Microsoft has now made available the beta 2 release of their, frankly essential, Windows Live Essentials 2011 package. The build, 15.4.3001.809 can be downloaded here and contains updated versions of all our favourite apps for Windows.
Live Mail, Messenger, Photo Gallery, Sync, Writer, Movie Maker, Family Safety and the Outlook Connector are all present and all the applications now use the Ribbon interface. You can choose at installation which of the programs you want to install, if you do not want the entire suite.
Windows Live Essentials has become a staple for Windows users, especially since many features such as Mail have been dropped in Windows 7. A great many people, including myself, say that this one of the first pieces of software they install on a new PC, and it’s easy to see why.
New features are few and far between but include some new functionality on Photo Gallery that improves facial recognition and allows you to blend photos together. Generally though this will be a more stable release than the previous version.
The installer is 151Mb in size. There are also links available to get the installer in different languages from LiveSide.
