Having dipped my toe into the Windows Vista beta 2 waters, I found myself in want of anti-virus to secure my OS. I remembered Ed Bott reported about free anti-virus options for Windows Vista so I went looking, and found this article. Ed reports that there are free versions of both eTrust EZ AntiVirus and Trend Micro's PC-Cillin products available. Happy antivirusing!

The last post regarding Marc Orchant`s OneNote article was the first that I have posted here running the Windows Vista and IE 7 betas. After making the post, I viewed it in IE to double-check that everything rendered correctly, and was greeted with a warning that The Unofficial Microsoft Weblog may indeed be a phishing site.

Now I commend Microsoft for doing something about the phishing problem that plagues the web - it`s certainly not going away, and anything the tools we use can do to help us not get taken in by these scams is welcome by me. Of course, it`s quite disconcerting to discover that one`s own site is considered to be a potential threat.

But, consider that we are a site that has `Microsoft`right in our sub-domain, even though we`re not part of Microsoft`s microsoft.com domain. And we collect information, if you call asking for a name, email address and URL to comment on posts as collecting information, which in fact it is. So it`s reasonable that software might consider us as a potential threat.

Fortunately,  Microsoft foresaw that the tool might pick up many false positives, and offers a form right on the warning to allow site owners to alert the Phishing Filter team to the problem. There also appears to be a voting mechanism so that if enough regular site visitors tag the site as either legit or not, the site will be considered that way. Pretty cool, as long as that is not easily abused.

Kudos to Microsoft for attempting to further protect us. I can`t say that I`ll stick with IE7 for longer than it takes to get a feel for it - in my opinion Firefox is still leaps and bounds ahead of IE in terms of usability and extensibility. But so far IE7 is a welcome update to a sorely outdated browser.

The newly revamped "Hibernate" function works flawlessly, even on archaic hardware like mine. It saves everything, so you can completely turn off your PC, and later turn it back on to the same turn in your favorite game. Very cool. Also, the sleep feature works well too, and doesn't leave you hanging either! One of the most amazing things about Vista thus far for me is that my drivers would not install correctly for a few devices (although it recognized more devices than my XP install did right off the bat) until I went in through the update driver option. This allowed Vista to find my driver file and install everything the way it wanted to, which worked famously. Vista did crash on me completely a few times, but at this point, I am not sure whether this is Vista's or my aging hardware's fault. To tell you the truth, I can't wait to buy a brand new PC, just to hot-rod Vista in all it's muscle. I know it has many flaws, but I think once Microsoft puts on the finishing touches, there is enough there to really please fans and critics alike.

A sigh of relief, a breath of fresh air, all because the wicked witch of MY is dead! Microsoft axed the whole stupid "my" routine in Vista, along with the verbose and dumbly named "Documents and Settings" folder. Thank (your favorite deity here)! It is now simply Documents, Computer, Pictures, Music, and the new Games folder. Another thing I like is that Vista places all these things into a C:\Users\username folder for better organization. This is the best way they have done it ever. Windows NT used to have these files under C:\winnt\profiles\username and XP had C:\Documents and Settings\username with all of the My pictures, My music, etc under the My Documents folder. Finally someone realized that Pictures and Music and Videos are NOT DOCUMENTS! Rock on!

Vista sports the new organizational structure that allows much easier browsing and finding of folders using a side-arrow and a drop down on every folder currently in your directory path. I also like Vista's new picture viewing application is excellent, even providing a slideshow view. The new search and all programs views let you type or click on what you want, and the results of both come up in the pane formerly reserved for only pinned items on the left. So instead of far reaching menus you must drill down through filling the screen, you can easily drill down via a faster, better tree-like interface. One thing I found interesting is that you can type run or calc, or notepad, and without further ado, Vista displays it, smartly knowing what I wanted, though these items, like run are not shown on the main start menu. On the integration front, Vista's new start button goes hand in hand with the new 2007 Office system beta's start-button common to most Office programs. There are many such improvements that make it easier for users to get the idea of how to use the system, since things look the same. Even display properties are interestingly arranged, while a little confusing to a seasoned user, will be very simple for a newbie.

