On Thursday Microsoft deployed Windows XP Service Pack 3 via Windows Update. SP3, which includes many previously released updates, as well as several new networking and security features had been delayed several times this year due to compatibility issues.

In our tests SP3 installed smoothly in about 15 minutes and resulted in no noticeable change in the performance of Windows.

However there have been wide spread reports on the internet of continuous spontaneous reboots after installing SP3 . At a high level the problem seems to be that with some systems, SP3 causes the computer to crash during boot, and Windows XP, by default, is set up to automatically reboot when it crashes, so you end up in the endless rebooting scenario.

A Microsoft spokeswoman commented in an email: “Microsoft is aware of these issues and we are investigating them further. We will keep customers informed with our progress. Any customer who experiences a problem with Windows XP SP3 installation should contact Microsoft Customer Support Services.”

There are a number of workarounds to this problems available depending on your system configuration. If you prefer not to talk to Microsoft, contact Computer Wizz at 877-464-4240.

Also, be aware that if you install SP3, you will no longer be able to downgrade from Internet Explorer version 7 to version 6.

Microsoft released its first major update for Windows Vista, Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) on Tuesday. We installed and tested SP1 on two computers, a Lenovo ThinkPad X61 with a 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 4 GB of RAM, and an Apple MacBook Pro with a 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU and 4 GB of RAM.

Overall the update worked fine on both machines.

The installation process is long… very long. Expect it to take over an hour and several restarts to install the update AFTER you have downloaded the 435 MB installer.

Although SP1 includes 551 bug fixes along with performance, reliability, and compatibility enhancements according to Microsoft, users performing typical tasks such as web browsing, email, spreadsheets, word processing and digital media will not notice much difference after installing SP1. Also, the update doesn’t do anything to alter the security features of Vista that many consider intrusive.

Other reviewers of SP1 have observed that the update actually exacerbated one of Vista’s main problems: slow start up times and applications launches. However, we did not experience that in our tests. We did observe that installing SP1 significantly improved the speed of copying large files.

The simplest way to get SP1 is to wait for Microsoft to push it out via Windows Update, which will take place by mid April according to the company’s website. However, some users will not see SP1 in Windows Update. Microsoft has indicated that SP1 will be withheld if any of the prerequisite updates are not installed or if the PC has any of a number of device drivers installed that conflict with SP1. Alternatively, SP1 is available for download now at the Microsoft Download Center. Microsoft is also offering Free Support for SP1 related issues.

Apple released a list of 10 large organizations that supported the 2.0 beta, including Cisco Systems, Nike, Disney, Genentech, Stanford University and Microsoft.

Although not mentioned, with the release of the SDK, it seems reasonable to expect that iPhone will eventually support other enterprise class email systems such as IBM’s Lotus Notes and Novelle’sGroupwise.

For smaller organizations Exchange support is less important. The more interesting part of the announcement for individuals and small businesses is the release of the SDK as well as the “iFund” backed by venture capital giant Kleiner Perkins. This will likely result in many new business applications being developed for iPhone, as well as support for hosted services such as SalesForce.com, Google Aps, Microsoft Office Live and others.

Apple plans to control the sale and distribution of iPhone software created by independent developers. The software will be distributed via a new program on the iPhone called App Store, as well as on Macs and PCs via a new section of the iTunes Store.

Apple’s Time Capsule device, which began shipping in late February, is designed primarily to be a companion product to Mac’s running the new Leopard operating system. With Leopard, Apple introduced a zero configuration back-up utility called Time Machine. Time Machine is intended to work with external hard drives. In fact, when you plug an external hard disk into a Mac running Leopard, you will be asked if you want to use it for Time Machine backups. If you chose to do so, Time Machine continually backs up your Mac’s hard drive any time that device is present.

That works fine for desktop Mac’s, but is not a convenient solution for laptops. Although Time Machine can be configured to back up Mac’s over a network in certain circumstances, the setup is complexed.

Time Capsule, which is a combination of an 802-11n Wi-Fi router and a large network attached hard drive solves this problem. In our tests we found that it generally lives up to Apple’s claims. The set up process is straightforward and the instructions are very clear. Time Capsule can be easily added to an existing network, it can replace an existing router or create a new network in just a few clicks.

There is one pitfall to watch out for though… if you allow the set up wizard to use the default naming convention for Time Capsule throughout the set up process, Time Machine will not back up to the device. This happens because of a glitch in Unix, which causes Time Machine to not recognize an external drive if the name contains any special characters (such as an apostrophe). If you instead name the Time Capsule something like “Time Capsule”, everything works fine.

Time Capsule works seamlessly with any Mac running Leopard. It will also work with Macs running Tiger, if you have the Backup 3.0 software which is included with a .Mac subscription. And if you have that .Mac subscription, you can access Time Capsule remotely over the internet using Apple’s Back-To-My-Mac feature.

We also tested Time Capsule with computers running Windows XP SP2 and Windows Vista Business Edition. Both Windows XP and Vista easily recognized Time Capsule, could use it to access the internet, and were able to use it as network attached storage. For example, we were able to create documents in MS Office 2008 on a Mac, copy them to Time Capsule, and then open and edit them in Office 2007 on a Windows PC, or vise versa.

Some Windows backup utilities can be configured to work with Time Capsule, such as the one built in to Windows XP. However, we found that the Backup and Restore Center included in Vista could not.

Tetris for Apple iPhone is a free web-based version of the classic Tetris game, which used to be the #1 game after Pacman back in the 80’s. And considering that iPhone’s touchscreen allows for some extended Tetris game functionality, it’s certainly one of the more fun games to play on the iPhone. At any rate, your father will be impressed…