A selection of screen shots of Live Mesh are available from the link below.

Full Article – http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/mesh_tp.asp

Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT) may be preparing to discontinue sales of Windows XP, but some OEMs have found a way to circumvent the software giant’s June 30 deadline.

In yet another sign of the market’s resistance to Windows Vista, Dell (NSDQ:Dell) Computer, Hewlett Packard (NYSE:HPQ), and Sony on Wednesday all confirmed plans to exercise the downgrade rights Microsoft offers with OEM versions of Windows Vista Business and Vista Ultimate in order to continue offering XP-equipped PCs to their customers.

Downgrade rights, which Microsoft also offers to volume licensing customers, give users the ability to roll back to the previous version of the product they’re using. Downgrade rights have existed since 2001 for Windows, but many Microsoft partners say they’ve been seeing a recent uptick in the number of customers exercising downgrade rights to roll Vista back to XP Professional.

Full Article – http://www.crn.com/software/207401680?cid=customFeed

If you thought the Windows Vista or Office 2007 packaging was fancy, then check out this awesome re-usable packaging for the Microsoft Wireless Notebook Presenter Mouse 8000. Some people have complained it is difficult to open, but I think it’s innovativeness makes up for it. The product name however falls on the opposite side of creativity scale.

Full Article – http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080422/neat-microsoft-presenter-mouse-8000-packaging/

Despite no announcement being made on UltimatePC.com, Microsoft have released a new sound scheme and a content pack for Windows DreamScene as part of its Windows Vista Ultimate Extras offerings for customers who purchased the Ultimate edition of Vista.
After installing the sound pack customers get Ultimate Extras Pearl and Glass sound schemes and additional Windows DreamScene Content.
For those who have been waiting for Ultimate Extras perhaps this is a sign that more is to come from the software giant.

While the planned release schedule for XP SP3 stated MSDN/TechNet subscribers would be receiving the update on May 2, a few days after the public release, Microsoft appears to have listened to the numerous complaints on its TechNet forums and has posted the bits to both the MSDN and TechNet Subscriber Downloads.

Intel Corp. today is set to unveil a new browser extension that allows users create client-side mashups as they browse the Web. The tool promises to help users enhance sites they visit with customized information ranging from geographical data to the leg room available on specific airplanes.

The new Intel Mash Maker is made up of various widgets that can understand the meaning of the Web site they are on and enhance existing content based on a user’s preferences and interests, Intel said. The company will launch a public beta of the technology Tuesday at the O’Reilly Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco.

Full Article – http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9079320&source=rss_news10

On top of the Grand Piano and Firefly game they’ve already released, it appears the Microsoft Surface team have been hard at work developing even more sample applications as well as updates to existing applications for the Surface.

I found these photos taken by Jean-Luc David, a Microsoft Canada employee who I presume was visiting the Redmond campus last week and had a chance to play with the Surface with some of these new applications loaded. Here’s a couple highlights.

Full Article – http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080418/pictures-of-new-and-updated-surface-demo-apps/

So I guess this is what you call teaching an old dog new tricks. A couple of days ago Microsoft released a new update for Windows Vista that adds additional wireless support and functionality to the operating system through a “feature pack”. Specifically it adds support for Bluetooth 2.1, a new “Unified Pairing” interface as well as “Windows Connect Now” updates and can only be installed on Vista SP1.

This is interesting to me not because any of the features above, but because up until now, the client version of Windows has never had “feature packs”. We have hotfixes, security patches, service packs and rollups, but not feature packs. What are they?

Full Article – http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080418/microsoft-releases-first-windows-vista-feature-pack/

Don’t look now, but Microsoft is finally working to tune up its Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) site. The effort promises to resolve long-running frustrations developers have encountered working with the online library and resource.

Redmond Developer News has learned that Microsoft has assembled a task force to determine how it can improve MSDN, a site that aggregates much of Microsoft’s technical content for developers. The task force, which spent much of this week in New York interviewing developers, made a stop last night at the monthly meeting of the NYC .NET Developer’s Group held in Microsoft’s New York offices. The task force revealed its effort to a group of more than 100 people attending the meeting.

“There’s great content there. It’s very thorough, but from a practical standpoint, it doesn’t really meet people’s needs,” said Brian Hsi, a product manager involved in the effort, who made his pitch at the meeting. “It’s kind of static. It’s really a library at the end of the day.”

