Windows Media Player 10 is the all-in-one media player that provides the best experience for discovering, playing and taking your digital entertainment anywhere--on Windows XP PCs and the widest choice of portable devices.

Today at RSA, Bill Gates talked about Internet Explorer 7. As the guy responsible for IE, I wanted to say a couple of things about it.

MSN Messenger 7 Beta Build 604 contains quite a number of changes from the previous beta build (425) including slightly modified icons and a grey text message next to each contact icon's name actually explaining their current status (Online, Away, Offline etc).

Thanks to Neowin for the Heads Up!

According to a message posted on February 9th at the MSN Messenger download site, all users on 6.1 and 6.2 are being forced to upgrade to the latest build or be 'blocked' from the service.

Flexbeta.net has got it's take on Windows XP Reduced Media Edition, which is basically Windows XP Pro stripped of it's Windows Media Player. To sum it up, there is hardly any noticable difference between XP RME and XP Pro, except for the welcome screen and Windows not recognizing their own file format. The article hints how this may be the beginning to a Windows OS clean of Microsoft applications. Bye-Bye IE?

The February 2005 Update of the Microsoft DirectX SDK is finally here.

Install Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) Release Candidate 2 (RC2) to help secure your server and to better defend against hackers. Windows Server 2003 SP1 RC2 enhances security infrastructure by providing new security tools such as Security Configuration Wizard, which helps secure your server for role-based operations, improves defense-in-depth with Data Execution Protection, and provides a safe and secure first-boot scenario with Post-setup Security Update Wizard. Windows Server 2003 SP1 RC2 assists IT professionals in securing their server infrastructure and provides enhanced manageability and control for Windows Server 2003 users.

Tweak MCE gives you access to systems settings and options not normally exposed in the Windows XP Media Center Edition user interface, including remote control settings, Skip and Replay time customizations, user interface options, and more. It also helps you to optimize Media Center Extender for plasma and non-CRT displays.

The security updates for February 2005 include several high-priority updates for Microsoft Windows that also affect Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Internet Explorer, and Microsoft Media Player technologies. If you have any of the software listed on this page installed on your computer, you should install the updates from Windows Update.

This week at Neowin, we've had the chance to take a look at Microsoft's answer to the controversial EU decision.

Microsoft have been forced to remove their Windows Media Player from Windows XP. The product which was originally named "Reduced Media Edition" is rumoured to be renamed after the EU complained to Microsoft officials about their naming strategy.

Microsoft adopted a new mantra on Thursday, promising to work harder to make its software work better with other software systems and hardware, Chairman Bill Gates said in an e-mail to customers.
Previously, such e-mails signaled the launch of massive new efforts by the world's largest software company. The last major initiative, to improve the security of the company's software, was launched by Gates three years ago, and most messages since then have focused on that issue. But in Thursday's lengthy e-mail, sent to major corporate customers and made public by Microsoft, the company said it would boost efforts to make its software work more smoothly, or "interoperate" with other existing technologies. Reuters has more

TechWeb reported:Microsoft on Thursday gave early warning that next week's monthly dose of security bulletins and patches will be among its biggest ever. According to the Advance Notification service, which pre-announces upcoming patches but limits the information disclosed, next Tuesday's roundup will include 13 security bulletins, at least three of which will be marked "Critical," the Redmond, Wash.-based developer's most dire warning.

But it's not Linux. And sorry, Apple Computer fans, it's not the Mac.
The biggest rival to Windows sales is Windows itself--or rather pirated copies of the OS. And Microsoft is starting to put its foot down. In its most serious bid yet to reap revenue from those who've been getting Windows without payment to Microsoft, the company plans to require computer owners to verify that their copy of Windows is properly licensed before allowing them to download software from Microsoft's site. By mid-year, the once voluntary Windows Genuine Advantage program will become mandatory. Read on at ZdNet

Microsoft has never released a service pack for Windows98 SE. But I made a Service Pack for Windows98 SE users. It contains all Windows98 SE updates from WindowsUpdate site and more.

CD copy-protection specialist Macrovision is to work with Microsoft to ensure their respective DRM and anti-rip technologies are interoperable, the two companies said this week. Sounds straightforward enough, but the deal runs deeper. Microsoft agreed to license a number of Macrovision's patents, in particular those relating to analogue copy protection technology and more recent extensions to that system that cover video-on-demand, pay-per-view content and support for the US 'broadcast flag', which determines whether consumers will be able to record digital TV broadcasts.............
"An Internet-delivered movie, downloaded to a PC, can now be protected on analog video playback out of a PC," the two companies claimed. The deal also signals MS' interest in building pay-per-view, VoD and support for other approaches to content delivery into Windows, the better to turn Media Center PCs into the jack-of-all-trades home entertainment systems MS wants them to be............. Read on at TheReg

Thanks to garrikfox in our forums for the hint. Windows XP Professional x64 Edition RC 1 is available for download on Microsoft website. If you want to play a bit, add if free to your Cart Quote:Note: The Windows XP Professional x64 Edition - CD will not be available until approximately late February. If you prefer to not wait for the CD version, you are welcome to continue to process your order for the download version. Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is designed to address the most demanding business needs of technical workstation users who require large amounts of memory and floating point performance in areas such as mechanical design and analysis, digital content creation, and scientific and high-performance computing applications.

This download enables you to update the Web Folders component in Microsoft Windows operating systems, and provides additional functionality.

Thats right folks! MSN has made the preview off the next msn.com available! Feel free to take the tour and try the new MSN.com BETA here! If you hate the new layout, go back to the old one!

Myth (Definition) - A fiction or half-truth, especially one that forms part of an ideology. There are numerous Myths floating around the Internet regarding Windows XP, especially relating to Optimizations and Security. Hopefully this site will debunk some of these.

A completely new version of the famous Scriptomatic, the utility that writes WMI scripts for you. (And, in the process, teaches you the fundamental concepts behind writing WMI scripts for yourself.) Unlike its predecessor, Scriptomatic 2.0 isn?t limited to writing just VBScript scripts; instead, Scriptomatic 2.0 can write scripts in Perl, Python, or JScript as well.