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Microsoft’s Windows XP
Mode for Windows 7 Professional or higher has RTM’d (Release to Manufacturing) today and will be available for download from Microsoft Download Center on October 22. OEM manufactures will be able to offer Windows XP Mode on their PC’s, based on their shipping schedules to consumers.

The design purpose for Windows XP Mode is to help put businesses minds at ease when upgrading to Windows 7 to ensure their applications are backwards compatible. Windows XP Mode will allow any program to run smoothly in Windows 7 Professional or higher just as it does in Windows XP. This also includes USB peripherals such as printers and pen drives, when they are run through the Windows XP Mode application.

Windows XP Mode offers users a free virtual-PC based edition of Windows XP SP3 on Windows 7 Professional or higher. Windows XP Mode is now compatible with not only Windows XP software but Windows Vista software too. Windows 7 integrates XP Mode into the desktop so applications run just like any normal application would.

Popularity: 1% [?]

We just caught a glimpse of ASUS’ EeeBox EB1012 nettop last month, but it looks like the company is already doing things one better with its new, redesigned EB1501 model. As before, this one packs the increasingly common one-two punch of NVIDIA’s Ion chipset and Intel’s Atom 333 dual-core processor, but makes its mark by being the first EeeBox (and one of the first nettops) to come pre-loaded with Windows 7, which also means it’s not shipping until the end of the month. Otherwise, you’ll get the usual 2GB of RAM (expandable to 4GB) and 250GB hard drive, a built-in DVD burner, and an HDMI port to make it feel right at home in your home theater. No official pricing over here just yet, but it looks like this one will start at €399 (or about $580) when it hits Europe.

Popularity: 1% [?]

As reported by Ars Technica, beginning July 1, 2009, Windows 7 users who are still on the beta (build 7000) will begin to receive bi-hourly shutdowns reminding the user to upgrade to the release candidate (build 7100). On August 1, 2009, all Windows 7 beta licenses will expire triggering the non-genuine experience for any user still using the beta. The user’s wallpaper will be removed and a message with the words “This copy of Windows is not genuine” will be displayed in the lower right corner above the taskbar.

Users who would like to continue testing the next Microsoft operating system are asked to download the Windows 7 Release Candidate that was released to the public in May 2009. The release candidate will be available to download until August 15, 2009 when the software will no longer be offered by Microsoft. Windows 7 users who are currently on the release candidate will not have to worry until March 1, 2010 and June 1, 2010 when bi-hourly shutdowns and license expirations will begin.

With the given dates taken into consideration, Windows 7 users will have an ample amount of time to move over to the RTM build that is rumored to be released on July 13.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Simple, Clean and Easy To Open…

We approached the packaging for Windows 7 the same way we approached the product – by listening to what our customers told us they wanted: make it a simple clean design, easy to open, and reduce waste.

Simple Design

Customers told us they liked the big bold Windows logo and how it clearly communicates that it’s Windows 7. They like larger typefaces to make it easy to read. They also like the background colors for each edition that make it easier to differentiate between Windows 7 Home Premium all the way to Windows 7 Ultimate. In their own words, the “clean” design gives off a “fresh” feel.

Make It Easy To Open

We’ve reduced the number of elements in the package down to three: the plastic case, the paper sleeve, and a simple Getting Started Guide. The plastic case opens easily like a standard DVD case and it will have a single easy-to-remove seal at the top – and that’s it!

Reduce Waste

The plastic case protecting the Windows 7 disk is lighter and is recyclable. The packaging itself has a 37% weight reduction and the econometrics score has improved by 50% over it’s predecessor.

Essentially, the packaging is what customers told us they were most interested in picking up to learn more about Windows 7. We hope you do the same.

Look for the new Windows 7 packaging to hit this fall!

Popularity: 1% [?]

Microsoft is looking for family, student or home business users of their successful Office suite to participate in the beta program for Office 2010. As part of the program, users will be loaned a laptop for at least six months and receive a free copy of the final Office 2010 suite when it is released.

It’s all part of a “real life stories” campaign that aims to tell the story of how you use Office to help you in your every day life, whether that be for your work, school or college assignments, or just household tasks. Microsoft will then use some of the best stories as part of a publicity and marketing campaign when the new version of Office is released, which apparently “can mean everything from being featured in case studies and videos to acting as a press reference or even just letting us share your testimonials about the software.”

If you are accepted onto the program then you will not only be given a laptop to borrow for the duration of the testing (with an Office 2010 beta version installed on it for you to use for your daily tasks or work) but you will also be given access to the new web-based versions of Word, PowerPoint and Excel. As well as this, you will be able to access unlimited email and phone support and a specialised community site, along with Q&A sessions and free monthly training through webcasts. At the end of the program you will receive a free copy of Office 2010.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Fedora 11, the next release of the popular Linux distribution, is now available from the Fedora website. You can find full details of the major improvements and changes in this latest release in our previous post about the launch of Fedora 11, but to mention just a few, the release claims to have major speed improvements, boasting a 20 second startup, as well as overall speed improvements as ext4 is now used as the default file-system.

