Channel 10

Hotmail Now Gets Push Support via Exchange ActiveSync

Sarah Perez — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 15:08:00 GMT

Microsoft Hotmail, calendar and contacts can now be automatically pushed to your phone using Exchange ActiveSync technology (EAS). That means that whatever you do on your phone, from reading an email, creating a new calendar appointment, updating a contact, etc. with be automatically and instantly synced with the web service at www.hotmail.com. It also means that emails get sent to your phone as soon as they arrive. And if you access your Hotmail in Outlook with the Outlook Connector or in the free program Windows Live Mail, whatever you do within the software program also immediately shows up on the web, too.

To set up support for ActiveSync on your phone, you’ll need the following info:

Server / URL: m.hotmail.com
Username: Enter full email address, for example: someone@example.com
Domain : Leave this blank
SSL: Enable this
Certificate: Accept the SSL certificate when prompted
Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Tasks: All can be enabled (see the Solution Center article for exceptions on some phones)

Currently EAS is officially supported on Windows Mobile 6.x phones, Windows Phone 7, the iPhone (iPad, iPod Touch, too), Nokia E-Series, S-Series and N-Series. Other devices may work, but support will be limited. Android support is currently not available but testing is underway. For details on your particular device, go here.

(via Windows Live team blog)

Channel 9 App for Windows Phone 7

Sarah Perez — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 15:07:00 GMT

An independent Windows Phone developer, Sigurd Snørteland, has created an application for accessing news from Channel 9 on your Windows Phone 7 device. The app, “myChannel9,” will display news and videos from the site and will offers features like the ability to favorite a show, browse by tags or search by keyword. You’ll also be able to use the app to watch videos right on your device, whether in portrait or landscape mode. Screenshots and demo videos of the app are available now on Snørteland’s personal blog. He has also created an app called Wall Street, which, as the name implies, will focus on delivering stock-related information.

(via PocketNow)

Family Pack is Back!

Sarah Perez — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 15:07:00 GMT

Microsoft is reintroducing the Windows 7 Family Pack, a discounted pack of multiple Windows 7 operating system licenses for use in homes that have more than one computer. Starting October 3rd in the U.S., you’ll be able to get 3 upgrade licenses of Windows 7 Home Premium for $149.99. On October 22nd, a discount will also be available to shoppers in Canada, the U.K., Germany, France, Australia and others, a date which also happens to be Windows 7’s one-year anniversary.

If you’ve been waiting around to upgrade your home’s computers, this is a good time to buy. To see if your PC can run Windows 7, check out the Upgrade Advisor here.

(via the Windows Team)

New from FUSE: Team Crossword Beta

Sarah Perez — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 08:40:00 GMT

The team from FUSE Labs (the folks behind Outlook Social Connector, Spindex, Kodu, Emporia, Bing Twitter Maps and Docs) have just launched a new project called Team Crossword. This application isn’t a major release like Docs.com, the Facebook-enabled Microsoft Office service, but is rather just a simple but fun social game. At TeamCrossword.com, you and your friends can solve crossword puzzles together online. The site also tracks the fastest time a team took to solve a puzzle, so you can see how you and your friends compare.

There’s a new puzzle available every day via the website. You can get started here by signing in with Facebook and inviting your Facebook friends to join.

(Thanks Steve Clayton for pointing this out!)

JumpControl Adds Shutdown Options to Windows 7 Taskbar

Sarah Perez — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 08:40:00 GMT

This is a nifty little app to have: JumpControl, available here on DeviantArt. It’s a simple program that lets you add shutdown, restart, sleep, log off, lock and switch user options right to your Windows 7 Taskbar.

As you know, Windows 7 introduced a new taskbar which lets you “pin” programs to it which could then be right-clicked to display “jump lists.” These jump lists include things like frequent tasks associated with that program and/or a list of recent files, among other things.

To use the JumpControl app, you just download the zip file, extract the files it contains to a folder on your PC, then right-click on the executable and choose “pin to taskbar.” You don’t actually have to run the executable, though, unless you want to configure which options will be displayed in the jump list.

After the app has been pinned to the taskbar, you can access these common shutdown/log off options right from the app’s jumplist – that’s handy!

The program is available as freeware and works as advertised.

