Windows vista pricing
This Blog has been published on http://nikhilw.blogspot.com
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Yesterday Microsoft accidentally released the pricing scheme for Vista in Canada, leaving some speculation as to what the prices would be in US dollars. (They charge our northern neighbors more than they do us in the states.) Well, Amazon.com has now listed Vista on their site, along with the prices, which are as follow:
Full Retail:
* XP Home w/ SP2: $199
* Vista Home Basic: $199
* Vista Home Premium: $239
* Vista Business: $299
* XP Pro. w/ SP2: $299
* Vista Ultimate: $399
Upgrades:
* XP Home w/ SP2: $99
* Vista Home Basic: $99
* Vista Home Premium: $159
* XP Pro. w/ SP2: $199
* Vista Business: $199
* Vista Ultimate: $259
(Note: I've included the retail prices of Windows XP for comparison purposes.)
Those who already own a license to a copy of Vista can purchase additional licenses by purchasing the associated License Pack, which costs an average of $20 less than the above listings.
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Also for comparison, equivalences are:
Windows Vista Home Basic = Windows XP Home
Windows Vista Home Premium = Windows XP Media Center Edition
Windows Vista Business = Windows XP Professional
Windows Vista Ultimate = No matching SKU
Other versions:
1.) Like with Windows XP, there will be 'N' versions available in Europe which lack the pre-installed WMP (required under the EU ruling), but they will be the same price as their WMP-touting counterparts.
2.) There will be a Vista Starter edition available in underdeveloped countries. It will be greatly limited when it comes to graphical and multitasking capabilities.
3.) There will be an Enterprise edition. It is a superset to Vista Business edition and will only be available to companies with a Microsoft Software Assurance agreement.
windows live writer beta
Windows Live Writer beta is a free desktop blogging application that lets you create and format blog entries and post them to multiple accounts. Why not use your own blog service's editing interface or a Web page creation app, such as Dreamweaver, to do such work? Unlike other WSIWYG editors, Windows Live Writer beta lets you drop customized maps from Windows Live Local beta into your blog posts and also make adjustments to pictures without needing to open an image-editing application. Because Microsoft has made the code of Writer beta public, we anticipate that Microsoft and third-party developers will eventually add plug-ins to enhance this app's capabilities.
The download and installation of Windows Live Writer beta took us less than five minutes on a Windows XP machine. No Windows Live ID is required. Once we opened Writer, it walked us through configuring the program for our personal blog. You can use Writer to make posts to a Windows Live Spaces blog or to a blog hosted by Blogger, LiveJournal, TypePad, or WordPress. Windows Live Writer beta also offers MovableType, RSD, and MetaWeblog support.
Windows Live Writer beta lets you tweak images within a blog entry to adjust the size or brightness and add effects, such as a watermark.
We gave Writer beta the URL, the username, and the password for our TypePad blog and sat back for several minutes while Writer beta said it was detecting our editing style. Writer verified the name and location of our blog, then opened a blank page with the same background color and font type as our blog so that we could compose prose and insert images instantly. A drop-down menu of categories let us choose from among the tags we'd used to categorize our posts in the past. Unfortunately, Writer did not import our past blog posts, a feature we'd like to see added so that we could archive and refer to our content in one locally saved place.
Later, we added our Windows Live Spaces blog to Writer, which again displayed our blog's formatting as it renders within Internet Explorer. Writer let us switch back and forth between our pair of blog sites with a quick pick from a top drop-down menu.
The interface is self-explanatory, featuring a blog composition pane in the center and drop-down menus and formatting icons on top that link to Writer beta's features. You can view a post in progress, see a preview of the published version, or view the HTML source code. A list of recent posts appears along the collapsible right edge of the screen.
To add a road or aerial map for directions within your blog or a Bird's Eye View to illustrate a location, Writer lets you insert Windows Live Local's dynamic maps, then go online to save that map to your Local account.
As other Windows Live services play well with each other, Writer integrates with Microsoft's next-generation online mapping tool. You can insert customized Windows Live Local beta maps into your blog post, complete with detailed routes and descriptions and Local's Bird's Eye views. To write a blog entry about eating organic lunches in downtown San Francisco, we dropped in maps to show readers where to walk. You can customize maps after inserting them, should you change your mind about whether to show, say, an aerial view instead of a road map or to pick a different place altogether. Click a map within the blog composition window, and you can jump to Windows Live Local to sign in and save that content. When a visitor to your blog clicks the map you've embedded, a new browser window pops up, directing them to a Windows Live Local beta map that they can manipulate (it would be even cooler if readers could manipulate the map on your blog without leaving the page).
When inserting an image, you can tell Writer beta to upload it automatically to your blogging service or to transfer it to your blog via FTP. It's handy that Writer lets you change a picture's size and brightness and add effects, such as a drop shadow or sepia tone. However, during our preliminary tests, we didn't find any shortcuts for inserting a table or embedding videos or music files into a blog entry.
We like that Writer beta lets you ping servers easily at Technorati, Icerocket, and elsewhere to tell the world you've posted a new entry, which is a clunky manual process in TypePad. And it was easy to manage TrackBacks and Comments settings within Writer.
Windows Live Writer beta is a preview product, not a final release, so there are some testing glitches. Unfortunately, Writer mysteriously shut down while we were tweaking an image. We're glad that we could save a draft of our blog and later pick up online where we left off, but we couldn't retrieve a draft of a blog entry saved remotely at our TypePad account. And while we could add categories imported from our TypePad account, we couldn't figure out how to add new tags. During our tests, a searchable online knowledge base for Windows Live Writer beta contained only two topics, but that section will probably be expanded.
