If you can't convince people to use your applications or web services over your competitor's, what's the best way to gain market share? Bundle your products and services with the operating system so that people won't have to go out of their way to use them.

Microsoft has obviously known this for a long time, and got into a spot of trouble in the EU a few years back for bundling Internet Explorer with Windows XP (among other things). So it should come as no surprise that Microsoft and HP announced a deal today that will make Microsoft's Live Search the default search engine on all computers the company ships starting in January.

HP will also install the Live Search Toolbar for Internet Explorer which also provides links to HP services including Snapfish. There's no word on how much Microsoft paid for the deal. Odds are folks who really truly prefer alternate search engines like Google or Yahoo! will change their default search engine at their earliest convenience. But we're willing to bet that an awful lot of people still just use whatever comes with their computer.