Another interesting feature is the ability to perform a minimal install, which amounts to about 500MB (at mount-point ‘/’), which should make this release more appealing to users running servers, or machines with older hardware. However, this does of course come at the cost of features.

In addition, the latest versions of GNOME and KDE are included with the respective versions. The release was delayed several times due to last minute issues, however it is now officially available. You can see the screenshot tour here, showing the installation process and the desktops for both GNOME and KDE.

The release is now available through BitTorrent and direct download, however, at the time of writing, not all mirrors had Fedora 11 to download, so you may be better off using torrents if you cannot find a mirror. Custom Fedora 11 spins are also available, including the Fedora Games Spin and Fedora Xfce spin.

For those wishing to upgrade, you must be using version 10 in order to upgrade to Fedora 11 through Yum. Users running Fedora 9 must upgrade to version 10 first, because of this. In case you aren’t familiar with Fedora, it is a free, open-source Linux operating system, and the whole project is sponsored by Red Hat, a company providing enterprise Linux solutions.

Download Page

Popularity: 4% [?]

At the World Wide Developer Conference today, Apple announced that they have made their browser, Safari 4, publicly available as a final release. The browser packs some rather handy new features over the old version, so we’ll go over them below.

First, Safari 4 is around about 4.5 times faster than the previous iteration; Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, said, “The successful beta release helped us fine tune Safari 4 into an even better, faster version that customers are going to love. Safari is enjoyed by 70 million users worldwide and with its blazing fast speed, innovative features and support for modern web standards, it’s the best browser on any platform.” The speed boosts come from Safari 4 being built on the Nitro javascript engine, which means it runs javascript code just about eight times faster than IE 8, and nearly four times faster than Firefox 3, according to Apple’s tests.

The final version of Safari 4 has a few UI changes; these include (according to AppleInsider):

– Top Sites, offering a visual preview of frequently visited and favorite pages
– Full History Search, to search through titles, web addresses and the complete text of recently viewed pages
– Cover Flow, to easily flip through web history or bookmarks.
– Smart Address Fields for automatically completing web addresses from an easy to read list of suggestions
– Search Fields, to fine tune searches with recommendations from Google Suggest or a list of recent searches
– Full Page Zoom, for a closer look at any website without degrading the quality of the site’s layout and text.

If you wish to get a hold of Safari 4, please head to Apple’s download page to get it as a free download for Mac OS X, or Windows.

Popularity: 7% [?]

We have a hard time believing that the FCC’s documentation system is efficient and well-coordinated enough to actually reveal documents at the exact date and time that filers want them to — so who knows, maybe the feds are in bed with Apple on keeping its most prized launches under lock and key until just the right moment. We kid, we kid — maybe — but at any rate, you can now peruse hundreds of pages of specific absorption rate plots for GSM, UMTS / HSDPA, WiFi, and Bluetooth in both 16 and 32GB flavors of the iPhone 3G S. It’s not likely going to tell you anything you didn’t already know or care about, especially since there aren’t any external photos or user’s manuals accessible yet — but if you get really, amazingly bored this evening, it might be worth a look-see.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Regardless of its efforts, when discussing desktops, laptops, and even rumored smartphones, there are few brands in the business capable of inspiring a deep, consumer yawn as quickly as Dell. That can’t be said about Dell’s display business however, which has consistently provided sleek monitors offering some of the best bang for the buck in the business. Dell’s newest 20-incher is already out in Hong Kong where we expect it will soon begin its journey west. This entry-level monitor speaks the new design language of Dell’s XPS and Studio rigs and comes packing HDMI and VGA inputs with specs that include a 1600 x 900 (that’s a 16:9 aspect) pixel resolution, 5 millisecond response, 1000:1 contrast and 250 nits of brightness with a 160-degree viewing angle. Not great, but decent specs for the HK$1,098 (tax inclusive) price which we expect to be about $120 – 130 by the time model ST2010 lands Stateside.

Popularity: 60% [?]

Those involved with Windows 7 will remember a while back the beta received test updates, to check if how well the update system worked within Microsoft’s new operating system. Well, a similar thing is happening, this time in the Windows 7 RC variety.

This has come straight from the company itself, via the Windows Team blog, as well as being reported on TechNet. Keeping it the same as the previous updates, they will deliver no fixes or anything of the sort, and there should be around about 10 of them. According to the TechNet post, most of these will install automatically, but some of them won’t, as this will, “test a new update notification feature that provides detailed information about available updates that need to be installed manually.” They’ll be clearly identified as test updates, also, to prevent any confusion.

So folks, keep an eye out on May 12th and be sure to let us (and Microsoft) know how it goes.

Popularity: 61% [?]