Daily Tech Digest

Good news for all the Microsoft Surface fans, you can now experience Surface at a store near to you in london at New Malden. The new revamped Currys Megastore at New Malden has got a demo table so that you can experience it whenever you want. The whole store is in itself a unique concept as to the whole layout of the store has changed and there is loads of varied products to have a first hand experience.

I had a chance to experience surface and believe me it was a once in a lifetime experience when i least expected it. The applications included in it were Google Maps, Paint and there were apps. related to news, photography and there was the most famous application which many of us seenon Youtube or anyother site that whenever a mobile phone is placed on the surface, pictures and music pop out on the screen with which you can play. Wel let me tell you that it needs a Winodws Mobile or atleast J2me installed on it and a mobile application which allows communication between the devices.

So go ahead and have a first hand experience on Microsoft Surface at the address given below.

Currys Megastore
New Malden
Burlington Rd
GB – New Malden KT3 4PA
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The latest operating system Windows 7 from Microsoft is the most compatible and the lightest version till now after Windows XP. The feedback from the PC users worldwide has been very positive, whether its concerned to the compatibility of older applications or the overall performnace improvement without compromising the speed of the computer.

Right now I am using the final version of Windows 7 Ultimate which i got through my MSDN account and guess what? all my older applications runs as smooth as it used to be on Windows XP. It includes Winrar, Yahoo Msg., MSN Msg., Gtalk, Lexmark Printer ans scanner, Opera, Safari, Firefox, PowerIso, UltraIso, Nero 7, Office 2007 Ultimate, Picasa and the list goes on , on & on……

Even for my Sony VAIO laptop which has got a decent config. of Intel Dual Core 2GHZ, 2GB DDR2 RAM, 250GB HDD and a DVD RW Drive (rating given by Windows 7 is 3.5) runs aplications without any hiccups which is far more better than compared to Windows Vista which would struggle even to run a simple application as Nero. The overall utilisation of processor is at max of 70% even when the PC is stressed to the max of using four applications at a time. The worst problem that i used to have in Windows Vista was Windows Update which used to take ages to install but in Windows 7 its a piece of cake, it hardly takes anytime to install the updates.

I would suggest all the Vista users to migrate to Windows 7 on or after Oct. 22nd  and utilise the full power of Windows without compromising on the speed.

Microsoft have confirmed that they will be releasing Windows 7 for public on October 22nd, 2009 and the RTM (Release to manufacturing) will be delievered to the partners by end of July this year.

In the recent keynote address at Computex 2009 in Taipei Microsoft’s OEM Division Corporate Vice President Steve Guggenheimer confirmed that they are ready to launch their latest offering of Windows by this year with the timeline given as end of July for RTM partners and October for general release.

As told by Steve Guggenheimer that

“We announce each milestone once we’re confident of where we are in the development cycle and that it is ready to be shared with customers and partners. We’ve received great feedback from our partners who are looking forward to offering Windows 7 to their customers in time for the holidays.”In addition to this, Guggenheimer announced that Microsoft will make available an upgrade option, so partners can offer customers the ability to purchase a Windows Vista-based PC and install Windows 7 when it’s ready.

“Microsoft has been working closely with partners to help our mutual customers be able to enjoy the many benefits of Windows 7,” he said. “With that in mind, we’re excited to say that there will be a Windows upgrade program available. Consumers can buy that new PC, whether for a student heading off to college or just because they need a new one, and know they’ll get Windows 7 as part of the deal.”

It will be available in six different versions as confirmed by Microsoft which will cater different type of users starting from Starter Edition, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise and then the Ultimate version which will have all the features of other versions as well.

So be ready the for the next OS from Microsoft and lets see how it turns out.

[SinglePic not found] Microsoft released it latest offering of Internet explorer 8 version on thursday. There are many sites which are still not compatible with this IE8 version and to overcome that problem users can simply switch to ”compatibility view” feature that enables the site to be viewed in IE7 mode.

Download Internet Explorer from Microsoft for Windows XP, Vista and Server 2003 and 2008 (32 and 64 bit versions).

Many new features have been introduced in IE including Webslices wherein a user can select a part or “slice” of the webpage to be updated signified by a green icon wherever visible. Just click on it and you will updated about it in your favourites. The best example being an ebay webpage wherein you can choose the product you are bidding on, add it to your webslice and get the latest updates on the bidding, instead of bookmarking the whole page.

Apart from this you also have InPrivate browsing in which none of your browsing history is stored, no cookies and no temporary internet files. Nowadays as many companies are keeping track of the browsing habits of the customers to deliver their products which sometimes becomes very annoying, the user have got the choice to bypass it. The users at the same time also have the choice of selecting which cookies or temporary internet files to be deleted.

Automatic crash recovery has also been integrated which has been missing from the previous versions of IE. If one of the tab crashes due to an add-on, it automatically closes without effecting other tabs which can also be called as “Tab Isolation”. In the event of all tabs unexpectedly closes or crashes, all the tabs are reloaded automatically and you can return to the pages open before the crash.

IE8 has got many more features which can be accessed on Internet Explorer home page.

[SinglePic not found]In the latest bid to gain an upperhand in the tech industry Microsoft have hired David Porter as Corporate VP of Retail Stores for the upcoming retail stores of the company. Their plans are to create a deeper relation with the consumer and also gaining a first hand on the customer review. The current news doing the rounds is that they will be using these stores to showcase their latest offering ie. Windows 7, Windows Mobile and Windows Live.

Lets see if they can bring out something much more sleek and bring along the Wow! factor of Apple into retail market. I think Porter would be able to pull out something interesting as he has previously worked with Walmart for 25 years with responsibilities in operations, merchandising and information technology and then moving in 2007  into Dreamworks,  biggest player in the animation industry, applying his management and creativity experience to the stores.