Computers running Windows 7 have all of the features of the high-end Ultimate edition built in. A feature called Windows Anytime Upgrade lets users buy a code and unlock new features, a process that the software maker says can be done in just 10 minutes. Unfortunately, Microsoft hasn’t had much luck making users aware of or interested in such upgrades.

Well, find an unexpected “Easter egg” this Easter Sunday!
(Sorry, that was a horrible pun, but funny enough in my mind that I had to write it down…)

Microsoft is unleashing special pricing for “Windows Anytime Upgrade” on Sunday. For users that are buying new computers that don’t quite meet their OS expectations, Microsoft allows the simple opportunity to do so at a discounted price.

• Windows 7 Starter may be upgraded to Windows 7 Home Premium for $49.99 (compared to the typical $79.99 price tag)
• Windows 7 Home Premium may be upgraded to Windows 7 Professional for $79.99 (compared to the typical $89.99 price tag)

Now, why would you care about which version of Windows 7 you have? Perhaps you wanted a computer for entertainment purposes (Windows 7 Home Premium) or a computer to use for work (Windows 7 Professional), these are the reasons Microsoft points out in their blog post.

Act fast as this offer expires June 3, 2010 in the United States. Be advised, not all dealers will be participating in this special offer.

After purchasing your upgrade, follow step-by-step directions on how to implement your upgrade here.

Windows 7 WAU Home Premium to Professional - 64-bit (Product Upgrade - Standard - 1 PC - Retail - PC - English)

Prices start at

$79.99

Avg user rating

0 user reviews

Merchant

Price

Rating

$74.99

24289 Reviews

$79.99

409 Reviews

$86.00

28551 Reviews

$89.99

61 Reviews

$89.99

217 Reviews

Prices and availability are subject to change by merchant without notice. Please check with merchant for details. For all prices or availability click here

March 13th begins (Google-owned) YouTube’s drop of IE6. “The latest YouTube interstitial (messaging) is part of a campaign to encourage users to update their browsers in order to enhance their overall site experience,” notes the YouTube blog. And, as forewarned, Google will also be dropping IE6 support for Gmail and other Google Apps sometime in 2010.

So, what’s a web surfer to do? I channel Beyonce when I say I’m going to “introduce you to some new things and upgrade you, I can up, can I up, let me upgrade you.” Upgrade to a more modern browser! Google Chrome, Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox are all great choices. There’s also Opera and Safari.

Yay? Nay? According to Ars Technica, IE6 held 1/5th of the browser market early this year — not too surprising since Windows XP came packaged with the product. This may be largely due to the fact that many IT departments haven’t made that upgrade decision yet. But lots of people, including a numerous web developers and designers, despise the outdated browser and some have even come together via the “Hey IT” group.

Aten Design Group, a Denver-based design company with a sense of humor, will be bidding farewell to IE6 on March 4th. The funeral services will be held at their offices.

Come mix and mingle with Denver’s top IE6 mourners. We’ll have a special time of remembrance, a round of IE6 darts, and plenty of food & drinks.

Zazz, an online retailer, refurbishes a number of computers running Windows XP. And since “Customers started asking how these computers would run Windows 8,” Zazz media manager Scott Lewis had his team run a few tests. The results of his tests? Upgrade to Windows 7 already! Upgrading is especially recommended for computers running a dual-core processor and at least 2GB of RAM. However, those with less are also encouraged to upgrade. Surprisingly “Photoshop ran faster on Windows 7 even with 1GB or RAM,” says Lewis.

If you’re ready to upgrade, be sure to read Jeremy’s post on Windows 7 Upgrade Eligibility and Paths. Also, check out the Sydney Morning Herald article for more information on Lewis’ findings and a few useful links.

Upgrade Eligibility:

You are eligible to purchase an upgrade to any version of Windows 7 if you own any previous version of Windows starting with XP or later. Windows 98, 2000, and ME don’t qualify you to purchase an upgrade. If the PC you want to install Windows 7 on has a version of Windows older than XP, you will need to purchase a full retail or OEM version of Windows 7.

Upgrade Paths:

An Upgrade Path is a scenario where you can install Windows 7 without needing to back up your files. For example, if you are currently running Windows Vista Home Premium, and you want to go to Windows 7 Ultimate, you would be able to insert the Windows 7 Ultimate Upgrade disk while running Vista, it would then “convert” your Vista operating system to Windows 7 Ultimate; However, if you are currently running Vista Home Premium and you want to upgrade to Windows 7 Professional, you would have to back up your files and perform what’s called a “clean install” by rebooting your system from the disk and re-installing the operating system from scratch. You can only perform an upgrade path from the following versions of Vista to the corresponding versions of Windows 7:

Supported Upgrade Paths

Note: If you are upgrading from any version of Windows XP you will have to perform a clean install. There are no supported Upgrade Paths from Windows XP.

Windows 7 Professional (PC)

Prices start at

$129.99

Avg user rating

0 user reviews

Merchant

Price

Rating

TheProDeal

$214.65

2 Reviews

$229.00

119 Reviews

TheNerds.net

$231.99

11246 Reviews

$235.00

469 Reviews

$239.00

29430 Reviews

Prices and availability are subject to change by merchant without notice. Please check with merchant for details. For all prices or availability click here

The developers of Office 2008 for Mac SP2 listened to customer feedback to improve on this very popular software suite for the Mac. With this update, program such as Word and Powerpoint will launch faster. Excel also features speed improvements, most notably with faster calculations. Users can also customize their default Themes to include their preferred fonts, color schemes, layouts, etc.

