Archive for the ‘Miscellaneous’ Category

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Yep, I just received mine via UPS about 10 minutes ago! Below are some pictures, but before that, here’s a description of everything in the package:

- 4 packs of party streamers
- Windows 7 napkins
- Balloons (just plain-old balloons, no Windows 7 branding)
- A deck of Windows 7 playing cards
- A Windows 7 puzzle of the turtle wallpaper
- A table-top center piece
- Some random Windows 7, “thank you” cards
- Some miscellaneous information
- Windows 7 carrying bags for party guests
- Some spam flyers for Nero, Norton, Kaspersky and Zune
- A Windows 7 poster
- A “Steve Ballmer-signed Edition” of Windows 7
- A 64-bit Windows 7 promotional disc in its own little white CD sleeve
- A beat-up Windows 7 decorative box that looks like Ace Ventura personally delivered it in

The “special edition” of Windows 7 is a thin cardboard cut-out with only a 32-bit promotional disc in it. I’m grateful for the free license, but they couldn’t stick the 64-bit version in a pre-cut slot on the other leaf? lol. Anyway, onward to some (crummy, I know… my camera was running out of batteries, the lighting was not optimal and my dog ate my homework) pictures!

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

I was super-excited today when I got home to see my fresh new GPU awaiting me in front of my door (check out the size of this freakin’ thing). Before you could say, “why the heck hasn’t Microsoft hired Rafael Rivera yet,” I slapped that puppy in my mobo, fired it up, installed the drivers and went to run WinSAT to acquire my new WEI rating (5.9 because of my hard drives… booo, everything else is at least 7.2).

If you’re never run WinSAT via command line, there are a number of ways you can run the tool. The way I chose to run it was: winsat formal -restart clean

Unfortunately, I couldn’t remember the command, so I pulled up WinSAT’s help information by running: winsat /?

When I did that, I was presented with what I consider to be a massive failure:

It looks like someone copied the text out of Wordpad or something and compiling the application incorrectly formatted the open/close quotes that should be around, “forgethistory”. Also, doing a Google search (and a Bing one, for posture), there were no results for, “winsat winast” (I didn’t have those in quotes when I searched), so I’m not sure Microsoft is aware of this yet. Because of that, it’s obvious that *nobody* leverages WinSAT via command line but me… soooo, I guess that makes me the ultimate nerd, huh? lol. That, and I suppose this post makes me a, “grammar nazi” to boot, huh? Oh well.

Hey, I don’t have Vista installed on any of my machines any longer, so do any of you want to check and see if this issue is present in it as well? In a command line window, just run: winsat /?

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

For those who like saving money, read onward!

With the news and excitement surrounding Bing having died down to not even a whisper, I thought I would cook up a post to serve both as a reminder for those who are familiar with and those who are new to Bing’s cashback program. I was familiar with it, but at the time of Bing’s launch, the cashback program wasn’t near as fruitful as it is now. Honestly, the cashback program has become the most exciting feature of Bing for me! Why? Because I do a lot of online shopping. Naturally, we all have our preferred merchants who we find typically have the lowest price of anyone out there. This is *really* where Bing’s cashback action comes into play, because I get cashback for just about every single one of my preferred outlets: Buy.com, Newegg, Amazon – you name it, they probably have some kind of cashback percentage for it. Heck, I’ve even purchased items from Ebay sellers who had Bing cashback discounts! For reference, you can find a massive list of participating online retailers right on this section of Bing.

Example: I’ve recently had my eye on the SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4870 Vapor-X 2GB GPU.

First, I try searching Google Shopping and sort the results by lowest price first. Then, I did the same with Bing Shopping. The results? Not counting Google Shopping’s one false-positive (the acmemicro.com link is actually a 1GB model; not the 2GB), Bing has the lowest price from Newegg with cashback factored in. Even with going to Newegg and factoring in shipping, I still come in at equally as much as Google’s first lowest of $194 (antaresdigital.com, but the site doesn’t show you how much shipping is). For good measure, I searched for the same card on Amazon.com, Buy.com and pricewatch.com. Amazon was priced higher, Buy didn’t have the card, and low and behold, the lowest-priced card on pricewatch.com is our $194 friend from Google Shopping’s results (antaresdigital.com)! And would you look at that; we have a shipping price included! It’s $10, bringing their total to $204. Newegg’s total with Bing cashback and shipping is $194, so there you go. While those aren’t savings that are going to allow you to go crazy buying scratch-off tickets at your local gas station, this is just one example. More results like this one will add up over time and there are *plenty* out there where you can save in the 10′s of dollars (and like I said, that’s especially awesome when you find cashback like that on items that are already priced the lowest you can find on the net).

