Futurecat - Michael Karek

You’ve heard us talk about some great Device Stage implementations such as Sierra Wireless AirCards, Kodak EasyShare M530, Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro and Canon Cameras and Printers but never about how to make Device Stage experiences come to life. We want to make it as easy as possible for our partners to enable Device Stage for their hardware products. So we’re excited to announce that the Device Stage Visual Editor Tool is now available for our partners. This new new tool and accompanying user’s guide make it extremely easy for our partners (device manufacturers) to develop and build custom Device Stage metadata packages for their products that include realistic device icons, eye-catching branding, and tasks tailored to the needs of their customers.

Glenn Ward, Principal Group Program Manager on the Windows Planning Ecosystem Team, describes the tool as “a more intuitive process for partners to create their own Device Stage experience” and that it “enables faster experience prototyping, with an instant preview of the device experience that awaits the user on Windows 7.” The diagram from the user guide says it all.

Device Stage in Windows 7 is a new way for consumers to interact with their “Compatible with Windows 7” logo’d devices. Device Stage connects users to the status information, tasks, and settings they most care about – things like memory and battery status, uploading pictures, synching media, and accessing support resources. This Windows 7 feature enables device manufacturers to brand and customize the experience to help their customers get the most from their device.

To get the most out of this tool, partners that are new to Device Stage should review the Windows Summit sessions dedicated to the topic (viewing the sessions requires a quick and free registration).  There’s a session for each device class supported by Device Stage (printers, cameras, media players, mobile phones, etc.) but make sure to start with the Device Stage Workshops-Getting Started session.

I am pleased to announce that Intuit is developing an SDK for Windows Phone 7, making it easier for developers to write Windows Phone 7 applications that interface with the Intuit Partner Platform’s cloud services for businesses, including QuickBooks. This enables business professionals to access key data from a variety of Windows Phone 7 devices and easily view their cloud data hosted in Windows Azure.

Our work with Intuit further demonstrates the industry momentum for Windows Phone 7. Today’s announcement also extends the relationship we began with Intuit in January, when we announced that we were joining forces to deliver Web applications to millions of small businesses through the Intuit App Center via integration between the two companies cloud services platforms:  the Intuit Partner Platform and Windows Azure platform.

Both Microsoft and Intuit Partner Platform remain committed to providing developers from both companies additional opportunities for revenue and by enabling them to develop for the cloud and for Windows Phone 7 devices, while also reaching Intuit’s vast network of businesses, we are certainly meeting this goal. I look forward to this continued relationship with Intuit and am excited about future opportunities.

Today I’m at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in Washington D.C., meeting with our partners and talking about the capabilities that Windows Phone 7 offers for creating mobile solutions and applications to help them grow their business.

I’m really energized by the conversations I’m having with partners at this year’s conference. I’m seeing some really exciting solutions coming together for Windows Phone 7 as partners from around the globe apply their unique skills to build compelling experiences for our mutual customers.

With a focus on end users, we designed an entirely different kind of phone experience and platform for partners to build on. Windows Phone 7 supports the needs of organizations in new ways and excels at a broad range of tasks that people do most frequently, which means it will be appealing to more people than previous versions. We incorporated software and services from across the company and integrated them into a rich set of experiences called hubs including People, Office, Marketplace, Pictures, Music and Video, and Games. Windows Phone 7 also delivers a powerful application platform for people to create compelling new experiences.

The net result is new opportunities for systems integrators and people creating applications to get into or to expand their businesses, such as:

• Creating compelling mobile solutions and services for businesses
• Providing unique experiences through mobile applications

In a session at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, I note that there is a billion dollar opportunity in smartphones. After the conference, you can access my presentation entitled “Windows Phone Partner Opportunity” on demand from Digital WPC.

If you’re interested in growing your mobile practice, here are the top things you can do.

Create Compelling Mobile Solutions and Services for Businesses

Businesses are progressively mobilizing their workforce to help them be more productive, creating opportunity for new services and solutions. Integration with popular Microsoft offerings like SharePoint Server, Exchange Server, Microsoft Office and Business Productivity Online Suite helps people communicate and collaborate through their smartphone, PC or the browser.

Windows Phone 7 uniquely enables collaboration through the SharePoint Workspace client, empowering people to download, edit and synchronize documents with their phone so that their teams always have a current document to work from. The overall services opportunity for Microsoft partners and developers with SharePoint is $5.6 billion today and will grow to over $6.7 billion in FY12. With SharePoint Workspace client and a rich Office hub experience that includes access to the mobile versions of OneNote, PowerPoint, Excel and Word for viewing and editing documents, Windows Phone 7 offers a unique way for partners to deliver value to their customers and to grow their services business.

