I applied through a recruiter. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Microsoft (Hyderabad) in Jun 2012
Interview
I got a call from MS when they visited Pune.
The first round was very short:
After asking a programming question, he selected me for the next round onsite
After flying down there I had 2 interviews back to back.
Both had the same pattern:
talk about the previous project
then a programming puzzle each
I applied in-person. The process took 2 days. I interviewed at Microsoft (Hyderabad) in Oct 2008
Interview
I had worked as SDE intern for 6 months. To get the internship, I had a written technical round and 2 rounds of interviews.
After the end of internship, I got what are known as Pre-Placement Interviews. There were a couple of them, 1st with a Lead and 2nd with a Director.
In the 1st interview, I was asked a Data Structures problem, 2 small coding tasks and an interesting puzzle.
In the 2nd interview, I was asked a coding problem based on Linked List (which I had done somewhere before) and a lot of HR/fit questions.
I applied through college or university. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Microsoft (Raleigh, NC) in Feb 2012
Interview
First spoke with a recruiter on my campus. Then had a first round interview on my campus which went well. Finally had an on-site interview in Raleigh, NC after which they immediately told me the results - I wasn't being hired. Overall the interviewing process was pretty good, Microsoft treated the candidates very well.