Microsoft

Microsoft said Tuesday that its investigation has turned up no evidence that anything in its November security updates should be causing users to encounter a so-called "black screen of death."

"Microsoft has investigated reports that its November security updates made changes to permissions in the registry that that are resulting in system issues for some customers," Microsoft security response communications lead Christopher Budd said in a statement. "The company has found those reports to be inaccurate and our comprehensive investigation has shown that none of the recently released updates are related to the behavior described in the reports."

Microsoft said it was not contacted by British security firm Prevx before that company went public with its claims. Microsoft said it has reached out to them to let them know the results of its investigation.

The company said on Monday that it would look into the matter, but issued an update later in the day saying it could not verify any issues.

"Our support organization is also not seeing this as an issue," Budd said on Tuesday. "The claims also do not match any known issues that have been documented in the security bulletins or (knowledge base) articles.

Update, 3:15 p.m. PT: Prevx posted an updated blog saying that it has done additional testing.

"Having narrowed down a specific trigger for this condition we've done quite a bit of testing and re-testing on the recent Windows patches," the comapny said. "Since more specifically narrowing down the cause we have been able to exonerate these patches from being a contributory factor."

The company also offered up a mea culpa to Redmond and said it also recommends users keep patching their systems promptly. "We apologize to Microsoft for any inconvenience our blog may have caused."

Microsoft is teaming with Live Nation to use a music-themed site to tout Windows 7.

(Credit: Screenshot by Ina Fried/CNET)

Borrowing a tactic it has used to tout Internet Explorer, Microsoft on Tuesday launched a music tie-in to help promote Windows 7.

Dubbed Section 7, the site offers discount concert tickets and is being done in conjunction with music promoter Live Nation. Among the things the site features are $7 concert tickets and $7 merchandise for select artists.

"Section 7 offers music lovers a host of insider benefits, including exclusive ticket buying options, discounts, and opportunities to meet their favorite artists, fan clubs, great deals on tickets, merchandise and more," Microsoft said in an e-mail.

The first 37,000 people who sign up also get a voucher for a free pair of tickets to a concert at a Live Nation club or theater.

Microsoft says it is trying to "simplify the music experience one concert at a time." That seems a stretch, but hey, free concert tickets sounds pretty good. Locations are limited, though, so not everyone will have a local option.

MISSION VIEJO, Calif.--On my way to last month's Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles, I took a small detour to Orange County to check out the recently opened Microsoft Store there.

Although I had heard plenty about Microsoft's nascent retail effort, I wanted to get a firsthand look.

At a glance, it's easy to understand why the store draws so many comparisons to Apple's stores. The outside of the store features an expansive glass window with a stylized Microsoft logo at the top. Inside, products are sorted into themed sections, with a help desk and theater in the rear, and all around are T-shirted enthusiasts ready to answer any and all questions.

From that standpoint, it's nearly a carbon copy. But even as it mimics much of the Apple approach, Microsoft finds ways to customize its message to its different role in the world. When it comes to laptops, for example, Microsoft is eager to lay out dozens of choices to highlight the variety of prices, sizes, and options available to those buying Windows.

Peeking into Microsoft's retail store (photos)

The company is starting small--opening just two stores so far, this one and another in Scottsdale, Ariz. The goal, Microsoft said, is to better understand what customers want at retail and, ideally, persuade larger retail chains such as Best Buy and Office Depot to adapt some of the more successful techniques to their stores.

Apple, by contrast, has become its own most significant channel with its online and retail stores, even though its computers and iPods can also be found at places like Best Buy. From a dollars perspective, Apple's retail stores alone accounted for $1.87 billion of the company's $9.87 billion in total revenue during the most recent quarter. Next year alone the company plans to open 40 to 50 stores, with more than half of them overseas.

But if its scale is different than Apple's, its goal is largely the same: to offer the best possible experience when buying its flavor of PCs and accessories, as well as to be, well, cool.

To that end, Microsoft has pulled out every tool in its arsenal, from PCs to phones to the Xbox 360, as well as a huge "video wall" made up of dozens of 42-inch flat screens connected to form a single, though constantly changing, image or video display.

But by far the biggest draw is a product that isn't even for sale--the Surface tabletop computer.

During the several hours I spent at the store, it was that device, more than the laptops, that drew people in and captured their attention.

