Microsoft will kick off the full scale roll-out of the Web browser “ballot screen” early next week, this will end up being served to all Windows/Internet Explorer users in Europe to comply with the deal that the European Commission and Microsoft arrived at in December 2009

Te browser ballot screen is designed to give users in the European Union a choice of additional browsers, these include Opera, Firefox and Google Chrome.

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Some users have reported that Microsoft’s recent security updates have crippled their Windows XP computers with the notorious Blue Screen of Death

The patch, part of Februarys update and listed under MS10-015 , dealt with a problem caused by the switchover from 16-bit to 32-bit systems back in 1993. A 16-bit emulator introduced with Windows 3.1 and present ever since turns out to run the risk of running a bogus application which allows access to the system’s kernel.

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Microsoft is reported to have said on Thursday that it is planning an update to Windows 7 that will close a number of loopholes that had been used to thwart the operating systems built in anti-piracy measures

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Microsoft on Tuesday released a record 13 security updates that patched dozens of vulnerabilities in Windows.

Five of the 13 updates were marked “critical”, seven “important” and one “moderate”. Eleven of the 13 affected Windows, while the remaining two impacted Office XP and Office 2003 on Windows and Office 2004 for Mac.

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Microsoft has re-introduced their second shot certification offer for a short time, the offer is designed to give you a free exam retake if in the unlikely event you do not pass a Microsoft certification exam on the first attempt.

To use the Second Shot offer you must take both the first exam and (if necessary) the retake exam before 30 June 2010 and applies to all Microsoft Learning IT professional, developer, project management, and Microsoft Dynamics exams, for more details visit the Microsoft Web site

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Starting on the 15 February 2010, users still running the Windows 7 Release Candidate (RC) version will receive a notification message reminding them that from the 1 March 2010, their PC will start to shut down every two hours in preparation for the RC version expiration on 1 June 2010.

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Microsoft is now providing an online resource called the Microsoft Automated Troubleshooting Services designed to diagnose and repair Windows operating systems, including Windows Vista SP2 and Windows XP SP3. Both Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 include the automated troubleshooting services by default.

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Microsoft has released a series of patches for Windows 7 covering both bug fixes and performance improvements.

The patches come in two sets, the first of which covers bugs which can occur on any Windows 7 computer. These include some keys on multimedia keyboards, such as one to launch the calculator, not functioning. Another fix solves a problem where, after an update to some applications, the relevant icon either moves or disappears.

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