Tag: tips

Post report: Vista limits choices, when others say we have too many

Post author By M3 Sweatt
Post date 12/06/2007
1 Comment on Post report: Vista limits choices, when others say we have too many

I read this morning in the Washington Post that Vista Limits Choices (or so Alan Sipress and Jeffrey H. Birnbaum report), as well as in this related article in the Post on Vista from Michael Liedtke.

“Internet search leader Google Inc. is trying to convince federal and state authorities that Microsoft Corp.’s Vista operating system is stifling competition as the high-tech heavyweights wrestle for the allegiance of personal computer users.

“In a 49-page document filed April 18 with the U.S. Justice Department and state attorneys general, Google alleged that the latest version of Microsoft’s Windows operating system impairs the performance of “desktop search” programs that find data stored on a computer’s hard drive.”

Whew… I thought that this was in reference to Steve Jobs’ comments on the number of Windows Vista choices available to customers…

“Set to launch in October, Leopard will be priced at $129 USD, just like previous Mac OS X releases. In a swipe against Microsoft and Windows Vista, Jobs explained the pricing behind Leopard: “Basic version, $129. Premium version, $129. Business version, $129. Enterprise version $129. Ultimate version, $129,” he said.”

Thanks, Apple. BTW, it’s [Windows Vista] Home Basic.

Hmmm… I wasn’t aware that Leopard offers BitLocker capabilities, advanced entertainment recording and management, and other capabilities… 😉

At retail, I heard it explained quite clearly yesterday by a sales rep at a local office supply chain store about the different editions of Windows Vista. (See this handy Vista feature comparison chart.) He went through the various versions and narrowed down the customer’s choices to Windows Vista Home Premium and “in some power user cases, you might consider Windows Vista Ultimate.”

IMHO, most consumers and home PC users should consider new computers or an upgrade to Windows Vista Home Premium. This version offers improved mobile computer power management, Tablet PC support, Windows Media Center support (esp when you have an on-board radio or TV tuner card). Most laptops I saw at retail this weekend featured this version. For basic computers, such as a kid’s PC or a current laptop running Windows XP, I would suggest Windows Vista Home Basic edition.

Tags Apple, articles, humour, tips, Windows Vista

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Mary Jo Foley: Ten lessons the Xbox Team can teach the rest of Microsoft

Post author By M3 Sweatt
Post date 20/05/2007
1 Comment on Mary Jo Foley: Ten lessons the Xbox Team can teach the rest of Microsoft

Last week, ZDNet‘s Mary Jo Foley posted on her blog the Ten lessons the Xbox Team can teach the rest of Microsoft.

“When it comes to building community — and profiting from it — Microsoft’s Xbox team is helping write the playbook. That fact isn’t lost on the rest of the company. Increasingly, other divisions at Microsoft are studying what the Xbox folks are doing right and trying to apply those lessons to their own products and services.”

She’s right, IMHO.

Mary Jo spoke with JJ Richards, the GM of Xbox Live, to collect his thoughts on what other parts of the company could learn from the Xbox. Here they are…

1. Tiers need to be clear and simple. In Xbox Live, there is gold and there is silver. Fewer, simpler SKUs are better.

2. The dashboard is the UI. Users want access to lots of data, all in one place. They don’t want to have to hunt for it.

3. An online marketplace sells content. The Windows and Office Live teams already grok this one. Making Microsoft and third-party wares available as a one-stop shop helps move more add-on hardware, software and services.

4. Arcade: Not everyone is a shooter-game pro. Users come with different skill sets and interests. Some prefer “Geometry Wars” to “Gears of War.” Microsoft’s Developer Division gets this, and is launching Express versions of its tools for hobbyists/nonprofessional programmers.

5. Achievements are a way to stay in touch. The more ways you can encourage community members to stay in touch, the better.

6. Ubiquitous voice and text are de rigeur. In the Web 2.0 world, everyone’s a multi-tasker. All services and apps should bake-in messaging, mail and other unified-communications technologies.

7. Roaming accounts are key. Users want their audio and video content, contact lists, address books, favorites and other settings available on any device, anywhere at any time.

8. Build communities within your community. Gamerzones in the Xbox world allow similar types of users to more easily connect. What’s the business equivalent of Xbox Live’s “Underground”? Good question.

9. Points are the new online currency. Office Online already is moving in this direction, and other Microsoft Live services will likely do the same.

10. Gamerscore = reputation. Other divisions at Microsoft have been wrestling with how to rank community participants by “reputation” to help users gauge which content/commentary to trust. Gamerscore could become the model here.