Josh Griffin stopped in at the store with his three kids, with all four quickly heading to the Surface.

"This is cool," said Griffin, who came into the store to check out Windows 7 among other things. "I've read about Surface before, but never been able to see it. It's actually a little cooler than I thought it would be."

The three kids began carving virtual pumpkins on the Surface while we chatted, but eventually Griffin turned his attention back to the tabletop computer.

"Can I do one?" Griffin asked his kids, trying only somewhat successfully to elbow his way in.

Surface, though, isn't the only thing worth pointing out.

Microsoft has taken an interesting approach to selling PC software--the category it is best known for. Although Microsoft stocks dozens of software products on its back shelves, hundreds more titles are available on-demand. Customers can browse on a touch screen through the various options and once they select a product, it can be burned to disc in the back of the store, complete with a professional-looking disc label, DVD case, and manual.

"We're like legal pirates," said Steven Precious, COO of Tribeka, the company whose system Microsoft uses in its stores. Precious just happened to be checking in on the Mission Viejo store while I was there.

The software maker also uses its position as retailer to influence what software is loaded onto the PCs it sells. While Microsoft the operating-system vendor is required by antitrust decrees to allow computer makers to install whatever software they wish, Microsoft the retailer is allowed far more say.

As a result, PCs sold at the Microsoft Store come with what Microsoft calls its "signature" software collection--a bundle that includes Windows Live products, Zune jukebox, Bing search engine and Microsoft Security Essentials antivirus software.

Having its own stores also allows Microsoft to try to match other areas in which Apple benefits from its direct contact with consumers, such as offering in-store support. Where as Apple has its "genius bar," Microsoft has an "answers desk." Both Apple and Microsoft offer a theater in the back for various trainings.

Microsoft is also trying to match Apple's passionate workforce. The retail store employees are made up of Windows enthusiasts, some of whom moved across the country to work at a Microsoft store. As evidenced by a recent YouTube video, the staff can be accused of many things, but a lack of passion is not one of them.

One of the key questions in my mind, though, is whether business will be brisk enough to allow Microsoft to profitably operate. The software maker has said it intends to run its stores as a business, meaning that to expand well beyond its current two locations, it will need to show an ability to not just look pretty, but also make money.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported the amount of revenue Apple gets from its retail and online stores. Apple got $1.87 billion in revenue last quarter from its retail stores alone; the company does not break out sales from its online Apple store.

Microsoft said on Monday that it is looking into reports that its latest security updates are causing some serious problems for certain users.

The problem has been dubbed the "black screen of death" because those affected are left with a black desktop and little else on their screen.

"Microsoft is investigating reports that its latest release of security updates is resulting in system issues for some customers," the software maker said in a statement. "Once we complete our investigation, we will provide detailed guidance on how to prevent or address these issues. "

The issue was noted by British security firm Prevx on its blog on Friday, with that company also offering a suggested fix for the problem.

"The symptoms are very distinctive and troublesome," Prevx said. "After logging on there is no desktop, task bar, system tray or sidebar. Instead you are left with a totally black screen and a single My Computer Explorer window."

Prevx suggested that the black screen issue can occur on a wide range of Windows machines from Windows NT through Windows 7. In its blog, Prevx said there appear to be many causes of the black-screen issue, not all of which are related to the security update.

"In researching this issue we have identified at least 10 different scenarios which will trigger the same black screen conditions," Prevx said. "These appear to have been around for years now." As for the latest security update, Prevx said changes to the way registry keys are handled appears to be the reason it is causing black screens.

I've asked Microsoft what it recommends users should do for now and will post its answer here.

Microsoft released its latest security updates on November 10, issuing six bulletins addressing 15 flaws.

Update, 3:35 p.m. PT: A Microsoft representative said that the company continues to recommend that customers "test and deploy" the November security updates.

"Based on our investigation so far we can say that we're not seeing this as an issue from our support organization," the representative said. "The issues as described also do not match any known issues that have been documented in the security bulletins or (knowledge base) articles."

Last week, Microsoft showed off some browser technology that could help Internet Explorer leapfrog the competition. But if Mozilla succeeds in its hope, Microsoft could be playing catch-up instead.

