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Microsoft: XP coming soon to OLPC

Microsoft said Wednesday that it is working to develop a version of XP that can run on computers without a hard drive, including the XO computer from One Laptop Per Child.

In a statement, Microsoft said that it will start "limited field trials" of XP running on the OLPC computer in January. If all goes well, Microsoft said it could have XP running on the XO by the second half of next year. However, it cautioned folks in North America, particularly those taking part in the Give One, Get One program, that it has no plans to offer … Read more

Public test next week for Vista SP1

Microsoft on Tuesday said that it has reached the "release candidate" with the first service pack for Windows Vista, with plans to make the test software available publicly next week.

It is releasing the test code this week to the 15,000 or so people who have been beta testing SP1 already, and will also make it available on Thursday to those in the MSDN and TechNet developer programs.

"We feel really good and we look forward to receiving feedback from our larger set of testers," said David Zipkin, a senior product manager on the Windows … Read more

Episode 617: Windows apps on a Mac?

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Microsoft gears up for Windows Server 2008 launch

Microsoft has reached another milestone on the road to the release of Windows Server 2008.

On Wednesday, the company made available the Release Candidate 1 version of the software and promised the final version will be ready in time for the product's February 27 launch. Microsoft plans to launch the product, along with SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008, at an event in Los Angeles.

The event is themed "Heroes happen here" and is planned as a love fest celebrating all the work done by the IT crowd. The software maker also said it will spend … Read more

Fixes for Windows standby and sleep problems

The standby and hibernate modes in Microsoft's Windows XP and the sleep mode in Vista are meant to be great time-savers. But too often a sleeping PC wakes up on its own--or doesn't awaken when you want it to.

The latter problem is particularly common with Vista, which is proving itself to be pretty worthless, even as Windows versions go.

The first time I set one of my XP systems to standby, it sprung to life each night, showing a message that my network was detected. The problem disappeared after I entered the machine's BIOS (press the … Read more

Apple enabling native Windows compatibility...in Leopard?

If what The Register writes is even remotely true, the writing is on the wall for Microsoft's desktop dominance. What does it say? "Game over."

The Register is reporting that Apple may be coding Leopard to run Windows applications natively (meaning, no need for Parallels, Boot Camp, etc.). It's a wild guess at this point, but the clues are there:

Leopard's PE (Portable Executable--a way of encoding executable files) support was uncovered by one Stephen Edwards, who'd been working with Wine, the open source version of the Windows application programming interface (API). He found that Leopard's Dynamic Linker (Dyld) will try to load a PE file. Soon after, Leopard's hunt for DLLs referenced by the PE file appeared as further evidence that the presence of PE support may not simply be a hang over from Apple's use of the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI).… Read more

Killer Download: Replacing Windows Explorer

Navigating your hard drive using Windows Explorer is pretty straightforward. Double-clicking a directory like My Documents brings up a list of items you have in that folder. You're given a couple of options for how you view the contents of a folder, such as arranging by date or by name. You also can view your documents using icons or tiles. The Windows Explorer window shares some of the features of Internet Explorer as well, like Favorites and toolbars. Clearly, this is nothing new to anyone who has used a Windows machine, and like many of you, I have my own ideas of how it could be made better.

We can probably agree that the options available with Explorer are adequate for navigating your hard drive, but a little more information and flexibility would go a long way. I found a few programs that add much more to file navigation, such as tabbed and paned directories for drag-and-drop file transfers and document previews so you know what you're opening before you open it. These Windows Explorer replacements offer tons of information about your files at a glance, like expanded properties and sorting capabilities not available with the default Windows setup. Some also feature much more intuitive methods for moving files around.… Read more

Palm releases Windows Mobile 6 update for Treo 750

Today, Palm officially released its Windows Mobile 6 update for the Palm Treo 750, bringing such enhancements as HSDPA capabilities (w00t!), Microsoft Direct Push Technology for real-time synchronization with Outlook, and better Calendar management. It's available now as a free download from Palm's Web site, and once installed, you also get support for HTML e-mail and more security options (encryption of miniSD cards, remote data wipe)--all the benefits of Windows Mobile 6, which you can read about in our full review.

In addition to the update, Palm also announced it has begun selling unlocked versions of the … Read more

Start Windows in an Instant

No two jobs are alike, but one thing millions of us have in common is the daily wait for Windows to get going. Why can't our PCs start as quickly as our radios, TVs, and other electronic devices?

Well, the instant-on PC isn't likely to arrive anytime soon, but you can get your workday rolling without having to stare down that annoying Windows logo. The simplest solution is to set Windows' Power Options to send your system into XP's standby or Vista's sleep mode after it has been idle for a while. Then you can simply … Read more