Windows Phone 7 was also designed to help organizations make the most efficient use of resources by enabling IT departments to use familiar tools and existing infrastructure to manage phones and to help meet corporate security and management needs.

Provide Unique Experiences Through Mobile Applications

We’ve invested heavily to deliver a significant step forward for developers and designers, with a new application platform, world-class tools, and an application store, the Windows Phone Marketplace. This system enables the quick and efficient creation of compelling applications and easy distribution to every Windows Phone 7 user.

People creating applications for Windows Phone 7 have access to a powerful and familiar arsenal of tools–Silverlight, the XNA Framework, Visual Studio 2010 and Expression Blend. These tools, combined with a strong set of web services enable quick and efficient development of compelling experiences for business and consumer use that can easily be extended from the phone to any screen. Best of all, these powerful tools are available free of charge, reducing development costs and making it an even more compelling proposition.

Today we announced the immediate availability of the beta version of the Windows Phone Developer Tools, which include all the tools necessary to start building new experiences now. Applications built with the beta version of the tools will be near ready to submit to the Windows Phone Marketplace. The tools will RTM later this summer, at which time final touches could be added with components announced previously such as Maps, Pivot or Panorama control. More information about the beta tools can be found here.

Aside from providing a great set of tools, the new design and integrated experiences in Windows Phone 7 provide an opportunity to create a fresh take on business applications—with richness on the client combined with the power of the cloud. The following picture is what a custom Silverlight-based productivity application might look like on Windows Phone 7. With a swipe, the user could switch between “Dashboard”, “Sales” and “Marketing” to access up to date business information.

All of these great applications will be delivered through the Windows Phone Marketplace, enabling partners to sell or distribute directly to customers. A clear advantage for developers and designers in the Windows Phone Marketplace is a structured yet open and transparent marketplace for applications. Additionally, we’ve recently lowered Marketplace fees, reduced administrative overhead and introduced private beta distribution for the better testing of applications.

We’re working closely with partners to help them learn more about the new Windows Phone 7. If you would like to get more information about opportunities with Windows Phone 7 or the Windows Phone Marketplace, you can find the latest resources at our web site: http://Partner.microsoft.com/windowsphone.

NVIDIA has announced a new addition to their GeForce GTX line of graphics cards – the GeForce GTX 460.

Like the rest of the GTX line (based on NVIDIA’s Fermi architecture), the GTX 460 supports DirectX 11. The GTX 460 will play DirectX 11 game titles at high resolution (1920×1200) and supports NVIDIA’s 3D Vision in full 1080P HD. NVIDIA says that the GTX 460 compared to the GeForce 8800 GT provides 4.5x the geometry horsepower and up to 2.6x the gaming performance. The GTX 460 will come in 2 flavors:

• GTX 460 768MB with 192-bit memory interface – Estimated U.S. Price $199
• GTX 460 1GB with 256-bit memory interface – Estimated U.S. Price $229

The GTX 460 768 version is available starting today, the GTX 460 1GB version will be available later this month.

For more information on the GeForce GTX 460, I suggest reading this blog post from NVIDIA’s nTersect blog from GeForce Product Manager Justin Walker. You can also check out the GeForce GTX 460 product page as well.

First, let me introduce myself. My name is Sarah Zenz and I am the Ecosystem Marketing Lead for the Windows Developer and PC Ecosystem Team. I work with product management and product marketing to communicate the amazing things coming out of the Windows ecosystem- vast compatibility, improved quality with the logo, and talking about the coolest products around. You’ll be hearing from me on some of our exciting programs for customers and the great hardware and software on Windows 7. You can also reach me on Twitter @Windowsgal.

Back in March, Brandon updated you on the fact Sierra Wireless announced Device Stage Support for AirCard products. I wanted to provide an additional update that Sierra Wireless is making good on that promise. The latest AirCard products to support Device Stage and earn the Compatible with Windows 7 are:

• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 301
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 302
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 306
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 307
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 308
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 309
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® USB 310U
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® 501
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® 503
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® Compass 888
• Sierra Wireless AirCard® Compass 889

All these devices have the same great Device Stage experience. They let you check for new firmware and software updates from Sierra Wireless, check your wireless broadband speed, go to Sierra Wireless’s online store to purchase any AirCard accessories, and of course their FAQ. Depending on your operator, you’ll see additional custom experiences.

