Microsoft’s Open XML is likely to become a de facto standard used by many organizations regardless of whether the ISO adopts it as standard.”

Gartner’s research said the ODF and Open XML standards could converge in the long term, “but all organizations should plan on them coexisting for at least the medium term.”

Source: FORBES

Microsoft Reveals New Partner and Products for Games for Windows at Annual Games Convention

Proving continued industry support from among some of the best games companies from around the world, Microsoft Corp. today announced new games, hardware and accessories that will exhilarate fans of the world's most popular gaming platform.

At the German Games Convention in Leipzig, Germany, Microsoft announced that top video game publisher Ubisoft Entertainment was the latest to join the Games for Windows branding program. The first title Ubisoft will deliver is "The Settlers(R): Rise of an Empire." Ubisoft joins other publishing powerhouses such as 2K Games, Activision Inc., Atari Inc., EA Partners, LucasArts, Microsoft Game Studios, Midway Home Entertainment Inc., and SEGA by committing to ship select titles under the Games for Windows brand, a brand that ensures a high level of quality, compatibility and support for key safety features for gaming on Windows(R). With the addition of Ubisoft, Microsoft now enjoys the support of the majority of top games publishers around the world to provide consumers with amazing Windows gaming experiences.

Microsoft also announced that "Train Simulator 2" from Microsoft Game Studios will join the roster of more than 60 titles currently announced to carry the brand. "Train Simulator 2" brings to gamers the most realistic train simulation experience ever from Microsoft, allowing train enthusiasts to explore the world's rail network or build their own in a detailed and immersive world.

Windows gamers are also enjoying a wave of exciting new products this fall and holiday. Microsoft Hardware, continuing its PC gaming hardware innovations, announced the return of its SideWinder(TM) line of gaming accessories with the first mouse to bear the SideWinder name, the Microsoft(R) SideWinder Mouse. Built from the ground up for gamers, it was developed to meet gamers' individual needs, providing custom tuning tools and a design for performance handling.

"Today we and our partners announced several products that dramatically improve the experience -- and fun -- for Windows gamers," said Kevin Unangst, global director of Games for Windows at Microsoft. "The addition of Ubisoft to the Games for Windows program and the continued innovation in PC gaming hardware is a huge win for gamers around the world who are experiencing the revival of the PC as a world-class gaming platform."

About Games for Windows

Microsoft Windows is the most popular operating system in the world for games, delivering the widest range of titles, the most gaming hardware choices, and advanced gaming technology for players of all types. With Windows as the cornerstone, the Games for Windows platform offers publishers and gamers the most enjoyable and innovative gaming experiences available on a PC. More information can be found online at http://www.gamesforwindows.com.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

(C) 2007 Ubisoft Entertainment. All Rights Reserved. The Settlers, Blue Byte and the Blue Byte logo are trademarks of Red Storm Entertainment in the US and/or other countries. Ubisoft and the Ubisoft logo are trademarks of Ubisoft Entertainment in the US and/or other countries. Red Storm Entertainment Inc. is a Ubisoft Entertainment company. Developed by Blue Byte Software.

Source: CNN

Microsoft Strikes Deal to Make Live More Reliable

Microsoft has entered into an agreement with Limelight Networks that will hopefully result in improved reliability of Xbox Live.

Limelight is a web content delivery company, with customers like Facebook and MySpace. The company will provide Microsoft with media streaming and content delivery services over the course of a multiyear agreement. The idea is that Limelight's services will help Live deliver its content via less congested routes on the 'net.

Rival firm Akami Technologies provides much the same services for Sony and Nintendo.

Source: WIRED

Nokia and Microsoft announce mobile tie-up

Nokia, the handset manufacturer, has announced that it will start pre-installing a raft of Microsoft internet applications on its phones from early next year as a way of increasing revenue from web services.

From January, owners of Series 40 handsets will find Windows Live Hotmail, Messenger, Live Contacts and Live Spaces installed on their phones, while the applications will be available for five phone models this week.

The deal, which applies in 11 countries including Britain, France, Germany and Spain, demonstrates the extent to which Nokia is trying to muscle in on the growth of internet-based mobile services such as web browsing and music downloads, which have traditionally been dominated by the networks.

Initially, however, only those phones purchased at retail price – without network subsidies – will offer the programs.

Nokia is seeking approval to offer the same package on phones subsidsed by the networks, which tightly regulate the applications that can be downloaded in order to maximise their own revenues, a spokesman for the company said.

A range of Microsoft products have been used in Nokia phones in the past, including Windows Media DRM 10, which provides copy protection for music files, but this will be the first time that the Nokia's own operating system will be able to synchronise with some of Microsoft's most widely-used consumer products.

The deal will mean, for instance, that contacts from a Nokia phone can be synchronised with those on Windows Live, Microsoft's internet platform, and that pictures taken on phones can be uploaded to the internet more easily.

Nokia has for some time been providing software designed to facilitate mobile internet access and, in turn, enable the company to share more readily in the advertising revenue associated with such services.

It added Microsoft's copy protection program in 2005, and earlier this month announced that its new phones would soon come installed with PlayReady, another Microsoft product, which provides a platform for delivering digital content such as music, video, and images.

"These aren't just applications that will sit in the background of your phone," Steven Knuff, a Nokia spokesman, said. "They will integrate and intertwine fully with your phone. This is about converging the fixed and mobile internet so that users just think of there being one internet, which they access from a single platform."

Steve Berkowitz, senior vice president for Online Services at Microsoft, said: "The availability of Windows Live services on Nokia devices demonstrates our commitment to extending people's online lives from the PC to the device."

Source: TIMES ONLINE UK

Microsoft PerformancePoint Server 2007 Due in September

Microsoft is set to launch a portion of its business intelligence technology platform, PerformancePoint Server 2007, at an event in New York on Sept. 20.

The second piece to Microsoft's BI technology triad, SQL Server 2008 (code-named Katmai), is scheduled to ship in the second quarter of 2008. The company's third major tech component, Office 2007, is available now—and will be integrated with PerformancePoint Server 2007.

But with the company's BI strategy spread over three major components with a remaining year-long release cycle, will businesses have the luxury to wait?

In a recent report, IT research firm IDC found that the BI market grew by more than 11 percent in 2006, with the BI tools market driven by the need for improved CPM (Corporate Performance Management) and, to a lesser extent, compliance software.

Performance management really centers around various decision-support and reporting functions that help companies to improve revenue, profit and operational efficiency, according to IDC analyst Dan Vesset, who said in a statement that "Microsoft had another strong year" with performance management.

The release of Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 next month is really the repackaging of Microsoft's ProClarity acquisition a little over a year ago, which brought CPM functionality to Microsoft's BI portfolio.


At heart, CPM allows chief financial officers to answer critical questions about their business—questions like: "How are we doing? Why are we doing well (or doing poorly)? And what should we be doing about it?"

But Microsoft isn't alone in pursuing the CPM angle to garnering business intelligence users—folks Microsoft hopes to lure beyond the CFO's office. SAP and Oracle, two formidable competitors in the business applications sector, have each acquired CPM capabilities in the past six months.

SAP announced May 8 its intention to acquire OutlookSoft, which provides planning, budgeting, forecasting and consolidation software. Oracle spent $3.3 billion in April to acquire Hyperion, an industry leader in CPM software.

Chris Caren, general manager of Office Business Applications at Microsoft said in a May interview with eWEEK that his company plans to do something "really different" with CPM.

"While we are targeting the CFO and compliance we bet incredibly hard on Excel, making it a place where you can work with information securely and share information securely," said Caren, in Redmond, Wash. "Our ease of use and our price point leads to much broader solutions. SAP and Oracle typically don't go beyond the CFO; our goal is to [reach] everyone who might own a budget."

ith about 500 million licenses of Office floating around, Excel offers quite a leg up for Microsoft as it works to expand BI throughout the enterprise—and with the release of PerformancePoint Server 2007 next month, it's available.

But that still leaves the question of whether a 2008 release of Katmai will leave users hanging?

While PerformancePoint Server will include dashboards, score carding and analytics for monitoring, analysis and planning, Katmai is really the underlying applications layer of Microsoft's BI platform—and the basis of Microsoft's overall data platform vision.

According to Microsoft's Aug. 22 press release, Katmai (SQL Server 2008), will "help organizations deliver a more secure, reliable data platform for storing business-critical information and delivering the right information to all users."


At Microsoft's May BI event in Seattle, Jeff Raikes, president of the Microsoft Business Division, outlined Katmai's capabilities that include the ability for large scale data warehousing and richer information delivery through Office.

"Beyond rational database capabilities, [users] will be able to store any type of data, including unstructured," said Raikes. "It's a new data model that will enable [developers] to build richer applications faster."

At the same time, Katmai will utilize software from SoftArtisans, a company Microsoft acquired last year that generates functional Excel spreadsheets and Word documents over the Web—without the need for Office on the server—by populating Office documents with dynamic data from any source. The bottom line: SoftArtisans enables better interoperability of reporting with Office.

"We have a very strong interoperability in terms of taking reporting services and exporting that to Word, or Excel, but [SoftArtisans] gives you the capability to start in Word or start in Excel to access information and author reports from there," said Caren in his May interview.

So while Microsoft BI users will have pretty good CPM capabilities with PerformancePoint 2007 Server—an obvious business driver—the real meat seems to be coming next year.

