Microsoft have confirmed that this is the General Availability date they are aiming towards and technology partners such as HP are confident it will happen. Phil Mckinney, CTO of HP said:

We’re locked and loaded for the launch…The quality of code is just absolutely stellar.

In order to finish the OS on time, Microsoft plans to wrap up development of the operating system by the middle or end of next month. Microsoft also said without giving specific details that those who purchase PCs running Vista between now and the Release Date will receive either a free or discounted copy of Windows 7. Interestingly, CNet reports that MS is considering a technology guarantee program that will allow existing Vista customers to receive some sort of discount when upgrading to Windows 7.

Anyone planning to line up already?

Via Windows 7 Center

A big red orb is hovering in the air at eye level in front of me, so I instinctively wind up and whack it with my fist, like a volleyball player serving a blistering ace.

It rebounds off a brick wall and heads back towards me, and I leap up and headbutt it. Again it ricochets back, this time low and off to the side, so I kick my leg out like Chris Osgood making a corner save, snagging a piece of the ball before it sails by.

Except the ball isn’t really there. Neither is the wall. They’re both just images on a flatscreen TV in front of me, which is connected to an Xbox 360 game console and a mind-blowing new device that could very well change video games as we know them.

In a bid to leapfrog Nintendo and the hyper-popular, family-friendly Wii, Microsoft has taken the wraps off a new Xbox 360 accessory that the company vows will usher in an era of “controller-free” games, in which players use their bodies and voices to direct the action on-screen.

Codenamed Project Natal, the device is a sleek horizontal bar fitted with cameras, sensors and microphones, and will allow players to simply act out whatever they want their video game characters to do, without the need to press buttons, flick joysticks or waggle a remote.

“Instead of learning what to do with a controller, you can control your avatar just by moving your body around,” Natal’s creative director Kudo Tsunoda told Sun Media in an exclusive hands-on demonstration at Microsoft’s Seattle-area headquarters, prior to its unveiling at the 2009 E3 Expo video game trade show in Los Angeles.

The Natal device won’t be available until sometime next year, and it currently doesn’t have an official name, much less a retail price. But Microsoft executives say it will form the foundation of a new breed of not just video games, but entertainment as a whole. And Hollywood agrees.

“The vast majority of people are just too intimidated to pick up a video game controller,” said director Steven Spielberg, who helped unveil Project Natal at Microsoft’s E3 press conference. He likened the technology to film’s transition from square screens to widescreen Cinemascope, and predicted it will open video games up to a much wider audience.

And I believe him. In the “Ricochet” demo with the ball and the brick wall, the moment I stepped in front of the Natal device, a translucent purple silhouette appeared on the screen, mimicking my movements like a digital shadow. Sitting, standing, walking, jumping, crossing my arms behind my back – no matter what I did, my on-screen avatar did the same. It made this jaded old gamer grin with delight.

Project Natal isn’t the first attempt at making a video game accessory that allows players to control the action on the screen with physical movements, but it’s a quantum leap ahead of anything that’s come before, accurately tracking a player’s entire body in 3-D space, with face and voice recognition features to boot. It’s the Star Trek holodeck in beta.

Imagine a football video game in which a player calls an audible, takes a snap and then throws the ball by pumping his arm in the direction of an on-screen receiver. Or talking to a digital character who reacts to your movements and words, as demonstrated at Microsoft’s press conference in a demo by Fable designer Peter Molyneux.

“It really is about finally breaking down the barriers that prevent the console from becoming the centre of home entertainment,” said Microsoft’s Shane Kim, one of the executives in charge of all things Xbox. “This is about making you the controller, where the only experience you need is life experience.”

Other announcements from Microsoft:

• Xbox 360 getting full retail games delivered on demand
• Xbox Live gets 1080p Zune video store, Netflix browsing, Twitter and Facebook integration
• Beatles Rock Band trailer, screenshots, Ludwig drums unveiled at E3

Via Canoe.ca and Engadget

Via LifeHacker

Microsoft is pushing out Service Pack 2 for Office 2007, promising significant performance improvements and support for the OpenDocument format, among other things.

