M-Dollar

Less than three weeks ago, Microsoft offered a chance to win a copy of Windows 7 Ultimate for filling out a survey. If you missed that chance, here's your second crack at it. This time, the ...

Microsoft is planning to revamp its Channel 9 website, which was launched in April 2004. Channel 9 features video channels, podcasts, screencasts, and discussions about Microsoft developers and their products. In the coming months, Channel 8 ...

Microsoft has hired Morgan Stanley to find a potential buyer for its Internet ad agency Razorfish, according to the Financial Times. The report indicates that Publicis Groupe, a French marketing company, as well as other agency ...

For most, the traditional combination of mouse and keyboard is not just a mode of computer input, but a way of life. While it has been decades since both technologies were first welcomed to the mainstream, ...

Let's look back at the week that was in Microsoft news: Windows 7 pricing announced: cheaper than Vista Microsoft has revealed almost all the remaining information about Windows 7. The biggest announcement is pricing: Home Premium ...

Microsoft has finally decided to phase out MSN Web Messenger; the service will be officially retired on June 30, 2009 (this Tuesday!). MSN Web Messenger launched back in August 2004. The replacement (pictured on the side) ...

All the Windows 7 news has inundated an interesting Zune HD rumor that deserves a little coverage. The information reportedly comes from a Software Engineer at Microsoft that has provided good information in the past, according ...

Windows Anytime Upgrade (WAU) is an upgrade method offered by Microsoft and selected resellers for users who wish to upgrade their edition of Windows Vista by buying a license. As we talked about in our Windows ...

A new rumor has sprung up that suggests Microsoft is looking at a third alternative for sending out copies of Windows 7: USB drives. There are currently two known ways to move to Windows 7 without ...

Today residents in the US, Canada, and Japan have the opportunity to preorder Windows 7 upgrade versions of both Home Premium and Professional editions (read: no deal for Ultimate) for significantly reduced prices. The deal lasts ...

The Windows 7 pricing announcement earlier today went through everything that Microsoft and OEMs will be offering. We at Ars have our own way to look at the Windows 7 pricing, and it involves a juicy ...

Microsoft today announced Windows 7 retail pricing, upgrade information, launch details, and a preorder deal. The software giant has reduced the price on its most popular retail Windows product, the Home Premium upgrade version, by approximately ...

Today, Microsoft took the wraps off a new Web service dedicated to managing energy use. Called "Hohm" (presumably, a play on the combination of "home and "Ohm"), the product will take advantage of smart grid data ...

This morning, on the Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) homepage, a message appeared explaining that the limited beta program has already filled up: "Alert! Thank you for your interest in joining the Microsoft Security Essentials Beta. We ...

Microsoft has finally revealed the Windows 7 packaging, confirming earlier leaks that led to much debate on blogs and forums. The Windows 7 Team Blog says the packaging was designed with three areas that customers said ...

Microsoft has launched the "Office 2010 Real Life Stories program" on Microsoft Connect. The program is looking for home users, small businesses, and college students that use 5 PCs or fewer on a daily basis and ...

Microsoft BizSpark now includes 15,000 participating companies across areas such as social networking, software services, healthcare, education, mobility, entertainment, and finance. BizSpark, announced eight months ago and now available in 99 countries, is a program that ...

This is a reminder post for all the Windows 7 users still on the beta (build 7000) that was leaked in December 2008 and officially given out to the public in January 2009. Bi-hourly shutdowns of ...

Microsoft today released the Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) beta on microsoft.com/security_essentials (redirects to Microsoft Connect which requires a Windows Live ID). The signing up process for the beta includes a seven-question survey. MSE is the company's ...

Another month, another Yahoo executive moving over to Microsoft. Redmond has hired a former Yahoo Operations vice president to lead its Data Center Services team. Kevin Timmons today joined the Global Foundation Services team as a ...

The Microsoft Solution Accelerators team recently released the beta version of the Microsoft Assessment and Planning toolkit (MAP) 4.0 on TechNet in both 32-bit and 64-bit flavors. Make sure to check out the Getting Started Guide ...

As of version 2, Silverlight includes a feature called Deep Zoom, which makes browsing images, no matter how large or how many, a speedy, seamless, and smooth experience. The Deep Zoom Composer is a tool used ...

