Author Archives: NeoSmart Technologies

Microsoft Office Public Beta 2 Available!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
Reply

Microsoft has just made publicly available Microsoft Office 2007 Beta 2, the latest installment in the new Office 2007 Suite.

This is a public beta, meaning that anyone who wishes can download the software or request it mailed to their address.

NeoSmart Technologies will be conducting in-depth reviews of the entire Office 2007 suite now that it is no longer covered by the NDA, and our picture gallery will soon enough have more pictures than you’re probably interested in seeing.

Microsoft Office 2007 Professional Edition is 440.8 MB, and can be downloaded via Microsoft SmartSource (not to be confused with the now-extinct SourceSafe!).

Microsoft Office 2007 Beta 2

New NeoSmart Redesign

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
Reply

NeoSmart Technologies has decided to celebrate WinHEC in our own special way: the long awaited NeoSmart v2 will launch in phase 1 as WinHEC debuts!

“Phase 1” refers to the layout, with phase 1 we will have a new homepage, logo, theme, and design. Soon to follow will be a complete backend written in php (what else?) that will use databases to store, sort, and retrieve information from our ever-growing collection of whitepapers, guides, software, and reviews. At the moment phase 1 is still in alpha testing, but we hope if all goes well it will be uploaded and unveiled within 24 hours :)

Microsoft Expression Web Designer CTP 1

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
6

A new CTP for Microsoft Web Designer was recently released, and we finally got to take a look at it.

The first expression we felt was probably closest to anger, when we found out that Expression wouldn’t install on a machine that had Office 2007 Beta 1 TR 1 installed, but it seems that in using the Office 2007 installer (an excellent idea BTW, that installer is really easy to use, though a color other than grey would probably suite it better) it requires that no older versions of Office be installed. So we uninstalled Office 2007 and continued, the installation didn’t take long, and we were up and running 7 or 8 minutes later.

Continue reading →

phpBB, maybe IPB, 0-Day Vulnerability

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
7

Yep, it seems that there is another vulnerability in the most popular online forum script, phpBB. Not even news worthy, seeing as the script’s 15 minutes of fame have long passed, and this is but another bullet in a long-since bullet-riddled history, but nevertheless, here is another one.

Continue reading →

VistaBootPRO 1.0 Beta Released!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
Reply

VistaBootPRO is now deprecated. NeoSmart Technologies’ EasyBCD utility has replaced it.

VistaBootPRO is the first tweak-ware to be released for Windows Vista, but it's more than just that. When Microsoft first announced that they would not be providing anything easier than bcdedit.exe (a CLI-only tool with nested options and embedded tags) for the modification of the boot loader, we knew something had to be done, and now we're proud to announce that together with PROnetworks and months of hard work, planning, desiging, and researching have come to test with the initial release of VistaBootPRO.

It can literally do anything with your Vista boot menu, and will in time completely replace bcdedit, but for now in this release there is still plenty to do, and much to learn. With VistaBootPRO 1.0, you can change everything and anything about how your boot loader looks, and what it loads, and where it goes with it. You can use VistaBootPRO to backup, export, modify, and restore the BCD registry at any time, and from any OS; so that even if your Vista won't boot, VistaBootPRO will!

Official Announcement
Download VistaBootPRO 1.0
VistaBootPRO 1.0 Support Forums

VistaBootPRO: Update

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
Reply

VistaBootPRO is now deprecated. NeoSmart Technologies’ EasyBCD utility has replaced it.

I'm really sorry to have to make this post, but yes, the assumtions that many of you emailed me are correct: VistaBootPRO has been delayed.

Don't get me wrong, the program is done, the files, are ready, the servers are up, the forums are open, and the experts are at hand, but nevertheless, VistaBootPRO has been delayed. It seems that there are some unforseen complications in our partnership with PROnetworks for the release of VistaBootPRO, and management issues on their end have caused this delay. NeoSmart Technologies has finished our part of the agreement, we are now just waiting on PROnetworks to let us know when they are ready. At this point, your guess is as good as ours, but for everyone's sake, we hope it's soon.

VistaBootPRO: Friday, May 12th!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
1

VistaBootPRO is now deprecated. Use EasyBCD instead.

It’s official! VistaBootPRO is coming this Friday, May 12th; and you’d better get ready for it! Yes, VistaBootPRO is the name of the mystery app that many of you have been asking about; and no, I still can’t tell you what it does besides that (if you can’t guess…).

Both NeoSmart Technologies and PROnetworks are very happy to be able to bring you this release, and we’re all working really hard to make sure it’s a success. For now, here is a userbar with half a logo to whet your appetite until later. And I promise, if everything goes well, you’ll know more before Friday :D

Vista Build 5381.1 Re-Released

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
Reply

Barely two hours after thousands of beta testers around the world began to download Vista Build 5381.1 Ultimate Edition for x86, it has been re-released. Though those that were downloading can continue to do so and those that have finished it can go ahead and run that build; there are certain complications.

As we reported here, the x86 build of Vista 5381.1 turned out to be an unstaged CHK build (see linked article for definitions and explanation) compared to the FRE staged build distributed for x64 machines. Now it seems there is another factor in the mix: Microsoft Corporation has pulled down the download links to the CHK debug build for x86 and replaced it with a staged FRE x86 build. On one hand this new build comes with a staged setup which will install faster and on more systems than an unstaged build would, and it is not a debug compile and as such it will most certainly run faster and smoother than the other; yet on the other hand, not everyone is even aware that it has been re-released, and for those that are, that's two hours of downloading gone to waste. Unfortunately the new build is also more than a gigabyte larger than the first build.

Continue reading →

Windows Vista Build 5381.1 Released!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
12

Microsoft has officially released Windows Vista Build 5381.1 today on Microsoft Connect.

Internal sources have confirmed that this is "what will be" Beta 2 – in a couple more days at WinHEC 2006. What we are seeing right now with this build is a feature complete Beta without the performance guarantee. If you want to put it in terms of practical use, etc. this is Beta 2; it will be compiled and recompiled several more times, mini-glitches taken care of, size and speed optimized, and maybe a couple of minor things changed, but for all intents and purposes, those of us that have been dying for another beta ever since the first; it's here. However, Microsoft Connect classifies this as being the Beta 2; so we're not entirely sure what's going on, but when we find out we'll be sure to let you know.

Continue reading →

NeoSmart Technologies needs your help!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
3

If you dropped by yesterday (like 300k others did…) you might have noticed that there was a “site susended” notification, asking us to contact our host to resolve it; because we had too much traffic in too little time. You may have also noticed that we are proudly ad and pop-up free, and may even realized that a non-profit organization sitting on the bleeding edge of technology and news costs a pretty penny to run. We need your help, and we need it ASAP. Our host has kindly given us a “probation period” for us to gather up the money and get upgraded to a VPS solution.

Continue reading →