From: Brian Valentine
Sent: Friday, April 14, 2000
7:33 AM
To: Microsoft Corporate
Campus: All Staff
Cc: Bill Veghte; David
Alles; Tom Adams
Subject: Welcome Windows Me into your
home
Earlier this year, we released Windows 2000 for businesses of all
sizes. It is a huge step forward and we
have already passed the million unit mark.
We are building on that success with a Windows release specifically for
home users - Windows Millennium Edition.
With this release we will improve the home user’s PC experience overall,
and particularly around digital media, online experience, home networking, and
keeping their system running smoothly and up-to-date. Please pitch in by using Windows ME on your
computers at home and send the Windows ME team feedback. I think it is going to be a great product and
your support will make it even better.
·
Digital Imaging - the easiest way to get digital pictures or
movies on to your PC, and then view and organize them; fastest thumbnail
browsing, movie/video editing and then the ability to post those to the web
·
Reliability & Stability - hundreds of fixes to improve
robustness since Win98SE, added System File Protection and Driver Signing for
extra protection, and in case anything goes wrong - use System Restore to bring
you back to a past state you were happy with!
·
Home Networking - finally, a simple way to set up a home
network, share an internet connection amongst PCs even with different network
media in your house (eg wireless + phone line networking), plus many
enhancements allowing things like latest DirectPlay games to work great across
home networks.
·
Windows Media Player 7 - the first all-in-one digital media
solution by Microsoft, the best way to keep your music library, with plenty of
chic skins & visualizations.
·
Latest & greatest hardware support - from those new USB
devices to other popular hw, and you should find lots of little streamlining
features like an “add new hardware wizard” that actually finds the right
drivers on your CD for you instead of often making you browse the CD and pick
one yourself.
·
Hibernate support - the fastest way to get your system
booted.
To see and read
some more about selected new features of Windows Me, check out http://windows/rollout/features
The team has
shipped the final beta. Many of you have
PCs at home that are widely used by people other than you (spouses, kids,
neighbors), and it is time to let them test-drive our next home OS and get us
feedback. (you can try it too…)
The beta sites
that have been running Windows Me since July 1999 have been sending in
accolades en masse at the quality of the Release Candidate of Final Beta, sent
out on 3/25. It is in the stage where it
is more than ready for you to be running it on your home systems, and at the
stage where those very few bugs you might find are truly critical for the
Windows Me team to hear.
We all recognize
that in a very real way, as Microsoft employees, we wind up being “support
consultants” for our family, friends and neighbors for Windows (and often a
wide variety of computer products from many companies). So think of this as a chance to reduce your
workload next year - you can support many people later, or you could get those
last issues fixed before we ship (now!!) and save yourself some ‘support calls’
later in addition to improving our customers’ satisfaction!
We will be
distributing final beta CDs to everyone that wishes to run Windows Me at
home. To sign up to receive a CD, fill
out the short form at http://windows/rollout.
The company will also be providing weekly updates so that you can see
the resolution on the very last issues you and your colleagues will be raising.
To make sure that you do not get stuck
in case of computer calamity, both HelpDesk and a product strike force team are
in place to help you. In one of these
cases, either:
a) contact Helpdesk at x65000 or sent mail to mailto:hdonline, or
b) send email to mailto:mstrike describing your
problem.
For other important but not as pressing
issues, there are a set of Newsgroups available for the direct support/feedback
of MS Employees. Information available
at http://windows/rollout/support.
Also documented on http://windows/rollout.
Thank you for your help and support in
making Windows ME a great release for home users everywhere.
brian