Northwest living

In the battle for capturing search market, Microsoft has come up some very cool features. If you havent given these a test drive, try them out and they are worth your time.

1. Visual Search - http://www.bing.com/visualsearch
Looking for buying an electronic item or searching for an album or for a famous personality. Visual search makes your job of searching extremely easy and fun.

2. Bing's Cashback - http://www.bing.com/cashback
Looking to buy something for this ThanksGiving or for Christmas? Save some extra cash on bing's cashback. Depending on which you store you buy, you can save nearly 30% extra. If you go through cashback, you can save additional 30% on eBay. All you need is a hotmail or some account from Microsoft. Bing helps you make a decision on your purchase.

3. Bing Travel - http://www.bing.com/travel
Planning to travel and dont know where to buy or when to buy your ticket? Bing travel helps you decide on both. Just go to www.bing.com/travel and start filling in the information. It will suggest you the lowest price along with whether the price is going to go down or up along with where to buy your ticket. Again helping you make a decision on your travel.

There are some really cool UI features in Windows 7. Here is a summary of some impressive ones

Windows Taskbar
- Windows 7 has taken quick launch feature to the next step. You can now pin any program to the taskbar by right clicking and selecting "pin to taskbar". You can even arrange the pinned programs.

- Windows 7 lets you preview various opened windows without selecting them. Point to a taskbar icon to see a thumbnail preview of open files or programs. Then, move your mouse over a thumbnail to preview the window full-screen. You can even close windows from the thumbnail previews—a big time saver.

Watch these features at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/products/features/windows-taskbar

Snap
- Windows 7 makes it extremely simple to compare two windows. How many times had we struggled comparing two excels/documents/jpegs? This is extremely easy in Windows 7. Just drag one window to the left and Windows automatically sizes the window to the left half of the screen. Now drag the other one to the right side and release, the second window fills the right half of the screen. Its fun and easy :)

- Windows has introduced another way to maximize a window. You can drag a window to the top of your screen and Windows maximizes the window. If you dont know, you can also double click on the title bar and Windows will maximize or shrink the window size.

Watch the demos at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/products/features/snap

Shake
- This is the most fun. Want to quickly get rid of the clutter on your screen and only want to have one window open. Simply hold the title bar and shake the window. Windows minimizes all the windows except the one that you have shaken.

Learn more about this at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/products/features/shake

Peek & Minimizing all windows
- Ever wondered how to get to desktop screen quickly without minimizing your windows? Simply hover your mouse over the bottom right corner and you get to see your desktop.

- If you want to minimize all windows, simply click on the bottom right corner.

Learn more about these at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/products/features/peek

You can check few others at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/products/features