Source: E WEEK

IBM Vs. Microsoft In Telephony Integration Middleware Race

IBM's plans to ship next year telephony integration technology as a foundation for its Sametime unified communications client highlights the company's approach to the emerging UC market, along with its key differences with rivalMicrosoft( MSFT).

Mike Rhodin, Lotus' general manager for IBM, on Wednesday unveiled Lotus Sametime Unified Telephony at the VoiceCon show in San Francisco. Along with the new product, which is expected to be released in beta in the first quarter of next year, Rhodin also introduced a new version of Sametime that starts to ship in the fall, and announced the acquisition of Web-conferencing company WebDialogs.

Unified Telephony, in general, would provide a software platform that IBM customers could use to leverage PBX or IP PBX systems from multiple vendors within the Sametime UC and collaboration client. PBXs interconnect telephone extensions to each other as well as to the outside telephone network. Unified communications enable the real-time redirection of voice, text, or e-mail to the device closest to the user at any given time.

IBM has partnered with Siemens to get the technology IBM needs to connect the Unified Telephony platform, scheduled to ship in the middle of next year, to legacy telephone systems. "It's a natural marriage of skills," Rhodin said during a news conference that followed his VoiceCon keynote. "They're very good at the back-end stuff, and we're very good on the front end."

The partnership also demonstrates a difference in approach to the UC market between IBM and Microsoft, which has yet to partner with infrastructure companies like Siemens in delivering its UC platform in the fall. IBM's announcements came one day after Gurdeep Singh Pall, corporate VP of Microsoft's Unified Communications Group, told VoiceCon attendees that Microsoft would ship Office Communications Server 2007, Office Communicator 2007, and Office Live Meeting Oct. 16.

IBM has chosen to approach the market with technology that can leverage companies' existing telephone systems, while Microsoft has made it clear that it hopes to one day replace those systems with software-based communications running on servers. "When you don't have a software-centric point of view, then you're heading in the wrong direction," Pall said at VoiceCon.

Rhodin, on the other hand, said IBM has no plans to compete with PBX vendors, but prefers to use standard integration technology to connect its middleware to whatever telecommunications systems its customers choose. "IBM is not trying to drive down a path that will require ripping out technology," Rhodin told reporters.

IBM also looks at Microsoft's UC platform as catch-up technology, arguing that the software maker is just starting to deliver capabilities that can match those of IBM, which has been in the UC market years longer than Microsoft. "We think we're in the lead here ... and we plan on staying ahead," Rhodin said.

According to market researcher COMMfusion, IBM and Microsoft are offering the same UC components: voice and telephony, collaboration, instant messaging and presence, unified messaging, and integration with business processes and applications. The differences, however, is that IBM is leveraging partner technology in the areas of voice and telephony, and unified messaging. In the area of integration to business applications, Microsoft, so far, is connecting only to its Office productivity suite. That, however, is likely to be expanded.

COMMfusion analyst Blair Pleasant said during a breakout session at VoiceCon that Microsoft is using gateways in the areas of voice and video Internet telephony to integrate with other parts of the enterprise. Its platform, however, could operate without PBXs.

Microsoft is expected to market its Office Communications Server and other software as a complement to PBX and IP PBX systems. But Pleasant believes the company is actually offering a "Trojan horse," since its likely when companies are ready to replace their PBX systems, Microsoft will have many of the telephone control capabilities they'll need.

IBM's products, on the other hand, emphasizes Sametime as the UC client, offer telephony integration with PBX suppliers, and leverages IBM's WebSphere application server to embed communications within business applications, such as enterprise resource planning and customer management software from SAP and Oracle-owned PeopleSoft and Siebel.

To extend Sametime with new functionality, IBM is offering open-source Eclipse development tools. Microsoft is focused on its own Visual Studio suite.

Meanwhile, in its effort to stay one step ahead of Microsoft, IBM introduced at VoiceCon Sametime 8, which will be available in three versions: entry, standard and advanced. The latter version would include three new capabilities. First is the ability to create a permanent chat room in which people can move in and out of. Secondly, communities of employees can be set up around, for example, a particular expertise, so a person can ask a question to the community and get answers from people they may not know. The response thread could then be archived as part of an FAQ.

The third function adds screen sharing to Sametime, so a person could actually see the desktop of the person they are communicating with. The standard edition of Sametime 8 will be available in the fall, while the advanced and entry editions are scheduled to ship in the first half of next year. The entry edition would be available in the fall to customers of Lotus Notes 8, which IBM made generally available Aug. 17.

With the WebDialogs acquisition, IBM plans to add Web conferencing as an online service accessible through Sametime. The software-as-a-service offering will be called Lotus Sametime Unyte. Unyte was the name of the WebDialogs service. "We found that they have the easiest system to use in the market," Rhodin said.

IBM is targeting small-to-medium sized businesses and departments within larger organizations. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Source: INFORMATION WEEK

Microsoft Recalls Smoky Xbox 360 Racing Wheel

The racing wheel accessory for Microsoft(MSFT)'s Xbox 360 is smoking -- but not in a good way.

In the latest setback to its troubled video game system, Microsoft is recalling a part on the wireless steering wheel because it overheats. Microsoft on Tuesday called the move a "precautionary" measure.

Microsoft in a statement said it's been informed of "a very small number" of incidents where components in the Xbox 360 Wireless Racing Wheel overheat and emit smoke when the unit is plugged into an AC outlet. The company is releasing a free retrofit that's designed to fix the problem. Until gamers receive it, Microsoft is advising them to use the wheel on battery power only.

It's hardly surprising that Microsoft is taking no chances when it comes to the Xbox and potential fire hazards. The company is currently being sued by the family of an Illinois toddler who died in a blaze that the family claims was started by faulty Xbox wiring. Microsoft has denied the allegation and is fighting the matter in court.

But the possibility of spontaneous combustion isn't Microsoft's only Xbox-related problem. A number of users have sued the company claming that the system scratches their pricey game discs, rendering them useless.

Additionally, Microsoft took a fourth-quarter charge against earnings of $1.06 billion to cover the cost of extending the warranty on the Xbox 360. The move was a response to users' complaints that the systems have a tendency to malfunction irreparably after just several months of use.

Xbox users can find out how to get the racing wheel retrofit by visiting the Xbox support forum on Microsoft's Web site.

Source: INFORMATION WEEK

We're not Google, says Microsoft

Microsoft has lambasted Google for its YouTube video-sharing site, claiming that its own Soapbox is far more responsible and doesn't take advantage of "loopholes" in copyright law, according to CNet.

Thomas Rubin, Microsoft's associate general counsel for copyright was quoted by the technology news site saying that unlike Google's YouTube, Microsoft's Soapbox video-sharing site has been designed to work in concert with copyright holders and that it represents an effort to be a good corporate citizen.

Soapbox uses what Microsoft calls Audible Magic fingerprinting technology to ensure this.

In a swipe at Google, which has been sued by Viacom over the presence of numerous copyrighted videos on YouTube, Rubin said that Microsoft "could have looked for potential loopholes in the DMCA or the fair-use provisions of the Copyright Act...but it would have done nothing to address the significant and legitimate concerns of the content industry."

DMCA stands for Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which sets the rules for Website liability. "Before a video is uploaded to the site, before it gets posted, there is a fingerprint taken of the file that identifies what that file is, and it's checked against the database that the content industry has created and populated (to tell) whether the uploaded file is infringing," Rubin said. "If it is, we don't allow it to go up. It's that simple."

If current court precedents are any indication, Google may not be legally required by the DMCA to implement pre-emptive filtering techniques.

A takedown procedure based on reports of infringing videos may be sufficient. But a Google attorney has said in the Viacom case that some kind of YouTube filtering will be in place by September, reported Cnet. "It's important to point it out because it really should serve as a model for all in the content and technology industries," Rubin said.

Alan Davidson, a Google representative in Washington, responded by saying "Google has valued" its relationship with "hundreds of content creators", but did not elaborate.

Microsoft has long been more copyright-friendly than Web-centric companies, as evidenced by its support for stronger copyright laws, artificial limits placed on its Zune media player and the steps it took to embed digital rights management (DRM) for "premium content" into Windows Vista (even to the extent of limiting usability).

One reason why Microsoft is more copyright-friendly than Google, of course, is that it makes nearly all of its revenue not from online advertising, but by selling copyrighted software. Google doesn't, and believes in a free world as they say.

Source: TIMES OF INDIA

Microsoft offers HD Photo plug-in for Photoshop

Microsoft has released an HD Photo plug in for Adobe Photoshop CS2 or CS3 running on Mac OS X v10.4. The plug-in is being offered as a beta version; it will expire on December 31, 2007.

HD Photo — once known as Windows Media Photo — was introduced by Microsoft to the public at large with the release of Windows Vista. Microsoft claims the format offers better image fidelity than JPEG, higher image compression efficiency and more flexible editing features. The company has even gone so far to submit the format’s specifications to the Joint Photographic Expert Group (JPEG) for consideration as a new standard Microsoft calls “JPEG XR.”

This beta plug-in enables those versions of Photoshop to support HD Photo images. “This release includes all the features and user interface changes for the final release, including the installer. The HD Photo plug-in supports a wide range of pixel formats (including high dynamic range, wide gamut formats) and numerous advanced HD Photo features,” reads the Web page for download.