So, as I write this on my laptop PC currently running windows Vista, I am thinking back over the last week that I have had Vista installed. The big verdict for me is that Vista is pretty good at some things, a little annoying with the security warnings, a little clunky yet, and not perfect, but for a beta, it is good. I have an older machine running 512MB RAM, and a 1.6GHz AMD Athlon 2800 chip and a whopping 40GB hard drive. Vista does make pretty good use of my ancient hardware. I tried out the ReadyBoost feature, which allows you to plug in any flash based memory stick, thumb drive, etc to help improve the performance of Vista and thusly your computer. This works surprisingly well, and makes me want to run out and buy a 2GB flash drive, just to see what it will do with that. My PC is rated by Vista as a 1, so it isn't the greatest of performances, and I don't even have the 128MB video card needed to run Aero, but I still like Vista quite a bit. There are some significant improvements to XP, better organization, and lots of little things that make computing easier. I love the new live preview of any picture, making it easy to tell your photos apart even on the desktop, without looking at the filename. Built in support for Clear-Type fonts is cool, making everything look ethereally slick.

This is a really good product. Microsoft did their homework on this one. I had downloaded and tested this product and it really does help people keep their systems safe and up to date. The features include anti-virus, a decent firewall, anti-spyware, PC tune-up, back-up, restore, and even email, phone and chat tech support, yup, included in the same package at the same price. The OneCare suite is available online for download, and also in most Best Buy stores and a bunch of other retailers as well. A quick Google search (sorry Microsoft) yielded that both CompUSA and MicroCenter have OneCare available for around $50 for a year's subscription. OfficeMax and OfficeDepot did not seem to have it in their search at least, as of this writing.

For a long time now, Microsoft hasn't been focusing on PC games, and even us PC gamers can't blame them. Going from zero to 360 in a few years, not bad at all. Now though, Microsoft is going to begin focusing on PC games again. Many think Microsoft will develop, or have developed a gaming platform for the PC that rivals the ease and simplicity of the XBOX brand. Hopefully this is true. A little birdie told me that Microsoft may even be planning to integrate XBOX and PC based gaming platforms via a service like the wildy popular LIVE. This would certainly give them the advantage over Nintendo and Sony, who don't have anything close to a viable PC link to them systems. In fact, most consoles far thus far kept PC gaming out of their respective portfolios, because PC's have been the enemy. Microsoft knows that there are millions of PC gamers who would love to gank their snoody console-based buddies and prove once and for all what PC gamers have known for ages: the PC is the best gaming platform ever. How can you beat a customizable 101-key controller or the ability to upgrade any part of your gaming system? You obviously can't do that with a console.

Cnet features Microsoft executive Michala Alexander talking about piracy and why people do it. Alexander states that, "it's just because people want what they can get for the cheapest price." While I understand this view and agree with the observation of human nature, I think the deeper issue is that software companies still cause a lot of piracy, because they haven't figured out what customers need. I know many people who bought a computer, then one day, inexplicably, their computer crashes. What do they do? They find the nearest guru, and ask for help. He gives them a copy of the operating system (that they didn't get when they bought the computer) to fix their computer. It may not be right, but is it fair to NOT give customers a copy of THEIR operating system THEY bought pre-installed? This is near-sighted and stingy of software companies. Most people in this situation would be fine if they could just get their computer back, yet no provision is made for them when the system crashes.  I know this isn't all of the piracy going on, but this is the portion that I have witnessed. In this way, software companies are pirating their own software.

Apple's iSight cameras now built into many products have been a big hit with mac users. Microsoft is taking a few clues and has come up with their own idea for a web cam as well. It is about time. I have often wished and wondered if this was an idea Microsoft sees the potential in, and apparently they do. The LifeCams should be available sometime this month, according to Mary Jo Foley of Microsoft Watch. No word yet on hardware integration of the product with things like laptops, but if the concept takes off it may end up in hardware in the near future. Video-conferencing would help many enterprises cut down on needless travel costs, as well as tighten the global community. It is a good idea, so Microsoft, bring it on!

