More details/reading
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/e2k7help/cb24ddb7-0659-4d9d-9057-52843f861ba8.mspx

James 2:14-18 (New International Version)

14What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
18But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds."
      Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.

As you may know we are nearing the end of the Office 2007 beta and we are getting ready to release Office 2007! Office 2007 is schedule to be available to business customers (and I assume MSDN subscribers) in Oct 2006 and it will be available to consumers in Jan 2007.

Source: http://blogs.msdn.com/descapa/archive/2006/10/18/next-steps-with-connect.aspx

Several people have complained to me the past few days about their inability to sign in to MSN messenger.  Using Windows Live Messenger on Vista/XP appears to be completely broken.

Messenger 7.5 appears unaffected; people who had trouble signing in were able to do so using 7.5.

I recently purchased a new Dell Optiplex 745 system (1.86 GHz Core 2 with 2x1 GB DDR2 SDRAM on a RADEON x1300 Pro).

I put Vista RC2 on this system; got a system benchmark score of 4.2.
Processor = 4.8,
Memory = 5.5,
Graphics (Aero) = 4.7,
Gaming (3D/gaming) = 4.2,
HDD = 5.3

I'm hooked.  With a system that actually takes advantage of all of these things - and with a system that actually meets the requirements... this is very nice.

There are still a few bugs - some kernel issues, network printing issues, and some multiple display issues that seem to pop up every once in a while.  I've bugged them - and this is shaping up very nicely.

How much does the general public actually know about Vista?  How many users think, "This is just another release..."?  There are lots of compelling reasons to upgrade; Vista harnesses the power of the latest hardware.  If you don't have the latest hardware, it's just more of the same - it's an operating system!  But on the latest hardware, you begin to see streamlining in the way you work... you get more work done, faster.  The system is more resilient and performs better than with previous versions of Windows.  You can feel it.

My T40 (1.6 GHz Centrino) just doesn't cut it.  It's a combination of a bad graphics adapter, and slow HDD - but it just feels sluggish on RC2.  It's not like the code is bloated - it's just not designed for it.  Having used it on the latest desktop processor - I feel the difference.

So anyway:  If you haven't looked/used Vista before, start looking.  Whether you like it or not, it's coming - so why not start testing?  Gamers, developers, casual users alike: Vista (desktop) or Longhorn server have features that you're going to like.  You're going to want it.  You just don't know it yet... because you've convinced yourself that Microsoft has nothing new to offer you.

Here's my bottom line:

Vista: Start menu has integrated search == productivity.
New kernel schedules tasks better, leaving system more responsive under high load.
User account control means proper escalation of privileges.

Server: Server core.  Streamlined wizards/role-based configuration tasks.  Actually snappier.

Just got build 5744 completely (x86).  It's marked as RC2.

• Daemon Tools works well.
• Install is fast
• All my devices work, and are supported properly.  My IBM ThinkPad needed the IBM a/b/g wireless drivers from OEM, and the IBM Power Management driver, also from OEM.  Everything else is working out of the box.
• Shell is nice and snappy.  Nice UI.
• I put MaxiVista 3.0 beta build 22 on this machine - and with 3 monitors, this build has allowed me to completely replace my previous development environment.
• I can do everything I need to do - at the speed I'm used to - on this build.  No annoying bugs encountered so far.