Stories by Joris Evers

Microsoft is readying a new consumer security product that offers virus and spyware protection, a new firewall and several tune-up tools for Windows PCs, a move that pits the software giant squarely against traditional security software vendors.

Microsoft is readying a slimmed-down version of Windows XP for users who want to upgrade their Windows operating systems but not their PCs.

Aiming to make the licensing terms for its products less complex, Microsoft plans to publish in July a shortened and simplified version of its "Product Use Rights" document.

Microsoft plans to release a new version of its Office productivity software next year, company Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates said Tuesday.

Microsoft, as expected, unveiled a new version of its operating system for mobile devices that it says offers increased reliability, improved hardware support and a host of new features to both entertain users and make them more productive.

Revving its Longhorn marketing engine, Microsoft is forming a team of bloggers who will get early access to prereleases of the operating system and will be asked to review the Windows XP successor.

As Microsoft approaches a major milestone in the development of Longhorn, company executives are talking more about the features of the Windows XP successor -- which they claim will be easier to use, more secure and less costly to manage than earlier versions of Windows.

Samsung Electronics has demonstrated a prototype hard-disk drive that includes flash memory, promising lower power usage and less trouble for laptop users.

Citing a mixed enterprise software environment, Microsoft on Thursday reported year-over-year increases in revenue and net income for its third fiscal quarter. But revenue fell short of Wall Street expectations.

Microsoft has slightly delayed the public release of the second beta version of Windows Server 2003 R2. The test version will be available in the next two weeks, company officials said Tuesday.

Microsoft on Tuesday badmouthed its own work on networking and hardware support in Windows XP in order to sell hardware makers on new technologies it has planned for Longhorn, the next version of Windows due late next year.

Microsoft has postponed most of its Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) security plan, company officials confirmed. Only a sliver of it will appear in the next version of Windows, code-named Longhorn, due out late next year.

Samsung Electronics plans to show a prototype hard-disk drive that includes flash memory, promising lower power usage and less hard disk drive trouble for laptop users.

The next version of Windows will include a new document format, code-named "Metro," to print and share documents, Microsoft said Monday. Metro appears to rival Adobe Systems's PostScript and PDF (portable document format) technologies.

Microsoft Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Steve Ballmer and Sun Microsystems Chairman and CEO Scott McNealy will host an event in mid-May to detail progress the companies have made since the signing of a 10-year collaboration agreement last year.