Hardware maker Nvidia is endorsing Windows CE as its platform of choice for Tegra-based netbooks. The company has rejected Google's open source Android platform and is also unimpressed with conventional Linux-based options, such as Ubuntu. Nvidia is ...

In April, the rumors about the Zune HD were plentiful and very interesting. Among them was one that suggested the device would be powered by Nvidia's Tegra chipset. This rumor kept coming up every few weeks ...

Let's look back at the week that was in Microsoft news: Microsoft announces free antivirus, limited public beta After early screenshots leaked and then an actual build leaked, Microsoft decided it was time to officially announce ...

In case you haven't yet heard, Microsoft Connect will be down this weekend as Microsoft upgrades the service. If you're itching to download some beta build, you'll have to either go grab it quickly before the ...

Using ads to promote a search engine isn't going to get you very far; you've got to push in various different ways. One of the ways to do so is to win over Web developers with ...

During his address at the Executives' Club of Chicago, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer Ballmer emphasized that the company is willing to invest up to one-tenth of its operating income in its search business for up to ...

Microsoft has released Robotics Developer Studio (RDS) 2008 R2, an upgrade to the existing 2008 version. The Express Edition is available for free from the Microsoft Download Center (Offline installation: 376.8 MB; Online installation: 97.4MB). The ...

Microsoft has begun to move its calendar users from MSN Calendar to Windows Live Calendar. According to Microsoft, this is a small set of users since most have already moved over by themselves, but nevertheless the ...

Microsoft Hardware today announced another addition to its BlueTrack Technology line of products: the Wireless Mobile Mouse 4000. Redmond's love-hate relationship with netbooks shows yet again in its marketing for another product, as it calls the ...

Microsoft today officially announced Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE), its free, real-time consumer antimalware solution for fighting viruses, spyware, rootkits, and trojans. Currently being tested by Microsoft employees and a select few testers, MSE is Microsoft's latest offering intended ...

Microsoft has launched a website titled "Windows Internet Explorer 8: Get the facts," where it gives reasons for installing the browser, compares it to two competing browsers, and busts myths around its offering. At the top, ...

Microsoft has revealed that it will be selling Microsoft Expression Studio 3 without Microsoft Expression Media. Expression Media is a robust digital asset management solution for photographers and other creative professionals. When Expression Studio 2 was ...

Microsoft is finally admitting to itself that Soapbox, the relatively unknown YouTube competitor, is going nowhere. Soapbox is the user-generated video portal under the MSN Video roof. The software giant is looking at ways to put ...

Despite Microsoft's best efforts, the company's new antivirus product (codename Morro) has leaked. A leaked pre-beta indicates that the final name is Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE), and it will come with a brand new UI. Currently ...

Microsoft on Monday filed its first lawsuit over click fraud via a civil complaint (PDF) in the US District Court in Seattle. Click fraud occurs when people manipulate clicks on an online advertisement, either with an ...

Morro is the codename for a free, real-time antimalware solution for consumers to be released in the second half of 2009. It will offer basic features for fighting viruses, spyware, rootkits, and trojans. Microsoft is getting ...

"It's not a man purse. It's a satchel... Indiana Jones has one." Forgive me for quoting The Hangover, but that's the first thing that popped into my head when I saw what Microsoft was giving its ...

Tomorrow at 12:01 AM PST, Microsoft will be taking down the whole Zune service, which includes the Zune Social, the forums on Zune.net, and the Zune Marketplace. At the same time, Xbox Live will also be ...

With the Messenger 10-year anniversary almost upon us (July 22), Microsoft has decided to reveal its userbase to the general public. According to the Windows Live Messenger blog, the world's most popular IM application has about ...

Microsoft continues to show that it is taking the complaints of application compatibility issues on Windows Vista into serious consideration for the upcoming release of Windows 7. Microsoft has begun to offer Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) ...

Yesterday we reported that the United States was the first "large country" to complete the DTV transition, from analog to digital-only programming, and that it had gone quite well. However, the long-awaited transition has not been ...

According to the Bing Blog, Microsoft has made two changes to Bing in response to companies that want to filter adult content: potentially explicit images and video content will now be coming from a single domain, ...

As we warned yesterday, Zune.net was down recently (for less than 12 hours) as Microsoft rolled out new features and content on the website. The software giant also noted that the update included a "bunch of ...

