A takes effect this month that moves the start of daylight savings time (DST) up by several weeks, and shifts it back a week in November. Rather than move clocks forward an hour in early April, as has been the case in recent years, DST begins March 11. That's left companies scrambling for software fixes that change the pre-set DST changes hard-coded in operating systems and applications, including every version of Windows except for the just-released Vista.

"Unlike Y2K, which was a bug, many companies and parts of the government just didn't blow the horn on the impact the changes would have," said M3 Sweatt, the chief of staff of the Windows core development group. Microsoft products still getting mainstream support -- meaning software within the first five years of its release -- have received free patches. But operating systems and applications now getting what Microsoft dubs extended support receive only security fixes for free; Corporate customers who want non-security patches must fork over large fees to Microsoft.

Among the titles in that extended support category are Windows 2000, Exchange Server 2000 and Outlook 2000, the e-mail and calendar client included with Office 2000.

For users running that software, Microsoft charges $4,000 per product for DST fixes. For that amount, customers can apply the patches to all systems in their organizations, including branch offices and affiliates, said Sweatt. "All they can't do is redistribute them," he said.

The $4,000 fee is a dramatic price cut from the $40,000-per-product charge that Microsoft set in 2006. "We believe we had to do the right thing for our customers, so we did something on the fee," explained Sweatt. "There is a cost involved in producing this, but we're not making money on [the $4,000]. It recovers just a part of the cost of development and providing support."