Palm announces webOS and Pre phonePalm is hoping to get back on track with its new Pre touch phone, which comes equipped with the equally new operating system webOS, both announced on Thursday at the Consumer Electronics Show.
The Pre and the operating system use a couple of key concepts to make the phone easy to use, and to tightly integrate it with Internet services for e-mail, instant messaging and search, as well as with Facebook.
[InfoWorld's Test Center reviews the new BlackBerry Bold. And to learn more about which software programs now run on Apple's mobile device, read iPhone apps get down to business.]
For example, the phone organizes multiple active applications using "activity cards," large icons that line up on the display. Using the touch interface, users can flip through them, move them around, or throw them off screen by dragging a finger from the bottom to the top of the screen.
Bringing together multiple data sources into one view is also an important part of the Pre and webOS user experience. Users can, for example, group together Outlook, Google and Facebook calendars or collect e-mail from multiple accounts in one inbox. All conversations with the same person over instant messaging or text messaging are grouped together in one chat-style view.
Things like new text messages and calendar appointments appear as pop-up notifications at the bottom of the screen.
The phone doesn't just use touch; it also comes with a QWERTY keyboard that slides out from the bottom of the phone. When the keyboard slides out, the phone becomes slightly curved. Just using a "cheesy virtual keyboard" doesn't cut it, said Jon Rubinstein, executive chairman at Palm, in a direct dig at his former employer Apple, with its famed iPhone onscreen keyboard.
Like most other companies that announce smartphones these days, Palm couldn't resist taking a couple jabs at market leader Apple. The executives also highlighted the fact that the Pre battery can be removed, unlike the iPhone battery.
Users can start typing on the keyboard to begin searching for contacts or applications -- a feature Palm calls Universal Search. If it doesn't find anything on the phone it gives the user the option of choosing from a list of sites to search, including Google and Wikipedia.
The phone will start shipping during the first half of 2009, Palm CEO Ed Colligan said.
Sprint will get exclusive access to the phone in the U.S., and its CEO, Dan Hesse, was on stage during the announcement hyping its capabilities. Hesse likes the fact that he can speak on the phone and at the same time check the calendar and send an e-mail.
Pricing for the Pre hasn't been announced.
On the hardware side, the phone has support for EV-DO Rev A, 802.11 b and g, GPS (Global Positioning System), Bluetooth with stereo support, a 3-megapixel camera with LED flash and 8GB of built-in storage, but no memory card slot
The phone has a 3.1-inch screen with a 320x480 resolution.
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Major software companies sued for patent infringement
Twenty-two major software and security companies are being sued for alleged patent infringement by a little-known entity now controlling the two patents in question.
Information Protection and Authentication of Texas (IPAT) filed suit on Dec. 30 against companies such as Microsoft, Symantec and CA, alleging infringement of U.S. patents No. 5,311,591 and No. 5,412,717.
[ Keep up on the latest tech news headlines at InfoWorld News, or subscribe to the Today's Headlines newsletter. ]
Patent 5,311,591 is called “Computer System Security Method and Apparatus for Creating and Using Program Authorization Information Data Structures” and was granted in May 1994. The inventor is credited as Addison M. Fischer of Naples, Florida. The innovation is intended to allow a computer user to control how an application behaves in order to thwart other malicious software.
The second one, No. 5,412,717, is also credited to Fischer and was granted in May 1995. The invention deals with using hashes -- unique numerical identifiers -- to ensure an application has not been tampered with.
IPAT is asking for a jury trial in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, where many companies choose to file patent disputes. IPAT seeks an injunction against the companies using the technologies and damages.
Also named in the suit are companies AVG, Check Point Software, Comodo, ESET, F-Secure, Iolo technologies, Kaspersky Lab, McAfee, MicroWorld Technologies, NetVeda, Norman Data Defense Systems, Novell, PC Tools, PWI, Sophos, Sunbelt Software, Trend Micro, Velocity Micro and Webroot Software.