(via NirmalTV.com)

Sick of Landscapes? Tons of New Artistic Themes Added to Windows 7 Gallery

Sarah Perez — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 08:40:00 GMT

While I’ve personally been enjoying the new Bing themes (especially the RSS-enabled one!), not everyone is interested in setting a tranquil landscape, cityscape or nature-inspired photo as their desktop background. If you would rather have something a bit more artistic to look at, you’ll be pleased to find that the Windows 7 Personalization Gallery has recently been updated with a big selection of new themes, all with a more artistic focus.

Here’s what’s new:

26 Creative – This theme features “cheerful florals” and “patchwork characters” from artist Chang, Fan-Hsuan.
Imagination – A gently surreal theme from artist Yeh, Hsin-Hung.
Bake House – A theme made up of cartoonish breads and pastry characters by Wang, Hsueh-Shih.
Girls Rock – An anime-esque theme featuring girl rockers.
An Hsin Pu Tzu – A dreamy, romantic theme featuring cartoon characters relaxing in nature.
Gears of War 3 – not necessarily an “artistic” theme, but worth a mention – this one features portraits of Marcus Fenix, Dominic Santiago and Anya Stroud from Gears of War 3, due to arrive on Xbox in April 2011.

Windows Live Sync Arrives for Mac

Sarah Perez — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:34:00 GMT

Windows Live Sync, the service which keeps your documents, photos and files synced in between all your PC, has now been released for Mac users. The download, available here at the Microsoft Download Center, serves as a replacement for Windows Live Mesh, the beta service which was merged into Live Sync, a part of the updated Windows Live Essentials suite of applications.

According to the download page, Live Sync for Mac (beta) will let you choose the folders you sync across your computers, and those will then be able to sync between both your Mac computers and your PCs.

Live Sync for Mac requires Mac OS X v10.5 Leopard or Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard and works on Intel-based Mac computer only.

No Surprise Here: King of Bing Maps is Taxi Fare Calculator

Sarah Perez — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:34:00 GMT

When the Bing Team announced that they were holding a contest for developers to create new Bing Map applications, called the “King of Bing Maps,” the blogosphere soon erupted with news of one of the entries: the Taxi Fare calculator.

The Taxi Fare Calculator app was developed by Ricky Brundritt, and, as you may imagine, it lets you enter in a starting address and end address and then see what the cab fare may be, as well as the shortest route. Fare estimates are based on rates for cabs in the area, and include pick-up rates and by-the-miles costs, as applicable.

Obviously, this map app is extremely handy, which is why everyone was raving about it.

Now the Bing Team has revealed that the app is the official winner of the contest, news which was announced via a video on MSDN's Channel 9. Brundritt, as the grand-prize winner, won $1000.

The other winners included in GeoSales Tax and Ricky’s Data Viewer

Windows Live Photo Gallery Now Does Geotagging

Sarah Perez — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:34:00 GMT

Thanks to the recent refresh of the Windows Live Essentials beta, Windows Live Photo Gallery now supports geo-tagged photos via Bing Maps. Geo-tagging (adding location information to a photo) helps you see, on a map, where a particular photo was taken. By supporting geo-tags within Photo Gallery, you can optionally sort your photos by location within the application.

Also, thanks to the new feature that allows you to publish a series photos directly to Photosynth (Create menu –> More Tools –> Create a Photosynth), the geotagged option will allow the synth to be rendered and then placed on Bing Maps. Then all you would have to do to finish your synth is add a title, tags, and a description.

To get the new version of Windows Live Photo Gallery which supports this feature, just head over to the Windows Live Essentials beta homepage here and hit the “download now” button.

(via the Bing team blog)

Hotmail Now Integrates with Bing Maps and More

Sarah Perez — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:33:00 GMT

In another great example of Microsoft tying its different services together, Windows Live Hotmail now integrates with Bing Maps. According to the Bing team, when you create a new email, one of the new options on the Insert Menu in Hotmail is “From Bing.” It sits to the right of the standard “Insert” options like “Attachments” and “Photos.”

From this menu, you can select one of the following: “clip art,” “videos,” “webpages,” and “Maps and Places.” Using any of these options lets you automatically insert content pulled from Bing, but probably the most useful will be the option to insert content from Bing Maps.

When you select this option, a task pane opens on the right-hand side of your screen, allowing you to search for a location or pull up a location you’ve previously saved. You can optionally edit the details of the item or just click “insert” to add it to your email.

That’s definitely a handy feature to have when trying to share directions via email – you don’t even have to go to another web page, you can do it all from your inbox.