Less than a day after the worldwide launch of Bing last week, there were reports about the progress the search/decision engine was making in the search market. The numbers were phenomenal; for example, StatCounter reported that ...

I've been covering imagery releases for Microsoft's mapping platform for a quite while now. The headline always described how much imagery had been added in terms of terabytes. With the worldwide launch of Bing, however, Microsoft ...

Zune.net will be going down tonight at 10pm PDT. The team explained that Microsoft will be adding new features and new content. The software giant did not specify a time for when to expect the site ...

During this year's WWDC, Apple took the time to talk up Snow Leopard, the successor to Mac OS X, but also made sure to talk about Windows. Apple's Bertrand Serlet made a point to say that ...

Late last month, China quietly ordered PC manufacturers to bundle Internet access control software with all computers sold in the country. The software, which appears to be Windows-only, looks to provide a mix of features, including ...

I've never really liked the phrase "New and Improved." If something is new, then it has not had a previous version, and so it cannot be improved. If something is improved, then it cannot possibly be ...

The Technology Guarantee program for Windows 7 is similar to the upgrade program Microsoft offered during the time leading up to the launch of Vista. In short, customers who purchase a Vista PC between a specific ...

When Bing officially launched worldwide this week, I recommended 25 queries to try, including controversial ones. Sexual content queries (sex, porn, blowjob, and so on) resulted in a ton of hyped-up headlines for Bing this week, ...

When the Wave 3 versions of the Windows Live client applications were released in January, the only software that didn't make it out of beta was Windows Live Movie Maker. The application has significantly less features ...

Microsoft today released the Windows Mobile 6.5 Developer Tool Kit on the Microsoft Download Center. The kit is necessary for using any of the Windows Mobile 6.5 Gesture API or samples. The gesture APIs, only ...

According to a Reuters report, Russia's state antimonopoly service announced today that it has launched a probe into Microsoft over cutbacks in supplies of Windows XP. The case will be considered on July 24, 2009. The ...

According to the Microsoft Security Response Center, Microsoft will issue 10 Security Bulletins on Tuesday, and it will host a webcast to address customer questions on the bulletin the following day (June 10 at 11:00am PST, ...

Microsoft has announced a beta of the IIS Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Toolkit, a set of new tools that help Web developers, hosting providers, and server administrators improve their sites' relevance in search results by recommending ...

With Bing's launch yesterday, Microsoft aired its first ad for the new decision/search engine. The first ad was quite weak in my opinion, but the next two ads are a slight improvement—though that's not saying an ...

Microsoft announced Bing earlier this week, and now it's live for everyone to use. The software maker is touting Bing as a "decision engine," though you'll still see them to refer to it as a "search ...

A Microsoft TechNet Plus subscription is aimed at IT Professionals who want full-version Microsoft software, beta software, professional support incidents, managed newsgroup support, a technical information library, Microsoft eLearning courses, online concierge chat, the TechNet Magazine, ...

Those waiting anxiously for the next version of Windows now have a date to anticipate. Microsoft has confirmed that Windows 7 will be launched on October 22, 2009. This date, which is referred to as General ...

Since Hotmail now has POP3 support, Microsoft is once again making plans to retire its Distributed Authoring and Versioning (DAV) protocol. The deadline for retirement is set for September 1, 2009. Microsoft wants to phase DAV ...

Compared to April, there's only one browser usage trend that managed to remain true: though its lead is still unmistakable, IE is still losing ground to all other browsers. Firefox is gaining, Safari remains in a ...

Google may still be tops when it comes to search engine popularity, but heavy searchers are apparently fickle and don't stick to a single search engine. According to data mined by Nielsen Online, nearly three-quarters (72 ...

Sure, Windows 7 isn't expected to RTM until sometime around August, but that doesn't mean Microsoft's hardware and software partners aren't already hard at work. Currently they're submitting their products' Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 ...

AV-Comparatives is known for the thorough tests it does on security software. Following its February 2009 on-demand report, the company has released its May 2009 retrospective/proactive test. It is the second part of the previous report: ...

It was a busy week in the world of Microsoft. Let's recap the top stories. Wondering how the Windows 7 release candidate UI compares to some of the earlier builds? Ars breaks down the differences in detail. ...