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Obama includes broadband, smart grid in stimulus package
U.S. President-elect Barack Obama laid out his plan for a huge economic stimulus package, with broadband rollout, an Internet-based smart energy grid and computers for schools as part of the plan.
During his campaign, Obama included rolling out broadband, energy issues and computers for schools in his list of goals, but in Thursday's speech in Fairfax, Virginia, he called for those items to be included in a giant stimulus package he'll push Congress to pass within weeks. The stimulus package could cost close to US$1 trillion.
[ Get the latest on mobile developments with InfoWorld's Mobile Report newsletter. ]
The president-elect called the economic situation in the U.S. a "crisis unlike any we have seen in our lifetime."
He also called for all U.S. medical records to be computerized within five years. "This will cut waste, eliminate red tape and reduce the need to repeat expensive medical tests," he said. "But it just won't save billions of dollars and thousands of jobs -- it will save lives by reducing the deadly but preventable medical errors that pervade our health care system."
Obama called on Congress to approve funding for rolling out broadband to unserved and underserved areas, although his speech did not provide details on how he wants it to happen. Several tech groups have called for a national broadband policy that would include a mixture of tax credits, loans and payments to broadband providers that bring broadband to new areas.
Part of the package should include rebuilding physical infrastructure such as roads and bridges, Obama said. "But we'll also do more to retrofit America for a global economy," he added. "That means updating the way we get our electricity by starting to build a new smart grid that will save us money, protect our power sources from blackout or attack, and deliver clean, alternative forms of energy to every corner of our nation. It means expanding broadband lines across America, so that a small business in a rural town can connect and compete with their counterparts anywhere in the world."
Smart energy grids would allow real-time monitoring of a customer's energy use through Internet technology. Proponents of a national smart grid say it would likely result in decreased electricity use, allow energy companies to more efficiently distribute electricity, and encourage homeowners to install alternative energy generators such as solar panels and sell their excess energy back to the grid.
Obama also called for Congress to approve money for "21st-century" classrooms, laboratories and libraries. "We'll provide new computers, new technology and new training for teachers so that students in Chicago and Boston can compete with kids in Beijing for the high-tech, high-wage jobs of the future," he said.
Obama's priorities line up with several tech groups that have been calling for more broadband and smart-grid funding. The Information Technology Industry Council (ITI), a trade group, praised Obama's stimulus plan. The package outlined by Obama represents an "excellent starting point," ITI President Dean Garfield said in a statement.
"Our firms know that technology investments are the quickest way to dramatically turn the economy around," he added. "Increased broadband spending, electronic medical records, green energy investments and new computers for schools and libraries are all smart ways to keep America competitive while also creating new jobs and spending."
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Microsoft to kick off 2009 with single security fix
After being forced to rush out an emergency patch for its Internet Explorer browser last month, Microsoft plans to release just one security update in its first patch release of 2009.
The update will be a critical fix for server and desktop versions of Windows, Microsoft said Thursday. It fixes at least one bug that could allow attackers to install unauthorized software on a victim's computer.
[ Learn how to secure your systems with Roger Grimes' Security Adviser blog and newsletter, both from InfoWorld. ]
Microsoft did not say which bugs it would be fixing with next week's updates, but the company has several to choose from.
In the past month, Microsoft has warned of flaws in its WordPad Text Converter and SQL Server database software
The researcher who disclosed the SQL Server flaw said recently that Microsoft has known about the issue since April, and had written a patch for it back in September.
One security researcher has also claimed that there is a bug in Microsoft's Windows Media Player, but Microsoft has disputed his findings.
But none of these flaws is in all versions of the underlying Windows operating system, which are being patched next week. According to nCircle Director of Security Operations Andrew Storms, Microsoft could be fixing a known Windows flaw that would allow hackers to gain unauthorized privileges on a computer. "An exploit has already been published for some time along with a whitepaper by the author," Storms said in an instant-message interview.
Microsoft has offered work-arounds for this flaw already, but it has now had enough time to prepare a full-blown security patch, Storms said.