Students: Get Windows 7 for $30

Sarah Perez — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 13:33:00 GMT

Wow, I just came across a handy link you’ll want to share with any college students (or parents of college students) you know: Windows 7 is only $29.99 for those enrolled in a U.S.-based educational institution. To qualify, the student must be taking at least 0.5 course credits and have either an @EDU.com email address or attend one of the institutions listed here. If so, the deal available here, will let them grab the Windows 7 Professional Upgrade edition for digital download. Backup media can be optionally added to the order, too, if desired.

The deal is currently being featured on www.microsoft.com/student, which is a valuable resource for finding great deals on Microsoft software, with links to Office 2010 for $79.95, all the student deals on the Microsoft Store site, all the free downloads from Dreamspark (professional development tools), and more. This almost makes me want to go back to school myself. Well, almost.

Just in Time for Back-to-School, Docs.com Updated with New Features

Sarah Perez — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 17:06:00 GMT

Docs.com, the application that lets you view, create and share Microsoft Office files on Facebook, has just been updated with new features aimed to improve document organization and discovery.

According to a post on the Docs blog, you can now tag your documents with keywords, which will allow you to better find your files in a large list. Also new is an improved search feature which lets you drill-down into your friends’ public document lists or see related files. While in these lists, you can sort by date, title, and file type. And finally, from anywhere on Docs.com, you can now search for files by people, places or tags.

These features for better organization and discovery will come in handy as September rolls around and kids, teens and college students head back to school. Since nearly everyone uses Facebook these days to communicate, having a central place to store, collaborate and share your files will be handy to students discussing homework assignments – especially those working on group projects, we’d imagine.

But keep in mind that students aren’t the only ones who can benefit from Docs.com. On the app’s Facebook page, underneath the “upload a doc” section, there’s a separate section called “use Docs + Facebook.” It’s here that you’ll find some really interesting tools.

The first, “Create a Resume,” automatically accesses your Facebook profile for your work and education history and contact information, and instantly creates a formatted and editable resume you can share with your friends.

The “Chart Your Friends” application accesses your friends’ Facebook profile info to instantly create a chart of your friends’ details, including things like ages, gender mix, location, etc.

And the third app, “Make a Photo Slideshow,” instantly creates a PowerPoint from your Facebook photos. Like all Docs.com docs, you can view or edit the file online or download it to your computer.

All the docs created on Docs.com also offer a shortened URL perfect for tweeting, posting in a status update or sending via text message. If you’ve never used Docs.com yet, you can do so by adding the app here.

Bing Launches Food Cart Finder Mapplication

Sarah Perez — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 17:06:00 GMT

Bing Maps has just launched a new “hyperlocal” Bing Maps application, the Portland-based “Food Cart Finder.” As the name implies, this map app helps the hungry spot one of the city’s many mobile food carts in real-time. At present, it tracks over 250 food carts in this test venture. If successful, the service will expand nationally.

When you load up the app for the first time, you’ll see the mobile food carts represented on the map (hilariously) as sporks, not pushpins. You can then filter vendors by prices, neighborhood, features and cuisine.

The Food Cart Finder isn’t Bing’s first map app with a hyperlocal focus. “Local Lens,” which launched in February is probably the most notable of Bing’s hometown-focused mapplications. This app displays blog posts and news articles as an additional map layer across a select number of U.S. cities. For example, an article about road construction would be pinned to the area of the highway being worked on. A robbery story would be pinned to the house or business where it took place.

Oodle Rentals is also a somewhat hyperlocal map app, too, as it allows you to search for and locate nearby rental properties from classified site oodle.com. All of these map apps and more can be found at bing.com/maps.

Surface Driven Robot

Larry Larsen — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 13:54:00 GMT

The Microsoft Surface Blog is linking to a Doctoral Thesis Defense that will be streaming live at 1PM eastern today (in 9 minutes) that will preview a system to directly control robots via a Microsoft Surface Computer.

For more details see the Surface Blog, or watch the live stream here.

"Magical" Kinect Demoed by Harry Potter Actors

Sarah Perez — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:50:00 GMT

Well that’s a good match! The actors who play the Weasley twins (James and Oliver Phelps) in the Harry Potter series of films, demonstrated the “magical” Xbox Kinect at the Gamescom event in Germany. The demo took place during Electronic Arts’ press conference where the game maker was briefing the audience on their upcoming lineup, including a new Kinect-capable Harry Potter game.

