Here’s another entry from Microsoft’s Next-Gen PC Design Competition. The AlphaGrip Handheld Computer (or AlphaGrip HC, for short), features full-size rocker keys on the front with a flip-up display and a keypad for thumb-typing. It also has a trackball for mousing and some buttons for “sophisticated PC games”.

Thing is, you may have noticed two things, both unappealing: It’s bulky and the top is shaped somewhat like a heart. I can’t imagine ever using this in public, but despite that fact, I like it. It took some imagination and looks a lot like the Atari Jaguar.

Earlier this week Microsoft announced that it is delaying the release of Windows XP SP3 because of some bugs it caused with the database server with Microsoft Dynamics. Last night I went home and was looking for the automatic update bringing SP1 to Vista and found that it wasn’t there either, much to my dismay as there are a number of issues I have on Vista that I was hoping to see corrected.

Today we find out that Microsoft has indeed delayed the release of Vista SP1 to Automatic Updates as well, due to the same issue. It sounds like some of found the problem has to do with SQL Server with Dynamics. It’s unlikely that the problem is with SQL Server alone since MS is surely to have tested that at some point, but the relatively few that are out there running Microsoft Dynamics are holding it up for the rest of us.

If you’ve been eagerly watching your Windows Update on XP waiting for SP3 to show up your wait is over; it’s not coming, or at least not quite yet. At what seemed like a very last minute decision, Microsoft on Tuesday delayed the launch of Windows XP Service Pack 3 due to a compatibility glitch with Microsoft Dynamics Retail Management System software. The release was scheduled to be available through Windows Update on Tuesday and has already been released to manufacturing and volume customers last week.

“In the last few days, we have uncovered a compatibility issue between Microsoft Dynamics Retail Management System (RMS) and both Windows XP SP3 and Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1),” said the firm.“In order to make sure customers have the best possible experience, we have decided to delay releasing Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) to the web.”

Microsoft has revealed some interesting info. Since June 2007, multiple law enforcement agencies have been using a forensic device it has developed that can bypass security on a Windows-powered machine and extract data for use in criminal investigations.

It’s named COFEE, for Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor. The device is a USB thumb-drive armed with 150 “commands” that can do all sorts of things like decrypt passwords, display internet activity, and uncover all data stored on the computer. The most important aspect is that it can do all of this on-site, instead of having to remove the machine during a search or raid and send it to a lab.

Chris Keroack, release manager for Windows XP Service Pack 3, has announced that the new service pack has been released to manufacturing (RTM) and is working its way to the OEM’s right now. For the rest of us, Microsoft is planning on getting XP SP3 online and available through Windows Update on April 29, along with its associated documentation.

This release is the first of its kind for XP since Microsoft released SP2 back in 2004, and is a welcome site to users of XP anywhere and especially to those that have battled with Windows Vista and lost, or at least came out slightly injured. Included in the update is a cumulative security update along with some performance and stability enhancements. They’ve also included some features to help integrated new Windows Vista OS’s along with existing XP machines on a network.

Are you content with simple multi-touch and built-in accelerometers? Microsoft Research thinks not. In fact they’re already working hard in the labs, toward integrating force-sensing technology. The kind of thing that will enable gestures and let you twist on-screen imagery without making UMPCs out of flexible material.

Those behind the idea feel that such tech would “turn an otherwise passive component that just holds the device together into an active input surface.” Auditory cues might even enable users to be alerted when they’ve applied enough pressure to cause a change. I just figure it’s a great way to play Rubik’s Cube in the future.

A rather strange landmark of the Albany, New York skyline is The Egg, a local performing arts venue. This oddly designed building could well be an omen for Microsoft’s freshly announced “Albany” subscription service - a big, fat laid egg.

Albany, as discussed by Microsoft product manager Bryson Gordon, will be an all you can eat service for consumers which gives them all the Microsoft goodness they can handle under one desktop. You can, for x amount of dollars, gain access to Office Home and Student 2007, Windows Live OneCare and Windows Live Mail, Messenger and Photo Gallery. This is on top of security updates and the like.

Microsoft is getting set to add some new colors to compliment its popular Wireless Notebook Optical Mouse 3000, which is said to currently be the best selling notebook mouse in the United States. These special edition mice will be priced at around $30 each.

Microsoft is coloring its expanded mouse line up red, dark pink, green, brown and khaki. The mice have their own unique color names by the way, just for the record, but they are too cheesy to put in this post (creme brulee?). The mice act much the same as other optical mice do, offering smooth tracking (Microsoft reports 1,000 dpi and 6,000 frames per second) and wireless connectivity to the host computer.

