links for 2007-02-01

Retail launch at Midtown Manhattan Best Buy

A picture of Ballmer belittling someone is included (at least it looks like that’s what he’s doing).
UK Green Party on The Vista Landfill Effect

Vista’s negative impact on the environment (forcing hardware upgrades). I’m surprised the excessive packaging for Vista isn’t mentioned as well.
Workaround Discovered For “Clean Install” With Vista Upgrade DVDs

So now it appears it’s possible to install Vista from an Upgrade disc without having XP installed first. The problem is you need to install Vista twice, and it’s still unclear if you can truly get a ‘clean install’.
Vista ‘Family Discount’ Bites Back

Family Discount users were issued invalid installation keys. Microsoft doesn’t currently have a solution and says ‘either wait, or get a refund’.
AutoCAD and the New Windows Vista

Expect an announcement in 2-4 weeks about details of AutoCAD running in Vista.
Microsoft to bend Vista SP1 under EU pressure

Microsoft agrees to rework SP1 to allow developers to bypass Vista’s PatchGuard, which is meant to prevent ‘malware’ from changing the OS, but which also prevents developers from making changes.
Vista Express upgrades off to a rough start

The website was unusable most of the day. Wow!