The new game is an adaptation of the upcoming movie, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part 1) and it lets you perform spells with just your hands. For example, players can use stupefy, expelliarmus, protego, windgardium leviosa, and others by moving their arms and hands in particular motions. (No actual magic wand is required).

For Harry Potter fans, this one’s going to be a must-have. For everyone else, there are plenty of other Kinect titles to choose from. You can keep track of the growing list here.

$100 Windows CE Netbook?

Sarah Perez — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:50:00 GMT

In netbook news, Engadget is reporting there’s a $100 netbook coming to your local CVS drug store later this year. The store will soon be stocking a Sylvania PC running Windows CE, and, despite its small size, the netbook’s ad claims it will be able to stream video and YouTube.

From the looks of it, the netbook Engadget discovered could be this 7-inch, 2-pounder described in detail here on digitalgadgets.com. According to those specs, the CE-based computer includes a 1.2 GHz VIA C7-M processor, 1 GB DDR 533 MHz memory, a 30 GB HDD and 7” display. Nothing too fancy, but only $100? Guess we’ll have to wait for CVS to make this deal official.

Also according to Engadget’s report, the tiny computer will support email, web browsing and social networking too. But no other details are available.

I for one, hope this is true. It would make computers an impulse buy at checkout!

Flight Simulator Returns!

Sarah Perez — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:50:00 GMT

Microsoft’s classic game Flight Simulator is returning 28 years after its debut, then called “Microsoft Flight Simulator 1.0.” Today, it will just be known as “Microsoft Flight.” In the new vision, Flight will reinvent itself for the era of modern PC gaming, inviting both long-time fans and new users to “experience the magic of flight,” reads the teaser on the website at www.microsoft.com/games/flight.

The game is still in development, but an alpha version is almost ready for internal testing, Kevin Unangst, a senior director in Microsoft's game unit, recently told CNET News. But don’t expect a public beta this year, he said.

Details on gameplay are few, as are screenshots, but the “Flight” website does have a teaser video available which shows a prop plane soaring over sparkling water as the sun rises, casting everything with a an orange-ish glow.

“Flight” isn’t the only game to be resurrected. Another classic, “Age of Empires,” is also returning in a new online version and it is taking sign ups for its beta launching in 2010. According to the news release, Age of Empires invites players to watch their own Greek civilization grow from village to empire, while embarking on quests and adventures, either solo or with friends.

You can learn more about all these games and other new releases at microsoft.com/games.

A Pink Mouse for the Cure

Sarah Perez — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:49:00 GMT

Call me a girl, but I like pink. I’ve never had a pink mouse though, although I’ve seen plenty for sale. But now there’s one available that’s tempting me to purchase, not just for its color but because I know it’s for a good cause.

This upcoming special edition of the Wireless Mobile Mouse 4000 has been made in partnership with Susan G. Komen for the Cure, which you probably know is the world’s largest breast cancer charitable organization.

Microsoft will be donating 10% of the selling price ($4.00 USD) with a minimum donation of $200,000 to Susan G. Komen for the Cure when the mouse goes on sale mid-September (retail price: $39.95 USD). The money will be used for research grants and community outreach projects, reports the Microsoft Hardware blog.

The mouse offers pretty great hardware specs, too, including BlueTrack technology, a tiny nano transceiver and customizable buttons. Windows 7 integration is supported as well. For more details, check out the full feature list here on Microsoft.com while you wait for the pink one to arrive in stores and online.

Windows Live Messenger Now Supports Facebook Chat

Sarah Perez — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 15:06:00 GMT

With the recent refresh of the Windows Live Essentials beta, Windows Live Messenger has been updated to now support Facebook chat in addition to its standard IM service. This new feature further enhances the IM client software, which is already more of a social dashboard than a simple chat application.

Thanks to the (optional) “full view” feature, Messenger users can check on social networking updates, photos, and status messages from Windows Live friends, Facebook friends and MySpace friends or reads news from MSN.com. If you click “connect more services,” you can also pick dozens of others to your dashboard, including popular social sites like flickr, Twitter, Pandora, Digg, Hulu, YouTube, Photobucket, Last.fm and many more.

Now, the new version of Messenger kicks up the social networking integration to the next level by allowing you to not only see and respond to social networking activity via the dashboard, but to directly chat with Facebook friends in real-time. Even if you don’t use Messenger IM itself, the app can now function as an always-on “people app” that alerts you when your friends come online in Facebook, explains Chris Jones on the Windows Live Team blog.

