Microsoft MSN Premium

MSN Premium, the premier all-in-one Web service offering from MSN, is optimized to take advantage of a high-speed Internet connection and enhance the online experience and efficiency for broadband users. Offered as an access-independent subscription service, MSN Premium is designed to meet the needs customers care about most, bringing advanced communication tools, persistent online protection and digital lifestyle management software together in one place to help them be more efficient online and get the most out of the Internet..

Features

MSN Advanced Communications

Built with extensive attention to customer feedback, MSN Premium provides advanced functionality that delivers a powerful and flexible communications experience to help customers more easily manage their lives and stay connected to the people and information they care about most. Features include the following:

# Multiple accounts with extensive storage. MSN Premium helps customers get their whole family online by delivering 11 accounts for each subscription (one primary account and 10 additional accounts). The primary e-mail inbox includes a generous 25 MB of storage and support for attachment sizes up to 10 MB. The secondary accounts, which include 10 MB of storage and support for 3MB attachments, can be used to manage multiperson households and help customers get their whole family online or establish multiple e-mail identities for the primary subscriber.

# MSN Mail inbox, calendar and address book. MSN Premium delivers more advanced functionality with personal information management tools, enabling customers to access and create folders for offline e-mail storage and to more efficiently manage and organize their appointments and contacts. Customers can also get e-mail, calendar and address book access virtually anywhere there is an Internet connection through http://www.hotmail.com/. With an exciting new shared calendar feature, MSN Premium customers can easily share their calendar with other subscribers or broadly publish their calendar information to the Internet. In addition, customers can view others' calendars alongside their own, or even compare their calendars with MSN Groups calendars.


# MSN Designer E-Mail and Photo E-Mail. MSN Premium customers can easily share their digital pictures with friends and family through MSN Mail, MSN Messenger and MSN Groups (subscription includes 30 MB of MSN Groups storage). Subscribers can use Designer E-Mail to create content-rich e-mail messages and photo albums that can include photos, stationery and titles, but which are sent using efficient compression techniques to minimize their size, helping ensure they don't clog up their friends' and family's e-mail inboxes. With the additional benefit of Photo E-Mail, customers can automatically have their original high-resolution images associated with their compressed photos and uploaded to 500 MB of temporary storage on the Web. Friends and family can view the photos in all their richness through a slide show or download the high-resolution images for printing.

# Multiple e-mail account management with MSN Mail. With MSN Mail, customers can easily manage multiple MSN and MSN Hotmail® accounts in the MSN Mail interface without having to log into or out of each individual account. Customers using the advanced MSN Mail inbox also can easily incorporate and manage their POP3 accounts in MSN Mail, with virtually no limit to the number of POP3 accounts that can be added in MSN. In addition, features such as designer e-mail and photo e-mail apply to all e-mail accounts managed in MSN Mail.


# Microsoft Office Outlook Connector for MSN. The new Outlook® Connector for MSN allows consumers to use Outlook XP or Outlook 2003 to manage their e-mail, calendars, address books and other information stored in an MSN or MSN Hotmail account. Consumers can save time by seamlessly managing their personal and professional information in one place, with a variety of views, and can easily drag and drop information between the e-mail, calendar and contact services.


# MSN Photo Swap via MSN Messenger. MSN Premium customers can share their favorite digital photos with others in real time while they chat about the photos using the innovative MSN Messenger service. The photos are optimized for sharing over the Internet.

Persistent Protection

MSN Premium provides powerful and flexible tools to help protect customers, their families and their PCs from viruses, online criminals, junk e-mail and pop-ups. Security features include the following:

# Virus Guard powered by McAfee Security. For no additional charge, MSN Premium customers receive Virus Guard powered by McAfee Security, which automatically detects and cleans viruses from e-mail, instant message files and downloads, and includes automatic updates so customers' protection is always up to date. Virus Guard also includes anti-spyware and cleaning technology.


# Firewall powered by McAfee Security. As part of their subscription, MSN Premium customers receive firewall protection, which helps safeguard them from hackers and unwanted computer attacks.


# Automatic e-mail scanning and cleaning. When MSN subscribers access their e-mail using the MSN software or a Web browser, McAfee technology automatically scans each message for known viruses while the messages are still on the incoming e-mail server. If a virus is detected, the message and attachment are cleansed automatically before they reach the customer's inbox or machine.


# Multilevel junk e-mail protection. MSN delivers multilevel junk e-mail protection, including Microsoft SmartScreen Technology that helps ensure e-mail remains a useful communications tool. MSN puts customers in control of deciding the level of filtering applied to their account. MSN Premium customers can not only classify e-mail as junk, they can choose to have all junk e-mail seamlessly and unobtrusively reported to MSN or report it individually by simply right-clicking on the junk e-mail message, and then clicking on the Report This Junk E-Mail to MSN option in the context menu.


# Pop-up Guard. With the new Pop-up Guard, customers decide which pop-ups they see and which ones they don't. This feature uses smart technology to intelligently determine whether a pop-up being generated from a Web site should be presented or blocked.


# MSN Parental Controls. Parental Controls were designed to deliver choice and help protect families by giving parents the tools they need to manage their children's Internet use and help protect them from inappropriate content and communications. Consumers can use Parental Controls to select from three age-specific settings to help block inappropriate Web sites, or go further to block inappropriate Web sites by customizing site category blocking or blocking all sites except those designated on an allowed list. Parents can also receive a weekly e-mail report that details their child's recent online activity, including the total time spent online, Web sites visited or tried to visit, e-mail addresses and MSN Messenger IDs of people with whom they corresponded, and files downloaded. Parents can manage their children's activity through the Pending Requests option or via the online activity report, or interactively manage their kids' online experience through features such as AskNow and Instant Block.

