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Huge breaking news for all Home Theatre lovers, Microsoft X-Box 360 and Playstation 3 owners, DVD movie purchasers and of course the retailers.

HD DVD is dead! Long live the Blu-Ray!

Sony and the Blu-ray High Definiton format has won the latest "VHS v Betamax" fight.

The headlines are starting to roll out in the news stories, Microsoft pulls out after Toshiba concedes race to Sony, etc. Just do a google news search for HD DVD or Blu-ray.

In our case it means we are even less likely to own a Xbox 360 as we are to buy a PS3.

I now have two quad core machines. The details are below, but first the reasoning behind the addition.

Research stage

I use PC's extensively for work and my main workstation has to be able to keep up with what I am doing. I have been frustrated with the Vista 32bit low RAM limits, maximum RAM being only between 2.75 and 3.5GB RAM. As I use virtual machines to do development work in, as well running a lot of applications simultaneously RAM is very important to me. As mentioned in my Why I need a quad core PC post recently my RAM usage is often over 80-90%.

So it seemed to me that 64 bit Vista was the only way I was going to improve my machine's performance and allow me to access the full 4GB or RAM or more.

I had been reading with interest Nick Hodges General Melchett Project, where he set out to build a machine with a Vista Performance index of 5.9, the highest available. Full story on the Channel 10 website. I had also been filing various bits of information about Vista 64 and limitations, things it would not do etc.

I am constantly running  a lot of applications, and am using the quad core and 2GB RAM that Vista will let me use (out of the 4GB installed) pretty heavily. I frequently see the cores drop into 80-90% use. RAM usage is often over 90%.

Right now I have running:

File Management

CuteFTP

Windows Explorer (2 instances)

Browsers

Internet Explorer 2 open tabs

Firefox 89 open tabs

Java game Settlers of Catan (playing a game with Judith and Miranda while eating lunch and working and writing this)

Particls - newsticker scrolling

Communications

Outlook

MSN MEssenger - 2 conversation windows open

Yahoo Messenger

Skype

8hands

So you've made the switch from gmail to hotmail, but how do you move all your old Hotmail email messages and folders to the new Gmail address. That's no worries at all, Amit has written a nifty little article telling us just how to do it using the Outlook Connector. To move your emails from Hotmail to Gmail via Outlook:

1. Install the Outlook connector and then configure your MSN Hotmail / Windows Live Hotmail accounts with Outlook.

2. Once you have all your Hotmail email message available locally inside Outlook, configure Gmail IMAP access inside Outlook.