Opera 10 is quietly being sampled out to beta testers

Download Opera 10 Alpha

From the Opera Website:

“Note that this alpha release is not intended to show off the full feature set of Opera 10—that will be a while off. It is the first public release of the Opera Presto 2.2 rendering engine, which will be present in Opera 10, made available so you can start trying out some of the new Web technology support. ”

We love to play with shiny new toys so we downloaded Opera 10 alpha for a spin.  This is a nice browser.  Most of the compatibility problems with Opera’s famous strict standards adherence are gone.

Speed is way way up!

The classic Opera speed dial is even better.

While Opera 10 is probably, today, not a good choice for your default browser, this is absolutely worth a look. In fact, I have no bugs to report in my use and this story was just published using it.  That’s better than Apple Safari 4 with which I could not publish anything.

I will publish a speed test report comparing it to Explorer 8, Firefox 3.1, Apple Safari 4 and Google Chrome when it gets to be Opera 10 Beta instead of Alpha.

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I saw that Apple has released Safari 4 Beta

I love the way that Apple approaches design and I keep hoping upon hope that they will someday deliver a better, faster  browser instead of one that seems fast for a few things but cannot be your day to day default browser.

I think Firefox is great, fast and ugly.  I know you can skin it, etc.  You cannot turn an ugly troll like Firefox and Explorer into a princess like Safari 4 Beta.  You also cannot teach that princess (Safari 4) to walk and chew gum at the same time. Read the full story

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I’ve used Avid, Adobe Premier, Pinnacle and even open source/free video editors. What I have not used before is video editing software that is as intuitive as Sony Vegas 9 Movie Studio Platinum. Ok, so it’s probably only intuitive to people who have experience in video editing, but having had projects using many different systems, I am very impressed with Sony’s offering.

Without consulting a manual or reading anything about it at all, I’ve just assumed that it works like a video editing software and viola, it does.  No strange quirks or annoyances, just productivity. All the menus, structure and symbols in the user interface are easy to interpret and follow industry standards (possibly the first time Sony has bothered with things like that). Read the full story

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Windows 7 Beta - One Month In, What Do We Know Now?

It’s been about a month since we loaded version Microsoft Windows 7 Beta version 7000 (official Microsoft Windows 7 Beta) on our test computers here at the office.

I thought it might help people if I shared a list of what seems to work, what has problems and what we did to get things going.  Here is our list and our install notes.

At the end of the article we give our top tips for Microsoft Windows 7 Beta Compatibility for your applications and games.

If you have any additions, things you’d like us to test or problems, please use the comments and we’ll get you an answer on every single item. Read the full story

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Having just installed Windows 7 Beta ,  I wanted to install my favorite applications that included Adobe Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Fireworks. I noticed that they have a new version CS4 and downloaded the trial to test them out.

Unfortunately none of the individual trial software packages would install. I tried Dreamweaver CS4 and Fireworks CS4 and they both fail about halfway through the installation.

I really wanted to try it the Adobe CS4 for versions so I downloaded them from a torrent site.  Stripped of their Adobe installation software they ran fine.  Attention Adobe: Get an instant upgrade of 20% or better in your software’s over all performance by outsourcing your install script to torrent freaks.  Oh yeah and the bonus is that your software will install on anything that can spin a fan.

Read the full story

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Spore, the latest release from EA (Electronic Arts) proves that imagination is in no short supply when it comes to new games.  In fact EA proves that the world of games can be not only stranger than you thought, but stranger than you can think.  The result is lovable, engrossing and dangerously time consuming.

You start life as a ‘cell’  You eat, mate and evolve to become bigger, stronger, smarter, faster and generally to eat more.  The more aggressive you are the more you evolve and the more other things follow you in your flock.  Periodically, you raid nearby camps, slaughter and eat them to gain power.  This is not dis-similar from my life in a large corporation. Read the full story

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Attention Microsoft: We Don’t need 6 versions of your product.  We need at most two versions that work very well.

We got 6 versions of Vista and that was a nightmare.  I really just want one version of Windows 7 and that should be the best version.  After all, you don’t want people to experience less than the best when running Microsoft Windows right?  I mean, you really want people to be loyal, love it and potentially respect it the morning after they get their copy from the torrents. Read the full story

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Microsoft confirmed that there will be no updates to Windows 7 Beta until final release accoring to Steven Sinofsky, Windows Dev Chief, at Microsoft.

Sinofsky emphasized in his new post that Microsoft is not sharing any new ship date targets for Windows 7.  Microsoft will release a private beta to developers and hardware manufacturers a minimum of 10 minutes before they ship it to the general public.   The RC will be”Windows 7 as we intend to ship it,” Sinofsky blogged. More about the RC from his post:

“We will continue to listen to feedback and telemetry with the focus on addressing only the most critical issues that arise. We will be very clear in communicating any changes that have a visible impact on the product. This release allows the whole ecosystem to reach a known state together and make sure that we are all ready together for the Release to Manufacturing. Once we get to RC, the whole ecosystem is in “dress rehearsal” mode for the next steps.”

Microsoft refuses to comment on the release date saying that it will be before 2010.  Most insiders predict a fast track release and the internal pressure is mounting to get the Windows Vista that we all thought we bought out the door as quickly as possible.

The question is:  Will Microsoft’s strategy for fixing the ‘world worst software release’, Vista, be to rush Windows 7 out the door to soon also?

So far I have to say that the answer is, Windows 7 is ready right now.  There is not one thing I do in business or for my entertainment that is not working under Windows 7 Beta right now.  For me, it’s a complete environment and production ready.  Is it perfect?  No.  I’m no Microsoft fan boy.

My guess for a reasonable release date would be August/September.

The currently released beta expires in July right?  So with no further update planned, how big a gap would you leave if you were Microsoft?  I’m thinking that a release in the July time frame would be the final RC and that would take care of the beta expiration problems.

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There are now three Antivirus / Anti-Spyware solutions approved by Microsoft for use with the Microsoft Windows 7 Beta 1 test program:

1. Avg 8 For Windows 7
2. Kaspersky 8 Windows 7 Beta Preview
3. Symantec Norton 360 v3 pre-release (beta)

After Hands on Testing Inlcuding Spyware and Virus Removal Here Are My Short Takes On Each:

AVG v8 for Windows 7 Beta and Windows Vista

This is the only one of the group that’s actually fully released.  I trust this solution because it was able to find and resolve a few things that other products didn’t.  It doesn’t feel like anything is running on your computer at all.  It never bothers you and it does it’s job very well without needing you to manage it.  It’s focused on protecting your PC and it does it very well. Read the full story

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A while back I posted on testing the Windows 7 Beta 1 release to developers and how incredibly great it is.  Yes, It’s still much better than Microsoft’s Windows Vista SP2 Beta.

I got some good news from AVG on current owners of AVG Version 7. Many Current AVG 7 Anti-Virus and Internet Security customers will be able to upgrade for FREE to AVG 8 Anti-Virus including Microsoft Windows 7 Antivirus Compatibility. Read the full story

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