Source: MACWORLD

Windows has 'fewer flaws' than Linux

Data collected by a Microsoft security researcher suggests that the company had to patch far fewer software vulnerabilities than competing vendors in 2007.

A vulnerability report maintained by Jeff Jones, strategy director at Microsoft's Security Technology Unit, claimed that the firm's Windows XP, Vista and Server operating systems required patches for some 20-45 vulnerabilities each.

During the same period, vendors such as Red Hat, Apple and Novell have had to patch hundreds of vulnerabilities, according to Microsoft.

Jones released a similar report in June chronicling vulnerabilities reported in major operating systems during the first 90 days after release.

The latest report does not give exact figures, only graphs, but the data appears to be accurate.

A tally of this year's security bulletins by vnunet.com found 43 flaws in Windows XP that had been patched, similar to Jones's estimates. In contrast, Apple's last security update alone patched 45 flaws in OS X.

Applications not installed by default, such as Microsoft Office, were not counted.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 Workstation and Ubuntu Linux topped the list with roughly 170 and 150 vulnerabilities patched r espectively. Red Hat's Enterprise Linux Desktop 5 received around 130 vulnerability fixes, according to Jones.

Jones's enterprise figures painted a similar picture, showing fewer than 40 fixes for Windows Server 2003, while Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 Server had more than 100 vulnerabilities patched and Novell's SuSE Linux Enterprise server had roughly 70.

The study only takes into account vulnerabilities patched by the vendor, and does not record such things as current zero-day flaws.

The report also does not mention vulnerabilities that were or are currently being actively exploited, an area where Microsoft continues to be far more prone than its competitors.

Source: VNUNET

Microsoft and Google go head to head in storage and office apps

Microsoft increases Hotmail storage to 5GB as Google bundles StarOffice in Google Pack.

There has been no love lost in recent times between arch-rivals Google and Microsoft but moves in the last few days show the two companies are on a head-on collision course in the Web 2.0 biosphere.

Earlier this week, Google announced it had begun including Sun Microsystem’s previously payware office suite StarOffice as part of its free Google Pack of software tools. Google Pack is an expanding range of free software tools that currently includes its own software such as Google Earth, Google Desktop, Picasa, Google Talk, Google Toolbar and Google Photos Screensaver and external third-party tools. These tools now cover Norton Security Scan (anti-virus), Adobe Reader (portable document reader), Skype (on-line telephony) and now StarOffice.

StarOffice has previously been sold for as much as $US70 and is closely related to the open-source freeware suite called OpenOffice and based on Sun’s Java platform independent runtime engine.

The addition of StarOffice comes only days after Microsoft admitted that it could release the next version of its venerable budget Works office suite as a free advertising-supported application online in coming months.

Google has also expanded its storage options allowing users to buy online storage with range of plans including:

6GB ($US20 per year)
25GB ($US75 per year)
100GB ($US250 per year)
250GB ($US500 per year)
The online giant now offers 1GB of free storage with its Picasa online photo image service and 2.8GB with a Gmail email account.

But not to be outdone, Microsoft has upped the ante by claiming it will soon be giving Hotmail users 5GB of free storage, more than 2GB above Google’s offering. With Yahoo giving users unlimited storage, it places Google back in third place out of the big-three online entities.

Microsoft will also increase the storage limit to paid users of Hotmail to 10GB.

The storage expansion is part of a number of changes the Microsoft online email service is rolling out over the next few weeks with improvements to performance, quality of service and added extras such as auto de-duplication of contacts and longer retention of deleted entries and folders according to the blog maintained by Ellie Powers-Boyle.

The emergence of online storage and free big-name applications looks to be the first serious threat to Microsoft’s dominance of the PC and it’s a threat that will have consumers front and centre deciding who wins.

Google and Microsoft have appeared as two boxers sparring at each other for the last 18 months however the announcements and releases over the last few days show that the sparring may soon graduate to an all-in brawl.

Source: TECHLOGG

Microsoft denies PatchGuard update connected to kernel hacks

Tuesday's update to Windows Vista's PatchGuard, a kernel-protection scheme designed to keep malicious or unproven code at arm's length, had nothing to do with recent hacks of another Vista defense, Microsoft said today.

The update to Kernel Patch Protection (KPP), also known as PatchGuard, was issued Tuesday to Vista 64-bit users, but the description of the enhancement was inscrutable. All Microsoft said at the time was "this update adds checks to this protection for increased resiliency in Windows."



Third-party researchers filled the vacuum with speculation about the update's purpose, with much of that speculation centered on a possible connection between the update and multiple disclosures that Vista's kernel code-signing defense -- another barrier Microsoft set up to protect the kernel, but separate from PatchGuard -- could be easily circumvented. Among the end-arounds was a utility written by Alex Ionescu, a Canadian college student interning this summer at Apple Inc. Ionescu's "Purple Pill" used a flawed, but legitimate and signed ATI Technologies video driver, to slip unsigned code past Vista's protection.



When asked to divine the update's intent, Ollie Whitehouse, a Symantec Corp. researcher tracking Vista kernel signing, said he believed Microsoft was reacting to the code-signing evasions by toughening up PatchGuard. "It looks like they are trying to make it harder to do anything malicious once you've exploited vulnerabilities which allow code to be executed in the kernel, such as the ATI driver," Whitehouse said Tuesday.



Microsoft claimed that wasn't the case. "These are unrelated events," said Russ Humphries, a senior product manager on the Vista team in a posting to the group's blog today. "Perhaps the mix up is due to a confluence of events, or -- put another way -- the fact that we released an update to KPP at the same time that news about an ATI driver issue appeared," Humphries continued. "The update to KPP has no relationship to the ATI driver issue or recent topics related to code signing."



Others in the company pointed out yesterday that PatchGuard, or KPP, has been updated before. During Microsoft's monthly post-patch webcast yesterday, Mike Reavy, a program manager with the Microsoft Security Response Center, said: "It's normal for us to update [KPP] on an ongoing basis. This is the second type of update we've released."



For his part, Ionescu agreed that his utility and the PatchGuard update were not conjoined. "They're not related," he said yesterday. "The [PatchGuard] patch was going to come out either way."

Source: COMPUTER WORLD

Microsoft Xbox 360 Elite launched in India for Rs 34,990

Microsoft has finally launched their Xbox 360 Elite edition in the Indian market. This variant of the gaming console sports a premium black finish, and signature metallic detailing.

It comes packaged with a component HD cable and HDMI cable along with a 120GB hard drive.

Microsoft is already selling the other two variants of the Xbox 360 in the Indian market including the one without any hard disk and the one with a 20GB hard disk.

This Elite edition supports high definition multimedia interface which would enable the owner to view the games in HD video (up to 1080p) and multi-channel surround sound — all from one cable.



Mohit Anand, country manager - entertainment and devices division, Microsoft spoke at the launch of the Xbox 360 Elite edition in the Indian market: “There is a huge demand for gaming in the country, and fans are constantly craving for products and features that enhance their experience. The Xbox 360 Elite’s good looks, larger storage space, and premium features will allow our customers in India to enjoy all that the next generation of entertainment has to offer.”

The Elite edition is however pretty expensive at Rs 34,990 which comes to around USD 875.

Source: TECHWHACK

Microsoft Wants To Top $155 Million In First-Day Halo Sales

Microsoft is shooting the moon with Halo 3. Variety reported over the weekend that Microsoft is looking to top not only Halo 2's opening numbers but the first-weekend box office take from Spider-Man 3:

In its first 24 hours of release in 2004, the second installment of the sci-fi shooter earned $125 million ... With "Halo 3," Microsoft's Xbox unit wants not only to top the 2004 figure but to reach $155 million in a single day -- besting the $151 million opening weekend for "Spider-Man 3," the current record holder for a pic at the box office.

Can they do it? I guess when you're guaranteed a huge success, you might as well set an even higher bar for yourself.


Source: VNUNET

Microsoft Reveals First Vista Gadget Bugs

Microsoft Corp. Tuesday patched several Windows Vista gadgets, the first time it's had to fix the small applications, prompting one researcher to mark the date as the real "arrival of the next-generation of vulnerabilities."

The three bugs detailed in one of the nine bulletins issued Tuesday could let attackers inject their own malicious code into a victim's Vista-powered PC, said Microsoft. Three of Vista's bundled gadgets -- the small applications that sit on the desktop, usually pulling information from other programs or off the Web -- are flawed: the RSS, contacts and weather gadgets. The vulnerabilities in the RSS and weather gadgets are particularly dangerous, since both are enabled by default in a standard Vista installation.

"If a user subscribed to a malicious RSS feed in the Feed Headlines Gadget or added a malicious contacts file in the Contacts Gadget or a user clicked on a malicious link in the Weather Gadget an attacker could potentially run code on the system," Microsoft reported in the bulletin.

Although the bugs can result in remote code executing on the target machine -- a characteristic that usually pegs the vulnerability as "critical" -- Microsoft ranked them one step lower, as "important," in part because Vista's revised account rights settings should deflect the worst kind of damage.

Most third-party researchers, however, fixed attention not so much on the bugs themselves but on the fact that they lived inside Vista's gadgets.

"Six months ago, around the time of Vista [release] we started talking about the new types of vulnerabilities we might see," said Amol Sarwate, the manager of Qualys' vulnerability research lab. "These vulnerabilities are a testament that this next generation has finally arrived."

