According to a draft announcement leaked to TechArp by a Microsoft OEM partner, the company is planning on allowing users who purchase new PC/laptop hardware (with Vista) from 1st July 2009 onwards, a free upgrade... More...

The Neowin CES 2009 crew is all present and accounted for. We just hit the press registration desk and picked up our badge holders and bags. Now we're headed to the ASUS Keynote and later... More...

Update: Our contest is now live, click here to enter! The HP Magic Giveaway has begun on several sites today. For a full list checkout the Google calendar at the bottom of this... More...

So pre-conference begun today and I went over to the conference center to take a couple of pictures. It's nearly Windows 7 time... More...

As we reported on last week, Microsoft has been prepping a big refresh for Windows Live Hotmail users. Starting this week, users should begin noticing changes to their interface. Due to the huge user base... More...

BT has restarted its Phorm trial despite huge privacy concerns. The Phorm system allows BT to track and monitor every website that a user visits. BT puts this information into a database and is then... More...

Microsoft has begun privately beta testing a new tool, known as "Windows Advisor," which is aimed at helping consumers better pinpoint why their Windows machines might not be up to snuff. Windows Advisor currently... More...

A free-to-view satellite television and radio service from the BBC and ITV is being launched across the UK. Freesat is available to 98% of homes with a satellite dish, including those who are currently... More...

We have arrived at CES! If last year's CES seemed a little more software-centric than usual, this year it's gadget oriented. Today the HD-DVD group officially canceled much of their CES events due to the... More...

Microsoft is expected to officially open the beta program for Windows Live Messenger 9.0 this afternoon (or early evening). Windows Live Messenger 9.0 is the next generation of Windows Live Messenger; this release is a... More...

It wasn't long after Google announced its long-anticipated mobile plans this week that a debate emerged about the prospective security of the project's Linux-based platform. Can the open-source model for the platform, now known as... More...

Matsushita Electric Industrial Company, the company that manufactures various consumer electronics under its Panasonic brand-name, has started using Large-Scale Integration (LSI) chips made using 45nm process technology in its Diga high-definition video recorders. The new... More...

Social network MySpace has launched a nationwide talent search for stars for its first movie, 'Faintheart'. As the next stage in the £1million MyMovie MashUp project – a fully user-generated feature film, being made in... More...

Over the past few months Dell has been gearing up to replace perhaps thousands of motherboards in XPS 700 and 710 systems for free; finally the program has been kicked off. All customers who opt... More...

Five years after the concept was first proposed, the so-called $100 laptop is poised to go into mass production. Hardware suppliers have been given the green light to ramp-up production of all of the components... More...

Popular tweaking site TweakVista.com and Stardock have teamed up to create a new utility for Windows Vista users called TweakVista. TweakVista allows users to change many low level settings in Windows Vista as well as... More...

YouTube has launched nine localized versions of its video-sharing site for the following countries: Brazil, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and the UK. YouTube co-founder Steve Chen announced the international sites have... More...

AMD has said that it has begun shipping its ATI Radeon HD 2400 and ATI Radeon HD 2600 series graphics processors (GPUs) in volume to its add-in board (AIB) customers. Graphics cards based on these... More...

NBC Universal Incorporated plans to make some of its news, entertainment and sports television programming available as widgets that users can personalize and add to blogs, Web sites, wikis and social networking profiles. NBC will... More...

Outpost Firewall Pro provides a superior arsenal of defense against PC infiltration. Outpost ensures your online security with solid protection against all Internet-borne threats. Vista product will be significantly different from the XP version, both... More...

The Ministry of Public Security in China is launching a six-month campaign to crackdown on cyber strip shows and sexually explicit images, stories and audio and video clips. The communist government encourages Internet use for... More...

Apple Incorporated has started to ship its new AppleTV product, a piece of hardware that allows streaming iTunes content from computers to the television. Apple Canada's online store prices the devices at a retail price... More...

Security expert Stefan Esser has declared war on vulnerabilities in the PHP core with the "Month of PHP Bugs." PHP is an open-source HTML embedded scripting language used to create dynamic Web pages. The... More...

Samsung Electronics announced today that it has begun mass producing the industry's first 1Gb DDR2 DRAM using 60nm–class process technology. Use of the new process technology is a significant milestone in that it increases production... More...

Sorry for not posting this a bit sooner. Needless to say some good news for some of you who enjoy The Ship free weekends, which seem to be popping up every month or so now.... More...

Samsung Electronics has announced that it is now sampling 16Gb NAND flash memory manufactured on 50nm process technology. The first samples of will have a multi-level cell (MLC) design with a 4KB page size, with... More...

