This is one of the most controversial things surrounding every new release of Windows. Ever since Windows 98, when Microsoft got into legal trouble by bundling Internet Explorer with the operating system, Microsoft have bundled more and more applications with Windows.

It’s not exactly like other operating systems don’t do this; but Microsoft, having the near monopoly, do tend to get into more trouble.

Guess what? There are plenty of new bundled applications for Windows Vista. From what I can see in Beta 2, we now have:

(* means they’re not new but there is a new version for Vista)

• Windows Photo Gallery (photo album software)
• Windows DVD Maker (makes video DVDs of photos and videos)
• Windows Media Player (plays video and audio) *
• Windows Media Centre (media centre program for media in your living room) * ¹
  
• Windows Calendar (calendar and organisation application)
• Windows Collaboration (peer-to-peer collaboration)
• Windows Contacts (replacement for the Windows Address Book)
• Windows Mail (replacement for Outlook Express)
• Windows Movie Maker (entry-level video editing) *
• Windows Defender (anti-spyware)
• Windows Ultimate Extras (free downloads for Windows Vista Ultimate Edition only)
• Windows Journal (journal/note-taking software)
• Windows Fax and Scan (fax and scanning functionality) *

1: We’ve seen Windows Media Centre before in the dedicated Windows XP Media Centre Editions.

If I’ve missed any off this list, please drop me an email. I won’t look at all of the bundled apps, but instead I’ll focus on the main ones.

So, can anyone spot the pattern here? All of the applications’ names begin with Windows. Yes, it emphasises that they’re bundled applications, but I think it does it a little too much. I’ll leave you to draw your own conclusions.

Overview

Whatever your view on Microsoft bundling the applications, you must admit it’s a pretty impressive line-up of programs, at least from the number that are there.

But should Microsoft be bundling? Let’s face it, Microsoft’s only real competitor in the commerical desktop market is Apple. And they do it. Strictly speaking, Apple’s iLife (iTunes, iPhoto, iDVD, iWeb, iMovie, GarageBand) isn’t part of Mac OS X, but it is given away free with every Mac. So it is essentially, bundling. Does that make bundling right? I’m not really sure, but I’ve no doubt some of the offerings here will cause some headaches for software companies, particularly Windows Defender, which I’ll look at in Part 2.
A lot of the new Windows bundles also seem to have similar functionality to their iLife contemporaries. In fact, Apple recently made fun of Windows due to its lack of bundled applications. So there’s Windows Photo Gallery - iPhoto. Windows DVD Maker - iDVD, Windows Movie Maker - iMovie. In fact the only applications not covered are GarageBand and iWeb.

Windows Photo Gallery

Microsoft have long been at loggerheads with Google. No, I haven’t forgotten what I’m talking about; it seems that Windows Photo Gallery is a response to Google’s excellent free photo management software, Picasa.

Windows Photo Gallery looks nice, and it feels very well integrated into Vista and the other bundled applications. It uses Microsoft’s new coloured toolbar idea, doing away with traditional menus. I like the look of the application, and the transparent navigation area at the bottom looks awesome when you’re using Aero (Aero Basic users get a nasty-looking grey).

Photo Gallery offers options for tagging and rating photos; as well as keeping them in albums. Seach integrated into the application means as long as you’ve tagged your photos, or they have meaningful filenames, you can very easily find what you are looking for. Helpfully, though, if you do search for a phrase and a folder containing pictures is found, the whole folder’s contents will display in the search results; so it’s not vital to have to name each individual photo, as long as your folders have a brief description.

You can also do minor edits to photos, which is similar to the functionality we have seen in Microsoft Office Picture Manager, which was included with Office 2003. The editing tools are easy to use, but aren’t really suitable for doing anything major, as you can only really adjust colours and fix red-eye etc.

There are also options to make DVDs through Windows DVD Maker, but I won’t delve into too much depth.

Windows DVD Maker

Windows DVD Maker, frankly, isn’t too impressive apart from sporting the new Windows Vista look. Now I haven’t really had much of a chance to look at its features, but from what I see, it seems only to be able to add movies and photos to a DVD.

Forgive me for not actually having tried burning anything with Windows DVD Maker, but it seems only to be a tool which plugs into Windows Movie Maker and Photo Gallery to burn things onto DVD. Unlike the name suggest, DVD burning functionality for normal files is built into Windows Explorer.

A word of warning: DVD Maker won’t run without 64 MB of video memory, so basically if you’re not running Aero, you’re unlikely to be able to use it at all. Obviously, it also needs a DVD burner.

Windows Media Centre

Microsoft wants Windows in every living room. Recently, a lot of PCs specifically designed for the living room have been sold, most running Windows XP Media Centre 2005. Media Centre has evolved a lot in Windows Vista, and will be available in Windows Vista Home Premium and Windows Vista Ultimate.

Media Centre oozes polish from everywhere. When you start it up you are greeted by a very cinematic fanfare, and you jump straight into a menu which is traversible by mouse, keyboard or by one of the nifty Windows remote controls that you’ve probably seen for XP Media Centre.

If you have a compatible TV tuner, you can watch TV on Media Centre, and also record it to your hard drive for watching later. I can’t test this out, because I haven’t the hardware. I’m told that it’s awesome in Windows XP, so I’m presuming it’s just as good in Vista.

Media Centre can be run inside a window, but it is really designed for running full screen or being shown on a TV. This can be done, but again, I don’t have the facilities to test this.

Media Centre, as well as watching TV, can also play your music in your Windows Media Player library, see your Photo Gallery photos and play movies on your computer. You also have access to an online service called Spotlight that allows you to download more content, such as movie trailers and the like.

Windows Media Centre is a brilliant piece of software, but at the moment TV tuner cards compatible with it are few and far between, and the TV functionality of Media Centre I think is probably its best feature.

To be continued…

That’s it for Part 1 of this look at Bundled Applications. I’ll be back with Part 2 where I will look at the new Outlook Express, Windows Mail, Windows Movie Maker for Vista and the controversial Windows Defender.

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