Microsoft is coming up with a new image format ,”HD Photo “ .Users can now test the new format in Adobe Photoshop CS2 and CS3.This move by Microsoft is to replace the industry popular JPEG format that has several disadvantaged like ugly artifacts in the compressed images and more .

Microsoft wants to replace JPEG with a more moderb and more capable image format.Developed under the name “Windows Media Photo” the company released the specification for its “HD Photo” format in November last year.

Users can download a plug in that allows owners of a copy of Photoshop CS2 or CS3 to take the format for a spin.

Microsoft claims that “this new ,next generation digital image format offers the best solution for the digital image editing and srorage and unlocks the potebtial for digital photography on devices applications and services .”The company promises a compression with up to twice the efficiency of JPEG with fewer damaging artifacts ,resulting in higher quality images that are one half the file size .HD Photo carries the file extension .wdp or .hdp ,offers image quality comparable to JPEG-2000.

HD Photo beta is offered as a free download and is compatible with photoshop CS2 and CS3 ,as well as windows Vista and XP .HD Photo is also included in Microsoft’s .NET framework 3.0