The technology in question is hardware-accelerated graphics and text using interfaces called Direct2D and DirectWrite that provide an easy way to use graphics cards' computing power. They're built into Windows 7, and Microsoft is bringing them to Windows Vista but not Windows XP.

The performance boost from Direct2D and DirectWrite was the centerpiece of Microsoft's demonstration of Internet Explorer 9 goodies shown last week. Online maps flashed on the screen quickly and tracked mouse movements responsively; text was clearer and changed sizes more gracefully.

But the day of Microsoft's demo, Mozilla evangelist Chris Blizzard had this to tweet: "Interesting that we're doing Direct2D support in Firefox as well--I'll bet we'll ship it first."

There's work to back up his rhetoric. On Sunday, Bas Schouten, the programmer who's been leading the work for Mozilla, posted a prototype of Firefox using the Direct2D and DirectWrite.

However, any Firefox fans tempted to crow about a victory should be cautious. Mozilla wouldn't commit to including the technology, much less to a release schedule such as Firefox 3.7 due in the first half of 2010. "We are currently investigating Direct2D for Firefox, but do not have a target for shipping it in Firefox at this time," the organization said in a statement..

Several Web pages arrive significantly faster using Direct2D rendering technology in Firefox.

(Credit: Bas Schouten)

The race is on
Microsoft declined to comment for this story, referring readers just to last week's blog post about coming Internet Explorer 9 features. "While we're still early in the product cycle, we wanted to be clear to developers about our approach and the progress so far," the company said while sharing a Direct2D demonstration video.

There's no doubt the race is on, though, given the potential benefits of the new interface and the commercial success of Window 7. Microsoft is lighting a fire under its developers, but the company's browser has lagged Firefox and other rivals in many technological areas for years, and many Web developers loathe earlier versions of IE still widely used. IE's market share has steadily eroded, though it remains dominant overall.

The attention is giving Google ideas, too. In a Chrome issue logged Sunday, Chrome programmer Peter Kasting pointed to Schouten's blog post on the subject as "motivation."

"If we can speed up the rendering time, the most noticeable benefit will probably be smoother-feeling scrolling," Kasting said. He also directed attention in October to DirectWrite support in Chrome, though cautioning that it might not work with the browser's present "sandbox" design to isolate elements of the browser for security reasons.

Mozilla has its own results to show off, too. Schouten offered a graph showing improved performance displaying a variety of Web pages. Facebook, Google, and Twitter rendered on the screen in half the time using the Direct2D; Slashdot and a Wikipedia entry were barely changed. One taxing page using the Scalable Vector Graphics format (SVG) to show movable, resizable graphics showed more than twice as fast, dropping from about 11 milliseconds to less than 4 milliseconds.

Microsoft's DirectWrite permits smoother display of many fonts.

(Credit: Microsoft)

What actually changes?
Direct2D replaces an older technology called Graphics Device Interface (GDI) used in Windows XP. Both offer a way for programs to tap into computing hardware without having to worry about the particulars of video card capabilities and settings, but Direct2D taps into hardware acceleration features.

The technology lets programmers control basic elements such as transparent boxes, curved lines, and resizable photos. Out of these, user interface elements are constructed; Direct2D calls upon a computer's graphics processor to speed that up. It's particularly helpful for dynamic situations that change element properties such as color, size, or opacity.

DirectWrite offers a similar graphics chip boost to the task of displaying text. That may not sound computationally intense, but some parts of it are. In particular, DirectWrite offers a more sophisticated mechanism for displaying text to take advantage of something called sub-pixel positioning of letters.

Each pixel on an LCD screen is actually made of three tiny slices--for red, green, and blue components--and sub-pixel technology subtly draws letters using pieces of these pixels to make the overall appearance smoother. The older GDI permitted some sub-pixel positioning, but only smoothed letters in the horizontal direction; DirectWrite smooths curves vertically as well.

Using the graphics chip in Direct2D and DirectWrite operations brings several advantages. Performance is the first: some operations are faster or smoother, and having more power on hand lets programmers tackle more ambitious projects. Second, the general-purpose central processor, relatively inefficient at handling graphics tasks, is unburdened, freeing it up for other tasks and saving battery power.

Firefox already has a graphics system of its own called Cairo. Schouten has been adding a Direct2D and DirectWrite.

