If you run 'winver', the Windows 7 beta reports an expiry date of 1st July.

Not sure why this is modded offtopic.

If you like Vista, Windows 7 is less resource hungry, and you can try out the beta and then the Release Candidate at least until July, the RC will probably extend that limit until later in the year.

As an addition, even those who have serious issues with Microsoft would do best to ignore these 'stories' and even perhaps make a stand against them themselves.

Posting half-truths, exaggerations and downright untruths discredits Slashdot probably more than it does Microsoft. If Slashdot focused on legitimate problems and grievances, and actually verified the accuracy of what they post, it would give those legitimate grievances far more weight than Slashdot carries right now.

Recently the standard of Slashdot articles about Microsoft has taken a huge nosedive, any opportunity to bash them seems to be taken. It used to be mainly misleading summaries, but nowadays anything with an anti-Microsoft slant, even something basically made up or down to the incompetence of the submitter, seems to get posted.

http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/02/06/1544207 - bashing Microsoft for letting you download Microsoft software on another PC besides the one you intend to use it on.
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/02/16/2259257 - the worst example I've seen - unfounded, unproven allegations with no substance whatsoever.

That would work up until somebody decided to add the same 'fact' a second time.

A 2009 release or 'RTM' date shouldn't be a surprise at all.

The beta expires in July, so the 'Release Candidate' build should be out before then, and the final version soon after.

If they removed DRM support, everyone with a Blu-Ray drive wouldn't be able to play back their films normally. You really think that would improve Microsoft's image?

And even if they did, what would be the possible benefit to people who don't use DRM? With or without it, your playback of non-DRM media won't be affected.

Slashdot's technology gives me the possibility to crush your will by modding you down!

...well, it did, until I clicked 'Submit' :(

Well I do.

The biggest incentive I had to switch to 64bit was the fact that, if I didn't, only ~3Gb of my memory would be used. I had no hardware/driver problems when I switched though.

When 4Gb of memory becomes common, that's when I expect 64bit installs to also become common. Until then, computer builders will likely 'play it safe' and install 32bit.

I think this is worth mentioning:

Microsoft also points out that the technology could be useful for emulators and virtual environments that are attempting to display advanced 3D graphics.

It may only get 7fps in Crysis, but I suspect that would be certainly more than enough for a virtual machine running an OS and/or games from a while back.

Intel graphics chips said to be designed for minimal power draw rather than all out performance

I somehow doubt Intel's key design goal is minimal power draw - cheap mass production is likely top of the bill.

As an example, just look at the Intel Atom - the CPU is designed to use a tiny amount of power, but the Intel graphics chipset it's usually integrated with uses a lot more power (relatively speaking) than the CPU and other chipsets out there.