However, the security researcher who found the flaw said he doesn't expect to see it patched next week. "I don't think they will patch my bug because it's rated critical (remote code execution) and my bug is about local elevation of privileges," said Cesar Cerrudo, chief executive of security research firm Argeniss, via instant message.
Local elevation of privilege flaws are not typically considered critical, although Storms said Microsoft may have discovered while fixing the problem that it was more severe than previously thought.
Microsoft's security updates will come nearly a month after the company scrambled to push out an emergency patch for Internet Explorer, after criminals began exploiting the flaw to install password-stealing software on victims' machines.
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Intel's Atom grows up, moves out of netbooks
Have you noticed Atom-based laptops seem to be getting nicer? The latest models sport bigger screens, more RAM, and slimmer and lighter designs than anything that's come before. They are also using versions of the Atom processor that weren't originally intended to be used in laptops.
The Atom processor family tree is split into two main branches. The side of the family that's gotten the most attention so far is the 1.6GHz Atom N270, formerly called Diamondville. This chip is the heart of Intel's netbook platform, an Atom processor paired with Intel's 945GSE Express chipset and intended for use in small, portable laptops, like Asustek Computer's Eee PC and Acer's Aspire One.
[Read InfoWorld's Notes from the netbook revolution to learn how this new class of less expensive machines can serve as excellent desktop, laptop, or even BlackBerry replacements.]
The N270 is closely related to two other chips, the 1.6GHz Atom 230 and 1.6GHz Atom 330. Both chips are designed for use in low-end desktops, a product segment that Intel calls nettops.
The other side of the Atom processor family is the Z-series, formerly called Silverthorne, a range of chips released before the N270 that run at clock speeds from 800MHz to 1.86Ghz.
"Certainly, the bulk of the volume and majority of netbook designs are and probably will remain on the N270. That said, if customers want to use a Z-series for these laptop designs, that is their choice," said Bill Calder, a spokesman for the chip maker.
Both the Z-series and the Atom chips found in netbooks and nettops have the same basic processor core. The only difference, apart from clock speeds, is that the Z-series processors support Intel's VT virtualization technology and Demand-Based Switching, a technology that reduces power consumption by adjusting the chip's voltage and frequency depending on how heavy the processing load is at a given moment.
Another feature of the Z-series is its chipset. Unlike the two-chip 945GSE Express used with the N270, the Z-series processors are paired with Intel's single-chip System Controller Hub US15W chipset, formerly called Poulsbo. The single-chip chipset helps cut power consumption and allows hardware makers to put Atom processors inside smaller computers.
The Z-series chips were originally designed for small, handheld computers that Intel calls mobile Internet devices, but they're now making their way into a new crop of Atom-based laptops, such as Sony's P Series.
The P Series mini-laptop, unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week, is arguably the nicest of the new machines. Priced at US$900, the P Series has a 1.33GHz Atom Z520 processor, 8-inch widescreen display, 2GB of RAM, a 60GB hard drive, a built-in GPS and 3G modem, as well as Wi-Fi and other features packed inside a sleek 680-gram package that's just 2 centimeters thick.
Even though the Z520 is a slower processor than the N270, Sony executives are adamant that the P Series is not a netbook, pointing to the GPS and 3G support as features that set it apart.
"It's definitely more than a netbook, it's a full-featured PC," said Michael Abary, senior vice president of product marketing at Sony Electronics.
Micro-Star International (MSI) showed off another good looking laptop based on a Z-series processor at CES. The X320 bears a strong resemblance to Apple's MacBook Air, but will be cheaper and significantly less powerful. Packing a 1.33GHz Atom Z520, the X320 has a 13.4-inch screen, 2GB of RAM, and -- at 1.8 centimeters thick -- the 1.3 kilogram laptop is slimmer than Sony's P series.
The similarities between MSI's X320 and Macbook Air are only skin deep: The 1.6GHz or 1.86GHz Core 2 Duo with 8MB of cache inside the Macbook Air easily outpaces the Atom, which has just 512KB of cache. On the other hand, expect the X320 to cost a fraction of the Macbook Air's US$1,800 price tag.