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang on Monday shot back a letter in response to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s 3-week ultimatum for Yahoo to come to negotiations with a firm message that Yahoo has not changed their tune in regards to Microsoft taking over the search engine. Ballmer’s letter had spelled out plans for a proxy contest to unseat the exist Yahoo board of directors and that continued delays could reduce the $44.6 billion offer which would mean less for shareholders.

“Our board’s view of your proposal has not changed,” said Yang along with Chairman Roy Bostock. “We continue to believe that your proposal is not in the best interests of Yahoo and our shareholders.”

Instead of going through the negotiations Yahoo has chosen to beat their exclamation points into swords and fight back against Microsoft. Yang continued in the letter stating that the offer and proxy contest would not be in the best interest of Yahoo and certainly not part of a friendly transaction as Microsoft first proposed.

Microsoft issued another letter to the Yahoo board of directors on Saturday with a deadline of 3 weeks for the company to accept the previous $44.6 billion takeover offer that Microsoft proposed in the beginning of February. Despite some recent talks between the two companies, an agreement has not been made and Microsoft is starting to lean heavy on the search engine firm’s board by threatening to go straight to the shareholders if necessary.

“If we have not concluded an agreement within the next three weeks, we will be compelled to take our case directly to your shareholders, including the initiation of a proxy contest to elect an alternative slate of directors for the Yahoo! board,” the letter read. “The substantial premium reflected in our initial proposal anticipated a friendly transaction with you. If we are forced to take an offer directly to your shareholders, that action will have an undesirable impact on the value of your company from our perspective which will be reflected in the terms of our proposal.”, stated Steve Ballmer’s letter to Yahoo.

Microsoft has announced that the plan for the general end of shipping Windows XP has been extended a couple of years, at least for the Windows XP Home edition. The latest plan for the end of most sales of XP was dated on June 30, 2008 but the advent of a new market of ultra low cost PCs (ULCPCs) has made Microsoft change there tune on forcing everyone onto the new Vista system.

Microsoft has just released Windows Vista SP1 which is usually a good milestone for those looking at upgrading to the next version of Windows, and is a point at which Microsoft helps push them along, but in the case of these UPCPCs, the Vista OS is just to big and expensive. The OLPC (supposed $100) XO laptop is one such machine that could still take advantage of the XP OS but would be forced to stick with Linux or look elsewhere if XP were phased out.

Check out this awesome concept. We all know the Zune has not been able to compete with the iPod. But the Xune on the other hand, would do very well I think. It combines music and gaming. It’s a combination of the Zune, iPod, Xbox and Sony Mylo.

The device features shoulder buttons, a touch-wheel with a center button, a sliding keyboard and 4:3 ratio aspect ratio screen. The keyboard can be used for web surfing, email and chat. It’s compatible with the Xbox 360 and Windows Media Center. It’s not bad looking. I’d hit that.

Here’s a concept device for snooty french artists who wear berets and hold a palette in one hand, while grimacing and scoping out the landscape between forefinger and thumb. This nice looking Palette-Digital Artist is an entry in the Microsoft NextGen PC Design Competition for 2008. It’s a handheld touchscreen PC, and like a traditional palette, it has a thumbhole for easy handling.

The design will make you feel like a futuristic Picasso and it will let you digitally paint your next masterpiece with a stylus. It’s wireless of course, so you could paint anything and not be tethered to the PC. The shape is amazing and could be used for many things, not just painting. Pretty nice.

Shortly after the fall of the HD DVD format Microsoft officially announced that they were ending production of the HD DVD player for the Xbox 360 and we, along with a number of others, figured they would be jumping on board with Blu-ray in short order.

According to Microsoft exec Aaron Greenberg, group product manager for the Xbox 360, the company appears to have no plans to move in the direction of a Blu-ray player, or any high-def player for that matter, for their game console. “Xbox is not currently in talks with Sony or the Blu-ray Association to integrate Blu-ray into the Xbox experience,” Greenberg said. He followed up that comment with “We’re the only console offering digital distribution of entertainment content,” which leads us to believe that Microsoft may have taken this opportunity to rid the console of physical disc media all together.

Microsoft is showing off today a new wireless laser desktop combo which is somewhat designer focused. It is called the Microsoft Wireless Laser Desktop 7000 and it prices around $130.

The Microsoft Wireless Laser Desktop 7000 is what Microsoft called “Windows Aero inspired.” It offers up a thin design in the keyboard, complete with “smoked” translucent border and “floating” keys which can be personalized. The keyboard also is designed to be ergonomically friendly.