Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Tuesday, 18 March 2008 21:31
Opinion and Analysis
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Well, it’s “Mid-March”, the expected timeframe for the first release of
Windows Vista SP1 to the masses, so it should be arriving any moment
now - but it's not here yet!
I’ve been regularly pressing ‘Check for Updates’ in Vista’s “Windows Update” tool for the past couple of days, waiting to see when the Vista SP1 update would be available to download – but there’s no sign yet.
That said, there’s been a lot of reports on the Internet that we should be seeing it arrive either today or tomorrow, with
Amazon offering to make a boxed retail copy of Vista Ultimate with SP1 included available from Wednesday 19th of March, although that most likely means the 19th in the US, which will be the 20th for Australians.
Although SP1 has been available to MSDN and TechNet subscribers for weeks now (after delays which initially saw MSDN and TechNet subscribers being forced to wait until general public availability, something Microsoft quickly did a backflip on after massive protest), a
series of SP1
snafus has seen a slippery start for SP1, a service pack meant to make things smoother.
Given the problems previous service packs for older versions of Windows have caused some users and enterprise customers, some users are promising to wait for a few weeks more after SP1’s launch, just to make sure Vista SP1 really isn’t “
Snafu Pack 1” or “
Slow Pack 1” in disguise.
Still, Vista SP1 has been baking long enough. As soon as Windows Update tells me SP1 is available to download, I’m going to do it, even though I’ve had the opportunity to download it for weeks already. I’ve waited long enough!
One would hope that Microsoft truly has taken all the extra time, along with feedback from MSDN and TechNet users, to make sure there are no more last-minute surprises.
Service Packs normally denote an operating system’s maturity, and is often the excuse used by businesses to hold off on immediately upgrading to Microsoft’s latest and greatest new OS, happy as they usually are with their existing computers, OS and standard operating environment.
Please continue to page 2.