Additional information can be found on the Sierra Wireless Windows 7 Device Stage page and the Sierra Wireless Windows 7 Support Page.

Following up on the release of Internet Explorer Platform Preview 3 last week, Lionel Menchaca Dell’s chief blogger took it for a spin. In this guest post, Lionel shares his impressions.

Microsoft’s release of the latest Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview brings a new level of hardware acceleration to the web. I took some time to play around with IE9 trying several of the demos on the IE Test Drive site. In a word, I’d say I’m “impressed.”

In a lot of ways, people tend to relegate web browsing to the low-end of computing hardware spectrum along with activities like e-mail and other basic productivity apps. I think that could very well change with the hardware acceleration in Internet Explorer 9.

Hardware acceleration in this case means offloading computing cycles from the system processor (CPU) to the graphics processor (GPU) in your system. Letting the GPU handle graphic-intensive tasks makes sense because GPUs are better at handling these tasks than the CPU. That efficiency translates into more overall speed and less battery life required (which is kinda important when you’re talking about laptops, netbooks and other mobile devices). Microsoft’s approach to new web technologies like HTML5 is new. They use Direct2D and DirectDraw, two components of DirectX that are supported in Windows 7 and Vista. Dean Hachamovitch refers to it as running through Windows.

So what does this mean to the average user when they are surfing the web?

• More speed
• The need for fewer proprietary web plug-ins
• Improved efficiency

All good things in my book… especially as the web becomes a more integral part of how we consume content and interact with information on computers. Harry McCracken says the IE9 could usher in the era of hardware acceleration to the web. I hope he’s right. I agree that Microsoft is onto something with what it’s bringing to the table with Internet Explorer 9.

Here’s what I’d love to see happen: bring hardware acceleration to web browsing for desktops, laptops and netbooks. Seems like Microsoft is well on its way delivering that. Then bring it to smaller mobile devices. The end result is something that’s good for hardware geeks and casual technology users alike. Empowering a range of devices that can do more on the web, using standards-based web technology all more efficiently than before?

Sign me up.

Lionel Menchaca, Dell

In this post, David Ragones of NVIDIA guest blogs about Internet Explorer Platform Preview 3.

Today, Microsoft hosted an incredible demo day in San Francisco celebrating the release of Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview 3.

The PC has always been the richest platform for experiencing the most immersive software – for example compare playing the latest DirectX 11 games like Metro 2033 in 3D vs. the typical game on a smartphone.  Developers for the PC have long had the advantage of powerful CPUs and GPUs to deliver the highest performance and most visual applications. 

But on the web, popular browsers have long enabled developers to create basic user experiences with simple interaction and interfaces that have improved somewhat over the years but still fall short compared to typical PC-based applications.

Until now.

With the upcoming release of Internet Explorer 9, Microsoft has embraced the GPU and turbo-charged the future of the web.  No longer will there be artificial roadblocks to compelling new web experiences.  Imagine your favorite site now re-engineered with the GPU in mind.  Desktop, Notebooks, and Netbook PCs with NVIDIA GPUs will navigate your social network visually; deliver smooth in-browser playback of multiple HD videos at once; smoothly pan, swoop, and zoom on photos and diagrams – and do it all without leaving the browser, using a plug-in, or having to launch another application. 

And, as website authors get even more savvy to the new technology, websites will become more visual, more immersive, and more engaging.  As with any new technology, it’s hard to know exactly how it will be used, but it’s clear that many frustrations of the past will disappear. 

With Microsoft Internet Explorer 9, the future of the web is bright, it’s powered by the GPU, and NVIDIA is glad to help make it happen.

David Ragones

Director of Product Marketing, ION/GeForce, NVIDIA

Today I was able to catch up with Gary Key who is a Technical Marketing Manager for ASUS to ask him a few questions about Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview 3.

James : Thanks for your time Gary. As a Technical Marketing Manager, how have you been involved with the release of Internet Explorer Platform Preview 3?

Gary : It’s really exciting to be involved! ASUS has been providing both mainstream and cutting edge hardware to Microsoft to ensure the best possible user experience with Internet Explorer 9. Not only have we been supplying exciting hardware for testing but we’ve also been providing input and feedback on how to make IE9 perform its absolute best on ASUS products.

James : You said that it’s been exciting being involved with Platform Preview 3. What’s been most exciting for you?

