Win 7, A Bestseller or what?

This is a conference cut out guys,

Windows 7 isn't just getting good reviews, it's also selling well, CEO Steve Ballmer told shareholders Thursday.

Delivering opening remarks at Microsoft's shareholder meeting, Ballmer said that Windows 7 was off to a "fantastic start."

"We've already sold twice as many units as any OS in a comparable time frame," Ballmer said. "Windows 7 is simply the best PC operating system that we or anyone else has ever built."

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer delivers a point at the company's Worldwide Partner Conference in July.

By last week, Windows 7 accounted for 4 percent of Web-accessing devices, according to Net Applications; it took Vista more than seven months to reach that level.

Addressing the overall economy, Ballmer reiterated that things seem to have stabilized. "The economy has, at least for now, leveled off," he said.

The meeting is still going on and has just entered the question-and-answer session and I'll update this post if anything interesting comes up. So far, though, it's been mostly about local and legislative matters, rather than technological issues.

Microsoft vs. Apple

There was one fun one from a shareholder who noted that young people tend to gravitate toward Macs and that Apple seems to be outmarketing Microsoft.

"You've got a real bad image out there," the shareholder said. "You sure don't have that younger generation." Ballmer acknowledged that there are "certainly always opportunities for improvement."

"We all watch television," he said. That said, Ballmer noted that "96 times out of 100, worldwide, people choose a PC with Windows."

He added that even in the toughest market--the high end of the U.S. consumer market--Windows is chosen 83 times out of 100.

"That doesn't let us rest on our laurels," Ballmer said. "Apple has picked up a couple tenths of a percent of market share."

But those couple tenths matter, he agreed. He said the downturn in the economy has actually bolstered Windows' competitive position. "People understand that Macintoshes are quite a bit more expensive."

Another questioner asked why Microsoft can't better compete against Apple's iPhone and other smartphones.

"Certainly our objective is to have the leading position," Ballmer said. "I think we have a lot of opportunity to improve...Undoubtedly we've got our work cut out for us."

He did say that Microsoft has put a lot of smart people on the task. "We've got our heads down to do our best," Ballmer said.

Windows 8 by 2012 ?

Steven Sinofsky may not be talking about Microsoft's future Windows plans, but the Windows Server team appears to see more value in letting customers know its road map.


In at least two slides apparently shown at the Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles this week, Microsoft suggests that a major release update to Windows Server is due around 2012, with one of the slides confirming the Windows 8 code name.

I've asked both the desktop and server teams for more context on the slides, which were noted this week by blogger Stephen Chapman. A similar slide cropped up--that time in Italian-- in August.

For his part, Sinofsky sat completely stone-faced when I asked him in our interview Wednesday where Microsoft was at relative to Windows 8--later noting that he hadn't even used the word Windows next to the numeral 8.

The 2012 time frame would roughly coincide with Windows Server's plans of having a minor release every two years or so and a major release every four years. It released Windows Server 2008 R2, a minor update, earlier this year as the desktop team released Windows 7.

In recent years, Microsoft has tended to line up its desktop and server releases fairly closely, although in this case the desktop OS was probably a more significant release than its server counterpart.

I think it'l surely come like a relief from the bugs and full potential that windows 7 cudnt deliver. Lets just hope to find a better point from all of it.

Dells 1st in China... amusing strategy

Dell and China Mobile on Monday offered up more details about the Dell Mini 3i smartphone, which will be going on sale in China later this month.


The Android-based device, Dell's first smartphone, will support e-mail, instant messaging, and both MMS and SMS messaging. It will include Bluetooth and GPS capabilities and a Mini USB connector, and will accommodate Micro SD cards up to 32GB.


The quadband GSM/EDGE phone weighs 105 grams and includes a 3-megapixel camera with zoom, auto-focus, flash, video capture, and photo-editing capabilities. The touchscreen has a 640x360 resolution. Dell had already confirmed earlier this month that the Mini 3i would have a 3.5-inch high-definition screen.

Under the hood, the device is running China Mobile's OPhone software, a customized version of Google's Android operating system.

Like other Android phones, the Mini 3i will provide access to an online store, in this case, China Mobile's Mobile Market, where people can download apps, games, wallpaper, and ringtones. Users will be able to run different widgets on the home screen to keep on top of the news, weather, stock prices, and sports scores.

Dell said it has been collaborating with China Mobile for about a year on the development of the phone. The two companies teamed up earlier in the year to integrate a 3G data card for Dell's Inspiron Mini 10 netbook for the Chinese market. With more than 500 million customers, China Mobile is the world's largest mobile service provider, according to Dell.

Dell was initially mum on details when it first mentioned the Mini 3i about 10 days ago. But the company did reveal that China Mobile and Brazil's Claro would be the first global providers to carry its new smartphone.

Like China Mobile, Brazil's Claro boasts a huge subscriber base, with 42 million customers in Brazil alone. By selling the Mini 3i through both providers, Dell can potentially capture a much larger mobile audience than it could through any U.S. carriers.

Arriving in China Mobile stores by the end of November, the Mini 3i will shortly thereafter be sold directly from Dell. For those interested in color schemes, the Mini 3i will be available in Red Passion and Oiled Bronze.

- Vaibhav K.

Another iPhone worm has been spotted in the wild.

Unlike the previous exploitation, which merely changed a jailbroken iPhone's wallpaper to a picture of Rick Astley of "Rickrolling" fame, this new threat allows hackers to steal sensitive information.

According to security firm Sophos, which wrote about the exploitation after a Dutch ISP spotted it late last week, the worm attacks jailbroken iPhone and iPod Touch devices only.

The worm "uses command-and-control, like a traditional PC botnet," I, Vaibhav, would like to warn users about the exploit. "It configures two startup scripts, one to execute the worm on boot-up, and the other to create a connection to a Lithuanian server to upload stolen data and cede control to the bot master."

Jailbreaking, which has been around for about two years, is a hack that enables iPhone and iPod Touch users to download applications unavailable through Apple's App Store.

Sophos wrote that the worm attacks users on several ISPs, including UPC in the Netherlands, Optus in Australia, and T-Mobile in several countries worldwide. Worse, the worm spreads faster on a Wi-Fi connection than a 3G connection. Users with affected devices might notice extremely short battery life while on Wi-Fi. According to Sophos, that's mainly due to the worm engaging in "so much network activity."

When a device is infected, it's assigned a unique number so that the attackers can easily pinpoint a single device. It also looks for authentication systems that use SMS, better known as mTANs. mTANs are frequently used by banks that send an SMS message with a password to mobile phones, allowing people to log in to their online accounts, Sophos wrote.

In essence, this threat is serious.

Sophos recommends that people with infected iPhones and iPod Touch devices restore them back to Apple's most recent firmware update. For now, there is no other way to fix the problem.