Tyler Reguly, a Toronto-based researcher with nCircle Network Security Inc., also tapped the gadget vulnerabilities as among the most interesting of Tuesday. "There was actually an article almost two years ago quoting a researcher at Trend Micro who said that RSS would be the botnets' next stomping ground," said Reguly in a posting to the nCircle blog. "This vulnerability could be proof of that. When you subscribe to an RSS feed you are implicitly trusting that feed. This vulnerability takes advantage of that trust relationship, inserting malicious code into something that you are 'blindly' trusting."

Like Sarwate, Reguly thinks that the RSS gadget bug is a harbinger of bad things to come. "It's a scary thought. This isn't like clicking a link in Internet Explorer...this action has been pre-approved. I'm interested to see where this will lead us."

VeriSign iDefense, which originally reported the RSS bug to Microsoft in March, also spelled out how a hacker could wreak the most havoc with the vulnerability. "If an attacker can find some way to inject data into a trusted feed then they will be able to exploit any subscribers to the feed," the company said in its own advisory, also published Tuesday. iDefense credited Aviv Raff, a security researcher who works for Finjan Inc. and is noted for rooting out bugs in Web browsers. In the past, Raff has disclosed vulnerabilities in Apple Inc.'s Safari and Mozilla Corp.'s Firefox.

But while these patches are the first to fix Microsoft's tools, flawed gadgets aren't new. Late last month, for example, Yahoo Widgets, a competing gadget platform, was tagged with a critical vulnerability in an associated ActiveX control.

Microsoft's gadget patches can be grabbed via one of the developer's update services.

Source: PC WORLD

Citrix Increases VMware's Competition

VMware saw its competition toughen up just a day after its eye-popping debut on the stock market -- but investors didn't seem to fret.

Business software maker Citrix (NASDAQ:CTXS) Systems CTXS said Wednesday that it would shell out $500 million for a small VMware VMW rival called XenSource, which sells "virtualization" software products that help make servers more efficient.

Executives at Citrix say XenSource will make it a strong player in the young virtualization market. Analysts estimate that privately held XenSource's sales this year will probably be less than $5 million, but they give it a chance to grow quickly because of the benefits of virtualization.

"It's a great market," said Michael Cristinziano, vice president of strategic development at Citrix. "It's one of those once-in-a-decade technology shifts."

Cristinziano estimates XenSource sales could rise to $50 million next year and $200 million in 2009.

Citrix already is somewhat in virtualization, but not in the hot server market. Citrix's main business is software that makes it easier to put Windows applications on PCs at remote locations via the Internet.

But some analysts don't see any big competition rising against VMware for a year or longer. VMware is viewed as far ahead in developing the technology. They call Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) MSFT the largest threat for VMware.

"VMware has several years (on) XenSource," said James Gilman, an analyst at Soleil Securities-Cross Research. "That will allow (VMware) to be able to compete and maintain their market share."

VMware became a Wall Street darling Tuesday when its stock soared 76% in its first day of trading. And despite the Citrix announcement, VMware shares rose another 13% on Wednesday. Priced at $29 a share, VMware now trades at 57.71.

Citrix shares fell 1.5% on another down day for the market.

VMware, founded in 1998, pioneered a new type of virtualization. Its software creates multiple "virtual" servers within a physical server. This saves customers money because they can pack more software onto servers. VMware also sells other software and services designed to enhance servers and other hardware.

Analysts put VMware's market share at 85% to 90%, a dominance that lets it command hefty prices. Its sales jumped 89% in the second quarter from the year-ago quarter. Its operating income rose 81%. The company is on pace to do well over $1 billion in sales this year vs. just $74 million as recently as 2003.

Citrix, which passed the $1-billion-per-year sales mark last year, gives XenSource some heft to take on the market juggernaut. Citrix, for example, has some 5,000 resellers to 350 for open-source vendor XenSource.

With XenSource, Citrix gains an entry into the hot server virtualization market. Market trackers forecast sales in this sector to grow at a compound annual rate of 40% for the next few years. Citrix also gets some help with its own desktop virtualization products. Its software lets companies set up desktop systems on multiple machines, using a single server to provide the operating system and applications.

Analysts say Citrix paid a steep price for XenSource, in a deal expected to close this year. But Citrix's Cristinziano says the sum was reasonable given XenSource's assets.

"You pay for what you get," he said.

Under Citrix, XenSource might be able to speed up its development of virtualization tools to close the gap with VMware, says Frank Gillett, an analyst at Forrester Research. (NASDAQ:FORR)

Microsoft, meanwhile, is expected to release its virtualization lineup that competes more head-to-head with VMware in late 2008.

Software sectors usually end up as two-horse races, and virtualization should be no exception, says Walter Pritchard, an analyst at Cowen & Co.

"If you're a No. 3 player in the market, it's not too exciting," he said.

He estimates that VMware's market share will fall to 53% by 2011, mostly due to gains by Microsoft.

Jefferies & Co. analyst Katherine Egbert points to another factor. While Citrix competes with Microsoft to an extent, it also has a long history of working with Microsoft. For that matter, she says, XenSource also has built a strong relationship with the maker of Windows.

The "co-opetition" between Microsoft and Citrix, Egbert says, could present more competition down the road for VMware.


Source: CNN

Google and Microsoft Look to Change Health Care

The New York Times reports that both Google and Microsoft may soon be entering the online health care market. Will there be a link to “Google Health” at the top of the company’s home page? According to the Times, the project is still an internal prototype and unlikely to be available even as a beta for some time.

The article does, however, offer a tantalizing glimpse at what Google Health could look like:

A presentation of screen images from the prototype — which two people who received it showed to a reporter — then has 17 other Web pages including a “health profile” for medications, conditions and allergies; a personalized “health guide” for suggested treatments, drug interactions and diet and exercise regimens; pages for receiving reminder messages to get prescription refills or visit a doctor; and directories of nearby doctors.

Google executives would not comment on the prototype, other than to say the company plans to experiment and see what people want. “We’ll make mistakes and it will be a long-range march,” said Adam Bosworth, a vice president of engineering and leader of the health team. “But it’s also true that some of what we’re doing is expensive, and for Google it’s not.”

Also worth noting in the Times piece is the way that the web has already changed how many of us approach health care. Of particular interest is the future-of-health-care portrait painted by John D. Halamka, a doctor and the chief information officer of the Harvard Medical School, who sees the future of health care on the web.

With more and more people using WebMD or Google to research symptoms before they see a professional, Halamka tells the Times that “the doctor is becoming a knowledge navigator… in the future, health care will be a much more collaborative process between patients and doctors.”

And that image probably won’t be limited to your symptoms, but may well extend to patient records. “Patients will ultimately be the stewards of their own information,” says Halamka who believes that eventually we will control our records rather than the institutions that provide the care.

Halamka’s vision might be a bit utopian given the nature of the health care industry and it also raises some additional questions — who hosts the records? And do you want Microsoft or Google in on the management of your health history?

Source: WIRED

Microsoft Increases Free E-Mail Storage Limit

Microsoft Corp. is increasing the storage limit for its Web-based e-mail service, surpassing competitor Google Inc.'s limit but far short of Yahoo Inc.'s unlimited storage.

The limit for a free Windows Live Hotmail account will increase from 2G bytes to 5G bytes. The change will be rolled out to users over the next few weeks along with a series of other upgrades, wrote Ellie Powers-Boyle, a Microsoft program manager, on a company blog.

Google offers around 2.8G bytes of storage space for a free account. Last week, Google began selling storage space that can be used for either its Gmail or Picasa photo sharing services for US$20 a year for another 6G bytes as well as more expensive plans.

Under the new changes, Microsoft will let users store 10G bytes of e-mail data for a $14.99 annual subscription. Those subscribers will also get a new feature: the ability to forward e-mail from their Hotmail account to a Gmail or other e-mail account.

Unfortunately, users of the free service will only be able to forward e-mail from one Hotmail account to another Hotmail account, essentially blocking them from a quick migration to another free e-mail service.

Another new Hotmail option is the ability to shut off the "Today" feature, which shows top news and features stories on Microsoft's MSN portal. It appears after a user logs into their Hotmail account.

Microsoft is also changing some of Hotmail's security features. One new feature is a link, "Report phishing" that alerts Microsoft to a possible scam Web site linked to an e-mail.

Powers-Boyle also wrote that Microsoft is trying to make Hotmail run faster. The company will also increase the amount of time that messages are stored in the junk and deleted items folders before being automatically flushed, although no specific time period was given.

Other improvements include: Better performance for Hebrew and Arabic writers, a feature that stops the duplication of contact information and the ability to set an automated response.

Source: PC WORLD

Google bowls for Microsoft Office buyers with free StarOffice

Sun's Microsoft Office workalike, formerly $70, suddenly materializes in the Google Pack download, writes Executive Editor Eric Knorr

Two years ago Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, and Scott McNealy, still CEO of Sun at the time, made a joint announcement that was notable for its lack of content. The only real substance: Sun would bundle Google Toolbar with Sun's Java Runtime Environment.

But Schmidt did drop one hint of more to come: "We will work to make the distribution of [OpenOffice] become broader. We are not announcing specifics."

It took a while, but if you check the Google Pack page –- where Google rolls together a motley group of free software into a big download –- you’ll now find StarOffice on the list. This is notable for a couple of reasons. First, although StarOffice and its open-source cousin OpenOffice share the same code base, StarOffice has added features -– a spell-checker and thesaurus plus some Windows fonts and clip art. And until now, StarOffice sold for $70.