“Richards acknowledged that the Xbox Live team can learn a thing or two from other Microsoft divisions, as well, such as how to handle child safety settings in world with more and more user-generated content. But it seems to me that it’s Microsoft’s non-gaming businesses that have more to learn from the Xbox team — at least when it comes to building community — than the other way around.”

I’ll add number 11: Connect with your customers. Customers want to be heard and sometimes appreciate that they have influenced product design and delivery with their feedback. More and more, teams have formalized how they get direct responses from customers, whether it’s internally through a dogfood deployment, more formally through a Connect-managed beta or customer focus groups to see how people react to and how they use a new product or service. Some of the teams that have the best understanding of their customer’s needs are connecting directly in 1:1 and 1:many discussions, whether it’s on Xbox Live in head-to-head matches and play, or on blogs like the Xbox team’s Gamerscore blog, the Xbox team blog on MSDN and of course Major Nelson.

Tags advice, articles, Microsoft, Microsoft culture, tips, Xbox 360

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Link: stop spam from foreign countries in Outlook (Lifehacker.com)

Post author By M3 Sweatt
Post date 10/05/2007

This from Lifehacker.com on stopping spam from foreign countries using Outlook…

Stop spam from foreign countries

Reader John discovered a way to virtually eliminate spam from his Outlook inbox: top-level domain blocking.

It’s known that most spam (particularly malware such as keyloggers) originates overseas (Estonia, Moldavia, China, Poland, etc.) By blocking email from most of the undeveloped world, I’ve successfully reduced spam by 95 percent in the past year. In Outlook, click Actions > Junk E-Mail > Junk E-Mail Options. Click the International tab, then the Blocked Top-Level Domain List button. Now select the countries you wish to block.

Killer solution! Before I hooked up with SpamArrest, the foreign e-mails used to drive me nuts. This filtering takes about 30 seconds to complete and should keep a ton of unwanted gunk out of your inbox. Care to share your favorite anti-spam solution? You know where: the comments!

Tags advice, link, Office, tips

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Quick note for consumers on security: turn on Automatic Updates

Post author By M3 Sweatt
Post date 04/04/2007
1 Comment on Quick note for consumers on security: turn on Automatic Updates

What’s all this talk about animated cursors and exploits on Windows?

Some times, email attachments and web sites aren’t what they appear to be on face value.

You might’ve seen a security announcement or press coverage on a new security patch that addresses a vulnerability associated with .ani files, which are associated with web site and animation attachments. (See the full technical bulletin here.)

Christopher Budd’s post and Mike Reavey’s (both from the MSRC team) post more info on MS07-017 on the MSRC Technet blog.

In short, if you’re a consumer or small business and you manage your updates via Microsoft Automatic Updates (aka “AU”) the update will be automatically installed. And if you’re a sysadmin or IT Professional, we encourage you to test and deploy this update via WSUS and SMS.

Visit the Microsoft Security at Home web site for more on protecting your computer.

Tags Announcements, customer satisfaction, security, tips

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Your questions: Tech & Gadgets asks “Is your digital photo collection under control?”

Post author By M3 Sweatt
Post date 03/04/2007
1 Comment on Your questions: Tech & Gadgets asks “Is your digital photo collection under control?”

MSN Tech and Gadgets is asking the question I have heard numerous times:

“Is your digital photo collection under control?”

“OK, so you’ve got tons of digital pictures on your computer — how do you actually organize and share them? Are there any features “missing” from your camera or computer that would make it easier for you to organize your collection?”

Although only a few people have added their thoughts to the thread, but I’ll add my relatively basic, low-tech approach: I recall images temporally, and store them by folder accordingly, by month and year. For instance, our summer pictures of the kids are stored in various sub-folders folders in My Pictures, starting with the “2006-06” folder. Images are then backed up to an external USB 2.0 hard disk using OneCare’s incremental back-up software (as well as drag copy archive to CD-Rs, and more recently to DVD-R discs). Each image from our Canon PowerShot SD500 Digital ELPH (7.1 Megapixels) runs about 3 to 4MB.

Using the the MS Office Picture Manager provided good basic editing features ’til I upgraded to Digital Image Pro 10. I archive all photos in the original format and then also save a smaller thumbnail in a simple format of “eventname_date_sm.jpg” — and any edited photos are saved in Digital Impage Pro .png format to preserve quality.

For more info and help on managing pictures, check out on Windows Vista, the Memories subsite on Microsoft.com Windows Vista site. Windows Photo Gallery makes it even easier to store, sort and search your photo library.