Other laptops based on the Atom Z-series are on display at CES, including two new models from Asustek, including one with a 512GB solid-state drive, and another system from MSI.
"The Z-series was designed for low power and pocketable devices, but as you can see, it can be applied in other larger devices," Calder said.
The popularity of netbooks puts Intel in a tough spot. Demand for these devices has risen quickly since the first Eee PC hit the market in 2007 and this product segment represents one of the few bright spots these days for the hardware industry, which otherwise faces slowing end-user demand for new computers. But Atom processors are less expensive than Intel's other processors, and can represent a smaller percentage of the total component cost of a laptop.
For these reasons, Intel executives would rather see users with Core 2 Duo-based laptops as their main computers instead of a netbook.
Intel has done a good job of locking down the specifications of the N270-based machines, limiting manufacturers to screen sizes of 10 inches and less, and capping the amount of RAM in each system at 1GB. The aim was to segment the laptop market into low-end netbooks based on Atom and larger, more powerful laptops based on the Core 2 Duo, preventing netbook sales from eating into sales of mainstream laptops.
With these system limitations in place, Intel rivals like Via Technologies and Advanced Micro Devices saw the gap between netbooks and mainstream laptops as an opportunity, with user demand for lightweight, portable laptops with more capable specifications than a typical netbook.
The first sign of change in Intel's limitations on Atom-based systems came from Dell, which unveiled the Z520-based Inspiron Mini 12, which sports a 12-inch screen, in October. The arrival of that system signaled the Z-series was not bound by the same hardware restrictions as the N270.
With the appearance this week of other laptops based on the Z-series, the product gap that exists between netbooks and mainstream laptops appears to be closing, even as Intel seemingly remains firm on the specifications of netbooks that use the 1.6GHz Atom N270 processor.
Whether or not the Z-series processor, especially more powerful models with higher clock speeds, become widely used in laptops remains to be seen. If users willing to pay US$900 for a laptop expect more processing power than the Atom Z-series can muster, such as the ability to encode high-definition video files, the number of laptop models based on the Z-series may be limited. Time will tell.
Martyn Williams in Las Vegas contributed to this story.
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You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz
Apple and Microsoft, Macworld and CES, Shiller and Ballmer. Does it get any better than this? Well, yes, actually. But while this week was dominated by the news coming out of San Francisco and Las Vegas, there were plenty of other tech headlines to fill our screens -- like Twitter hacks, litigious supermodels, and 26-year-old movie sequels. Do you have what it takes to ace our quiz? Correct answers are worth 10 ducats. Now start clicking.
1. While rumors of his death are somewhat exaggerated, it seems Steve Jobs isn't a paragon of health after all. What medical issue kept him off the dais at this week's Macworld Expo?
a. Inflamed pancreas
b. Imbalanced hormones
c. Obsessive compulsiveness
d. Enlarged ego
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Windows Server 2008 R2 beta airs
Lost in the Windows 7 hype, Microsoft also released the beta of Windows Server 2008 R2, which is the companion to the client OS.
Watch a slideshow of eight tools that make Microsoft shops run smoother.
[ The big Microsoft story: The release of the Windows 7 public beta ]
The company is aligning Windows Server 2008 R2, which briefly was referred to as Windows Server 7, and the client OS Windows 7 although Microsoft officials have not said if they will ship together.
But users who adopt both will get new security, network, and other features although some of those will require network upgrades like implementing IPv6.
The R2 beta's integration with Windows 7 is high on the server's feature list. The integration points include a laundry list of features including DirectAccess, which lets Windows 7 PCs directly connect to intranet-based resources without needing a VPN connection.
While DirectAccess could eliminate VPN infrastructure, users will have to support IPv6 and IPSec on their network in order to access intranet resources.
Bill Laing, Microsoft's vice president of Windows Server and systems, said late last year that a company's entire network does not have to be IPv6 for DirectAccess to work. The client nodes and some of the network nodes for tasks such as authentication have to support IPv6. But he did add that users will also need to support IPSec.