Microsoft is making sure that Office 2010 will be available via a familiar experience across the PC, phone, and browser. One of the ways to do that is to have a beta program with dedicated testers ...

Last week, Paul Thurrott claimed that Microsoft would be removing the three-application limit on Windows 7 Starter. The limit stops the user from running more than three applications at once. Via the Windows 7 Team Blog, ...

Earlier this week, Microsoft officially confirmed the Zune HD, and we talked to Brian Seitz to get some more details. The leaked images were finally established as genuine thanks to Microsoft's own provided image (right). Later ...

The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) is reporting today that European Union antitrust regulators aren't done with Microsoft yet. The EU is looking into more sanctions against the software giant for including Internet Explorer with Windows, ...

The Microsoft team responsible for Windows Speech Recognition (WSR) has released the first Community Technology Preview (CTP) of the WSR Profile tool, which allows the user to backup and restore their speech profile (so all that ...

Windows Azure is the cloud operating system that serves as the development, run-time, and control environment for the Azure Services Platform. The May 2009 Community Technology Previews (CTPs) for Azure are now available on the Microsoft ...

Microsoft has posted Security Advisory 971778 to warn its users that it is investigating public reports of a new vulnerability in Microsoft DirectX (versions 7.0 through 9.0) that hackers are actively exploiting. The vulnerability could ...

Bing might be launching this Wednesday, but that doesn't mean there aren't still updates coming in (they affect both the current Live Search and the new Bing). Back in February, Microsoft added the Oscars to its ...

Microsoft has released a beta of the Windows 7 Software Logo Toolkit (1.0.7112.36) for download. Companies can use the toolkit to verify an application's compliance against the requirements of the Windows 7 Client Software Logo Program ...

Hulu dropped a surprise on TV fans Thursday by introducing public beta of Hulu Desktop—desktop software for the Mac and Windows that works with the popular TV streaming site. The software finally removes Hulu from the ...

Just when I sat down with a sigh of relief, thinking that this week of Microsoft news frenzy was over, I got an e-mail and couldn't stop my fingers from flying across the keyboard. The above ...

During the development of Windows 7, the Windows team has been working very closely with the Microsoft Surface team for all the multitouch features. The Windows 7 Team blog this week announced the Microsoft Touch Pack ...

Microsoft has finally taken the wraps off the new branding for Live Search, and the final name is Bing. We've known since March that a rebrand was coming, and we've been saying for even longer that ...

As part of its series of many frequent minor updates, the Live Search team has this week added something that basketball and hockey fans will surely appreciate. Instant Answers is a feature that is triggered for ...

Microsoft has launched Microsoft Mediaroom with virtualization, noting that this is a first for any Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) platform. The move was made possible with Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, the company's hypervisor-based server virtualization technology, ...

I'm not really a fan of Twitter, but there's no denying that it's successful. Microsoft realizes this too, apparently. With celebrities starting to embrace Twitter, the software giant has decided it needs to capitalize on the ...

Ford recently noticed that it was about to sell the 1 millionth vehicle with Microsoft Sync. Knowing that Microsoft would want to celebrate the milestone, the company decided to give the vehicle away as a present. ...

Microsoft last night announced (officially) the Zune HD, even though the device won't be available for several months. While the product itself looks nice, it's the "platform" behind it that is finally coming to fruition and ...

Earlier this month, Microsoft made the Windows 7 Release Candidate build publically available. The flood of e-mails began: "Emil, what's new in the RC? What changed? What is different?" That question can be answered in many ...

VPlay is an interactive system based on a Microsoft Surface that is being developed over at Microsoft Research Cambridge. In short, it allows one or multiple users to manipulate video in real time. VPlay is designed ...

The Zune talk this year has been very extensive: new products and new software have been rumored and speculated. It's time to add to all the Zune craziness with a new rumor, courtesy of Zune Scene. ...

After a lengthy development cycle that included delays and furious testing, Microsoft has finally given the public Service Pack 2 for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 (final build is 6.0.6002.18005). You can download the installer ...

Most Windows Live Web services were updated to the Wave 3 look in December 2008, but even months later Microsoft is still updating some of them. Windows Live Video Messages (videomessages.live.com) and Windows Live Alerts (alerts.live.com) ...

