Vista123 News

LAS VEGAS--On one score, Yahoo has been extremely receptive to an offer from Microsoft. With its Yahoo Messenger for Vista, the Internet company has been one of the few consumer software companies to come out with a Windows  Vista-specific product.

Intel on Wednesday confirmed that it would ship the six-core Xeon processor in the second half of this year.
Speculation about the shipping date of the processor, code-named Dunnington, surfaced last month after an Intel presentation detailing the processor was leaked by Sun Microsystems. The presentation, which showed that the chip would ship in the second half, was available on Sun's servers, but was later pulled off.

Well we're here in Las Vegas (more on that later), getting ready for Mix to officially start with the keynote this morning, and it looks like we're not the only ones getting ready.

Thanks to pikalu0530, we can show you two web pages up now, all set to provide download links for IE8. Just a quick glance shows some new features - activities, and web slices:

Microsoft has provided an update for its Vista Ultimate plans. UltimatePC.com is a new website where Microsoft is hosting "blueprints" of the best PCs available and exactly what you can achieve with them.

Although the domain name was transferred last October, Microsoft has only decided to make use of it now.

The Web has been abuzz with chatter about Windows Vista's upcoming Service Pack 1 (SP1): What it will and will not fix, how it will affect performance, how long will it take to install, and so on. PC manufacturers, some journalists, and a great deal of torrent addicts already have the service pack, and we're among that crew. While there are lots of things to write about SP1, the first thing we're going to focus on is performance. Sure, security is important as is compatibility, but we're hoping SP1 turns Vista into the screaming speed demon Microsoft once seemed to suggest it would be. Of course, when we say performance, we're mainly talking about games, but we checked out other areas in which it supposedly improves the Vista experience as well.

You may think of Wal-Mart as a down-market PC seller, but as emails in the Vista "junk PC" case show, Wal-Mart was furious at Microsoft's Vista Capable scheme, and thought that Windows Vista Home Basic never should have been developed, much less released. They're not alone. Other retailers, notably Office Depot, thought Vista Home Basic should have been killed. Here's all the dirt, including emails.

Microsoft's chief operating officer has dismissed concerns that an update to its flagship Windows Vista operating system is incompatible with a number of applications.

Speaking at the CeBIT trade show in Hanover on Tuesday, Microsoft's third-in-command, Kevin Turner, told ZDNet.co.uk that the software giant was not concerned by the problems that Service Pack 1 (SP1) has encountered with some third-party programs.

"Lighter" is the key word Symantec hopes customers will feel when installing Norton 360 version 2.0, which is the company's security and backup system for small business and home users that was launched today.The Web browser moves to the fore in the release of Norton 360 Version 2.0. Two key features are Identity Protection, which now supports Firefox, and Browser Protection, which Symantec claims will protect against drive-by-downloads delivered by maliciously tampered Web sites.

Vista  has been an all-around disappointment and even those with SP1 have reason to complain.  Those with problems are probably more outspoken than those that don’t but the issues keep piling up and Microsoft does little about them.  This program may brighten up your Vista experience a tiny bit.Real Desktop comes it two forms, Real Desktop Standard and Real Desktop Light; major differences set the two apart.  With Real Desktop Standard you get all the features and with Light, not so much.

Monday from the annual Microsoft Office SharePoint Conference, Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft Corp., will announce that the company will offer Microsoft Online Services to businesses of all sizes. This announcement marks a significant step for Microsoft toward expanding its software plus services strategy.