Microsoft Hits Record Revenues, But Vista Sales Forecast Lowered
by Alex Woodie

Microsoft was running on all five cylinders during its last quarter, as the software giant announced a 13 percent increase in total revenues, to just under $13.4 billion for the three months ended June 30, helping the company to top $50 billion in annual revenues for the first time. Importantly for Microsoft, customers signed multi-year maintenance contracts at a feverish pace. But the company downgraded its Windows Vista sales expectations for fiscal 2008, as questions over the value of multi-year enterprise agreements continue. READ MORE >

Could Windows '7' Provide Virtual Desktop Breakthrough?
by Alex Woodie

Microsoft confirmed this week that it is working on the next version of the Windows client operating system, codenamed Windows '7.' While details are scarce on exactly what Windows 7 will look like or do, Microsoft is promising its largest customers that the OS will be delivered in about three years, or sometime during 2010. However, Microsoft did hint that virtualization products, now contained in the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack, could be a large part of the Windows 7 equation.READ MORE >

NEC, Stratus Flesh Out Fault Tolerant Server Lines
by Timothy Prickett Morgan

Back in March, partners NEC and Stratus Technology previewed a two-socket fault tolerant server that was based on Intel's quad-core "Clovertown" Xeon 5300 processors. Last week, that box has started shipping, and the two companies are also starting to take orders for smaller configurations of their fault tolerant machines, which are based on Intel's dual-core "Woodcrest" Xeon 5100s and which come with one or two logical sockets per server.READ MORE >

HP Buys System Management Tool Maker Opsware for $1.6 Billion
by Timothy Prickett Morgan

Since it was founded during the IT downturn in 2002, systems management software maker Opsware has spent a lot of time and money creating the system and network management tools that it has always said cope with the deficiencies of tools made by IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, and others--and it has spent lots trying to convince the data centers of the world that its Opsware System was just the right thing to bring server, storage, and network sprawl under control. Today, HP admitted that Opsware was right after all, announcing that it would spend $1.6 billion to acquire Opsware. READ MORE >