Full Article – http://entmag.com/news/rss.asp?editorialsid=9773#1

A change is coming for users that access Hotmail with Outlook Express. Outlook Express uses a protocol called DAV (Distributed Authoring and Versioning protocol) to access a Windows Live™ Hotmail® e-mail account. DAV, like POP3 or IMAP, is the way that a mail client communicates with a web-based mail server.

As of June 30, 2008, Microsoft is disabling the DAV protocol and you will no longer be able to access your Hotmail Inbox via Outlook Express. As an alternative, we recommend that you download Windows Live Mail, a free desktop e-mail client that has the familiarity of Outlook Express and much more.

This next generation of free e-mail software will allow you to easily manage multiple e-mail accounts—including Windows Live Hotmail, plus other e-mail accounts that support POP3/IMAP. Better yet, Windows Live Mail integrates well with other Windows Live services, and downloads in minutes. After you provide your user name and password, you will automatically be linked to your Hotmail account, providing continued access to your email and contacts.

Full Article – http://emailsupport.spaces.live.com/Blog/cns!5D6F5A79A79B6708!5359.entry

Recently I became rather intrigued with Hyper-V’s Limit Processor Functionality (LPF) function. One little checkbox became such an obsession that I start wasting hours of my time trying to find out exactly what it does. The dialogue says, “Limit processor functionality to run an older operating system such as Windows NT on this virtual machine”.

That sounds pretty plausible because the newer multiple core processors with hardware accelerated virtualization were not around in the old days these operating systems were around.

Simple I thought. I’d find a selection of system information tools and run those with the check box flagged and without. I’d then compare the processor details and get the answer. So I chose three popular tools I thought would help me out. They were Everest, SiSoft Sandra and CPU-Z. They actually ended up adding to my confusion!

Full Article – http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/natashamocke/archive/2008/04/19/the-mystery-of-hyper-v-s-limit-processor-functionality-part-1.aspx

Recently I became rather intrigued with Hyper-V’s Limit Processor Functionality (LPF) function. One little checkbox became such an obsession that I start wasting hours of my time trying to find out exactly what it does. The dialogue says, “Limit processor functionality to run an older operating system such as Windows NT on this virtual machine”.

That sounds pretty plausible because the newer multiple core processors with hardware accelerated virtualization were not around in the old days these operating systems were around.

Simple I thought. I’d find a selection of system information tools and run those with the check box flagged and without. I’d then compare the processor details and get the answer. So I chose three popular tools I thought would help me out. They were Everest, SiSoft Sandra and CPU-Z. They actually ended up adding to my confusion!

Full Article – http://blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/natashamocke/archive/2008/04/19/the-mystery-of-hyper-v-s-limit-processor-functionality-part-1.aspx

New elements of Live Search continue to roll out, the latest at http://search.live.com. Future updates will hopefully be coming soon, making the rest of the live pages match.

Google is typically tight-lipped about it the inner workings of its search business, but there are a few nuggets worth looking at in a Popular Mechanics interview with Udi Manber, the Google vice president who oversees search quality. Among them: Google rejiggered its search algorithm 450 times last year.

The job of the algorithm is to best match Web pages with people’s search terms. One tweak the company tried last week was increasing the “diversity” of search results so the listed Web pages would cover a broader scope in an attempt to compensate for the ambiguities of search terms, he said.

And while some might see the industry of search engine optimization (SEO), which strives to get Web sites higher placement on search sites, as gaming the system, Manber said that at least a basic amount would make his life easier.

Full Article – http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9921148-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

In an email sent out to Windows Live users, Microsoft today announced that from mid-April, personalised Live.com pages will be available from http://my.live.com. Just last week, the title of the page switched to “Windows Live Personalized Experience”, suggesting that it may very well be seeing some actual feature updates soon.

Now with home.live.com, my.live.com and live.com, its now slightly easier for end-users to know exactly what page they should be using for different purposes. Add My MSN into the mix though (there’s an update on the way for that too), and it seems like we have too many pages trying to achieve the same aim. Full email is after the jump.

Dear Windows Live user,
Starting in mid April, we have a new URL for your Live.com Personalized Page! You can now access your personalized page by signing in with your Windows Live ID directly at http://my.live.com.
Visit http://my.live.com today to view your personalized page and make our new URL your Homepage, or add it to your Favorites.
You can continue to use Live Search from within your personalized page, or you can search directly from www.live.com.
While you are on your personalized page, please visit the new Directory under the Add Stuff link.
Thanks,
The Windows Live Team

Full Article – Liveside