Firefox is of course a browser that doesn't just work on Windows. The DirectWrite technology helps that operating system catch up to its rivals, said Mozilla's John Daggett in a blog post Sunday. "Platform APIs [application programming interfaces] on Mac OS X and Linux already do a good job rendering Postscript CFF [Compact Font Format] fonts," he said. "This just brings them up to parity under Windows 7."

Direct2D is used elsewhere in the browser. "We've made significant progress and are now able to present a Firefox browser completely rendered using Direct2D, making intensive usage of the GPU," or graphics processing unit, Schouten said. And because Cairo is used by other open-source software, other projects will benefit from the work, he added.

The Direct2D work is Mozilla's second hardware acceleration effort; the company also is working on one using a different hardware acceleration interface called OpenGL for mobile devices using Nvidia's Tegra chips, according to Mozilla.

This Mozilla demonstration of photos and Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG), with transparency and click-and-drag resizing, works more than twice as fast Direct2D graphics.

(Credit: Screenshot by Stephen Shankland/CNET)

The interactive Web
Microsoft went out of its way to emphasize that the Direct2D and DirectWrite work will help existing Web pages without programmers having to change a line of code. Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of Internet Explorer, contrasted that to other hardware acceleration efforts including Native Client and O3D from Google and WebGL from Mozilla and the Khronos Group.

Native Client, O3D, and WebGL are part of a long list of developments designed to transform the Web into a foundation not just for static pages but also for interactive applications. Those technologies, though, require new programming skills and tools.

Mozilla, Google, Apple, and Opera have been pushing this interactive Web agenda, and Microsoft is showing signs of interest, too. However, for now, Microsoft emphasizes that Direct2D support will help the existing Web. But the browser makers have their eyes on interactive technology as well. Direct2D will help with complex sites that use 2D graphics interfaces such as SVG and Canvas, Mozilla said.

Added Schouten, "As Web sites become more graphically intense, dynamic graphics will start playing a larger role, especially in user interfaces."

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.

"I didn't say any of the words--Windows 8--those were all your words," he said

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.

LOS ANGELES--While some have criticized Steven Sinofsky for being tight-lipped, the Windows boss insists that he is being prudent, not secretive.

"Everybody wants to know what's coming and what's next." But, he said, talking too soon, too early is actually a bad thing that just leads to frustration.

"You reacting to some nightly developer build isn't really productive to anybody," Sinofsky said in an interview at this week's Professional Developers Conference.

Sinofsky says that people don't want to show up to a restaurant and watch a potato being peeled and taste it half-cooked. For the same reason, he prefers to not talk about things until they are well, fully baked.

"It's hard to imagine what else you want to see while it's in progress," Sinofsky said. "I don't want to see the daily cuts of a movie. I want to see what the director thought at the end."

As a result, Microsoft didn't show Windows 7 until last year's Professional Developers Conference, just a year before the product was released. That's in sharp contrast to the prior version of Windows, which was first shown as Longhorn back in 2003. It ultimately suffered through numerous delays and significant changes before being released as Vista.

Windows boss Steven Sinofsky said his Windows philosophy boils down to a single word--responsibility. "There's not another project in software to work on that a billion people use and we take that really, really seriously."

(Credit: Ina Fried/CNET)

From early indications, Sinofsky would appear to be on to something. While Vista was largely panned by critics and shunned by businesses, Windows 7 has thus far had strong early sales and gotten high marks from reviewers.

It's some of the same philosophy Sinofsky took in his earlier days, when he led development of Microsoft's Office franchise.

"Normal people have stuff to do," he said.

That's also why he doesn't really look for public feedback until the software is largely done.

"We don't want feedback on a screenshot," he said.

Sinofsky shifted from Office to Windows in March 2006 and earlier this year added responsibility for the business side of Windows as well, becoming the unit's president.

He said his philosophy toward Windows really boils down to a single word--responsibility. "There's not another project in software to work on that a billion people use and we take that really, really seriously in the hallways of our dev team," he said.

Sinofsky also isn't one to be swayed by emotional arguments for or against a feature. If you want his attention--show him the numbers. He said he wants feedback, but he wants that feedback to "be based on data and not assertions or opinions or anecdotes."

During his PDC talk on Wednesday, he referred to the other approach as "testosterone-based engineering."