In the past few people took Star/OpenOffice seriously. Those who still deal with the vagaries of, say, Mac Word documents opened in Windows shudder at the idea of adding file interoperability uncertainties with third-party software. And neither StarOffice nor OpenOffice support Office 2007 file formats.

But do they need to? Just over the weekend, a non-technical friend complained to me that Office 2007 hid all the commands he used and exposed all the commands he didn't use. Such lamentations depend on how you use the product, but the point is that Office 2007's UI is a major departure from earlier versions, and those who despise learning curves may seek out an alternative that more closely resembles previous Office versions.

Microsoft may be in a tougher spot than it's ever been -- Vista sluggishness in sales and performance, browser-based workalikes of its desktop apps, reports of developers moving away from Windows. And as far as anyone can determine, the company does not yet have a coherent response to Google Apps. The sudden appearance of StarOffice as a free download is not a momentous event. But it's one more chink in Microsoft's corroding armor.

Source: INFO WORLD

Microsoft Moves Toward Exchange Server 2007 SP1

Microsoft(MSFT) Tuesday announced details of Exchange Server 2007 SP1 and opened up a new test release to Microsoft Developer Network and TechNet subscribers, adding much-needed integration and support for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 into Exchange.
Though an older test release of the company's latest e-mail server product already was powering e-mail for more than 150,000 people, the new community technology preview is now feature complete, including increased support for Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003 SP2, and Windows Vista. For example, Exchange management tools now run on Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. The Vista support fills one of Vista's remaining holes in application compatibility, which has been one of the operating system's early troubles.

However, the number one feature request for Exchange Server 2007 SP1, according to Microsoft, was "standby continuous replication," a feature that enables an organization to do keep a hot copy of live e-mail data on a standby server in lieu of or in addition to implementing more extensive clusters of live servers. Mid-size organizations are demanding this so they don't have to pay for clusters, and enterprises want it for smaller sites, according to Microsoft group product manager Ray Mohrman.

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 also adds an array of other updates, including the introduction of IPv6 support, new features for Outlook Web Access, tighter integration with Office Communications Server 2007, a service pack for Forefront Security for Exchange Server that "increases filtering and scanning performance," new ActiveSync policies for synchronization, authentication, encryption, and smaller details like the ability to prevent Exchange ActiveSync-enabled mobile devices from taking pictures with their cameras.

According to a slide shown at the company's annual Financial Analyst Meeting last month, Exchange is a $1.5 billion annual business. Microsoft says more than 1,000 companies and about 3 million people total have switched from Lotus Notes to Exchange Server within the last year. The final version of Exchange Server 2007 SP1 is expected by the end of the year.

Source: Information Week

Microsoft Buys aQuantive, Sets Up Online Ad Group

Microsoft Monday said it completed its most expensive acquisition ever and is establishing a new online advertising group to battle Google and Yahoo head-to-head.

In May, the company paid US$6 billion for aQuantive, a digital marketing services agency, to help expand its Internet advertising business. The deal, Microsoft largest ever in terms of dollar amount, closed and Microsoft formed the Advertiser and Publisher Solutions (APS) Group that will be headed by former aQuantive CEO Brian McAndrews.

In July, CEO Steve Ballmer emphatically said that Microsoft was investing in new areas, including online advertising where the mindset is to win big.

"We are going to be an advertising company," Ballmer said during the company's annual meeting for financial analysts. "We need to embrace that. We need to be world class at that."

The acquisition of aQuantive is the centerpiece of an online advertising build out that also includes the July purchase of AdECN, which links buyers and sellers of Internet ad space. In May, the company bought ScreenTonic, which delivers location-based ads to mobile devices. And last year, Microsoft bought video game ad firm Massive, which will be used to inject ads into online gaming services such as Xbox Live and MSN games. Terms were not announced for any of those deals.

Last year, Microsoft went live with its adCenter platform, which lets companies by advertising space on Live Search.

The flurry of activity represents Microsoft race with Google and Yahoo to provide the top platform for delivering online advertising.

Google also has been busy, paying $3.1 billion in April to acquire DoubleClick from under Microsoft's nose in a deal that prompted Microsoft aQuantive purchase. Also in April, Yahoo paid $680 million to complete a deal to acquire Right Media.

According to a report by UBS Investment Research in March, Google continues to be No. 1 in worldwide online search revenue, taking $10.5 billion of the $24.5 billion online advertising market in 2006. UBS cited figures from ZenithOptimedia and company reports. Yahoo came in second with $5.6 billion in revenue, while Microsoft was a distant third with $1.6 billion online advertising revenue in 2006.

As part of the close on the aQuantive deal Microsoft also set up its new APS advertising group, which will be responsible for all ad platforms, including aQuantive, MSNDR, AdCenter, and in-game and mobile ads.

Group chief McAndrews will report to Kevin Johnson, president of president of Microsoft's platforms and services division.

As part of the transition, Steve Berkowitz, senior vice president of the online services group, and Satya Nadella, corporate vice president of the search and advertising platform group, will also report to Johnson.

Source: PC WORLD

Group's Top 10 Mostly Microsoft Products

What have been the most influential products in the technology market over the past 25 years? The Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) was founded 25 years ago.

The organization was founded by representatives of five microcomputer dealerships working together to find better ways to do business, a spokesman for the group, which has now grown to 22,000 member companies, said.

For its 25th anniversary, the association decided to poll its members to find out what products have influenced technology. The list of 10 products was released this month.

Four of the five top spots were taken by Microsoft products. The Apple iPod, which has become one of the most successful products in history in its short life, was the only non-Mircosoft product in the top five.

The No. 1 spot went to Internet Explorer, selected as the most influential product by 66 percent of the information-technology professionals surveyed. Introduced in 1995, it has been around for only half of the 25-year span, and remains the market's predominant Web browser, the association noted.

Second was Microsoft Word, gaining the votes of 56 percent of those surveyed.

Microsoft Windows 95 placed third in the poll. It was chosen by 50 percent of those voting.

The exciting iPod and the rather unexciting Excel spreadsheet program from Microsoft tied for fourth place with 49 percent each.

"More than 100 million iPods have been sold since the portable digital media player launched in 2001, and more than 1.5 billion songs have been purchased from the Apple's iTunes online store," the association noted.

Meanwhile, Excel has taken about 90 percent of the spreadsheet market since it was introduced in the mid 1980s.

Rounding out the top 10 in the CompTIA poll on the most influential products, applications or technologies of the past 25 years were:

BlackBerry, 39 percent. Launched in 1999 by Research In Motion, this all-in-one wireless data and voice device was the first wireless device to synchronize with company e-mail systems so users did not require a different e-mail address when traveling.

Adobe Photoshop, 35 percent. The de facto standard in image editing was the first to bring affordable image editing down to the personal computer level in the late 1980s.

McAfee VirusScan, 32 percent. Popular antivirus program.

Netscape Navigator, 31 percent. Introduced in 1994, Navigator quickly became the leading browser on the Web.

Palm Pilot, 31 percent. The first personal digital assistant device manufactured by Palm, Inc., then a division of U.S. Robotics, and introduced in 1996. The following year, the device was named "High Tech Gizmo of the Year" by Newsweek.

Source: The Ledger

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Beta 3 VHD

Microsoft has released a pre-configured VHD of Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Beta 3 that can be downloaded and safely evaluated in a Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 environment in a similar manner to that of a VMware virtual appliance.

Overview:

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 is the next generation of the Windows Server operating system that helps information technology (IT) professionals maximize control over their infrastructure while providing unprecedented availability and management capabilities, leading to a significantly more secure, reliable, and robust server environment than ever before. Windows Server 2008 delivers new value to organizations by ensuring all users regardless of location are able to get the full complement of services from the network. Windows Server 2008 also provides deep insight into the operating system and diagnostic capabilities to allow administrators to spend more time adding business value.

Windows Server 2008 builds on the success and strengths of the award-winning Windows Server 2003 operating system and on the innovations delivered in Service Pack 1 and Windows Server 2003 R2. However, Windows Server 2008 is far more than a refinement of predecessor operating systems. Windows Server 2008 is designed to provide organizations with the most productive platform for powering applications, networks, and Web services from the workgroup to the datacenter with exciting, valuable new functionality and powerful improvements to the base operating system.

Source: INFOWORLD

Microsoft tests dashboard view of online offerings

Microsoft started testing on Thursday a new dashboard view for its various Windows Live online services.

A Windows Live user can sign onto home.live.com and quickly scan for new e-mails, blog postings from friends, contact updates or try out other Microsoft services such as online antivirus and spyware scans.

"It's a quick view and summary for all of the services you are using on Windows Live," Chris Jones, a Microsoft corporate vice president in the Windows Live group, said in a phone interview.

The world's largest software company aims to create a large and engaged audience in order to compete against Web rivals Yahoo and Google for tens of billions of dollars in online advertising.

Working in Microsoft's favor is a network of more than 300 million Windows Live users, who frequently log in to check e-mail and instant messages.


The company's other Web services are not as popular, but Microsoft says the new look could help introduce new services to existing e-mail and messaging users.

All Windows Live services will also have a home icon to take a user back to the dashboard view.

Windows Live services are linked on the back end by a common contacts database. A user can post a picture on Windows Live Spaces, its blog- and picture-sharing site, and send a notice to anyone on their instant messaging contact list.