Digital Life Management

MSN Premium delivers features that offer a customizable experience and maximum value to people as they manage their digital lives. Whether it's enriching the enjoyment of sharing photos with friends, helping a child research a school report, paying bills or personalizing their online experience, MSN Premium has solutions to help customers make more out of their time online. Features include the following:


# Customizing customer experience. MSN Premium software includes a dashboard, which provides a customized and personal view of a selection of features chosen by the customer - from a photo show of their favorite photos to easy access to incoming e-mail, online contacts, their calendar and customized alerts, to a traffic map of their area highlighting current incidents. MSN Premium software also includes the ability to easily resize the toolbar and quickly add or remove icons, allowing customers to tailor their environment and be as productive as possible while online. MSN also now has a new, free My MSN, available to MSN Premium customers through MSN.com. My MSN has a new look, improved customization, the ability to create multiple My MSN pages and a greater choice of content, including broadband-specific content. My MSN can be customized easily by dragging and dropping content modules to provide easy access to consumers' favorite content and communication services.


# MSN Encarta Premium. The new MSN Encarta Premium complements the innovative and compelling features of the No. 1 best-selling encyclopedia brand,2 Encarta Reference Library 2004, offering customers the flexibility of accessing learning tools and premium content through the Internet. This comprehensive online resource delivers a variety of tools and premium content to help people young and old discover their world:


- Encarta provides a one-stop resource for reference content, including a comprehensive online encyclopedia, the Encarta Interactive World Atlas; the Encarta World English Dictionary and Thesaurus and translation dictionary; a multimedia center; searchable magazine collections; Literature Guides; and insights into great works of literature.


- For children, Encarta provides a powerful set of tools across the service and in the Homework Center, with a wide array of topics such as math, history, English and foreign languages, to help families overcome daily academic frustrations.


# MSN Photos Plus. This new collection of software solutions makes it fun and easy for people to view, organize, store, edit, create and share their photos with friends and family:


- Picture It Library 9 helps customers easily locate, organize and view digital photos stored on their computer.


- Picture It! Express 9 is an easy-to-use editing tool that gives people the ability to fix red eyes and adjust the contrast in photos. Advanced editing capabilities make it a snap to add frames, mats and fancy edges.


- Photo Story Lite gives a fabulous finish to photos by enabling customers to take photos from their collection and add voice notes and music to create rich multimedia slide shows that can be shared easily in e-mail with friends or posted on MSN Groups sites.


# MSN Money Plus. Online tools for virtually effortless financial management tools include the following:


- A Dynamic Home Page gives customers continuously updated information on daily economic events.

- An Online Bill Payer makes it easy to receive and pay bills online any time.

- Connections to different financial institutions provide updated market analysis.


Personalized spending analysis and budget trackers help customers understand where their money is being spent and how to best manage it.

System Requirements

* Windows compatible computer with 500 MHz or faster processor (800 MHz recommended)
* Microsoft Windows XP, Windows 2000 with Service Pack 2, Windows Millennium (Windows Me) Edition or Windows 98
* 128 MB or more of RAM (256 MB of RAM recommended); up to 320 MB of hard disk space during installation; after installation, up to 180 MB
* CD-ROM drive (if installing from CD)
* Super VGA (800x600) or higher-resolution monitor with 256 colors
* 256-color VGA or higher resolution graphics card (SVGA or higher resolution graphics card recommended)
* Microsoft Mouse recommended (other compatible pointing devices are acceptable)
* 16-bit sound card and speakers recommended
* 28.8Kbps or faster modem or other Internet connection (broadband service requires available USB or Ethernet port on the main computer, not on a hub or serial connection through other devices)

1 Separate download required.

2 NPDTechworldSM, March 1993-March 2003. Based on total U.S sales.

3 Promotional offers only available to new subscribers, in the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. After the trial period (if any), the then-current price for your MSN plan will be automatically charged to your credit card until you cancel your account or select an alternative plan. You must agree to the MSN Subscription Agreement to access the service. A major credit card is required. MSN is available only for personal noncommercial use. Internet access service not provided; you must have existing Internet access service. No refunds on prepaid plans, unless cancelled within 30 days. MSN 9 Details: For users of Windows 98 or later operating systems only. Prices subject to change. Additional terms may apply...

Availability

MSN Premium is available at http://get.msn.com/?prod=premium

Price

MSN Premium costs $9.95 a month or $99.95 per year for U.S. subscribers and delivers ongoing updates and benefits. MSN partners, including Verizon Communications and Qwest Communications International Inc., will make the service available to their broadband customers at no additional cost.

Note:

Since the release of the re-branded Windows Live Hotmail in 2006, users of MSN Premium or MSN Dialup 9 were unable to receive the New Windows Live Hotmail which included an increased amount of email storage, 5 GB, as well as newer features, security and new design, which was given to free users. Microsoft however, had started emailing MSN Premium and Dialup users about the change from MSN Hotmail to Windows Live Hotmail in mid-2007. As of July 2008, Microsoft has ended the use of the "Classic" MSN Hotmail as use. Microsoft has updated the style to the current Windows Live Hotmail Scheme as a free upgrade, which also led to the upgrade of storage from 2 GB to 10 GB, rather than what free users have.