Kumo is the codename for an upgrade to Live Search that Microsoft's own employees have been testing internally for at least two months. While it is possible for codenames of Microsoft products to sometimes become the ...

Let's look back at the week that was in Microsoft news: Leaked: Office 2010 Technical Preview screenshots. A Technical Preview build of Office 2010 leaked this week, and we had a ton of screenshots up... but ...

Back in March, news trickled out that Microsoft employees were testing a new search experience named Kumo, possibly one that will replace Live Search. That same week, some users were lucky enough to (apparently randomly) get ...

MSDN subscribers now have access to the Beta 1 releases of both Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0. If you have MSDN access, go ahead and start downloading. From what I've heard, performance is supposed ...

According to a recent Nielsen Wire report, Live Search Cashback and BizRate Shopping Search were the only two (out of the top ten) shopping search providers to have grown between April 2008 and April 2009. That ...

According to ComputerWorld, Microsoft is planning to let its Marketplace for Windows Mobile customers run purchased applications on up to five Windows phones at the same time. Windows Mobile 6.5, the upcoming version of Microsoft's mobile ...

Earlier this week we learned that Microsoft would be giving out the Office 2010 Technical Preview to select testers on an invite-only basis. In January, screenshots of the alpha (then still codenamed Office 14) were leaked ...

Two weeks ago, we were watching Sheila look for a laptop under $2,000 during the fourth advertisement in Microsoft's Laptop Hunters marketing series. Microsoft has a fifth ad up now, and it's déjà vu all over ...

The next version of Groove is getting a new name; the successor to Microsoft Office Groove 2007 will be SharePoint Workspace 2010. Microsoft claims that this is a natural progression since Groove is to SharePoint like ...

Again to sum up, TechEd 2009 has brought us fresh headlines for Windows 7, Office 2010, and Windows Mobile 6.5. So, what else is worth talking about? How about the Microsoft Surface. The company quietly (sans ...

Last week, Service Pack 2 for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 arrived on MSDN, TechNet, and Connect. We noted that testers would not be getting slipstreamed ISOs of the operating systems but that MSDN and ...

Last week, Polish website CentrumXP published what at first glance looked like leaked images of the retail boxes for the various editions of Windows 7. Remember that only Windows 7 Home Premium and Windows 7 Professional ...

Microsoft today released Internet Explorer 8 Multilingual User Interface (MUI) packs for Windows XP SP2/SP3 and Windows Server 2003 SP2. If you already have a MUI pack installed for Windows XP or Windows Server 2003, you'll ...

This week, General Motors announced that its OnStar service, which provides subscription-based communications, in-vehicle security, turn-by-turn navigation, and remote diagnostics systems in United States and Canada, would be integrating Virtual Earth into its emergency response system ...

TechEd 2009 already gave us details on Windows 7 and Office 2010 this week, and now it's Windows Mobile 6.5's turn. After the first day of the conference, a panel was put together and asked to ...

Apple has released another new batch of "Get a Mac" ads, just a few weeks after four ads were last aired. This series of three ads seems to address Microsoft's "Laptop Hunters" series more directly than ...

Last month, rumors of the Zune HD erupted: it would be touch-enabled and it would finally give the iPod touch a run for its money. Various websites claimed different feature sets, some more exciting than others. ...

The trends for browser usage have changed very little since March. IE is still losing ground to Firefox, though its lead is still unmistakable; Safari is not threatening any of its competitors, nor is it being ...

Microsoft's QnA website has had a very shaky development, never quite becoming good enough to lose the beta tag, and never quite becoming popular enough for its company to give it the attention it really required. ...

Last week saw the emergence of speculation, instigated by none other than the CEO of ARM, Warren East. In a conference call with reporters, East suggested that Windows 7 support for ARM would make the netbook ...

Microsoft's Laptop Hunter ads (one, two, three, and four) must be doing quite well, because what Microsoft started off as a price attack on Macs seems to have transcended over to the online music store business. ...

In addition to learning that Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 will be ready by the end of this year, TechEd 2009 attendees have also been automatically placed in the invitation-only Microsoft Office 2010 Technical ...

At Microsoft TechEd North America 2009, Microsoft today announced that Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 will both be available to customers in time for the holiday shopping season. Previously, Microsoft's official stance was that ...