Microsoft has said the next wave of Windows Live services is due out later this year.


Source: Reuters

Microsoft says 'Halo 3' presales set record

Microsoft, warming up the "Halo 3" hype machine, announced today that preorders for the upcoming Xbox 360 video game have topped 1 million units -- a record pace for presales, the company said, citing reports from retailers.

Another interesting factoid: The company says the $129.99 "Halo 3" Legendary Edition -- complete with Spartan helmet case, pictured below -- is on track to sell out, based on preorders, even before the game is available. The news release doesn't say how many Legendary Edition units Microsoft is selling, but I've asked for that information, and I'll update this post if the company discloses it.

On the subject of this previous post, Microsoft also confirmed some of the product tie-ins that it's planning with other companies. They include a special "Halo 3" branded soda from Mountain Dew, "Halo 3" packaging at Burger King, a contest to win a limited-edition "Halo 3" G6 GXP Street car from Pontiac -- and, of course, a collectible "Halo 3" Slurpee Cup, from 7-11.

For the record, there are still 47 days remaining until the Sept. 25 launch.

Source: SEATTLEPI

Web 2.0 could erode Microsoft's dominance

Microsoft's dominance is leading businesses to overlook problems with its products, says analyst Gartner.

But the growth of Web 2.0 technologies will challenge the company's position, says the report published last week.

Microsoft software is not always the best but firms are swayed by a combination of integration, ease-of-use and aggressive sales and marketing.

Reliance on Microsoft limits firms' flexibility, and also creates dependencies on the supplier's other products, says Gartner.

But the advent of quick-to-market Web 2.0 systems will erode the Redmond-based supplier's dominance and turn it into a follower rather than a leader.

'As enterprises move to standardise on a single workflow platform, Microsoft will be challenged to displace key infrastructure vendors such as SAP and Oracle,' says the report.

Source: VNUNet

'Vista Capable' Suit Against Microsoft Allowed to Proceed

A judge in Washington state has denied Microsoft Corp.'s request to dismiss all claims in a suit alleging that "Windows Vista Capable" stickers the company put on PCs violated consumer protection laws and were an example of deceptive business practices, allowing the case to move ahead toward a jury trial.

In the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington in Seattle, Judge Marsha J. Pechman dismissed one of four claims by plaintiff Dianne L. Kelley in a lawsuit against Microsoft over the stickers, which Microsoft -- in conjunction with PC makers -- affixed to PCs that were sold before Windows Vista itself was available to give consumers an idea what machines could run the OS.

The suit also calls into question the fairness of Microsoft's "Express Upgrade" coupon program that allowed users to upgrade to Vista from XP machines for little or no cost after buying a "Windows Vista Capable" machine.

According to court papers, Judge Pechman is allowing two of the plaintiffs' claims to move into the trial phase of the case. One alleged that Microsoft violated the Consumer Protection Act by engaging in unfair or deceptive business practices by affixing "Windows Vista Capable" labels to PCs without telling consumers they may have to spend more money for a machine to run a premium edition of the OS. Another alleged that Microsoft unjustly received payment for Windows XP licenses and upgrades from Vista Basic to Vista Premium because of their practices.

Judge Pechman dismissed one claim, which called Microsoft's placement of "Windows Vista Capable" stickers on PCs that could not run all versions of Windows Vista a "breach of contract." Another claim -- that a "Windows Vista Capable" sticker represents a written warranty under federal law -- has been taken under advisement by the judge, which means she will decide how to proceed on that claim later, Microsoft said.

The case is scheduled to go to trial on Oct. 8.

Microsoft's hardware partners began shipping PCs with the "Windows Vista Capable" logo in April 2006 as a way for people to know that if they purchased a new Windows XP PC before the new OS was available, their machine would be ready to run Vista. However, the designation was potentially confusing, because a PC with the label was only guaranteed to run the least expensive, most basic version of Vista, Windows Home Basic.

A month later, Microsoft launched a Web site to explain the hardware requirements for different versions of Vista, as well as a new PC designation called "Windows Vista Premium Ready," which the company used to label PCs that could run Vista editions -- such as Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate -- with more features than Vista Basic. Microsoft also provided coupons for people who purchased these PCs to upgrade to the appropriate version of Vista either for free or for little cost once the OS was made available.

Kelley filed her suit against Microsoft in March as a class-action case, but whether the suit applies to an entire class of people with similar complaints has not yet been determined.

Kelley, a resident of Camano Island, Washington, purchased a PC with a "Windows Vista Capable" sticker affixed to it in November 2006. In her complaint, she said that Microsoft was "deceptive" in its failure to indicate that the PC lacked the "Premium Ready" designation. She also claimed that the upgrade she received for her PC only allowed her to upgrade to Vista Home Basic, which offered "few ... advantages over the existing XP operating system." Therefore, consumers were duped into thinking they would receive coupons for a "dramatically new" OS when they could not, according to her complaint.

Microsoft spokesman Guy Esnouf Friday said the company is pleased one of the claims in Kelley's complaint has been dismissed and looks forward to proving its case in court.

Source: PC WORLD

Apple Beats Microsoft at its Own Open XML Game

Apple Inc.'s release of iWork '08 this week is "embarrassing," an analyst said Friday, not for its maker, but for Apple's rival, Microsoft Corp.

Tuesday, Apple rolled out a refreshed iWork that added a spreadsheet, dubbed Numbers, to the earlier mix of a word processor/page layout Pages and presentation maker Keynote. But it was iWork's ability to handle the Open XML file format -- the new native format for Microsoft's own Office 2007 application suite -- that Michael Gartenberg of JupiterResearch talked about.

"This was the ultimate insult to injury," Gartenberg said. "Not only has Microsoft not delivered the ability to read and write Open XML in its Mac Office, but at the end of the day, Apple was the one who delivered."

Gartenberg referred to Microsoft's problems developing Office 2008 for Mac, which the company announced last week would be delayed until mid-January. Among the roadblocks, said Microsoft's Macintosh Business Unit (MBU), is the shift to Open XML as Office 2008's native file format. The company has also been slow in releasing conversion tools that let earlier editions of its Mac suite work with Office 2007's Open XML documents.

"This is embarrassing for MBU," Gartenberg said. "It has said that the shift to Intel has caused [its] problems, and changes in development tools, and the file format, too. But every other major vendor has pretty much managed to get their apps over to Intel [on the Mac]. Microsoft is one of the oldest Mac developers out there, so it's not like it doesn't have experience [on the platform]."

IWork '08 applications can open the OpenXML formats churned out by their Office 2007 counterparts -- Pages with Word, Numbers with Excel, Keynote with PowerPoint -- but cannot save in those formats. Currently, Office 2004 and Office v. X users can both open Word and PowerPoint Open XML files and save in those formats using beta converters MBU has issued. No such converter has been released that handles Excel 2007's Open XML files, however.

Ironically, one of those who praised iWork's handling of the Microsoft file format was a program manager for Office 2007. "[iWork '08] reads the Office Open XML files with very high fidelity," said Brian Jones on his company blog.

At the same time, Jones defended his fellow developers at Microsoft in MBU. "The Mac Office folks have a ton of stuff they are working on for the next version, so it's not surprising that you aren't seeing full Open XML support until they reach that point," Jones said in response to a question asking how Microsoft lost the race to Apple's iWork.

"Office for the Mac is just not a real priority for Microsoft," said Gartenberg as he spelled out his take for Microsoft's tardiness creating software on the Mac that can handle what are, after all, its own file formats. "And that's not likely to change anytime soon."

Asked to explain why Microsoft hasn't been able to match Apple, MBU's marketing manager, Amanda Lefebvre, ticked off the development issues that have delayed Office 2008.

"The transition to the new file format is one of several reasons the development cycle is longer with Office 2008," she said. "Office 2008 [for Mac] will run natively on Intel- and PowerPC-based Macs with a Universal Binary [and] this transition necessitated a switch to a new set of development tools as well. The combination of these two technology shifts definitely impacted our schedule."

Not quite, Gartenberg said. "What this really shows is Microsoft's inability to ship software on time these days," he said.

Apple, meanwhile, is doing the smart thing. "They're making sure that they're not dependent on Microsoft for any of the important software [for the Mac]," said Gartenberg.

That strategy, along with the US$79 price of iWork and the window of opportunity because of Office 2008's delay, puts Cupertino in the cat bird seat. "It's going to be hard for Microsoft to get those people who try and buy iWork back," he said. "Microsoft's let down its Mac customers."

Source: PC WORLD

Microsoft Unveils 'Money Plus'

Microsoft on Friday released updated versions of its Microsoft Money personal finance management software.
At a time when more and more consumers are facing with a credit crunch and sagging stock portfolios, Microsoft Money Plus offers several new tools to help users keep a tighter rein on their finances.

Enhanced utilities provide alerts on when bills are due or overdue, offer detailed cash flow analysis and track a number of markets -- including stock exchanges, currencies and commodities -- through a dashboard, according to Microsoft.

An "Insights" feature makes key financial data available on the desktop so users don't have to launch the full application to get a quick update on their finances.

"Everyone is busy these days, and sometimes you just need to know your account balance or check out whether you have enough extra cash to splurge on dinner, an amazing outfit or the latest 'must have' golf gadget," said Chris Jolley, group manager of the Financial Products Group at Microsoft. The company has been offering personal finance software for 17 years including last year's $20 download-only Money Essentials.

