Windows Archive

Microsoft has announced the release to manufacturing of Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R3, the next-generation of the componentized, real-time Windows Embedded CE operating system that now features a rich immersive user experience provided by Microsoft's Silverlight Rich Internet Application platform. The company also delivers Windows 7 connectivity to the platform.

"Starting October 1--and for a limited time--those in the U.K. will be able to preorder Windows 7 for 30 British pounds, according to a Microsoft Web site. In a Twitter posting, Microsoft said that U.S. college students will be able to get the software for $30, but the Web site it linked to does not yet have details on the offer. 'This offer is specifically designed for those students who are not planning to purchase a new PC this year but would still like to take advantage of what Windows 7 offers,' a Microsoft representative said. Those who order the software will be able to download it when Windows 7 ships on October 22. Students interested in the deal need a valid college e-mail address. Microsoft plans similar offers in Canada, Australia, Korea, Mexico, France, and Germany, though the prices will vary somewhat."

Microsoft has been very protective over its OEM pricing, and while various figures float around the web, the company has never really confirmed or denied any of them. At the Jefferies Annual Technology Conference, however, Charles Songhurst, general manager of Corporate Strategy, revealed some of the pricing details for OEMs.

"Microsoft late last week said it won't patch Windows XP for a pair of bugs it quashed Sept. 8 in Vista, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008. The news adds Windows XP and SP3 to the no-patch list that previously included only Windows 2000 Server SP4. 'We're talking about code that is 12 to 15 years old in its origin, so backporting that level of code is essentially not feasible,' said security program manager Adrian Stone during Microsoft's monthly post-patch Webcast, referring to Windows 2000 and XP.... 'By default, Windows XP SP2, Windows XP SP3 and Windows XP Professional x64 Edition SP2 do not have a listening service configured in the client firewall and are therefore not affected by this vulnerability,' the company said. 'Windows XP SP2 and later operating systems include a stateful host firewall that provides protection for computers against incoming traffic from the Internet or from neighboring network devices on a private network.'"

We usually don't report on security flaws, unless they're on platforms that usually don't see such flaws, or when the flaw in question is pretty serious. Well, a new zero-day flaw has been discovered in Windows Vista and Windows 7 which will trigger a blue screen of death using the new SMB 2.0 protocol. Update: Windows 7 RTM and Windows Server 2008 R2 are not affected by the flaw. So, this is less of a problem than expected.

Yesterday, Microsoft released the first Community Technology Preview release of Windows Embedded Standard 2011, freely downloadable to play with. This is the first Windows Embedded release based on Windows 7, and therefore brings a whole number of Windows 7 technologies to the embedded Windows world. The final release is expected somewhere during the second half of 2010.

"We've been doing some investigating, friends - making phone calls, demanding answers. And it was worth it. We can confirm something very few people get to confirm: British shoppers aren't going to be totally shafted over software pricing for once. Full versions of Windows 7 Home Premium are going to cost us half as much as they cost Americans."

Last week we talked about what Linux (well, okay, X) could learn from Windows Vista and Windows 7, focusing on the graphics stack. A short article over at TechWorld lists seven things Windows 7 should learn from the Linux world. Some of them are spot-on, a few are nonsensical, and of course, and I'm sure you have a few to add too.

While the tech media are all busy praising Windows 7, the operating system still obviously does have issues, it being Windows and all. Because we are talking about Windows, and not, say Ubuntu or Mac OS X, it comes with one big downside that will mostly hit new users of Windows 7 (meaning, everyone): the incredibly complicated upgrade paths.

Earlier this week, we had a page 2 item about a possible showstopper bug in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, but as I could've probably guessed by taking my time before posting said item, this bug has been way overblown and is anything but a showstopper. Steven Sinofisky himself responded to the bug by commenting on the blog.

The media might be heralding Windows 7 as the Windows release which will erase all the bad Vista memories, but there's still this nagging security flaw in Windows 7's User Account Control which Microsoft refuses to fix, stating that it is not a security flaw at all. Well, Microsoft, if this is not a security flaw - then why does your security software block the tool that demonstrates the flaw?

At a recent Microsoft event the Inq was given an exclusive walkthrough of the final version of the new Windows Phone operating system, running on a touch screen HTC Touch Diamond2. In addition, Microsoft has published a case study detailing how to port an iPhone application to its Windows Mobile platform as it prepares to launch an online store for mobile applications to compete with Apple.

"Windows 7 Ultimate has been cracked. The pirate milestone, reached almost three months before Windows 7 is set to hit General Availability on October 22, 2009, was achieved via OEM instant offline activation that passes Windows Genuine Advantage validation and keeps the operating system permanently activated. Previous cracks weren't as solid: while they may be working now, they can easily be disabled by Microsoft. This one won't be so easy."

A lot of our readers are still happily using Windows XP - 36% of our users use XP, 12% Vista, and 6% Windows 7. While Windows XP is showing its age in a lot of areas, there is at least something you can do to prettify the operating system at minimal cost. In Windows XP, and to a lesser extent Windows Vista, there are still a lot of old-style icons and graphics that should be updated to more modern variants. There are free tools that do just this (thanks to IStartedSomething).