Microsoft Empower for ISVs
About a week ago, I signed up my µISV/Consulting Practice for the Microsoft Empower program, and today I gleefully received a package from Microsoft which contained my new MSDN subscription. In my opinion, this is one of the best offers ever for startup companies. For $375 (just a little under $400 after taxes and shipping), you will receive a thick stack of DVDs which cover the most desirable (and not so desirable) Microsoft software ever produced for an ISV: Office, Visual Studio, Visio, etc.
Of course, there is a catch. You have twelve (12) months to develop a software package and your licenses expire, forcing you to purchase the products retail or stop using them.
In preparation for today's festivities, I reinstalled the Microsoft Media Center OS on my laptop which cured some of the significant performance degradation I had been experiencing (lethargic boots, slow shutdowns, and worse extremely poor battery life). Of course, it took quite a while to eradicate all of the crap that comes bundled with an HP laptop.
After putting the DVDs in the included CD binder, it was time for second phase of my laptop spring cleaning. I promptly installed: Office Ultimate 2007, Visio, Visio for Enterprise Architects and Office Groove.
I uninstalled VM Ware in favor of Virtual PC, primarily because virtual PC doesn't take up any resources until you want start the virtualization software. VM Ware, on the other hand, has services that start at boot up and run all the time. I've already installed Fedora Core 6 and am now installing Vista under Virtual PC.
Labels: mISV
