According to an email sent last February by Microsoft general manager John Kalkman, the software giant lowered Windows Vista"s minimum hardware requirements to ridiculous levels only because Intel needed to sell more graphics chipsets.
The email was just one of many released in response to a federal class action suit that accuses Microsoft of misleading the world with those "Windows Vista Capable" logos it slapped on new PCs in the run-up to the operating system"s debut. The logos appeared on system more than nine month before the OS was unveiled.
Judging from these emails - unsealed by the court this week and spewed to the digerati by Todd Bishop of Seattle Post-Intelligencer - the case has a pretty good chance.
"In the end, we lowered the requirement to help Intel make their quarterly earnings so they could continue to sell motherboards with the 915 graphics embedded," John Kalkman wrote to Scott Di Valerio, who oversaw Microsoft"s dealings with PC partners.