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Ed Bott is an award-winning technology writer with more than two decades' experience writing for mainstream media outlets and online publications.
I just experienced a Windows Genuine Advantage failure. Only it’s not a false positive, like the horror stories I’ve been hearing for nearly two months now. No, I just installed a pirated copy of Windows using a stolen product key, and Microsoft's Windows Genuine Advantage tool says I'm perfectly legal. The whole story reveals a lot about how poorly the WGA program is being run.
Microsoft and Mozilla are on a collision course, racing to complete major updates to their flagship web browsers scheduled for release this fall. IE7 and Firefox 2 include major new security features, including tools to help stop phishing attacks. Does either browser have an edge?
Not business, that's for sure, according to a new report. Meanwhile, Microsoft is rushing to have shrink-wrapped copies of its new operating system available for consumers in ... January? If there's a worse month for a product launch, it's hard to imagine what it could be.
My loyal commenters keep telling me I should give up on Windows and switch to Linux. I'm trying, I'm trying! For my latest attempt, I added some inexpensive hardware upgrades to a Y2K-era notebook, blew away Windows Me, and set it up to dual-boot Windows XP and Ubuntu Linux. Guess which one I'm using now?
Microsoft's Vista boss tells a room full of financial analysts that the high-end version of Microsoft's new operating system will cost a little more, and he won't commit to a ship date. So why is this good news for Windows customers?
If you’re a Microsoft product manager and you want to make sure that the latest version of Internet Explorer gets on as many computers as possible, how do you handle the upgrade? Why not deliver it automatically? That’s the thought process behind today’s announcement that IE7 will be offered to as a High Priority update to anyone who has Automatic Updates turned on.
I guess Microsoft has begun to take notice of the many, many complaints from Windows customers who have installed the WGA Validation tool and have been accused of running a “non-genuine
Microsoft says its WGA validation code is so accurate that it has produced only a "handful" of false positives. It's hard to take that claim seriously when one of the most widely read members of the Windows enthusiast community just got stung.
In its road shows last year and earlier this year, Microsoft promised that you'd be able to install Windows Vista in as little as 15 minutes. But current beta builds aren't even close to that milestone. Where are the bottlenecks in the Vista setup process?
According to a Microsoft manager, 60 million people have failed the Windows Genuine Advantage validation test. Microsoft claims the tool is nearly perfect at rooting out improperly licensed copies of Windows, with "only a handful of actual false positives." But the numbers don't add up.