Windows 8 is slowly gaining market share by taking it from Vista. While there are a lot of critics of Windows 8, the OS isn’t that bad. All new PC’s ship with Windows 8 and it will become more and more prevalent on the desktop scene. But, I am not sure if the increased market share is due to people actually wanting it with their PC, upgrades or custom PC’s, or if it is mainly from people upgrading their older Vista or pre-Vista PC’s with a new model that comes with Windows 8. The numbers don’t really say that much.

The Outlook.com calendar has finally been updated to the newer ‘Metro’ style interface. This was one of the first things I noticed with the new Outlook.com styling, was that it didn’t expand into the other features. I’m glad they finally are updating the others. The calendar definitely looks better. As of right now, mine is still the old style, but it is expected to roll out to all users this week.

We also made navigating and getting info into your calendar faster than ever. You can add or edit events with a single click, enter an event by simply dragging your mouse across the time or date range you need, add tasks without opening a new page, and jump to a particular day simply by clicking the date.

Sources have said that the new update to Windows 8, also known as Windows Blue, will be called Windows 8.1. This is similar to the Windows Phone releases with WP7, WP7.1 and WP7.5 before jumping to Windows Phone 8. As Windows 8 is a new direction for Microsoft with more, but more incremental, updates it makes a lot of sense for these smaller version changes.

Microsoft executives like Windows Chief Financial Officer Tami Reller have said repeatedly that Microsoft envisions Windows 8 as something more than a one-season wonder. Reller has saidMicrosoft considers Windows 8 a product "of multiple selling seasons." So it makes sense that Blue would be christened Windows 8.x, not Windows 9.

I’m back from a nice vacation to Arizona. Drove from Oregon. I like driving, I don’t like driving 2000 miles. Expect more posts coming soon for Windows, Xbox, and general Microsoft news. A little something I noticed – my HTC 8X (Windows Phone) has quite a bit better reception than an Apple iPhone 4S. Just the antenna design, I guess, but enough to make a substantial difference!

There have been some rumors and screen shots for the upcoming release of Windows Blue (supposedly the newer version of Windows will not be Windows 9) that show a new kernel, using 6.3, which is ahead of Windows 7’s 6.1 and Windows 8 6.2. If this is true, then it will bring more improvements than previously thought. Some were saying the Windows Blue was more of a Service Pack than a real release.

The screenshots do not show what type of features Windows Blue will include, but the NT kernel change is notable. Windows Vista adopted NT kernel 6.0, while Windows 7 jumped to 6.1, and Windows 8 to 6.2. A switch to 6.3 with Windows Blue suggests this is a major revision to Windows, but one that will be delivered much sooner than a traditional Windows cycle. Sources tell us there is no "Windows 9" project inside Microsoft at the moment, and that Blue is the next major update to Windows.

Outlook.com has officially gone out of beta and into full time production use. A lot of people have already transferred their Hotmail to the new Outlook.com. There is a definite improvement in the user interface, speed and options.

Outlook.com has been in preview since last summer, drawing a lot of attention to it’s very simple yet powerful interface, lack of targeted advertising (with some shots fired at Google’s GMail in several ads) and speed.

Through the preview, Microsoft has heard a great deal about customers’ favorite features, the way they use the product, and how well Outlook.com is delivering on the company’s vision for modern email. For example, Outlook.com lets customers connect to popular social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Today, millions of people are using those features to keep up to date with friends’ contact info updates, photos and tweets. Outlook.com is also designed to make it easy to send hundreds of photos and videos in a single message — all powered by SkyDrive. After only six months, nearly half of all people using Outlook.com have already used SkyDrive to share more than half a billion photos and Office documents.

I just got a new email asking to update to Skype as they are starting to move from Messenger. If you’ve been putting it off, now might be the time to start the upgrade.

Hello, Starting April 8th, we will begin upgrading customers from Messenger to Skype. The process will take a few weeks to complete. April 8th is the first day you may be required to upgrade. This is a bit later than the March 15th date we previously mentioned to some of you as we wanted to give you more time to make the transition. To keep chatting with your Messenger contacts, simply upgrade to the latest version of Skype using the instructions below and sign in using a Microsoft account (this is the same ID you use to sign into Messenger). Once signed in, your contacts will already be there. You’ll be able to instant message and make video calls with them just like before, and start discovering new ways of staying in touch, including Skype on your mobile or tablet. Upgrade now

Yours sincerely,

The Messenger and Skype Teams

Lately, there has been a lot of talk about how much free space is left on a Surface Pro and how much better Apple’s MacBook Air is with it’s free space. Ed Bott has gone through and taken a deep look at both systems and not only how much free space is involved, but how each company measures their space to begin with. Who is deceiving who with this missing space, and is it that big of a difference? Read the article. It’s very interesting and revealing.

Microsoft has been absolutely pummeled in the press and in reader comments this week by pundits and customers alike. They feel cheated by the amount of free storage space available to them on the new line of Surface Pro devices.

But is that criticism fair or even valid?

The next Xbox (720/Durango/Next) is rumored to require a persistent internet connection to prevent the usage of used games. So far, the user reaction to this rumor has been completely negative. Out of the thousands of comments I read on the linked article, Reddit and other forums, I haven’t seen one that was positive. For me, I love to play single player games when the internet is down. If that’s not happening, I’ll play a single player game: New Super Mario Bros. U. I’ll skip the new console in favor of one that does support the single player game. Regardless of it is to stop used games, a required internet connection does a lot more than just that. It stops me from playing games, which is why I buy a console. If I can’t play, there is no reason to buy. Simple.

This is the same reason I won’t be buying the new SimCity – persistent internet connection required. I don’t pirate my games. But, if my network connection goes flaky and I can’t play the game (single player with no network needed), then that makes the purchase worthless.

If this rumor turns out to be true – sales will suffer. GameStop and other used game outlets will fall. I would also expect to see a LOT more piracy going on. If they can’t play a game because of some DRM – that DRM will be defeated very fast. And users will flock to it. Not to pirate the game (although they will, of course), but to actually PLAY the game they paid $60 for.

Edge is citing "sources with first-hand experience of Microsoft’s next generation console" saying that games for the system will be available via download or as Blu-ray discs with a capacity of up to 50GB. The disc-based games will reportedly all ship with an activation code tying the game to a single user account, making the disc essentially worthless on the second-hand market.

With more online risks, you would think users would do more to protect themselves online. A study by Microsoft shows that this really isn’t true. In a world of growing online risks – with passwords, credit cards and other personal information getting into the hands of criminals – it is a necessity to keep yourself, and your personal information, safe.

Your home PC may be the only place you look to secure, but a growing number of attacks are aimed at mobile devices. With a lot of newer technologies such as cloud storage, online banking, etc., your mobile device may have a lot of information that you may not even think about.

Keep safe out there. Protect your information. Once it’s out there, it is a very long and difficult road to getting things back in order.

“Mobile devices often have just as much, if not more, valuable personal information stored on them as a home computer, making mobile devices equally attractive to data-stealing criminals,” said Jacqueline Beauchere, Microsoft’s incoming chief online safety officer. “The latest MCSI results demonstrate that no matter where or how people access the Internet, exercising safer online habits is essential. There are steps that people can take and technologies that they can employ to help prevent them from becoming a victim.”