To get the new Messenger, just head over to the Windows Live Essentials beta homepage here and hit the “download now” button.

What New with Windows Live Essentials Beta Refresh

Sarah Perez — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 15:06:00 GMT

The Windows Live team has just pushed out a refresh of the Windows Live Essentials beta. This suite of add-on programs for Windows includes favorite apps like Messenger, Mail, Photo Gallery, Live Writer, Movie Maker and Family Safety, all of which can be optionally installed or skipped when you download the beta package.

According to news from Chris Jones, the beta has proved quite popular so far, with 3 million unique users in Messenger alone, 3.5 million updates to display pictures, 6.2 million video calls, and 7.6 million updates to status messages, just to give you a taste of some of the beta-related stats.

So what’s new this go-round? A lot, actually. Here’s the list of service improvements:

A quicker Messenger – The time it takes to sign in, and to refresh contacts and social feeds, as well as animation speed, are all faster than in previous versions of Messenger.
More efficient video chat - Messenger video chat uses 30% fewer CPU resources by offloading work to the GPU.
Better facial recognition - Photo Gallery facial recognition is improved significantly and works more quickly.
Larger movie uploads - Movie Maker will upload higher resolution movies to SkyDrive (480x640 vs. the previous 320x480).
Higher bit-rate movies - Movie Maker now supports higher quality (bit-rate) content.
Better spell-checking - Writer has significantly improved the quality of its spell-checking.
Better integration with Office - Writer is much better at retaining all formatting when you copy and paste from Word and other Microsoft Office programs.
Better handling of Gmail – Mail now automatically handles Gmail’s spam and trash folders properly.
Faster web filtering - Family Safety web filtering is 35% faster than in the previous version.

There are also new features being introduced as well, like “quick previews” and an improved tree view in Photo Gallery, Flickr video publishing and “Snapshot” in Movie Maker, Bing Maps integration in Photo Gallery & Movie Maker, 640x480 video upload resolution to SkyDrive, Jump List integration in WLW plus some other improvements to formatting features and spellcheck, better alerts and reporting in Family Safety, support for Russian and German languages in addition to English, Spanish, French, Dutch, Portuguese, Japanese, and Simplified Chinese, and even more minor upgrades too numerous to list here.

But perhaps the feature I’m most excited about is Facebook chat via Live Messenger. I may hang out in “invisible mode” a lot on IM, but it’s nice to know that when I want to chat over my preferred communication service – that’s Facebook, actually, sorry GChat, AOL, & Messenger – I can. And I can do it without having to go to Facebook.com itself, which, quite frankly, can be a huge time suck I don’t always need.

To try out the new beta yourself, just head over to its homepage here and hit the “download now” button.

Xbox LIVE Games for WP7 Revealed

Sarah Perez — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 14:29:00 GMT

Microsoft has just revealed its Xbox LIVE launch titles which will arrive on the upcoming Windows Phone 7 handsets. Within the “Games” hub of phones built with the new mobile operating system, you’ll be able to access games, demos, Xbox LIVE leaderboards, achievement info and more.

The initial lineup (over 60 games) will include well-known titles from Gameloft, Konami, Namco, PopCap and THQ. And there are more to come prior to the phone’s launch this holiday season, says Microsoft. After the phone launches, additional Xbox LIVE titles will be added every week.

In addition to mobile gaming, WP7 will let gamers customize their avatars, check on their friends’ online status, compare achievements, message Xbox LIVE friends via the phone and invite friends to play multiplayer games on either the phone or PC. Game-related news, tips and tricks will also be available via the Games hub.

For the compete game lineup, check out the news release here. Some notable standouts include Guitar Hero 5, Bejeweled, Crackdown 2, Fast & Furious, Halo Waypoint, UNO and two Star Wars titles.

An Xbox Controller Fit for a King

Sarah Perez — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 14:29:00 GMT

In addition to the special Halo:Reach Xbox 360 controller, there comes this new jazzy number, too: the Fable III controller, designed to look like the Crown of Albion, as seen in the game’s trailers. With its gold styling, its design may be a bit too much for you, but Kotaku says the look, while seemingly “quite garish at first,” began to grown on them.

The controller starts shipping Oct. 5th, well before the game’s arrival Oct. 26th. It will retail at $59.99 and includes an Xbox LIVE token for an exclusive in-game downloadable tattoo.

If you really want to see this controller in action pre-launch, check out the video Major Nelson just posted here.