Microsoft is also using Microsoft Money Plus as a platform through which it can deliver third party financial services to users. Identity theft monitoring, tax preparation and investment education are among them.

Microsoft has partnered with Experian, H&R Block, The Street.com and others to provide the services.

Microsoft Money Plus Deluxe sells for $49.99 with a $20.00 mail in rebate on offer. Money Plus Premium sells for $79.99 with a $30.00 rebate. A Home and Business edition sells for $89.99, also with a $30.00 rebate.

Microsoft is making a basic edition of the program available as a download for $19.99. The Money Plus software requires Windows XP (with SP2) or Windows Vista.

Source: INFORMATION WEEK

Microsoft India appoints new GM

Software major Microsoft today appointed Amit Sircar as General Manager to head its Hyderabad-based Microsoft Global Services - India (MGSI) operations.

"MGSI is key to Microsoft's global growth plans in the services of business and we are confident that Amit is the right person to take the charter even further," Microsoft India Chairman Ravi Venkatesan said in a release here today.

Source: The Hindu

Perfect 10 Sues Microsoft

A publisher of nude model photography is suing Microsoft Corp. for putting links and images of the company's content in search results taken from other Web sites that are illegally reproducing the material.

The company, Perfect 10 Inc., previously filed similar suits seeking injunctions against Google Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. over alleged copyright infringement.

The latest suit alleges that Microsoft's MSN image search feature creates unauthorized thumbnails of content owned by Perfect 10 and includes links to see a full-size versions of the images for free. The suit also says that Microsoft's MSN search engine makes passwords available to the company's perfect10.com Web site.

Microsoft also takes advertising money from Web sites that have stolen Perfect 10 images, and provides links to Web sites that offer passwords for Perfect 10's services, according to the lawsuit. The companies could not be immediately reached for comment.

Source: PC WORLD

Microsoft Confirms HDMI Port Addition to Xbox 360

Microsoft confirmed late Wednesday the existence of newly updated Xbox 360 units that include HDMI support. The news comes amid reports that new machines are now available in stores coinciding with today's price drops.

"Yes, we are offering an HDMI port for Xbox 360 simply as another choice in Xbox 360 owners' games and entertainment experience," a Microsoft rep told Shacknews in an statement. "Retailers are gradually introducing HDMI-enabled Xbox 360s into the channel to meet demand."

The company denied comment on the port addition to cheaper Core models not to mention the rumored cooler running processors. "We have not announced any plans to add HDMI to the Xbox 360 Core System," the rep said. "We are constantly updating the console's more than 1700 internal components and therefore will not comment on details of specific components or manufacturing processes."

HDMI allows for higher audio and visual fidelity when connected to HD-enabled TVs, and was first made available on Xbox 360 Elite models.

Source: PC WORLD

Microsoft Says No Windows Virtualization on Top of Linux

SAN FRANCISCO—Microsoft will not allow Windows Vista or Windows XP to be virtualized on top of Linux, Sam Ramji, the director of Microsoft's open-source software lab, said at the annual LinuxWorld Conference and Expo here Aug. 7.

"What we have heard predominantly from customers is that they want to be able to mix and match their data center applications, but we haven't seen significant demand for Linux applications on the desktop or for desktop virtualization on top of Linux," Ramji said in an address titled "Linux and Windows Interoperability: On the Metal and on the Wire."

But, he said that while he does hear a lot of requests for this from developers in the Linux community, the feedback Microsoft is getting from customers and its Interoperability Executive Customer Council with regard to the desktop is that they want .Net and Java interoperability.

"We get no significant request for desktop virtualizations across platforms," he said.


It is possible, however, that virtual machines will be able to move between Linux and Windows in the future.

Source: PCMAG

Apple Kicks Microsoft Where It Hurts

Apple's announcement this week of new iMacs, software, and services strikes at the Windows platform's core strengths. The new generation of iMacs, priced starting at $1,199, compete on price/performance with midrange PCs. And Apple rounded out its iWork suite with the Numbers spreadsheet software and other capabilities, making it a head-to-head competitor with Microsoft Office.

It's getting hard to find reasons to buy a Windows PC, aside from sheer inertia. Windows PCs used to be far more cost-effective than Macs, but no longer. Macs can now compete hard with PCs on cost, for all but the very cheapest, sub-$600 Windows machines.

This is especially true when you factor software into the price. The Mac comes bundled with iLife software, offering sophisticated video, photo, and audio editing. You have to pay hundreds of dollars to find equivalent software for the PC.

But while Apple is entrenching its position in the midpriced and high-end desktops, it's accelerating its retreat from the bargain basement. Apple is discontinuing the $999 17-inch iMac; the entry-level iMac is now $200 more expensive: $1,199 for the cheapest of the new line.

Even the Mac Mini, priced under $800 without a display, keyboard, or any external components, is an afterthought for Apple. Although the Mini received an upgrade Tuesday, it didn't get any of the love lavished in the iMac and applications.

Apple's retreat from the low end is intentional -- Apple just isn't interested in shipping el cheapo PCs, said Apple CEO Steve Jobs: "[We] just can’t do it. We can’t ship junk. There are thresholds we can’t cross because of who we are," Jobs said Tuesday.

Mac fans will see that as a declaration of Apple's superiority. Mac haters will see it as ridiculous snobbery. I don't see it as either -- just a simple statement of fact. Apple is competing in the midrange and high end PC market, it's not interested in the low end of the market.

iWork: iWork is a main area where Apple is bringing the battle to Microsoft. Apple added a spreadsheet to iWork, called "Numbers," making it more of a head-to-head competitor with Office. John Gruber, author of the blog Daring Fireball, writes: "This is the 'bring it on' release of iWork."

MacUser writes:

Numbers is a spreadsheet done in the style of Keynote and Pages, featuring intelligent tables that allow sorting and filtering by clicking on headers; a flexible canvas that allows multiple sheets on a single canvas, meaning you can use formulas to tie them together, but format them separately; interactive printing that lets you scale content so that you get exactly what you see; and drag-and-drop formulas.

The point of Numbers, as with the other elements of the iWork suite, is to be able to make beautiful spreadsheets very quickly. Best of all, it’ll allow you to import and export almost all Excel documents.

Gruber describes Numbers as:

a total ground-up re-imagining of what a "spreadsheet" app is. The fundamental element is not the spreadsheet; it’s a canvas on which you can place elements, which elements can be tables (which are spreadsheets), charts, and graphics.

Look at the “Intelligent Tables” features. What Numbers really is is a way for people to create their own table-based software. Numbers might be as much a new Hypercard as it is a new Excel.

Apple upgraded Pages, its page-layout software, to make it function better as a word processor, including the ability to import documents with change-tracking from Microsoft Word.

Microsoft is going to be facing some tough times with its Microsoft Office monopoly. The monopoly is currently riding on fear -- everybody else uses Office, so if I don't I might not be able to share critical documents -- and the needs of a few Excel and PowerPoint power-users. For the rest of us, there are plenty of good alternatives to Office. Office costs $300 for most people -- although student discounts can bring the price down to about $150. OpenOffice.org and its Mac port, NeoOffice, does almost everything that Microsoft Office does, and it's free. Now, iWork is another alternative for Mac users, priced at $79.

iLife: Apple upgrade iLife, with changes to iMovie to speed up the movie-making process, GarageBand for creating audio and podcasts, and iPhoto. AppleInsider has details, with screenshots.

iPhoto has features that make it easier to organize photos.. It addresses a problem that I face: Thousands and thousands and thousands of photos occupying the hard disk, almost completely disorganized. Are you looking for the particular photo you took four years ago of Great-Aunt Gertie dancing the cha-cha at your son's Bar Mitzvah? Good luck with that -- it's buried under a vast pile of digital mulch.

The new iPhoto organizes photos that were taken at the same time into Events.

You can also hide photos in iPhoto. That's great for people like me -- I hate to delete a single photo, but I don't want to look at all of them every time I flip through an album.

iPhoto automatically exports your photos into a Web Gallery, which is a new feature of the .Mac service.

Apple incorporated Web Gallery into the iPhone, updating the smartphone's software through some magical means that didn't involve user intervention. That's unusual; until now, updates to iPhone software were delivered over the Internet, through iTunes, when iPhone owners synched their devices to the desktop. iPhone Atlas speculates that the updates were delivered wirelessly over the EDGE network. Either that, or the Web Gallery was included in the iPhone software update 1.01, released July 31, and timed to go live Tuesday.

iMovie '08 isn't just a movie editor - it also works as a library of all your online video. MacUser writes:

Music, sound effects, photos, titles, and transitions can all be added with ease, and the Share options make it a snap to export video to a variety of sources: iTunes, ipod, iPhone, Apple TV, or in a .Mac Web Gallery. You can encode in multiple resolutions for different quality downloads, even going higher than DVD if you want. And if you want to share it immediately, there’s a Share option that lets you send your movie directly to YouTube.

iMovie requires a G5 or Intel processor, so owners of older Macs need not apply.

You can get video tutorials of the new iLife and iWork applications. While you're there, catch a video of Jobs's presentation, and see the new Mac commercial, which will give you good idea what the new iMacs look like.