Mr. Doug Lombardi from Valve just sent over a little press release, so here it is for all of you to enjoy: World War II Week begins today on Steam with new product,... More...

That's right, Red Orchestra Osfront 41-45 is having another free weekend right now! At 1:00 PM PST (about 45 minutes from now actually) everyone can start playing what is in my own opinion one... More...

Updates to Counter-Strike: Source and the Source Engine, along with some improvements to SourceTV have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The specific changes include: ... More...

Hundreds of wallpapers have been submitted to the 2006 GUI Championships. Many hours have been spent by artists crafting their masterpieces in an attempt to get their hands on a chunk of our $12,000... More...

Gamespot is reporting that Nintendo have already received their first shipment of "Broadway" CPUs for their up and coming much anticipated console the Wii. Genyo Takeda, senior managing director and general manager of Nintendo's integrated... More...

Following the release Friday of Microsoft Windows Vista Release Candidate 1 (RC1), Microsoft Corp. announced plans to make RC1 available for broad customer and partner testing. With this milestone, Microsoft is also communicating the U.S.... More...

K2 Network today launched the Open Beta for Warrock, an Online only First Person Shooter in the vein of Battlefield 2 and Counter-Strike: Source. Warrock, when launched in a few months time (one would figure)... More...

As promised the "Free Weekend" for Day of Defeat: Source has begun (a few hours ago, sorry my connection is still screwy) and anyone can now play Day of Defeat: Source. Simply download... More...

Apple has activated its previously announced free computer take-back program, offering to recycle old computers for US customers when they buy a new Mac. While it does not yet offer this service in its other... More...

To bolster their opinion among the average consumer, Apple has revamped its almost non existent Mac advertising campaign with instead a massive, in comparison, six TV advertisement campaign as well as a new addition to... More...

Anti-virus companies are advising that everyone scan their machines before February 3, when the destructive virus known as Nyxem will delete a multitude of filetypes. The virus has picked... More...

As promised earlier last week, Valve has allowed Steam users to begin the process of pre-loading Day of Defeat: Source files on their hard drives. The process of pre-loading involves downloading the game's files, in... More...

The beta version of Norton AntiVirus 2006 for Windows 2000/XP is now available for download. Symantec's Norton AntiVirus 2006 is the world's most trusted antivirus solution. It removes viruses and security risks automatically, blocks certain... More...

ATI Technologies has recently unveiled plans fo a $100 rebate program for consumers who purchase its upcoming CrossFire line of graphics cards in pairs. Consumers who purchase an X8xx series card before September 29th... More...

EA ships the new stealth actioner--inspired by the superhero blockbuster--for the GBA, PS2, Xbox, and GameCube. Today, the would-be summer blockbuster Batman Begins debuts on more than 3,400 screens nationwide in the... More...

Sun Microsystems is expected to release Solaris as open-source software Tuesday; the move is a centerpiece of the company's plan to regain lost relevance and fend off rivals Red Hat, IBM and Microsoft. ... More...

Sony has started shipping compact discs armed with copy-protection technology provided by the UK-based firm First4Internet. The security feature is not designed to thwart sophisticated duplication strategies used by those who will stop at nothing... More...

Turbine and the DDO Team are excited to announce that Alpha Registrations for Dungeons & Dragons Online are now open to the community in the Members Only forum! Please note: at this time, Alpha signup... More...

Multiplatform movie tie-in will feature likenesses of Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Liam Neeson, Katie Holmes, and Oscar nominee Morgan Freeman. Electronic Arts' latest movie-based game loaded up on voice talent today. Batman Begins,... More...

Microsoft began its appeal yesterday against a $565m judgment that it infringed on a patent held by Eolas, a University of California spin-off. The federal appeals court heard that the patent should not be valid... More...

North American retailers first to receive Sony's PC MMORPG; Standard and Collector's Editions should start arriving in stores tomorrow. Sony today announced that the sequel to the long-standing massively multiplayer online role-playing... More...

Although its experiment with the Catwoman license didn't go so well, Electronic Arts is undeterred in its pursuit of a comic-to-movie-to-game hit. It should fare a bit better with Batman Begins -- the publishing giant... More...

The shooter doesn't have a release date yet, but Valve will take your money anyway. Valve has announced that online orders for Half-Life 2 via the developer's Steam downloading service have begun.... More...

Half-Life 2 pre-loading begins to Steam account holders today. Over the coming days, those who have selected the pre-loading option will have encrypted Half-Life 2 files delivered to their PC. No purchase is required to... More...