So, if you’re new to Bing’s cashback program or you haven’t checked it out since Bing’s launch, go ahead and give it a shot! Take about 5 things you want to buy, find the lowest price you can via Google, then go to Bing’s shopping section of the site and search for the same item. Even *if* you find your item priced lower elsewhere directly from a vendor, with Bing’s cashback applied to the same item from a different vendor with a higher cost, you still may very well end up with a lower price when all is said and done! Soooo… that’s it! Go have a field day shopping with Bing!

ATTENTION DEVELOPERS: This post just made me think of a cool gadget that I’m sure one of you talented programmers out there could whip up. How about a Bing gadget that will allow you to type the name of an item you’re searching for and have it return Bing’s lowest price on that item (with or without cashback) which you can then click on to be taken to that vendor’s site? Maybe something like this already exists… but if not, I know I’d certainly help you promote it!

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

Just a short ‘n sweet update here for those of you interested developers. From the Microsoft Download Center: “The Windows 7 Training Kit for Developers includes presentations, hands-on labs, and demos designed to help you learn how to build applications that are compatible with and shine on Windows 7.” The training kit is noted to utilize key Windows 7 features, such as:

* Taskbar
* Libraries
* Multi-Touch
* Sensors and Location
* Ribbon
* Trigger Start Services
* Instrumentation and ETW
* Application Compatibility

And Application Compatibility topics such as:

* Version Checking
* UAC Data Redirection
* Session 0 Isolation
* Installer Detection
* User Interface Privilege Isolation
* High DPI

Source: Windows 7 Training Kit For Developers Website

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

I just finished watching a really neat documentary on Bill Gates (from just over a year ago, actually… can’t believe I’d never heard of it ’til recently) and figured some of you might find it interesting as well. The woman interviewing Bill, Fiona Bruce, waited a solid 2 years (and not a day too soon, as it takes place just a week or so before he retired) to finally get this opportunity! Weighing in just shy of the hour mark, this documentary is a good summary of the making of Microsoft, the major issues surrounding the company throughout the years, and the history of the man himself, Bill Gates, in addition to his focus beyond the company once stepping down. There are a few familiar faces throughout this documentary, including Steve Ballmer, Steven Sinofsky, and, of course, Bill Gates.

There are some really great photos of a young Bill Gates, as well as a few great looks at Bill’s passion when sitting in on meetings with groups. Let’s just say he’s not a boss I would want to upset.

Also interviewed are integral figures of Microsoft’s competition from years past. There is one person in particular who seems to still hold Bill accountable for what he deems were ruthless and unfair business practices. Even with Bill Gates pumping some 30+ BILLION dollars into trying to rid the world of malaria and similar diseases, some people have a chip on their shoulder. I suppose that’s understandable to some degree, though. Interestingly enough, there’s not a single mention of Apple, Linux, or any of the head figures from either establishment. All-in-all, if you don’t know much about Bill Gates or the history of Microsoft, this is a great place to start!

Oh, and if you weren’t interested yet, you’ll catch things like this in the documentary:

Enjoy!

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

If you’re not a Microsoft Partner, chances are, you have no idea about most of their exclusive offerings. One such offering is DOVO: Desktop Optimization using Windows Vista and Office 2007. Pulled from Microsoft’s, “DOVO For Partners” Connect site:

“DOVO leverages Microsoft tools and technologies for deploying the desktop. Based on the Microsoft Deployment Solution Accelerator, it is designed to fully capture the benefits of desktop optimization by helping reduce total cost of ownership, improve user productivity, and increase agility.”