Not the least of Tuesday's announcements: Apple upgraded its .Mac service.. I mentioned the online photo gallery earlier; Apple also added additional storage capabilities, bringing the maximum online storage to 10 GB.

The added capacity actually makes .Mac practical as an online backup service. Apple really needs to add an unlimited-storage option to make .Mac competitive with online backup services like Amazon S3 and Mozy.

Mac Mini: The Mac Mini got upgrades as well.

The new version still comes in two models, $599 and $799, but features Core 2 Duo processors versus the previous Core Duos — now 1.83 and 2.0GHz instead of 1.67 and 1.83GHz (supposedly “up to 39 percent faster than the previous generation”). Apart from that, 1GB of RAM is now standard, and the hard drives got a modest increase, now up to 80GB and 120GB. Amazingly, it seems the new model does not include 802.11n, which is surprising and disappointing. No cosmetic change, no mention on Apple’s homepage....

Jobs hates the Mac Mini, says Gruber on Daring Fireball. "[T]think about [Jobs's] comments during the event making fun of Dell machines because of the all the cables you need to hook them up to displays and webcams. That all applies equally to the Mini," Gruber said.

New keyboard: The change to the iMac extended to the keyboard, which is now a sleek, silvery device. You can get a closer look at the new keyboard on the Apple Web site.

One change to the keyboard: No Apple logo on the Command key. Instead, you just have the cloverleaf symbol, and a new addition, the word "Command." This will be useful for new Mac users, who often have trouble finding the Command key because it doesn't say "Command" on it. As an interesting aside, Apple pioneer Andy Hertzfeld, part of the origianl Mac development team more than 20 years ago, explains how that cloverleaf symbol came into being.

Apple opened up the floor to Q&A with Jobs at the end of the news conference. MacWorld writes:

One question that came from the audience wondered why Apple doesn’t participate in the “Intel Inside” program, in which PC manufacturers affix the well-known labels to their computers.

“We like our own stickers better,” Jobs said. “Don’t get me wrong. We love working with Intel. We’re proud to ship Intel products in Macs. They’re screamers, and combined with our OS, we’ve tuned them well. It’s just that everyone knows we use Intel processors. We’d rather not tell them about the product that’s inside the box.”

Gruber responds on Daring Fireball:

Jobs offers a rare chance for a public Q&A and someone asks why they don’t booger up their computers with horrid stickers? Will someone please tell me who asked this question so I can name him jackass of the week?

Source: INFORMATION WEEK

Microsoft Launches New Service Site for Xbox 360

Microsoft has launched a new web site, found at service.xbox.com, that lets you create a repair order, check repair status, cancel an existing repair and view your system's warranty status.

This new web site follows Microsoft's extension of the Xbox 360 warranty to cover any issues resulting in three flashing red lights, for three years from purchase. Last month, Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft's entertainment and devices division, told Associated Press that the company will record a charge of up to $1.15 billion for its fourth fiscal quarter to cover the additional costs associated with the new extended warranty.

Source: TEAM XBOX

Microsoft And NASA Team Up For 3-D Space Shuttle Tour

Microsoft has announced a new collaboration with NASA designed to give users a 3D photographic tour of the space shuttle Endeavour before its launch later this week. The new exhibit uses Microsoft’s Photosynth technology to create a three-dimensional environment with “views of shuttle Endeavour on the launch pad, interior and surrounding area of the Vehicle Assembly Building, and the return of previous flight Shuttle Atlantis atop a 747.”

You’ll need to download the Photosynth viewer to see the images (sorry Mac users, for now Photosynth is only available for Windows XP and Vista — running either IE6 or IE7). If you don’t meet the minimum requirements or if you’d just like to see an overview, there’s a nice video preview available on the Microsoft Labs site.

Blaise Aguera y Arcas, an architect at Microsoft Live Labs, also gave a talk at the TED festival a while back that shows off some of the remarkable capabilities of Photosynth and SeaDragon, which you can see here.

NASA says it hopes this joint project will lead to more collaborative initiatives with Microsoft. And Microsoft is no doubt hoping the same, especially since most recent NASA collaborations have been with rival Google, which gets some of its Google Earth data from NASA.

Also worth noting is that, near the end of the promotional video linked above, Blaise Aguera y Arcas says that Photosynth with soon offer features which allow users to stitch their own photos together.

Given that Photosynth relies on image data from a normal SLR camera, it might soon be possible for even you and I to stitch together some impressive 3-D tours, provided you take enough images.

Source: WIRED

Microsoft Co-Founder Bails Out Of Dreamworks

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, recently ranked by Forbes as the fifth richest U.S. citizen at $18 billion, has decided to further reduce his stake in DreamWorks Animation. Allen is selling 10 million shares of common stock worth about $320 million, a move that will automatically (according to the terms of his original agreement) force him to give up his seat on the company’s board of directors.

Allen said, “The reduction in our position in DreamWorks Animation is part of an ongoing effort to rebalance the Vulcan Capital portfolio. I am pleased to have been a principal investor in DreamWorks since its inception and proud of the Company's many successes to date.”

Although Allen will remain one of the company’s largest stock holders, retaining roughly 6 million shares, the high-profile move doesn’t help a studio recently plagued by rumors that one of its founders, Steven Spielberg, may soon bolt for greener pastures.

Source: WIRED

Microsoft Hires EA Executive to Run Xbox Live

Microsoft Corp. has hired another Electronic Arts Inc. executive in an effort to help support a surprisingly successful part of the Xbox group.

John Schappert, who was executive vice president at EA, will fill a new position at Microsoft as corporate vice president of Live, software and services in the Microsoft Interactive Entertainment Business. He'll oversee activities related to Xbox Live, the service that lets subscribers play games against each other online and buy content such as TV shows and arcade games.

Schappert will focus on expanding Live's online services and broadening the audience using it, Microsoft said in a statement. Live users can also do video, voice and text chat with each other.

Xbox Live is one of the best performing parts of the Xbox business, gaining subscribers faster than Microsoft expected and earning more money than the company anticipated, said Matt Rosoff, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft.

The service has more than 7 million users and has had 220 million downloads of content, including 45 million paid arcade games, Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft's entertainment and devices business, said at a recent meeting with financial analysts.


The Xbox Live video marketplace has been a "pleasant surprise" for Microsoft, he said. Strong subscriber growth is expected to continue, he said.

Schappert's move follows other recent executive exchanges between EA and Microsoft. Last month Peter Moore, formerly the head of Microsoft's Xbox and Windows gaming initiatives, joined EA as president of EA Sports. Don Mattrick, a former president at EA, took his place at Microsoft. Schappert will report to Mattrick.

Moore left the company shortly after Microsoft acknowledged that some Xbox 360 consoles have a hardware problem. Microsoft took a more than US$1 billion charge related to fixing and replacing the consoles.

Source: PC WORLD

Microsoft drops Xbox 360 price by $100

Microsoft is cutting $100 off the price of the Xbox 360 as of today. The version with a 20-gigabyte hard drive will sell for $400, while the basic core system, which does not come with a hard drive, will be $300.


The Xbox 360 Elite, with a 120-gigagbyte hard drive, will be priced at $500. A special-edition Halo console will be available in September at $500 with a Spartan green-and-gold finish and 20-gigabyte hard drive. The price cut is timed to coincide with the Aug. 14 release of the popular Madden NFL 08 title, Microsoft said.

Source: THE LONDON FREE PRESS

Microsoft Releases Windows Updates, Vista SP1 And XP SP3 In Testing

Microsoft isn't standing still with Windows Vista. The company Tuesday released two updates to address performance and compatibility concerns with the operating system and confirmed this week that Windows Vista SP1 is in early pre-beta testing with a "select group of testers."
After unauthorized versions of the two Vista updates appeared online last week and were quickly removed by Microsoft, they became public on Tuesday. These fixes, available now only through Microsoft's download center, will later become available through Microsoft Windows Update. Next Tuesday is Patch Tuesday for Microsoft, so they could be available on Windows Update sooner than later.

The first update, KB938979, is a package of performance updates that deal with such problems as poor memory management, long calculation times for estimating the total time remaining on large file moves, memory leaks when using the Windows Energy screen saver and delays upon returning from hibernation or when exiting the Photos screen saver. Some Vista users have complained of poor performance, so any fixes are likely much wanted additions. The first update also fixes file corruption problems when writing to AVI files, synchronizing offline files to servers and editing image files that use the RAW image format.

The other update, KB938194, focuses on compatibility and reliability. For example, it addresses video and gaming graphics problems, printer spooler interruptions, screens blanking when external displays are turned off, display driver error messages and problems with diagnostics when the computer is under heavy usage.

Microsoft hasn't been tremendously open about the prospects for Windows Vista SP1, up until now only saying that it hoped to have a beta version of the service pack out by the end of the year and painting SP1 in the broadest of strokes, such as a fix to assuage Google's complaints about Vista's integrated search technology. Though no new details have emerged on SP1's contents, Microsoft is confirming that a pre-beta version of Vista SP1 has been released to some testers, and that screen shots found on the Web this week are indeed of the elusive service pack.

The company apparently isn't done with Windows XP yet, either. Reports this week suggested that just as one group of testers got their hands on Vista SP1, another group began testing Windows XP SP3, which Microsoft has preliminary plans to release the first half of next year. Microsoft on Wednesday confirmed those reports.

Source: INFORMATION WEEK

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This is a blog for those who are interested in anything related to Microsoft.