The biggest improvement brought by SP2 is in the area of document collaboration and file-sharing. Office 2008 for Mac now supports seamless integration with Microsoft Office Live Workspace. This free file-sharing network now supports Safari 4 and Firefox, which will make it easier for users on all platforms to access their documents. Microsoft SharePoint, the enterprise level document sharing server, now has a better user experience for collaboration with Mac documents.

To download Office 2008 for Mac SP2 for free, check out this direct link from Microsoft. For a free trial of Office 2008 for Mac, check out this previous blog post.

Participation in this program varies between different manufacturers. Check out this Microsoft page for the complete list of participating manufacturers. That link also contains the complete FAQ on the Windows 7 free upgrade, if you have any questions.

Also starting today, Microsoft is opening up a heavily discounted pre-order program for Windows 7. To reward loyal customers, Microsoft if selling a pre-order of Windows 7 Home Premium for $49.99 and Windows 7 Professional for $99.99. This is 50% off the standard upgrade price. To pre-order your copy right now, check out the Miscrosoft Store.

Microsoft also announced the estimated retail prices for Windows 7 yesterday. The upgrade prices are as follows:

• Windows 7 Home Premium (Upgrade): $119.99
• Windows 7 Professional (Upgrade): $199.99
• Windows 7 Ultimate (Upgrade): $219.99

The full retail boxed version prices are as follows:

• Windows 7 Home Premium (Full): $199.99
• Windows 7 Professional (Full): $299.99
• Windows 7 Ultimate (Full): $319.99

Al of these products will start shipping on October 22nd.

I really like these aggressive pricing techniques from Microsoft. Let’s hope everyone will upgrade to Windows 7 right away, and we can finally put Vista behind us. Check out the Windows Team Blog for even more information.

With this new extension, HP will be able to offer its customers the option of Windows 7, Windows Vista, or Windows XP on new computers (once Windows 7 is released). This extension will last through April 30, 2010.

Since many Windows users were extremely reluctant to upgrade to Vista when buying a new computer, offering a Windows XP OEM alternative was essential for hardware manufacturers. These “downgrades” basically transferred the Vista user license to XP Professional at no charge, with the option of upgrading to Vista for free in the future. This is how the Windows 7 downgrade program will work as well.

Will users remain skeptical of the Windows 7 ugrade? The buzz around the internet is saying Windows 7 will receive a much more favorable response than Vista did, possibly making these downgrades obsolete. Maybe once Windows 7 is released it will finally be time to say goodbye to Windows XP (and Vista).

What is the difference between a 32-bit OS and a 64-bit OS you may ask? I’ll tell you. A 64-bit OS essentially uses a data path that is 64-bits wide, allowing the system to transfer data around in packets that are twice as large. This speeds up your basic, underlying system performance. Perhaps the biggest advantage to a 64-bit OS, however, is the ability to utilize nearly unlimited memory. Windows XP and Vista 32-bit editions are limited to only 4GB of RAM, and those systems can only make use of about 2GB of that RAM. With Vista 64-bit, you can upgrade your RAM to 16GB or higher without any problems. That is where the new Adobe CS4 programs really shine.

All CS4 applications are designed to work with a 64-bit OS and harness extra memory beyond 4GB. Tests by Adobe have shown speed increases in Premiere Pro of up to 200% on 64-bit systems with 16GB of memory, over maxed-out 32-bit systems. With the price of memory upgrades at an all-time low, upgrading to 16GB or higher should run less than $500. For someone using HD workflows in CS4 Production Premium, the immediate leaps in productivity make this upgrade a no-brainer. Vista also makes upgrading to 64-bit as painless as it can be, but you will have to check to make sure all of your harware has 64-bit drivers. You will also have to upgrade your Adobe software to the latest versions and tweak the memory usage settings in the individual programs.

You Mac users have nothing to worry about because Mac OS Leopard is already 64-bit capable. So go ahead and throw another 32GB of memory into your system and watch your render speeds go through the roof.

Adobe recently released a white paper outlining the benefits seen in using CS4 Production Premium after upgrading to 64-bit Vista. This white paper should answer any additional questions you have and give you some guidance. Karl Soule also oulined some of the benefits of upgradaing in his blog as well.

Creative Suite v.4.0 Production Premium (Graphics/Designing - 1 User - PC)

Prices start at

$900.00

Avg user rating

0 user reviews

Merchant

Price

Rating

$727.00

60 Reviews

$745.00

446 Reviews

Purplus.com

$775.95

426 Reviews

$900.00

596 Reviews

ComputerSoftwarePlus.com

$999.88

32 Reviews

Prices and availability are subject to change by merchant without notice. Please check with merchant for details. For all prices or availability click here

Some of the major improvements found in SP2 include support for Bluetooth v2.1, improvements to the RSS feed sidebar, Blu-Ray Disc recording capabilities, and the inclusion of Windows Search 4.0.