Annual updates to most of Microsoft's consumer home software products have been released. These products, including Encarta, Money, Streets and Trips, and Student, boost Microsoft's presence in the retail channel and are often bundled by OEMs. However, another product from this division, Works, has not been updated, and rumors abound that Microsoft will release a hosted, online-only version.

New Versions

By mid-October 2006, Microsoft had released annual updates to the following consumer software products:

Encarta Premium 2007 includes updated entries and more multimedia content than its predecessors but has no major new features. It retails for US$50 after a US$10 rebate. The product is no longer available in lower-end editions.

Student 2007 is the first update to Microsoft's bundle for students in secondary school and older. Student includes Encarta Premium; access to the MSN Encarta Premium online service (which otherwise costs US$25 per year); tools for helping students with math and foreign language study; and Learning Essentials, a set of add-on templates and toolbars for Office that help students complete homework assignments. The 2007 version of the product includes new tutorials on math and science and a new graphical equation calculator. The product retails for US$70 (with US$20 rebate).

Money 2007 comes in a new low-end version, Money Essentials 2007, which costs only US$20 and includes budgeting and expense-tracking tools, online integration with data from thousands of financial institutions, and the ability to transfer data to tax preparation software. However, the Essentials product has no financial advisory or tax preparation functions and cannot import data from Quicken or previous versions of Money. Apart from the new version, the product has changed little from past years. Money is also available in a Deluxe Edition (US$30 after a US$20 rebate), which adds more budgeting and tax tools; a Premium Edition (US$50 after a US$30 rebate), which includes more tax tools and a bundle of free and discounted financial services; and a Home and Business Edition (US$60 after a US$30 rebate), which includes tools for managing small businesses.

Streets and Trips 2007, the latest version of Microsoft's offline mapping product, includes integration with Live Search business listings: when online, users can search for businesses in a particular location, then save those listings to Streets and Trips for offline access. Microsoft also ships a version of Streets and Trips with a GPS locator; the latest version features a GPS receiver that Microsoft claims is ten times more sensitive than the previously included device and includes a USB adapter so that it can plug into a notebook without cables. Streets and Trips retails for US$40, or US$130 with GPS locator.

Digital Image Suite Anniversary Edition is a new bundle in the Digital Image line of products, even though the core software has not been updated for 2007. The Anniversary Edition bundle, marking the product's tenth year, includes Digital Image Suite 2006 plus free and discounted products from partners, such as photo prints from Snapfish (a Web site that lets users order prints of digital images) and one-year subscriptions to Good Housekeeping and Popular Photography magazines. The bundle retails for US$50 after a US$30 rebate. Microsoft continues to offer Digital Image Plus 2006, which incorporates video editing features from the company's Nov. 2005 acquisition of Pinnacle Software, for US$100 after a US$30 rebate.

Works Online?

Unlike past years, Microsoft did not release a fall 2006 update to Works, its suite of basic productivity tools, including a word processor and spreadsheet.

However, according to several Sept. 2006 news reports, Microsoft is considering repackaging Works into an online service and offering this service in both free (advertising-supported) and subscription-based formats, perhaps through its Office Live offering for small businesses. (Office Live, despite its name, does not currently include any hosted versions of Office applications.)

An online version of Works would help Microsoft meet new competition from Google, which recently combined its online word processing and spreadsheet applications into a free offering called Google Docs and Spreadsheets. But unlike Google, Microsoft must worry about cannibalizing sales of its lucrative Office suite to small businesses—the need to ensure that the locally installed version of Office is a superior value could make it hard for Microsoft to create an online productivity suite with enough features to compete with the Google offering.

The home page for Microsoft Home products is www.microsoft.com/resources/discover/default.mspx.