Travel Agent

It’s a great time to unleash your personal computer’s full potential. Pack your PC with Windows 7 Home Premium and get a chance to win a brand new Montero Sport.

The people at Microsoft believe and understand the importance of technology for Filipino families. Whether you’re a busy dad, a multi-tasking mom, a teen bursting with passion and creativity or a kid at play, Microsoft delivers performance to address your individual needs. That’s the reason they designed Windows 7 to be more nimble, efficient, and responsive.

Here are just a few of my favorite new features in Windows 7.

HOMEGROUP

Gone are the days when you would always carry a USB flash disk or an external hard drive around whenever you’d want to share music, photos and videos with other family members’ PCs in the other rooms. All you need to do is create a HomeGroup on your Windows 7 Home Premium (or Professional, Ultimate and Enterprise editions) PC running on a wireless network and have the others connect to it via secured and password-protected private network even your nosy neighbors can’t break in.

My boy playing with the Windows 7 PC in the bedroom

REMOTE MEDIA STREAMING

Whether you’re in the office and your stay-at-home-mom/husband caught the baby’s first steps on video or you’re traveling out-of-town and you’re too eager to share a mesmerizing video you’ve caught on a handycam, you no longer need to wait to be back home to share the joys with your loved ones.

Turn Remote Media Streaming on using the new Stream menu in Windows Media Player 12 and associate two computers (both running Windows 7) with an online ID such as a Windows Live email address.

And with the help of the all-improved Windows Live Movie Maker, you can even turn precious photos, videos and music into a full length music video. This is part of the Windows Live Essentials, a free download that also includes tools for photos, instant messaging, email, social networking, and more.

PARENTAL CONTROLS

It’s so amazing how my daughter, at a very young age, can already operate a computer and search for her favorite videos on video streaming websites all over the web. On the other hand, her early exposure to the internet makes me worry that she may stumble on a not-so-kid-friendly website.

But this is where Windows 7 Parental Controls come in handy. Download Windows Live Family Safety, a free program which helps parents manage which websites they can browse or the persons your kids can talk to online.

Not only that as Parental Controls also help parents limit the time the kids can use the computer as well as the programs and games they can use so you don’t have to worry that they’ll just be wasting their time doing silly things in the computer instead of being a productive kid exploring new things and improving their knowledge and creativity.

All in all, Microsoft made a lot of improvements and innovations in Windows 7.

It is designed to make programs run faster. Personal computers sleep, resume and reconnect to wireless networks faster. Smart search allows you to look for something in your not-so-organized file folders faster. New USB devices get installed and ready to use faster.

It’s all about the speed.

Nobody likes to wait and this is why Windows 7 is designed to be more nimble, efficient, and responsive. That way, you could spend every precious moment with your family and loved ones.