"It turns out we did a lot of things by that method," Sinofsky said. Often times, decisions on which features to include in the next version of a product were made that way. People, Sinofsky said, would basically just ask their friends.

"Let me get this straight," Sinofsky said. "You are going to ask your 10 friends who all go to Fry's and build their own gaming machines and that's going to be the way we decide which features go in the product?"

That, he said, "seems a little homogeneous. It seems a little limited in its reliability."

But these days, Microsoft has a better option, gathering lots and lots of data from real-world use. Quite often, he said, the data will show things that might not be intuitive to Redmond's engineers.

As an example, he showed a graph at the conference that showed the huge variety of graphics resolutions that Windows users were operating at, including a significant number with VGA-resolution displays. Folks in Redmond initially assumed they didn't really need to worry about such low-resolution screens.

True to form, Sinofsky was emphatically silent when my questions drifted toward the future. I asked whether we might see a beta of Internet Explorer 9 at Mix and he literally just sat there silent until I asked the next question.

Later on in the interview, the mere mention of Windows 8 got the same stone-faced glare.

"I won't ask you what's in Windows 8, but can you talk at all (about it)? You mentioned that you are a few weeks into designing IE 9," I said. "Are you a similar amount into Windows 8?"

Silence. More silence.

"I didn't say any of the words--Windows 8--those were all your words," he said. "Next."

Sinofsky did have some interesting things to say when I asked for his take on competitors like Google and Apple.

"You have to take it very seriously," he said of the competitors. "That's always, always true in the software world. In the software world it doesn't take a lot to have a dramatic shift in how people perceive you or how they act. It's just very important no matter what your perceived or real or measured share is at one moment, it doesn't take a lot to change it down the road."

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.

(Credit: Microsoft )

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.

LOS ANGELES--As a software guy, Windows division president Steven Sinofsky readily admits that he had little idea of all that goes into building a laptop.

Like many at Microsoft, he tended to think of products as done once the software was finalized. During the past couple of months, though, he has gotten a much better idea, as his Windows team went through the process of designing and building a Windows 7 laptop in conjunction with Acer.

Steven Sinofsky, surprised the PDC crowd on Wednesday, announcing that paid attendees would get a free notebook that Microsoft helped design.

(Credit: Ina Fried/CNET)

That laptop made its debut on Wednesday, as Microsoft handed out the devices to paid attendees of the Professional Developers Conference here. It's quite a little laptop, built around an 11.6-inch swiveling touch screen that works as either a tablet or traditional notebook.

Sinofsky wanted to give attendees at this week's PDC a computer that would really show off Windows 7's capabilities, including a touch screen and top-of-the-line wireless. Oh, and it should be light. And have a glossy screen. And not cost too much.

"They look at you like, 'what are you building'?" Sinofsky said in an interview with CNET.

Sinofsky said it's kind of like remodeling a kitchen. "You start off by saying I want these cabinets this counter top and this kind of a sink and all of a sudden you've got this kitchen you can't afford and don't have the time to build. That's pretty much the first phase of building a laptop."

In the end, Sinofsky had to make a few compromises, but the process itself was an important one for the Windows team, Sinofsky said. While PDC attendees got the laptops, his team got a better appreciation for the full process of designing and building a Windows PC.

"That was part of the learning, really making sure we can walk in their shoes," Sinofsky said.

The Windows team quickly learned about some of the trade-offs that computer makers have to make, as well as some of the hidden costs. At one point, Sinofsky said, he wanted to cut out Bluetooth in order to add GPS capabilities.

There were two problems with that, though. First, taking off Bluetooth would actually cost money. It was already part of the wireless chipset and the standard chassis had a blue indicator light built-in already, meaning that it would cost more to cover up that light.

Unboxing the free PDC laptop (photos)

And with Sinofsky's ideal laptop already containing multiple flavors of Wi-Fi, Ethernet, wide-area networking and three audio paths, there just wasn't room for GPS.

"They were like, look we're running out of room here," Sinofsky said.

Other things Sinofsky did get. Although most laptops with touchscreens have matte finishes, Sinofsky said "We really wanted a glossy screen."

Sure enough, the PDC has a glossy touchscreen.

That's just a part of what Sinofsky talked about in our interview on Wednesday. Look for more from our chat in the coming days.