Jokes: Mouse Trouble
This blog is posted on
http://nikhilw.blogspot.com======
Once optional, now essential, the mouse is one of the most misused,
misunderstood peripherals in the home computer market. Keyboards and
printers are easier to grasp by those already familiar with typewriters, but
the principles of the mouse are unprecedented in the mainstream.
Several years ago I was at a computer show demoing software. The audience was comprised of retired school teachers. I explained how to use the mouse to point to things on the screen. As I walked around the room making sure everyone was doing ok, I saw one woman holding her mouse to the Mac's monitor moving the mouse around on the screen. ---------------------------------------
One customer held the mouse in the air and pointed it at the screen like a TV remote, all the while clicking madly.
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I was teaching a user about windows.
Me: "Move the cursor up to the menu line. . . . Move the cursor to the menu line. . . . Move the mouse up to move the cursor up to the menu line. . . ." Still, nothing was happening on the screen. Finally I looked over her right shoulder to see what she was doing. She had raised the mouse literally up -- about a foot off the desk.
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Tech Support: "Ok, can you see the arrow in the middle of the screen?" Customer: "Yes." Tech Support: "Good! Now trying moving the mouse around. Do you see the arrow moving?" Customer: "No." Tech Support: "Not even a little?" Customer: "No, not at all." I spent several minutes having the user follow the cable from the the mouse to the back of the PC. It was plugged in all the way.
Tech Support: "Ok, try moving it again. Up, down, left, right -- anything?" Customer: "Nope, still nothing." Tech Support: "Hmmm, maybe the table is too slippery -- why don't you try rolling the mouse on a book or a piece of paper?" Customer: "Oh!! On the table!"
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One lady, in an Excel class, was having a terrible time with the mouse until the instructor noticed that she was literally pointing with her finger and clicking the mouse.
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Tech Support: "Ok, to access the files on the disk click the mouse on the picture of the disk." Customer: "Nothing happened. I told you, I've already tried this." Tech Support: "Ok, do it again. Is the mouse moving?" Customer: "Yep." Tech Support: "On the screen?" Customer: "Yep." Tech Support: "Now click twice on the picture of the disk." The consultant hears two clicks. Customer: "Nothing." Tech Support: "Ma'am, double click once more for me." The consultant hears the two clicks again. Tech Support: "Ma'am, are you hitting your screen with your mouse?"
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Tech Support: "Ok, now click your left mouse button." Customer: (silence) "But I only have one mouse."
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And another user was all confused about why the cursor always moved in the opposite direction from the movement of the mouse. She also complained about how hard it was to hit the buttons. She was quite embarrassed when we asked her to rotate the mouse so the tail pointed away from her.
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courtesy:
some jokes website
Inkjet photos are turning yellow?: Don't Worry
This Blog is posted on
http://nikhilw.blogspot.comDoes your snaps carrying those cherished memories have faded away. You can
stop that straight. Read on to know how .......
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First of all, BACK UP YOUR PICTURES!!! Put them on a CD, a DVD, another hard drive, an Internet storage site--some place safe.
BOTH the ink and the paper contribute to the loss of quality on any printed material over time. I will address ink later, as it is a little more in depth of an explanation. Your question was regarding cost, so we'll get right to that.
PAPER The first thing you should be sure of is that you are using acid-freepaper.
Bad paper, light, and gases in the air are the top contributors to yellowing in printed material. For maximum print life, you should display all prints under glass or lamination and properly store them.
QUALITY vs. COST If it's a quality issue, then you should stick with the recommended products from your manufacturer. That is the only guarantee the printer maker will offer you, and it's extremely limited, at that.
There are a few things you can do to reduce the costs of printing your own pictures.
1. Several online photo sites will print quality pictures for a reasonably low cost.
2. Local stores are starting to offer both digital and traditional film-developing options. You will see kiosks popping up all over soon, with trained staff to assist you in printing your own digital images on their machines.
3. Research, research, research--the professional home photographers who print their own work lean toward specialized printers that use a different type of ink (for the most part).
Major manufactures do offer inkjet printers that are comparable in price to other manufacturers' and are available to home users with the benefits of the ink that is used by commercial companies.
NOTE: Most inkjet printers are dye-based and/or offer only two ink tanks (black and color). Sometimes, the upfront cost is more, but the ink is less in the long run. You should look for printers that offer individual tanks for ALL the colors and black. That way, you are replacing only one tank at a time, as opposed to a tank full of all the colors, thus reducing your costs.
INK Understanding ink and print is something that usually only commercial users concern themselves with. But here's the skinny: There are two basic options available to the home user.
1. Dye-based inks (most common) dissolve in water like sugar. They spread out on paper and don't bond tightly. This makes them more vulnerable to light and air. That's why your pictures faded quicker. A dye-based ink will typically last only about 6 to 12 months before noticeable change takes place.
2. Pigment-based ink is the type that most commercial printers use. Basically, they form a bond, settling with the actual fibers that make up the paper so that they don't reflow (like sugar water). They are more resistant to water and light. Once the bond is formed, they tend not to smudge, and if they get hit by water or humidity, they don't dissolve the colors. You should know that commercial printers use an archival-quality ink on acid-free paper. That's why they cost more.
I typically don't like to overpromote any one manufacturer, but Epson does offer what it calls DuraBrite ink. If you do a cost analysis, you'll see that these inks stay steadier in price. They're not the cheapest but not the most expensive and have remained that way over the years. DuraBrite ink is pigment-based and comes with individual refills. Read about it here:
http://www.epson.com.au/products/consumables/dura_brite.aspFor my everyday use, I chose the CX 5400 all-in-one...doesn't have all the bells and whistles, but it has outlasted all my other printers, and I have spent a whole lot less money printing since I switched. And I do A LOT of printing for the home and office.
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Courtesy
Cnt networks
