I use WordPress as more than a blogging platform, more along the lines of a Content Management System.  When it comes to formatting pages, the existing visual editor; TinyMCE, leaves me wanting more control.

Windows Live Writer has undergone some serious improvements. So serious, I’d wager it rivals many, if not most other desktop blogging clients — free and commercial. Here is a quick overview of its Pro’s:

• Advanced text formatting features, such as headings and tables, are included in the WYSIWYG editor.
• Extensible via plug-in (Much like WordPress)
• Auto Save
• Choice between HTML/XHTML on a per blog basis. This is good if you’re a stickler for clean and well formed code
• Supports FTP upload to multiple blogs
• Supports date modification, which means you can set a post to publish in the future (or the past if you so choose).
• Tag support with a variety of providers, including custom providers.
• Advanced image insertion that supports thumbnails and lets you add some basic styles, such as drop shadow and photo style borders, to your images. You can even apply some more advanced image styling such as black & white conversion, sepia tone, as well as others.
• Video insertion
• Customizable ping list with trackback support
• In line spell checking
• Multiple writing views including layouts that mimic your blog and a full in software preview of the entry as it would appear on the blog. 
     

Even though it doesn’t have everything on my wish list, it does come pretty darn close. Plus, the fact that developers can create plug-in’s to add functionality that’s not included by default only instills more confidence. In fact, With the growing base of programmers willing to develop plug-in’s, I can definitely see it going places. Microsoft has a winner on its hands with this product, but they can’t allow themselves to get too lazy.

For me, the fact that it saves me countless hours when it comes to formatting either pages or posts makes it a winner in my book

My best advice is to download the software (It’s Free), play around with it for a few weeks and decide whether it has all the features you need to help your productivity.   Be sure to check out the plug-in repository.