Paul Thurrott in a stunning break from tradition has declared the latest build of Windows Longhorn (5048) to have “all the makings of a train wreck”.  He notes that the sidebar is gone, as is a lot of functionality that was meant to be in the final release.  Not only that, but he also points out that the minimum specs are now a 1Ghz PC with 256MB of RAM, way above Mac OS’s requirements (400Mhz G3 with 256MB of RAM).