TechWeek: Buena Vista

With Wall Street fixated on Microsoft's(MSFT Quote - Cramer on MSFT - Stock Picks) new Vista operating system, and its ability to drive the company's revenue, every whisper of problems sets pulses pounding and blogs a-bleeping. The rumor du jour: Vista and SQL Server 2005, the company's database software, are not compatible.

If it were true, Microsoft would be sporting one heck of a black eye. After all, SQL Server contributed $2.07 billion to the company's top line in 2005, according to market research firm Gartner, and is finally stealing share from Oracle(ORCL Quote - Cramer on ORCL - Stock Picks) and IBM(IBM Quote - Cramer on IBM - Stock Picks).

What's more, no sane IT department would install an operating system that's incompatible with its database software. And that would mean corporate purchases of Vista -- a key to renewed growth for Microsoft -- could be put off indefinitely. All in all, a world-class debacle.

But happily for Microsoft investors, and unhappily for the oh-so-smug denizens of the blogosphere, there's not a lot of fire under the billows of smoke.

Sure, there's a kernel of truth in the rumor: At the moment, Vista and SQL Server 2005 don't play well together.

But the issue has been known for months and will be fixed before the end of the first quarter of 2007 with the release of Service Pack 2 for SQL Server, according to Microsoft. Sure, I can hear you laughing. Microsoft products never seem to be ready on time.