"DirectAccess is a compelling feature, but there is infrastructure work you need to do and it will take time to roll this out," Laing said.
Other Windows 7 integration points with R2 include Branch Caching, which caches frequently used content on a branch-office network; a read-only Distributed File System to improve branch office security, power management via Group Policy, BitLocker drive encryption for USB drives referred to as BitLocker To Go, and an Offline Folders feature for mobile users.
Unique to the server side, the R2 release includes support for Live Migration, a much anticipated feature add-on to Hyper-V. Not only will the feature help Microsoft match similar tools already available from VMware and open source hypervisor platforms, Live Migration is key for availability and scalability in the VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure) support coming in R2 server.
Another key VDI component is Remote Desktop Services, formerly called Terminal Services, which allows users outside the intranet to connect to desktops and application running inside virtual machines on a server.
RDS includes the Remote Desktop Connection Broker, an upgrade to the Windows Server's Session Broker, an administrative set-up tool for both server-based virtualized desktops and traditional Terminal Services remote desktops.
Microsoft is building its VDI infrastructure on the back of the Connection Broker, Hyper-V and Virtual Machine Manager.
RDS fits in a loose grouping with Microsoft's other virtualized desktop software that is part of its popular MDOP (Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack), which includes App-V and Enterprise Desktop Virtualization.
Also included are power management features called Core Parking, and deeper integration with PowerShell.
Microsoft is also working on application virtualization for the server, but it will not be part of R2 server. Also not in the release is technology Microsoft acquired when it bought Calista Technologies, which delivers 3D graphics, such as Vista Aero Glass, and multimedia support to virtualized desktops.
Network World is an InfoWorld affiliate.
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Nokia ends production of its only WiMax device
After selling them for just a few months, Nokia has decided to stop making its N810 WiMax Edition handheld computer.
Nokia unveiled the device, the only one from the phone giant that uses WiMax, in April last year. The WiMax Edition uses the same hardware and software as the previously introduced N810, which employs Wi-Fi to connect to the Internet. The devices are larger than typical cell phones but smaller than laptops and run the maemo Linux-based OS2008 operating system.
[ For a better understanding of the WiMax technology read InfoWorld's "Road test: Does WiMax work in the real world?" | Get the latest on mobile developments with InfoWorld's Mobile Report newsletter. ]
When Nokia introduced the WiMax Edition, it expected to start selling them around the middle of the year near the same time that Sprint planned to launch its Xohm WiMax network. However, Sprint delayed its launch, introducing service in its first market at the end of September. Many online reports show Nokia's WiMax devices first becoming available in October.
Nokia has now stopped making the WiMax products because they have reached the expected end of their lifetime, said Doug Dawson, a Nokia spokesman. The N810 platform is about 18 months old, he said. Dawson did not say whether the Wi-Fi-enabled N810 would also be discontinued.
The WiMax Edition models that are already in the sales channel will be available for consumers to buy, he said. Both the WiMax and Wi-Fi versions of the N810 are still available for sale on Nokia's Web site.
Dawson would not say if Nokia was readying other WiMax devices but said the company would continue to follow the market.
The N810 WiMax Edition was probably ahead of its time, said IDC analyst Godfrey Chua. So far, Sprint has launched WiMax only in Baltimore. As a result, most WiMax customers will use the network as a home Internet connection via laptops or desktops rather than as a mobile network they can access on the road.
Nokia may have also decided that the market for WiMax users in the United States is just too small right now. "They play a volume game, and I just don't think the volume would be there," Chua said.
But the decision to cut the WiMax device could be a signal of a larger shift away from WiMax at Nokia, said Nadine Manjaro, an analyst at ABI Research. "They struggled with the network so maybe they decided because of the downturn to change their strategy," she said.