If you're planning on using Windows 7, you'll either be getting a new PC with it preinstalled, putting it on a computer you built yourself, or upgrading the OS of your current rig. If it's the ...

According to the Microsoft Security Response Center, Microsoft will issue one Security Bulletin on Tuesday, and it will host a webcast to address customer questions on the bulletin the following day (May 13 at 11:00am PST, ...

The CPU support picture for Windows 7 was blessedly simple, at least until this week, when Microsoft complicated things for one corner of its upcoming OS. This new wrinkle was the discovery that Windows 7's recently ...

With Internet Explorer 8 out for almost two months now, Microsoft has decided to ask the testers in the now closed Internet Explorer 8 Technical Beta program to start giving suggestions for the next version. IE9 ...

Product activation and validation in Windows 7 is built off the same Software Protection Platform that was introduced with Windows Vista. Microsoft claims the technology is much better than the one in XP: Vista is harder ...

The developers behind the Moonlight project, an open source implementation of Microsoft's Silverlight media framework, have released a preview of Moonlight 2.0. The new version of Moonlight introduces compatibility with critical Silverlight 2.0 features, such as ...

Yesterday everyone was scrambling to get their hands on the public release of the Release Candidate builds of Windows 7 RC and/or Windows Server 2008 R2. However, it seems that the same day Microsoft also gave ...

Microsoft this week announced the second wave of its mass layoffs: around 3,000 employees in the US and abroad have been let go. CEO Steve Ballmer sent an e-mail to the company's staff describing the layoffs ...

As expected, the Windows 7 Release Candidate (build 7100) is now available to the public for download. The beta keys Microsoft gave out during the public beta will work just fine with this build. The RC ...

Less than a month ago, we were watching Lisa and Jackson look for a laptop under $1,500 during the third advertisement in Microsoft's Laptop Hunters marketing series. All three ads were about a week apart, but ...

As expected, the Windows 7 Release Candidate (build 7100) is now available on TechNet and MSDN in English, French, German, Japanese, and Spanish. The build first leaked last week, again showing that pirates are often the ...

We are inching closer to a resolution to the European Commission's latest antitrust complaint against Microsoft. The software giant has submitted its response to the Commission's current inquiry into whether the bundling of Internet Explorer with ...

As expected, Microsoft has released Office 2007 Service Pack 2, consisting of a slew of general product fixes and updates. Microsoft highlights improvements to charting functionality in Excel as well as better stability and performance for ...

The Open Invention Network (OIN), a consortium of companies that have banded together to defend the Linux platform from patent litigation, announced on Tuesday that it has launched an effort to find prior art for Microsoft's ...

Microsoft is planning to launch an iPhone rival as early as 2010, according to a new rumor. The project is supposedly code-named "Pink" and aims to extend Windows Mobile with new features and capabilities, as well ...

Redmond is taking a page from the early days of Mac OS X with Windows 7. Similar to Classic—Mac OS X's emulation-based support for Mac OS 9 (and earlier) apps—the newly confirmed "XP Mode" that will ...

As you can see above, screenshots of Windows 7 build 7100 have started to appear around the Web. They are being posted on various Windows 7 enthusiast forums and websites, like Seven Forums and Windows 7 ...

As the last round of quarterly reports rolled in, Apple's didn't look so hot—until they were followed by mediocre results from Microsoft and an absolute disaster for Sony. This time around, with everyone's expectations lowered ...

Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly has extended her oversight of Microsoft's antitrust settlement by another 18 months, setting the new expiration date for May 12, 2011. Kollar-Kotelly acknowledged during a hearing today that this would be the second ...

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Or, in this case, partner with them. Microsoft has announced that it will be adding 20 new third-party feed partners and three new contact partners (MySpace, Hi5, and Tagged) ...

The The Wall Street Journal this week published a story titled "Microsoft Gambles on Windows 7 'Starter'" and honestly, the headline sums up the story beautifully. In terms of actual news, there's nothing really new here: ...

Google and Microsoft find themselves competitors in a variety of areas, including the field of electronic medical records (EMR), where they are going up against a number of entrenched players. Because of the potential barriers for ...

The Wave 3 version of Hotmail just keeps on getting better and better. Talk of Web Messenger being integrated into Windows Live Hotmail has been getting louder and louder for months. Finally though, the official word, ...