Now, with Windows 7 out in the wild, Microsoft is planning to upgrade this offering in a new little acronym called DOWO: Desktop Optimization using Windows 7 and Office 2007. DOWO is currently planned to be launched in 2009 Q4. Even further down the road, Microsoft has a projected probability of 60% that DOWO will get an update in 2010 Q2. The difference? Office 14 in lieu of Office 2007. Here is a comparison of the two from an internal Microsoft Partner offerings roadmap:

Since DOVO and DOWO are essentially the same type of offering (with DOWO leveraging more recent technology, of course), here’s a slide about DOVO from an internal presentation with an overview that adds to the description I provided from Microsoft’s connect site:

And for what it’s worth, I just couldn’t come up with anything corny enough to make a decent pun with the word, “dojo.” Feel free to indulge in the comments section below, should you be so bored…

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

About a month ago, I ran across a picture of an internal Windows 7 MCE box with a custom Windows 7 case. Doing a bit of research, I noticed it was being lugged around to various conferences/events… or maybe more than one of these was made. Regardless, I just happened upon a few more pictures to add to the collection. As I noted in my last post, I have no idea how this would be useful for anything more than demonstrative purposes… or perhaps an expensive entertainment system front-end. Anyway, on with the pictures (click on them for high-resolution versions):

If nothing else, the case certainly looks cool! =)

Update: An anonymous commenter left a link where you can view the specs for this hardware on the vendor’s site (customized Windows 7 case, not included) here.

-Stephen

That’s not Windows 7 you’re looking at; it’s ViGlance by LeeSoft running on Windows XP. Quite simple to install/enable, check out the promotional video below:

Whereas I use Vista and will absolutely upgrade to Windows 7 as soon as it RTM’s, if you’re one of the 2 XP users who has still refused to learn Windows Vista’s user interface and has also yet to install a single build of Windows 7 to fiddle with, then this appears to be a great way to get the feel of Windows 7′s taskbar, or, “Superbar,” as it has previously been called.

Well, what are you waiting for? Get it!

Website: LeeSoft ViGlance

-Stephen

My friend, Rafael, over at WithinWindows has posted an interesting article regarding the feature lock in Windows 7 Starter Edition which restricts users from changing the wallpaper. Apparently, OEMs and Microsoft’s Partners must abide by the same restrictions! He quotes via Microsoft:

“In Windows Starter Edition, OEMs must not modify or replace the Windows-provided background for Windows Welcome, the logon screen, or the desktop.”

Wow, so it’s not only the wallpaper on the desktop, but everywhere else a user or OEM could customize backgrounds! Chatting with Rafael, he also made a good point that this restriction makes little sense in lieu of keeping the 3-application limitation which was canned. Strange, indeed. I guess Microsoft figures that background customization is bound to drive a person crazy in ways the 3-application limit has yet to. At that rate, I wonder just how much the next SKU up from Starter Edition will cost, considering they obviously want users to upgrade.

How much are you willing to pay just to be able to change your wallpaper? lol.

Anyway, definitely make sure to catch the rest of his article here.

Source: WithinWindows.com

-Stephen

Check this post out from the forum of thewindowsclub.com! Member, “hackerman1″ has run a few tests on a really old (and I mean REALLY old) system just to see if Windows 7 would run on it… and it looks like he was successful! Here are the specs of the machine he used for his tests:

CPU: 266MHz Pentium 2
RAM: 128MB, 96MB, and 64MB RAM (He lowered the RAM for each test)
GPU: 4MB

Apparently, only 2 of the 3 tests were successful: 128MB RAM and 96MB RAM. Below are screenshots of the System screen show such success:

128MB RAM on left, 96MB RAM on right; click for larger images.

From, “hackerman1,” “[o]n my third test with 64 MB I got some error messages about “insufficient memory”, then it rebooted…”

Naturally, the aforementioned is merely a novelty, as I doubt anyone on this planet plans on running Windows 7 on such an old machine… but stranger things have happened, I suppose. Last of note is his mention of performing the Windows 7 test on a 166MHz Pentium 1 system that sports an amazingly-amazing Aero-worthy (not) 1MB GPU! Stay tuned to thewindowsclub‘s forum for more on that, if interested.

-Stephen

PS – Thanks to deeper2k for informing me of that post! =)