Microsoft Goes 3-D With Map Search

Virtual Earth 3D launched from Microsoft as a response to Google's Earth program, with Microsoft's version running in the browser as a plug-in instead of as a separate program.

Live Search received an update from Microsoft, enabling users of the new Virtual Earth 3D to closely explore a number of places. But with only 15 US cities available at launch from Live.com, Microsoft has a lot of ground to cover to match the highly popular took Microsoft to task over its IE-only focus for Virtual Earth 3D, and its substantial hardware requirements: Besides the Internet Explorer limitation, the performance of Virtual Earth 3D is incredibly bad on average computers. Having a high-end gaming computer is the only way to truly enjoy what this product offers. Microsoft's minimum and recommended specs for Virtual Earth 3D have a substantial range between the low and high ends, as Rogers showed: •  A 1.0 GHz processor (2.8 GHz or faster recommended) •  256 MB of system memory (1 GB recommended) •  32 MB video card (256 MB recommended) that supports Microsoft DirectX 9, with 3D hardware acceleration enabled Virtual Earth 3D and whatever Google's response proves to be should escalate the battle for local search dollars. We don't expect Google to wait too long before they roll out something new to match Microsoft. Tag: Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl Bookmark Murdok: David Utter is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business.