Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

The Zune has some reason to celebrate, and while they are still far from Apple and the iPod, they have just reached the respectable 2 million sold mark. This new level comes just about one year from when Microsoft announced they sold the first million Zune’s, and with the increased sales some increased market share comes as well. Microsoft has been (albeit small) affecting the market share of some others such as Creative, who recently saw a two-percent drop. While the Zune has still not been able to affect the iPod with any major significance, its seems to be in the game for the long haul and has only been improving since its initial launch back in November 2006.

Via [electronista]

$899 million euros or $1.4 billion is definitely a huge sum of money and it seems like Microsoft would not just want to lose that amount over an anti-trust ruling that the EU has slapped Microsoft in February 2007. The fine was a result of a case filed against Microsoft for failing to comply with a 2004 ruling. So, Microsoft is appealing the EU ruling and hoping against all hopes that the EU would heed its plea to overturn the ruling or at least reduce the fine.

If you recall, sometime in 2004, the EU slapped Microsoft with a $768 million fine after it failed to comply with an anti-trust ruling that ordered Microsoft to provide rival companies with data that would allow their servers to connect to the Windows platform which was the predominantly used operating systems in majority of the PCs in 2004. In return, Microsoft is allowed to charge reasonable royalties for giving rival companies access to its Windows Platform.

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Microsoft has brought back their “Ultimate Steal” promotion, and once again are offering a great deal on Office Ultimate. Microsoft is currently running the promotion for students which will allow them to save $620, which is 91% off the retail price of Microsoft Office Ultimate. The office suite normally retails for $680, however up until May 16 anyone with access to a .edu address can take advantage of this deal.

Based on the website for the promotion, you must be an active student, meaning you are currently enrolled in a class, however the New York Times is reporting that all you need is an active .edu email address. Well, I have a spare $60 lying around, just a shame I don’t still have access to my old .edu address.

Read [The Ultimate Steal] Via [Lifehacker]

Software giant Microsoft and Korea-based car company Hyundai reportedly have partnered so the former could provide music for the latter’s cars. By 2010, Hyundai cars to be distributed in North America only are expected to feature a voice-controlled system that is connected to the vehicle’s stereo and other mobile devices.

No official specs have been revealed yet but it is safe to say that Bluetooth connectivity will be present aside from the direct cable connections that we usually find in car’s audio system to play portable devices such as the MP3 players and mobile phones. SlashGear even made a prediction that text messages could be read out loud by the system. 

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Microsoft has released Windows XP SP3 to the masses and also re-added Vista SP1 as an automatic update. After having some recent compatibility issues, Microsoft had delayed SP3 for XP and although SP1 for Vista remained available, it had to be manually downloaded.

It seems everything has been fixed and both updates are now available and waiting to be installed. Simply wait for Windows Update to kick in, or if you feel like you cannot wait any longer lunch the Update get the satisfaction on having an up to date system, at least for a little while.

Via [Engadget]

Well it only took about 18 months but the Zune is finally making its way into Canada. Beginning June 13 Canadians will be able to grab the Zune of their choosing. Well, except for a few small details, namely the lineup is not quite as complete as it is here in the US.

There will not be any 30GB model or green models. Do our friendly neighbors to the north have something against green? Anyway, up for grabs will be the Zune 80 in black or red for $249.99, the Zune 8 in black, red or pink for $189.99 and the Zune 4 in black, red or pink for $139.99.

Via [Engadget]

The Yahoo-Microsoft deal that wasn’t: a victory for emotion and memory.

You saw it in Yahoo co-founder and CEO Jerry Yang’s “OK, so now what?” post on his Yodel Anecdotal blog. And you really saw it in the comments to that post.
Yang is now being spanked throughout the blogosphere for having the temerity to say no to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. Allegations of Yahoo execs high-fiving each other after the deal fell through will no doubt end up in the inevitable shareholder lawsuits.

True, the shareholders are the ones losing a lot of money as they watch the stock price sink. A thousand blog posts won’t make them believe Yang when he writes that he was trying to maximize shareholder value - his executive mandate - by hanging tough for what was believed to be $37 a share.

But he’s also blogged about keeping another group in mind during this process: customers. End users. The people whose patronage ends up paying the bills. Yahoo! isn’t doing as good a job at keeping them happy as it used to, but enough fans still exist and they want an independent, Microsoft-free Yahoo!

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Look who’s playing catch up with Apple’s iTunes?  Microsoft has confirmed the rumors that it will start selling TV shows in its Zune Marketplace, possibly to compete with the recently announced iTunes movie download offerings. For starters, Microsoft has sealed a deal with NBC, which incidentally is coming off the recent break-up with Apple’s iTunes.

Although Microsoft’s move maybe a little bit late, lagging behind Apple’s iTunes which started selling TV shows two years ago, Microsoft is confident that its Zune Marketplace will be able to make some headway over the iTunes especially now that one of iTunes biggest content providers has decided to move over to the Zune Marketplace. NBC and Apple had previously disagreed over pricing which caused NBC to stop offering their content in iTunes. 

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Our personal choice for low-cost, well actually free Windows anti-virus has been AVG for a long time now, which as you can imagine is directly related to the price. There are lots of great alternatives and I cannot or will not attempt to tell you which is the best, however if you are looking for another alternative to AVG, that you can also get for free, check out Microsoft OneCare 2.0, which currently is free after rebates. Amazon is offering OneCare 2.0 for $30 along with a $30 mail-in-rebate, which will in turn lower the cost to $0. Similar to other subscription based services, this $30 will offer one-years worth of protection, after which it will have to be renewed.

Product [Amazon] Via [jkOnTheRun]

Yesterday, the mighty (or once mighty) Jerry Yang, CEO of Yahoo! wrote a blog post entitled, “Ok, so now what?”.  The post was what you would think a CEO might write about his actions under the Microsoft microscope and hopes for a bright future.  One of the fun thing about blogging is the response it invites.  The response Mr. Yang got is rather interesting:

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