Official support for Office 2004 for Mac will end in October of this year, Microsoft said today. The company's Mac BU said that it plans to put its full focus on Office 2008, as well as ...

PhotoZoom, a website where people could create albums that are displayed using the Seadragon technology included in Silverlight 2 (referred to as Deep Zoom), now redirects to its own domain: deepzoompix.com. The name is slightly longer, ...

Let's recap the most important Microsoft stories from the past week: Microsoft continued its assault on Apple with the third installment of its Laptop Hunters campaign. The latest spot features a mother and son hunting for a ...

According to a page on the Microsoft Partner Program website, Microsoft is planning to give its partners the Windows 7 Release Candidate via both TechNet and MSDN. The page says the build is available "now," though ...

Microsoft TechEd 2009 is this year's iteration of the company's conference that gives "technical education" to developers and IT Professionals. Traditionally, Microsoft gives more insight on the latest versions of its various products, and according to ...

Microsoft has announced that it will begin to support the International Criminal Police Organization's (Interpol) Global Security Initiative (GSI), a project that addresses international security challenges. Microsoft will provide its Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor (COFEE) ...

Apple is unfazed by Microsoft's recent attempts to make Macs out to be a bad value. "A PC is no bargain when it doesn't do what you want," Apple spokesman Bill Evans recently told BusinessWeek. "The one ...

The US Department of Justice has asked for yet another extension to the judicial oversight of Microsoft's antitrust compliance in order to give the company more time to update its technical documentation. The original judgment had ...

Microsoft has added the ability for users to sort their photos on Windows Live SkyDrive (in a folder, click Sort => Arrange photos). Previously, files and photos could be only sorted by name, size, date, or ...

The general consensus around the blogosphere is that rumored Zune HD will be coming this fall, and it will be a more "international" release, though an official list of countries is not yet available. The leaked ...

Microsoft has been very tight-lipped about the next version of its productivity line of products, but this week the company started to talk. The next wave of Microsoft Office-related products is as follows: Microsoft Office 2010, ...

As expected, Microsoft today released an alpha version of the Windows 7 Software Logo Toolkit for download. Companies can use the toolkit to verify an application's compliance against the requirements of the Windows 7 Client Software ...

Last month, a very believable rumor started flying around in regard to Office 2010 shipping in 32-bit and 64-bit versions. Check out ZDNet and Within Windows to see how the conclusion was drawn. Everything pointed to ...

Those who want to try out Office 2008 for Mac but don't want to fork over hundreds of dollars just yet can now use a 30-day trial of the software. Microsoft's Mac BU made the fully-functional ...

Microsoft has announced that the latest addition to the family of SideWinder gaming products, the SideWinder X3 Mouse, will set the customer back just $40. The X3 will start shipping sometime in May. According to Microsoft, ...

As planned, Microsoft today retired Mainstream Support for Windows XP and Office 2003. However, for both products, Microsoft is not planning to retire Extended Support until April 8, 2014. If Redmond ends up releasing a fourth ...

Last month there was a job posting on March 12 that quickly led to speculation around whether or not Microsoft was planning to revamp the updating system for its Windows Mobile platform. The general consensus is ...

Finally beating Google and Yahoo to the punch, Microsoft Advertising has inked a deal with the Discovery Channel to promote its "Deadliest Catch" television series across Microsoft's advertising platform. Deadliest Catch, a reality series which centers ...

We've known for about two weeks that the fourth generation Zune would be coming this fall, but details on the device were scarce, and unfortunately they still are. Over the weekend though, someone sent in screencaps ...

The Linux Collaboration Summit—which took place last week in San Francisco—primarily focused on the Linux platform, but one of the most vigorous discussions that took place during the event looked beyond the confines of the kernel ...

Less than a week ago, we were watching Giampaolo look for a laptop under $1,500 during the second advertisement in Microsoft's Laptop Hunters marketing series. Since before that we saw Lauren looking for a laptop under ...

There has been a lot of talk about Office 14, the codename for Office 2007's successor, but many have forgotten that before the next version is released, Microsoft is scheduled to release the second service pack ...

Last week, two job postings pointed to Microsoft's upcoming plans for the Zune platform. The company is readying a hardware refresh for the Zune devices, and has plans for improving the services centered around the Zune. ...