If you're either a TechNet or MSDN subscriber then there's no need to rush though the sooner you start evaluating Windows 7 the sooner you can realise the benefits in your business. The public download of Windows 7 Beta 1 finishes on 10th February so if you want to try it then you'd better get your skates...

The Windows Team Blog will be updated in the next few hours detailing when and where to download the public beta 1 of Windows 7 I've been running the PDC/WinHec build of Windows 7 since October daily as my main machine and it's worked brilliantly. James Senior's blog has some great links to and...

This may not be a problem for you but it's worth being aware that any websites that automatically sign you in (after you've logged in the first time and asked the browser to store your password for the site) will forget who you are - therefore make sure you know the passwords for such sites before upgrading...

If you’ve tried installing IE8 Beta 2 onto a machine that already had IE8 Beta 1 on it then you’ll have seen the following message: Install Windows Internet Explorer 8 A previous build of Internet Explorer 8 is already installed on your computer. You must remove it before installing the latest version...

I was surprised that the download link for Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 for Windows Vista wasn’t as easy to find as I’d expected hence writing this post. If you’re wondering why to give IE8 a go then you may wish to read the following sites: Internet Explorer Team Blog Internet Explorer site Internet Explorer...

I’m giving Internet Explorer 8 a whirl – it’s early days as we’re only at Beta 1 and I’ve found a glitch whereby upon installing the new version I lost the cookies on my machine. I’ve fed the problem back to the product group and am confident they will address the it as soon as they can. Post install...

The latest Community Technology Preview (CTP) for SQL Server 2008 (formerly known as "katmai") is available for download via the Microsoft Connect website . As is mentioned on the right hand side of the download page you need to register for the CTP BEFORE downloading the code otherwise you'll be disapointed...

The Microsoft Community team in corp have released betas of TagSpace, Microsoft Forums and Microsoft Blogs. The ethos is for us to provide plumbing to make it easier for communities to link up and share information. Browsing to the " Help Build Microsoft Community Applications & Services " page provides...

Forefront Client Security is one of the expanding range of Microsoft Forefront Security products. It's aim is to provide enterprises with the means to centrally define and measure compliance to an anti-malware policy. Specifically Forefront Client Security protects against Worms, Viruses and to some...

Following my post about recent builds of Windows Vista I received a comment from hir8er pertaining to frustration about the cost or difficulty of getting hold of the Beta software. This is the only blog post I've written over the last couple of years where I mention the price of anything or "push...

Click here to download Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 . IE 7 is nearing release bringing with it a wealth of security improvements including significant re-engineering and new features including the anti-phishing filter. Much will no doubt be made of the functionality improvements too such as the neat...

Internet Security and Acceleration Server is an established security product that's been in production environments since the year 2000. The second major release of the product was denoted "ISA 2004". ISA 2004 majors on protecting Microsoft Server applications including Exchange and Internet Information...

At last week's PKI TechNet event in Reading several people asked how to get around the challenge of allowing multiple certificates to be used (corresponding to individual HTTPS web sites) in conjunction with ISA's web server publishing feature. For those of you who many not be familiar with the problem...

There's a great deal of chatter on the web with regard to "a new CTP" (Community Technology Preview) of Windows Vista. Personally I'm participating in a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) community gathering - just like online there's a great deal of discussion about this build Build 5342...

I've read some entertaining posts about IE 7 beta 2 comparing it to some other browsers. One in particular made me laugh though I can't post it as it included an expletive ;-( and I don't want to offend anyone. I've been surprised by the number of children that read my blog. The post included the...

Click here to find out more about our updated AntiSpyware offering. Windows Defender is the new name for Microsoft AntiSpyware and it's built into the current Beta of Windows Vista. The website includes an interesting comparison of Windows Defender to the competing solutions in the market - click...

Note: The information in this post is based on the features of beta software and hence they may change before Windows Vista ships. To make the most of Windows Vista's advanced security features you need to ensure that new machines are TPM 1.2 compliant. TPM stands for Trusted Platform Module - details...

This is not a supported configuration nor am I recommending you to try this at home/work HOWEVER I'm happily running Virtual Server R2 (pre-release version) on Windows Vista Beta 1 - I'm runnning the beta that's available from the MSDN subscriber centre. I haven't yet managed to network my virtual clients...

This won't come as a surprise for those of you who've read many of my blog entries or who've discussed security with me directly but I have a somewhat obtuse Wireless Protected Access (WPA) passphrase and I've just mistyped it on my newly built Windows Vista client machine - I want to share with you...

Some of you may have read my post "What is R2" and wondered why on earth I only posted a single (not particularly funny) line entry. Many people ask me about R2 and so I figured I'd write a meaningful post - unfortunately I accidentally posted it as it was. R2 stands for "Release 2" - it is a generic...

We have just released a white paper which explains in detail the plans for Network Access Protection(NAP) to enforce the security of IPSEC clients. NAP will be a very powerful part of Windows Vista and the corresponding server operating system (currently referred to as Longhorn Server) which will make...

As of just a few moments ago there is content on the Windows Vista site which announces the limited availability of Beta 1. The software itself is being released to a limited number of official beta testers and hence you can't browse there and start pulling down a version to play with yourself - unless...

With SMS to Spaces you can easily send text messages to your MSN Space even if you are not near a PC! There is no charge for sending messages to your MSN Space however standard mobile charges apply. So you can be out on the road and still post text entries to your blog - very cool. Warning - this...

Michael Swanson beat me to it blogging about the availability of the beta code - if you've not already seen it I recommend checking out his article for an excellent overview. The beta code itself can be freely downloaded from here . Our internal testing has demonstrated that it's a useful tool in the...

Browse to http://blogs.msdn.com/benriga/archive/2004/12/28/338992.aspx for an interesting review of our upcoming anti-spyware software - Ben shares is experience of using the beta code.