Welcome back everyone, to another edition of “The Roundup”!

This week I’m talking about Windows 7 being cheap (for students), Facebook adding features, and 802.11 N Wi-Fi is now real! Take a look, after the jump.

This week I have four stories for you. Let’s get started.

1: From : Lifehacker
Get Windows 7 Home Premium for $30 With a College Email Address
Thursday, September 17, 2009

Didn’t get in on the $50 Windows 7 pre order? Did you already preorder it and want a better price? Are you a US college student (or have a US .edu email address)? Well, cancel your preorder! Because your eligible to preorder a copy of Windows 7 Home Premium straight from Microsoft. It looks like I’m going to have to cancel my Costco preorder and get this instead, because this offer is just too good to pass up! Just go to Windows741.com to snag a copy for yourself. Don’t forget you can also participate in Microsoft’s Ultimate Steal offer and get Office 2007 Ultimate for only $60!

2: From : CNET NEWS
Voice chat coming to Facebook
Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Have you ever been using Facebook chat, and ever told the other person “Let’s move this to the phone”? Well, soon you won’t have to. Facebook will be partnering with Vivox, and creating a integrated voice service that you can not only use with chat, but app developers will be able to take advantage of. All a user has to do to take advantage of the voice service, is download and install the Vivox plug-in. You don’t even have to have a microphone, or be a Facebook user (but let’s face it, who isn’t these days. Facebook just hit over 300 Million users. That’s also most the entire estimated 2009 US population.), because you will be able to use a free call-in number, so that anyone can join in the conversation. I don’t ever expect that I will be taking advantage of this service, as I barely use Facebook chat to begin with and I’m a big fan of Skype, but it is nice to know that it is a option and that Facebook is continuing to innovate. The Facebook voice service should launch in the next few weeks.

3: From : DigitalBeat via TechMeme
Facebook adds support for Twitter-like @ symbol
Monday, September 14, 2009

In other Facebook news; Facebook is continuing to chase after Twitter, one “@” at a time. Facebook now lets you “tag” you friends in your statuses. All you have to do is type a “@” sign and box will show up below the status field. Just start typing one of your friends’ names and Facebook will auto-complete it (much like the search box). When you do select a friend, the “@” will be removed and the name will become a hyperlink to your friends profile. It will also put your status on your friend’s profile’s news feed. This is great, but Facebook needs to roll this out to more areas of the site, like photo comments and wall posts. And they are trying to copy twitter, I mean, there using the “@” sign, they couldn’t think of any other way to implement this?

4: From : Engadget
It’s official! 802.11n standard finalized after a mere seven years
Saturday, September 12, 2009

Did you every relies that if you bought a N Wi-Fi router or wireless card, it was only a draft standard and subject to change (and then possible stop working with other N devices). Well, that’s no longer a problem, because only 7 years after the draft spec was released, the Wi-Fi Alliance work all the final details (meaning, they changed nothing, all draft N devices still will work), with the IEEE. Good job guys, so why don’t you start working on the next 802.11 Wi-Fi standard so that we can get to it a tiny bit faster? The final standard is set to be published mid-October. Hardware devices that are officially on the N standard should be out a bit later, since nothing has changed, so manufacturers just have to change the label and update the firmware.

That’s it for this week, see you next time, right here at The iLife.

–Keith Hobin