Gary : Here at ASUS we’ve been at the forefront of netbook and notebook innovation by providing the type of CPU and graphical processing power that Internet Explorer 9 thrives on. For example, we shipped the first Intel Atom dual-core with NVIDIA ION powered netbooks, NVIDIA 3D Vision enabled notebooks and one of the first DX11 gaming notebooks powered by ATI’s Mobility Radeon HD 5870 GPU. It’s this type of power that enables IE9 to provide an extremely responsive and interactive user experience on the Web. ASUS’ continued commitment to provide excellent CPU and GPU performance in its mobile products along with Microsoft’s innovative use of hardware acceleration in IE9 will help to create an unlimited possibilities for new Web applications that are both graphically and functionally rich.

James : You mentioned some of your innovative hardware. I’ve had my eye on your U30Jc or UL80Vt notebooks. How will they perform with the latest Platform Preview?

Gary : Thanks to the Intel dual-core processor and discreet graphics performance of the NVIDIA mobile GPU chipset in either notebook the user experience with Internet Explorer 9 will be incredible. In fact, even our AMD based Eee PC 1201T netbook will provide enough graphical and CPU processing power to ensure the user has a terrific web experience with IE9.

James : How about elsewhere in your range? Is there a price point or a particular type of machine I should be looking for?

Gary : We have a vast number of new mobile products launching this summer that are built with Internet Explorer 9 in mind. Everything from our upcoming Eee PC 1215N netbook and slim and light U35Jc notebook to the new 3D capable Republic of Gamers G53 gaming notebook will offer users a rich and interactive internet experience with IE9.

James : So do I need to buy a new notebook or workstation to take advantage of the hardware acceleration in Internet Explorer 9?

Gary : Not at all. We’ve been using discrete graphics and multi-core processors in most of our machines since we started shipping Windows Vista and Windows 7 machines so Internet Explorer 9 will be able to take advantage of that horsepower too. Of course, buying a new shiny notebook with an aluminum body never hurts does it?

James : You’re really trying to talk me into that U30Jc aren’t you? One last thing, what’s your favorite Platform Preview 3 demo on the www.ietestdrive.com site and why?

Gary : That’s a very difficult question to answer. I really do not have a single favorite Internet Explorer Platform Preview 3 demo as they all show how the combination of IE9 and the processing power available in ASUS mobile products will provide a uniquely rich, responsive and interactive Web experience for the user. However, I would have to say during testing that we probably ran the Flickr Explorer demo the most as it truly displayed the power of our current and upcoming mobile products when using IE9.

James : Gary thank you so much for your time.

Gary : It’s been a pleasure.

In this guest post, David Hoff of AMD shares his take on Internet Explorer Platform Preview 3.

The web is exploding with new content and is on an exciting path to deliver entirely new web experiences that feel more like applications running on your PC than web sites. What a perfect time for balanced computing -  mixing multi-core CPU and GPU computation -  to be taking a huge step towards very broad consumer adoption. AMD has been the unique voice promoting the balanced approach of using the complete PC. And through development collaboration with Microsoft and the Windows 7 standard public APIs (Direct2D and DirectWrite), Internet Explorer 9 takes advantage of that perfect balance and delivers a compelling experience.

Today’s web browsers need performance and capabilities that will meet the needs of everyone, from digital natives and gamers to the mobile workforce.  As the Director of Advanced Technology Initiatives in the office of AMD’s GPU CTO, I spend many hours focused on improving the visual computing experience both online and off.  Now Microsoft is once again raising the bar for visual computing with Internet Explorer 9.

We see this approach as a winning combination of software and hardware working together to provide a richer, more immersive online experience.  This is an ideal complement to my work at AMD providing PC users the best possible visual computing experience.

David Hoff is a Director of Advanced Technology Initiatives at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such linked sites and no endorsement is implied.

Back in April, I published a blog post about Western Digital’s WD TV Live earning the Compatible with Windows 7 Logo and bringing Windows 7 awesomeness with support for Play To. Today, Western Digital has announced a new addition to their WD TV line of media players – the WD TV Live Plus. The WD TV Live Plus also carries the Compatible with Windows 7 Logo and brings all the benefits of WD TV Live including support for Play To in Windows 7 and adds instant streaming of premium content with Netflix (Netflix subscription required). For more on WD TV Live Plus, click here and see this page for a comparison of Western Digital’s WD TV media players. I continue to use the WD TV Live in my home today and find it an impressive way to stream content such as videos and music to my TV in my bedroom.