Vista is Microsoft’s last major Windows release

Market Research Company Gartner has said that the Vista operating system is the last major Windows release from the software giants.

Microsoft has already launched Vista for their business customers and a retail release is due for January 30.

Gartner said that the company is likely to focus on flexible updates rather than work on monolithic deployments of software releases.

The group further said that by 2010, 60 percent of worldwide mobile phone users will be “trackable” via an emerging “follow-me Internet” technology.

Microsoft - only two players capable of dominating the web race

Google is the market leader when it comes to search and online advertising. Yahoo! comes second. Microsoft trails in both these markets but is hopeful of closing the gap and become a leader in the coming years.

The software giant has now said that they believe that Google and Microsoft have pockets deep enough to survive in this competitive market.

Steve Berkowitz, head of Microsoft’s online services group said that Yahoo! is likely to end up becoming a smaller player relying upon third party services.

Berkowitz said: “You have to be able to invest at a level that only right now two companies in the world can invest at and that’s Google and Microsoft.”

Berkowitz added that they need to work hard on getting the web users to spend more time on their websites. We say, make your site work in Firefox and Opera and they just might do that. My experiences using MSN services is terrible on the Opera web browser. The web is platform independent. Do not force the user to use Internet Explorer and ActiveX and Windows Media Player technology.

Samsung, Microsoft launch new smartphone

Samsung Electronics joined Microsoft on Monday in launching the first mobile phone in Asia and Europe to use high-speed HSDPA wireless technology.

The companies said the phone — the Samsung Ultra Messaging i600 — was the world's thinnest 3G smartphone with a full QWERTY keyboard. It is also the first smartphone that supports Web applications like podcasts and RSS Feeder, which scans websites for updates, the companies said.

The announcement was made in Hong Kong at ITU Telecom World 2006, a major convention for the telecommunications industry.

The companies said the phone, which can connect with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.0, was designed for work and play. It has two digital cameras and can be used for 3G video calls.

"The mobile population is increasingly looking to use one device that easily plugs into their life, both in and out of the office," said Pieter Knook, a senior vice president at Microsoft.

The device, powered by Microsoft Windows Mobile 5.0, uses the new mobile protocol called HSDPA, or high-speed downlink packet access, that provides faster downloads of video and streaming music. The download speed is designed to be as fast as those provided by ADSL, or Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line, used in homes.