Microsoft has released fresh betas for the next versions of its email server and email security software, with product availability loosely pegged for 2006 or 2007.

Microsoft called its Exchange Server 2007 beta 2 a "feature-complete" milestone, providing unified access to email, voice mail, calendars and contacts from a variety of devices.

Also included are new reliability and management tools to prevent Exchange servers from grinding to a halt. Exchange Server 2007 is due either late this year or early next, depending on availability of its email client companion Outlook 2007.

A second Forefront Security for Exchange Server beta, foreshadowing the next version of Microsoft's Antigen for Exchange that was launched in June, has also been released. The upgrade is capable of co-ordinating the performance of edge, hub and mail servers, and providing in memory and multithreaded scanning. The software uses up to five anti-virus engines to simultaneously search for viruses, worms and phishing attacks.®