While bloggers will surely appreciate the new version of Windows Live Writer, Microsoft has also added a few nifty features to all the other Live Essentials apps. The new version of Photo Gallery, which now supports multitouch screens and Windows 7 libraries, also features built-in photo recognition. The real wow-factor, however, comes from a new feature called Photo Fuse, which allows you to combine the best parts of different pictures into one composite image. This is a great tool for making sure that everybody in a group photo is smiling, for example. You just select the best parts from multiple images (preferably all taken at the same height, distance and zoom range). Photo Gallery's new retouch feature should also make it easier to fix problems in your photo.

In addition to these features, the Photo Gallery app now also allows users to send their photos on Facebook and - more importantly - comments from your Facebook friends will be imported back to the desktop app.

Sync

Windows Live Sync helps users keep their folder in sync across multiple computers. This feature works in the background and automatically syncs data back and forth between different machines. Just like Live Mesh - which this tools is partly based on - Sync also allows users to easily open up a remote desktop connection to their PCs. The folder synching feature is available for Windows and OSX, though the remote desktop access is limited to Windows machines. To get started with Sync, just head over to http://devices.live.com

Mail

Windows Live Mail now features a Gmail-like conversation view - and unlike in Hotmail, this feature will be turned on by default. Just like Hotmail, Live mail now features "quick views" that allow users to organize and filter their mail.

Thanks to tighter integration with the calendar, Mail now feels more like Outlook.

Mail has also inherited some features from Windows Live Writer. Users can now, for example, create small image galleries inside an email and perform some small image editing tasks in the app.

Movie Maker

Movie Maker also got a nice update and now allows users to easily share their videos on Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Microsoft's SkyDrive. In addition, Microsoft added a number of new themes, and you can now easily import photos from the Photo Gallery and create an animated slideshow with just a few clicks. The new movie even highlights captions.

Verdict

The question, of course, is how these apps compare to Google's and Apple's offerings. Google's Picasa and Apple's iPhoto offer some of the same features as Microsoft's Photo Gallery (face recognition, retouching, online galleries), but Microsoft, of course, has the advantage of offering a tool that is more closely integrated with the Microsoft ecosystem. Microsoft also makes it easy to upload images to multiple third-party photo services and gives users a more generous allotment of free space for sharing pictures than Google. (Apple charges for these features.) The ability to sync Facebook comments back and forth between the cloud and the desktop is also a welcome addition to Live Essentials.

We haven't been able to get our hands on the Windows Live Movie Maker, so we will have to withhold judgement of how well it compares to iPhoto. In the last version, the app got a major makeover and compared very well to Apple's iMovie.

Microsoft is clearly trying to create a better connection between its desktop and online tools. While there used to be a lot of confusion around Microsoft's syncing tools, for example (at one point, it felt like the company offered 10 tools that all performed similar functions), Sync now feels like the glue that will hold all of these tools together. While geeks generally tend to overlook Microsoft's offerings (besides maybe Live Writer), this new suite of tools is worth another look.

All of these applications are meant to complement the Windows Live online experience and work closely together. You can, for example, use Windows Live Sync to keep your online and offline photo albums in sync. Live Sync has replaced FolderShare.

We tested the new versions of the Live Essentials for the last few weeks and all of them represent a major update to the older versions.

Even if you don't typically use the Microsoft's Live services, installing the Live Photo Gallery, for example, is well worth a try thanks to its seamless integration with Live Photos and SkyDrive. This new version compares quite well with Google's Picasa 3 and also lets you upload photos to Flickr. Photo Gallery also ties in with other Microsoft tools like Auto Collage or PhotoSynth.

Windows Live Writer, on the other hand, is more of an evolutionary update, but it is the favorite blogging client for a lot of us Windows users here at RWW and the update makes handling media files a lot easier.

Also worth a look are the enhanced Live Toolbar and the Windows Live Messenger, which has received a major facelift. The Live Toolbar (IE only) now displays your updates from the Windows Live online services, including new messages and pictures from friends. You can also use the toolbar to sync your IE7 and 8 bookmarks between different computers.

Software Plus Services

The real selling point for the Live Essentials suite, however, is how well all the apps play together, both online and offline. Live Photos, for example, can use your Live Messenger and Hotmail contact lists for tagging faces, or the Live Messenger connecting to your status updates on your Live Profile page. The one Live Service that has remained behind, though, is Live Mesh, which seems to be on its own development track. We assume, however, that it will be merged into the Live services at some point.