microsoft

When Newsweek's Steven Levy sat down with Bill Gates to discuss the Vista debut, it wasn't long before Apple's television ads were brought up. The ads depict a cool, young "Mac" guy and a not-so-cool "PC" middle-ager, played by author John Hodgman. ... A recent ad showed Hodgman having to undergo surgery to update to Vista. Gates' reaction? Well, he wasn't too impressed. (Source: dailytech.com ) "I don't think the over 90 percent of the [population] who use Windows PCs think of themselves as dullards, or the kind of klutzes that somebody is trying to say they are," Gates says. (Source: msnbc.com ... (view more)

In July of 2005, the U.S. Congress passed the Energy Policy Act in an attempt to establish a comprehensive long-range energy policy. President Bush later signed it into law in August of 2005. The new law changes both the start and end dates of ... daylight savings time (DST). DST now starts 3 weeks earlier and ends 1 week later. The time will now change at 2:00 a.m. on the second Sunday in March and will end at 2:00 a.m. on the first Sunday in November. The change in DST applies to the U.S. (with the exception of Arizona, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and American Samoa) and Canada ... (view more)

You've heard of pay-as-you-go cell phone plans and pay-per-view movies. It's proven a lucrative market for telecommunications companies and cable television services. And now Microsoft is introducing something very similar with its distribution of ... Office 2003. That's right -- it's the old version -- not the new Word and Excel tools included in the fresh new versions of Vista now sitting on retailer shelves. According to sources (and Microsoft themselves), there is a demand for this kind of program. It may work best in corporate environments where the necessary software is only needed once or ... (view more)

It's a fact: a clean install of Windows is *always* preferable to upgrading a new version over top of a previous Windows installation. Why is this so? The answer is three words: The Windows Registry. For example: when you install and uninstall ... programs to a Windows PC, things get added to the Registry -- the 'heart' of the Windows Operating System. The Registry is a complex database that keeps track of installed programs, program preferences, user data, operating system settings, and the like. However, over time, some programs may not install or uninstall properly, and the Registry becomes ... (view more)

One day after the release of Microsoft's 6 billion dollar operating system, and there are already reports from UK's PC Advisor that the Windows Vista DRM is being cracked by a Canadian kernel developer. On the eve of the Windows Vista launch, ... numerous retailers opened their doors at midnight. However, very few consumers actually showed up for the event. The excitement and hoopla surrounding the launch seems to have disappeared. The Dallas Morning News and numerous other sources are reporting the luke warm response to the official Vista launch. Upgrading To Vista Unless you're running Windows ... (view more)

A lot of the hoopla surrounding the new Windows Vista operating system (OS) is based on it's new multimedia capabilities. However, users purchasing Vista to use the much-hyped and enhanced multimedia capabilities to watch high definition or blu-ray ... DVDs -- or to listen to audio CDs -- may be in for a very upsetting surprise. In a disturbing, albeit, eye-opening white paper detailing a cost analysis of Windows Vista Contect Protection, Peter Gutmann (a Department of Computer Science security engineering researcher at the University of Auckland, New Zealand) details the consequences of ... (view more)

A recent email memo leaked to APC Magazine revealed that Microsoft is already hard at work on Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1). Microsoft sent out emails to customers and partners to test and provide feedback on (SP1) to help prepare for it's ... release in the second half of 2007. In comparison, it took 11 months after the release of Windows XP for Microsoft to rollout the first service pack. Specific details of the changes (codenamed "Fiji") have not been released by Microsoft yet. Microsoft claims that regressions from Windows Vista and Windows XP (specifically: security, deployment blockers ... (view more)

Is Microsoft getting the message? For those of you that haven't heard, there is an annual event known as CES (the Consumer Electronics Show) in Las Vegas. CES is the place where every electronics geek in the world would love to be because everything ... new in the world of electronics for the year is showcased. Typical items found at CES includes computers, coffee pots, TV's, tooth brushes (yes, even those), the latest gadgets, toys, software, and more. This year, CES 2007 invited Bill Gates to be the Keynote speaker. He addressed a crowd of about 15,000 attendees and got the shock of his life. ... (view more)

With the anticipated launch of Vista's home version nearing, Microsoft is making a valiant effort to bring as many people into the fold as humanly possible. They're doing so via a limited time offer that will give consumers who purchase the ... operating system's "Ultimate Edition" the ability to install it on an extra PC. Such a notion was previously thought unlikely from Microsoft, who plan on demanding an additional $50 for each PC license afterwards. (Source: pro-networks.org ) Microsoft is launching the opportunity at what it calls "super-engaged customers", the type who may be involved in ... (view more)

It wasn't so long ago that Microsoft shipped its latest browser, Internet Explorer 7. Ditto for the latest iteration of Mozilla's cult hit Firefox, with version 2 upgrading many of the features that made it second only to IE. However, even as these ... two web surfing tools begin to make their way onto more and more home and business computers, Microsoft and Mozilla are hard at work on their next browser generation. It's not surprising considering the one core reason why continual updates are necessary: security. Codenamed "Gran Paradiso", Mozilla appears ready to launch Firefox 3 sometime this ... (view more)