Microsoft Unleashes Plus! Digital Media Edition Update

   Today, Microsoft released an updated version of Microsoft Plus! Digital Media Edition (DME) for Windows XP, a collection of tools that enhances XP's digital photo, digital video, and digital music experiences. The release includes a new version of the popular and trend-setting Plus! Photo Story tool and 20 new Plus! Dancers.
   Microsoft originally released Plus! DME in January. The company sold more than 1 million copies of the product in its first 5 months of availability.
   "Plus! Digital Media Edition is the perfect companion for digital camera owners who will love how Plus! Photo Story 2 gives them an entirely new way of experiencing, sharing, and showing off their photos," said Dave Fester, general manager of the Windows Digital Media Division. "For consumers who want to try before they buy, the free trial versions of Photo Story 2 and Plus! Dancer give a taste of what the excitement of Plus! Digital Media Edition is all about."
   Plus! Photo Story 2, the standout tool in Plus! DME, lets you create stunning animated movies from your photo collections. The new version adds two key features: the ability to save photo stories for re-editing later and the ability to create Video CDs (VCDs) of your photo stories that you can play back in almost any DVD player.
   The Plus! Dancers feature has proved popular, logging more than 1 million dancer downloads. Today, 10 new dancers are available, along with a special 11th Halloween dancer named Boo Hoo? that commemorates the late October launch of Microsoft Office 2003.
   The free Plus! DME update for previous users, a slew of dancers, trial versions of Plus! Photo Story 2 and Plus! Dancer, and other Plus! DME-related downloads are available now from the Microsoft Web site . Plus! DME costs $19.99; you can download the product or purchase a boxed version at retail stores. The updates and trial versions are free. My full review of the Plus! DME update will be available today on the SuperSite for Windows.