She's referring to Nokia Siemens Networks' loss of a contract to build the Xohm network in Dallas. Sprint initially announced that Nokia Siemens would build the network but Samsung ultimately did. Many observers speculated that Nokia's equipment wasn't ready in time so Sprint turned over the contract to Samsung, Manjaro said.
"Nokia Siemens did struggle with their product so they might say they'll put their efforts on LTE rather than try to do both," she said. LTE (Long-Term Evolution) is the next generation mobile technology that the majority of mobile phone operators plan to transition to.
Nokia Siemens wouldn't be alone, if it is indeed shifting away from WiMax. Altcatel-Lucent, which Manjaro considered a leader in the market, recently said it planned to reduce spending on WiMax. Both companies may be deciding that they need to focus their efforts under stress from the faltering economic conditions, she said.
(Peter Sayer in Paris and Stephen Lawson in San Francisco contributed to this report.)
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Consortium tackles cloud computing standards
Everyone's talking about building a cloud these days. But if the IT world is filled with computing clouds, will each one be treated like a separate island, or will open standards allow all to interoperate with each other?
That's one of the questions being examined by the Open Cloud Consortium (OCC), a newly formed group of universities that is both trying to improve the performance of storage and computing clouds spread across geographically disparate datacenters and promote open frameworks that will let clouds operated by different entities work seamlessly together.
[ Special report: Inside the emerging world of cloud computing ]
Cloud is certainly one of the most used buzzwords in IT today, and marketing hype from vendors can at times obscure the real technical issues being addressed by researchers such as those in the Open Cloud Consortium.
"There's so much noise in the space that it's hard to have technical discussions sometimes," says Robert Grossman, chairman of the Open Cloud Consortium and director of the Laboratory for Advanced Computing (LAC) and the National Center for Data Mining (NCDM) at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Say you're running an application with one cloud provider, such as Amazon's EC2 service, and want to switch to another one. "Our goal would be that you would not have to rewrite that application if you shifted the provider of cloud services," Grossman says.
The OCC wants to support development of open source software for cloud-based computing and develop standards and interfaces for the interoperation of various types of software that support cloud computing.
OCC members include the University of Illinois, Northwestern University, Johns Hopkins, the University of Chicago, and the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2). Cisco is the first major IT vendor to publicly join the OCC, though more could be on the way.
The consortium's key infrastructure is the Open Cloud Testbed, a testbed consisting of two racks in Chicago, one at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore and one at Calit2 in La Jolla, all joined with 10 Gigabit Ethernet connections.
Grossman and colleagues recently used the testbed to measure the performance penalty when doing computation over wide areas. Grossman says by using Sector and Sphere, open-source software developed by the National Center for Data Mining for use in storage and compute clouds, they were able to transport data about twice as fast as Hadoop, an Apache Software Foundation project. One of several reasons for the speed improvement is the use of the UDT protocol, which is designed for extremely high speed networks and large data sets. Most cloud services use TCP, Grossman says.
The project won the SC08 supercomputing conference's Bandwidth Challenge Award.
"Processing data by clouds today is almost always done within a single datacenter due to the technical challenges processing data across multiple datacenters," a press release announcing the award states. The project "demonstrated technology ... that enables cloud computing to utilize high performance networks and spread cloud computing across datacenters to create wide-area clouds."
The Open Cloud Consortium is just getting started, having formed in mid-2008. Grossman says the group is looking at the same technical issues as companies like VMware, which is developing a broad operating system that can manage the entire data center.
The main idea is to gather universities and IT companies in a noncompetitive way to exchange technical information, hopefully leading toward cloud computing that is faster, more secure and based on open standards and open source software.
"I'm not a marketing guy," Grossman says. "This is really trying to understand interoperability issues that I still don't think are clearly understood, and issues about how you operate clouds over wide areas."
Grossman is hoping more major IT vendors will sign on too.
"At this point we're just trying to get a critical mass of vendors to exchange information," he says.
Network World is an InfoWorld affiliate.
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Windows 7 is less of a resource hog than Vista
Good news: The next version of Microsoft's Windows OS appears to be less of a resource hog than Windows Vista.