Joystiq commentary on this latest is hilarious, I might add, with opinions on the new hardware ranging from that’s sexy to that’s fugly. Apparently, this is a personal preference kind of thing. What do you think about its looks?

Windows 7 Phone: Details Matter

Sarah Perez — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 14:19:00 GMT

I love this! Over on Channel 9, Matthew Bennett describes in detail the sounds in the upcoming Windows Phone 7. One notable feature, which blogger Long Zheng discovered too, is that the soft-keyboard on the phone varies the sound the keys make as you type. Instead of just using one “key click” sound, there are eight variations on that sound, played in a loop while you tap different keys. (The iPhone, however, uses just one audio file).

That seems like a small feature, sure, but it’s details like this that are key to making an overall great product. For example, remember how we looked at the subtle shading given to the icons in the Windows taskbar prior to Windows 7’s launch? At the time, we said “sometimes it’s the little things that make the biggest differences.”

If you want to check out some more of these finer features, visit PocketNow.com. They’ve been tracking these sorts details, noting things like how WP7 will update over-the-air, how it switches off data when roaming, how WP7’s speech UI will support Zune control, how fast and responsive the keyboard is, how it opens Zip files, how it will have a dedicated camera button which works instantly even when the phone is locked or off (but uses its proximity sensor to not take pictures of your pocket if accidentally pressed), and a lot more.

iPhone Apps from Bing

Sarah Perez — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 14:16:00 GMT

Did you know there are several other Bing iPhone apps available for download besides the primary “Bing” search app? The Bing Team just blogged about this, highlighting the numerous Bing apps available in the iTunes App Store, the majority of which are music related.

I’ll admit, I was aware of some of these, but some were new to me.

Have you seen them all? Check out this list:

Top 100s by Year by Bing: Currently free, this app lets you find and listen to the top songs from any particular year from 1947-2009.
Hip Hop 100 by Bing: This app lets you listen to the latest news Hip Hog songs of 2010. It’s free for 60 days, then $.99 to buy.
Pop 100 by Bing: Same as above, but for Pop songs.
Classical 100 by Bing: Classical music top 100, again, $.99 to buy after 2 months.
Ryan Seacrest’s Mixtapes by Bing: Listen to music, view photos, search videos, read news, and connect with Seacrest via Facebook, Twitter and email. New playlists added weekly. This one is $1.99 after 60 days.
Chicktionary by Bing: Currently free (usually $1.99), this is a word game where you create words using letters…hatched by chickens.
Conde Nast Traveler Gold List: Search, browse, share, and book the best hotels, resorts, and cruise lines around the globe as chosen by the world’s most trusted travelers the readers of Conde Nast Traveler. Powered by Bing.
Vanity Fair Trivia Movie Madness: Trivia questions from Vanity Fair’s stable of film geeks with 25 levels.
ESPN World Cup Trivia by Bing: World Cup 2010 may be over, but you can still quiz yourself on your knowledge of the games.

The team also notes that Bing functions as the search provider in a number of other apps, including Whrrl, iTV and Flixster, too.

To find these apps in iTunes just search by name.

Now You Can Get 4 TV Tuners on 1 Card

Sarah Perez — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 14:10:00 GMT

The Windows Team Blog has the scoop on the newly released Ceton InfiniTV 4 digital cable tuner card, which Media Center enthusiasts have been waiting on for some time. Last November, changes to industry policy allowed for the installation of digital cable tuner cards to any Windows PC that supported them.

Now, that’s a very real possibility with the new InfiniTV 4 card.

The card outperforms most cable companies’ DVRs by a longshot, allowing you to record up to four live channels of HDTV at once. It offers support for regular, HD and premium channels, too.

The card interoperates with Windows Media Center and its Extenders like the Xbox 360, allowing you to ditch the monthly DVR rental fee you pay to your cable company today. Instead, you install the card and then just stream live or recorded TV from the PC where it’s installed to the other PCs and TVs (via extenders) around the home.

The card is designed for desktop computers, not laptops, but will support “slim” entertainment PCs thanks to its PCI Express Low Profile form factor. The company says an external USB-attached version and other form factors are currently in the works for laptop users and those on other platforms.

The Ceton InfiniTV 4 card has a Suggested Retail Price of $399.00 and is available to pre-order today from Zones.com. Pre-ordered units will ship mid-2010. Over time, it will arrive in brick-and-mortar and online stores as well as in PCs built by OEMs.

To see if your PC supports the card, check out the system requirements here.