In all the update packs in hundreds of bug fixes and improvements for Microsoft’s suite of office applications, which you can see in their entirety in this Excel doc. If you’re an Office 2007 user, now’s the time to fire up Windows Update and get going on that 290MB download. If you don’t want to go through Windows Update (or it’s not showing the update yet), you can also download the file directly from Microsoft here.

via Lifehacker

Lifehacker – Office 2010 Screenshots Preview What’s to Come – Microsoft Office 2010

After the guessing games of last week, it has been officially announced that Microsoft will definitely be issuing the final release candidate for Windows 7 next month.

The Windows 7 RC will go out to MSDN and TechNet professionals on 30 April and more widely on 5 May. After that, it’s almost certain that the retail version will appear in the summer, probably in July.

Shares pick up

Although Microsoft announced a 32 per cent drop in quarterly profits this week, its shares rose when it became clear that the much-anticipated operating system would get an early release.

Also, fears about backwards compatibility for older pieces of software look to have been eased after leaks suggest Windows 7 will be able to emulate Windows XP.

Virtual XP tooExperts at SuperSite for Windows say XP Mode will come as a free download for users of the Professional and Ultimate versions of Windows 7.

Reportedly, it will offer a virtual workspace running XP with Service Pack 3 inside a container that remains separate from the rest of the OS.

Windows 7 due in July, will include XP too | News | TechRadar UK

Engadget

Tags: Windows7 RC 7100, Windows 7, Microsoft

Microsoft will be renaming Office 14 and make it available as an ad-supported web version…

We knew Microsoft was almost ready to lift the lid on the next version of its Office suite of software, but we hadn’t expected the surprises that appear in the offing.

According to reports in the US and Japan, the next iteration will not be called Office 14, as had been expected, but will instead go by the name Office 2010.

Online ads

Moreover, it will also be delivered as a web-based set of tools like Google Documents that will be free to use and supported by advertising on the same pages.

It is expected that traditional, boxed versions of the software will also go on sale, but that those will come with monthly fees or charges based on how much they’re actually used.

So far, none of this is official, but we’ll bring you the lowdown just as soon as Redmond lets the cat out of the bag.

Engadget posts evidence that Microsoft is further positioning itself directly against Apple’s product line. Marketing images of a so-called “Zune HD” whos an iPod touch-like media player.

We present what might possibly be your first look at, yes… the Zune HD. In the gallery below, you can see images from what appears to be a forthcoming marketing campaign for Microsoft’s new PMP. We don’t have any word on specs right now, though we’ve got a sneaking suspicion this will have an HD display.

Microsoft’s Zune music player was originally launched in November 2006 as a competitor to the iPod. Zune sales have not been particularly impressive and still falls well behind the iPod in marketshare.

A “Zune HD”, however, would position a device head-to-head against Apple’s iPod Touch which has seen tremendous sales since its introduction. Apple revealed that there have been 13 million iPod Touches up until December 2008. The popularity of the iPod Touch, however, is in part due to the increasing popularity of the iTunes App Store. Specifically, Apple has been aggressively marketing the iPod Touch as a gaming device. It’s unclear if Microsoft’s “Zune HD” would do anything more than playback movies and TV shows.

via Macrumors

Microsoft confirms you’ll need to do a clean install of the OS instead

Microsoft has confirmed it isn’t providing an upgrade path for Windows XP to Windows 7.

The not unexpected confirmation came in a new post on the Engineering Windows 7 blog outlining the latest developments with the new OS as it moves swiftly towards release.

In the post – signed ‘Windows 7 Team’ – the subject of XP upgrading is broached, but it admits that, actually, an upgrade option has never been part of the plan.

“We realized at the start of this project that the ‘upgrade’ from XP would not be an experience we think would yield the best results. There are simply too many changes in how PCs have been configured (applets, hardware support, driver model, etc) that having all of that support carry forth to Windows 7 would not be nearly as high quality as a clean install. This is something many of you know and already practice.”

To be fair to Microsoft, an upgrade isn’t the best way to install a new OS – especially one so different from XP as Windows 7. After all, we’re talking eight years since XP first hit the streets. Added to which, many users will simply look to get Windows 7 when they buy a new machine anyway.

However, Microsoft, does say that the installation process does “provide support for moving files and settings and will prompt at setup time, but applications will need to be reinstalled.” Fair enough. “We know that for a set of customers this trade off seems less than perfect, but we think the upfront time is well worth it.”

Techradar.com

Tags: Microsoft, Windows 7, migrate to Windows 7, XP