[Via Microsoft-Watch.com]

Many Microsoft fans, users, tech support people, individuals, and the like are still wondering about the viability of Vista and its many intricacies. Sidebar widgets, Flip 3D, gaming support, Halo 2, new parental controls, easier search and information access are some of the few things flying around lately. When the Customer Preview Program for Vista starts in the "next few weeks" according to Microsoft's GetReady website for Vista, a lot of these questions will be answered, at least partially. The Vista Beta will have much of the final edition, so it will serve to give people a decently accurate view of what they might expect come January, or February, or later next year. Many of the people I work with aren't even interested in Vista yet, or have even heard of it, which seems like the general consensus among users. I guess for now, the beta will benefit Microsoft by receiving feedback from technophiles, IT personnel, and general geeks like me. Early adopters let's say, will be the ones most critical and potentially helpful for Microsoft's production team to tweak and polish Vista. I must remark about how smart this is to pre-release Vista. This will ensure Microsoft gets a good mix of comments and feedback on the things that work and things that don't in Vista. It can also be a doubled-edged sword, since any vulnerabilities stand to be more easily exploited by malicious individuals before Vista's lid is completely locked down. It is a necessary risk to harden your operating system before that fateful launch day. Will Vista do the trick? What do you think?

Microsoft has a marketing site up called See Windows Vista, where Tom Skerrit invites you click on links to view videos describing the virtues of Vista. Although the site is very polished, and has a few nice touches (leave your browser sitting on the site for awhile and Tom will do a few cute things to try to draw you back in), I can't help but notice that while the site works under Firefox, it occasionally has some rendering problems. Regardless, if you're looking to be convinced why upgrading to Vista will be a good thing, this is perfect for you.

Microsoft has decided to differentiate between the version of Internet Explorer 7 that is available for Windows XP, and the version that will release with Windows Vista by calling the Vista version Internet Explorer 7+. The reason for the difference in designation stems from the fact that there are features that will be included in IE on Vista that apparently were not easy to create for XP - presumably they rely on technologies that are built in to Vista.

Of course I can't let this go by without mentioning that although this is a relatively minor example of it, this is yet another case of poor product naming. The 'plus' designation in software has had a long-standing perception of being a version of software that you pay extra for - and get extra features. In other words, a user that has IE 7 may well wonder what they can do to get IE 7+. When the answer turns out to be upgrade to Vista or buy a new PC, you can bet they won't be very impressed.

In fact, is it really necessary to differentiate the products by name? It's perfectly reasonable that in any given product, some features that might rely on the operating system might be available in the new OS but not the old one. Isn't it?

Chris Pirillo has a post listing his personal Vista feedback to Jim Allchin. I haven't installed the Vista beta 2 yet, but I'm assuming that there is a boilerplate message from Allchin that users receive when they do so requesting feedback.

[Update 3:54pm - It turns out Chris's post was in response to some time he spent with Jim Allchin during which Jim requested his feedback. Good for him!]

Chris took this to heart, and while some may find his remarks pedantic, the fact is that he's absolutely right about every single comment. Having never worked at a software development company (to my knowledge), Chris is showing the absolute attention to detail that is necessary to deliver a stellar product. This list is the kind of thing that Apple engineers would take seriously, and Microsoft has shown it does not for so many years. It's not a sexy or fun list of bugs and changes to do, but collectively they seriously impact the final user experience of the operating system.

Windows already has style difficulties simply by virtue of the fact that there is so much Windows software out there that is aesthetically challenged, to put it nicely. Unfortunately, Microsoft doesn't appear to be trying to set the bar any higher than it was in XP. This is a real shame.

Robert Scoble, if you're listening, make sure Jim Allchin actually does see Chris's list. Or maybe it needs to go to Bill. Whatever the case, Vista will disappoint if this level of attention to detail is not given to it.

Check out the Vista upgrade adviser. While it doesn't give you specifics, it does let you know what you need to preform the tasks you select for your version of Vista. It will even tell you which Vista you will want based on your selections. While I think this is a bad excuse for making too many versions for no good reason, it is kinda helpful. What was unclear is if Vista will take up 15GB of my computer, or if that is what is recommended to have. Some of the results are vague and ambiguous, but then again, it is geared toward consumers, and not the tech-speak I am so accustomed to. Have your relatives, mom, dad, etc. who are wondering what Vista is try out the upgrade adviser, it will help them decide if an entire PC upgrade is worth it. To use Aero, you have to have at least a 128MB video card to run it. Kind of a bummer for anyone who still has older equipment, but not too terrible to upgrade. It isn't as bad of an upgrade as it sounded at first, which is good news.