Microsoft announced Wednesday that a beta version of Windows 7 will be available for the general public to download and try out on Friday. At the same time, it provided a list of the minimum system requirements it recommends for people who run the beta.
[ Test Center: Windows 7 benchmarks unmasked ]
They call for a 1GHz processor (32- or 64-bit), 1GB of main memory, 16GB of available disk space, support for DX9 graphics with 128MB of memory (for the Aero interface), and a DVD-R/W drive.
Those are very similar to the recommended requirements for Windows Vista -- even though PC hardware will have advanced by as much as three years by the time the finished version of Windows 7 ships.
Microsoft noted that the Windows 7 requirements are for the beta version only and subject to change. But it has also said the beta is "feature complete," suggesting the requirements will not increase by much if the beta tests go smoothly.
Microsoft had indicated previously that one of its design goals for Windows 7 is to give it the same system requirements as for Vista.
When Vista shipped it was seen as too resource hungry for the systems some customers were trying to run it on, resulting in sluggish performance. Indeed, Microsoft had to extend the life of Windows XP for small netbook computers because system makers said Vista would barely run on those devices at all.
Microsoft has now learned its lesson for Windows 7.
"We are working very hard to provide comparable capabilities from a hardware consumption perspective -- memory and processor -- to what you saw in Windows Vista, and I think we may even be able to do a little bit better," said Bill Veghte, Microsoft's senior vice president in charge of Windows, in an interview at the Consumer Electronics Show Wednesday.
"I don't want to make commitments on where we'll be at RTM (release to manufacturing, when the OS is complete), but at beta right now we look very comparable to the hardware requirements that Windows Vista had when it came out, and the hardware has moved on. I am very optimistic," he said.
Windows 7 will also be able to run on netbooks, he said.
"Doing a great job in Windows 7 around that class of devices is important and we're committed to providing support for them," Veghte said.
Microsoft's official target for the completed version of Windows 7 is early next year, although Veghte suggested the company would release the OS earlier than that if the beta tests go very smoothly.
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Sony rolls out Atom-powered mini-laptop
After several weeks of leaks and teasers, Sony took the wraps off its anticipated Vaio P-series mini-laptop at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Wednesday evening.
The small machine has a widescreen 8-inch display and measures 24 centimeters wide by 11 centimeters deep by 2 centimeters thick, giving it a form factor that, according to Sony, makes it possible to drop the PC into a jacket pocket or handbag.
[ For more on products in the hot mini-notebook category, check out our hands-on looks at Asus' Eee PC 901 and 1000, the Cloudbook Max netbook, Elitegroup's G10IL mini-laptop, MSI's Wind low-cost laptop, Giga-byte's M912X mini-laptop, HP's Mini-Note netbook, and Acer's Aspire one. | Get the latest on mobile developments with InfoWorld's Mobile Report newsletter. ]
An advantage of the wide form factor is that the keyboard can be made slightly larger. The key pitch on the Vaio P is 16.5 millimeters, which is considerably more than on keyboards used on some of the small-form-factor netbooks currently available.
"We did something a little bit different with this product," said Michael Abary, senior vice president of product marketing at Sony Electronics. "We thought about who this product would be for and targeted a customer before we conceived or designed this product. And that customer is fashion conscious, skews slightly more female, and really is interested in how this product will make them look and feel rather than the speeds and feeds."
The computer is based on an Intel Z520 Atom processor, and the screen has 1,600-by-768-pixel resolution. It comes with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, and U.S. models will feature a 3G wireless data modem. There's also GPS.
Instant-on is supported by a mode that will take users to Sony's Cross Media Bar, the navigation system employed in the PlayStation 3 and many Sony audio-visual products. Though this interface users can gain quick access to music, video, and pictures without booting Windows.
The Vaio P goes on sale in Japan on Jan. 16 for ¥100,000 ($1,082). It will be available in North America from February at prices beginning from about $900. Launch plans for other markets will shortly be announced by local Sony offices.
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