Windows Vista Release Candidate 2 is now available for download for individuals who want to give it a try. You can find the download and more information about the release from the Microsoft TechNet website.
My wife has been experiencing some problems with her Vista laptop locking up in the middle of her working when she has a few different programs open.
I’m hoping Windows Vista SP2’s final release will resolve or improve some of these issues. Still trying to determine if it’s completely a Vista issue or a Toshiba laptop issue.

You’ve got about 3 more days to get a copy of Microsoft Office Home and Student version for $99.99.
The original price is $149.95, but you get a discount before checkout. The order form defaults to including a software license lockbox feature for $14.99, but you can take that off and get your price down to $99.
Purchase Office Home and Student 2007 for $99.99 here.
Image: Promotion product email from Microsoft

One of the current projects we’re working on involves a large database. The initial project was to optimize and clean-up an existing Access database application. However, as we’ve gotten involved in the project it’s expanded to include more features, larger requirements and more potential users.
We initially asked about migrating the database over to a full SQL Server 2005 solution, but ran into some resistance for a variety of concerns, one of which was cost of setting up and installing SQL Server 2005.
We then started to take another look at potentially using SQL Server 2005 Express edition as the solution for …read more

We’ve been looking for some files lately that seemingly just can’t be found on Microsoft websites that state they should be there.
You can click on the image above to have a perfect example. When you click on the image it will enlarge to full-size and you can see what I’m seeing. On the page is the statement:
Please download the attached file that contains the previous service pack release notes.

Do you see a link somewhere that I’m not seeing? If you do, please let me know. You’d think this should be obvious, and it appears to be, except for the …read more

I confess, I’m addicted to Bubble Breaker on my Windows Mobile phone. The problem is I’m actually getting bored with it. I need to find a good game or two to add to my device to break-up the monotony a little bit.
Solitaire is old as well, so wondering what everyone else is playing? I’m not really interested in any in-depth, drawn out games. Just simple stuff to play when you’re waiting in the car for someone or have a few minutes to kill between appointments.
I play Bubble Breaker as a bit of a de-stresser and opportunity to …read more

One of the great tools you can get with the PowerToys I talked of earlier is the PowerToy Calculator. A feature you may not be expecting with the application is tools for converting a variety of measurements from English to Metric equivalents and more.
As you can see from the screen shot above, all the basics you probably wonder about frequently are available.
In addition to the conversions, you get all your basic calculator option, including graphing and trig functions too. You know all that cool stuff you used to use with your Texas Instruments T51 calculator in high school.

After doing some research on my AutoPlay and autorun.inf questions earlier I was reminded about some of the features that are available for tweaking your Windows XP install with the PowerToys applications like TweakUI.
Here’s a quick reminder about some of the other tools that are available:

Color Control Panel Applet: Professional-level photographers and designers know that getting consistent, accurate color from file to screen to print and beyond is a requirement for great results. This new tool helps you manage Windows color settings in one place.
SyncToy: With new sources of files coming from every direction (such as digital cameras, e-mail, …read more

Awhile back I blogged about hearing of the Kinoma mobile browser for media. In that time I’ve used the application to take advantage of finding some YouTube videos and browsing flickr for some images to share with friends and family while on the go.
I’ve been very impressed with the browser overall. It took some getting used to it’s own way of navigation and user-interface, but it absolutely lets you view content that’s nearly impossible to enjoy with the default Internet Explorer browser that’s on my phone by default.
I could be wrong, but I think in the time since I …read more

Some of you may remember my desire to stop being nagged by Outlook about installing the Windows Search app onto my machine.
A few days ago I finally caved in and went ahead and downloaded and installed the Windows Search tool. It looks like they’ve made some improvements on it because it appears to be returning better results for me than the last time I had it installed and tested everything.
This evening I get a new comment on my old post that gave me instructions for disabling the constant nagging that Outlook was giving me to get me to install the …read more

I just downloaded a new app for my mobile phone called Kinoma FreePlay.
Without Kinoma FreePlay, your smartphone is just a phone. With Kinoma FreePlay, it’s a mobile media powerhouse. Kinoma FreePlay is the world’s first mobile media browser—it’s everything you need to find and play video, audio, and pictures, whether the media is on your phone, on your home PC, or on your favorite web sites.

I’ve been playing around with the SkyFire browser on my phone lately since the mobile version of Internet Explorer on my phone is just about useless for any site that’s not specifically developed for mobile …read more