When Windows Vista is released, the default email program Outlook Express will be rebranded as “Windows Mail”. (You can read in an earlier post how the similarities with Apple Mail, its main competitor in the default OS email client stakes, are more significant than the name alone).
The latest beta of Vista (version 5342) was released on 24 March. Screenshots of the OS 
in general can be found on x64bit.net.
As well as “the glass look” and innovative features like windows that “flip” in 3D, the new beta offers a “sidebar”, into which you can drop things that look like widgets.
A screenshot of Windows Mail from this latest beta has been posted on the German site winfuture.de. Here it is:
Click the picture for a full-sized image
Unfortunately the “About Windows Mail” dialog obscures some of the interface, but I think you can get the general idea of the way in which the new look Outlook Express is developing. Spooky.
It looks a lot better than recent screenshots of the next Outlook at any rate.
Gavin Shearer (who works at 
In the next version of Windows, known as “Vista”, Outlook Express is set to become “Windows Mail”. 
