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Mary Jo Foley reports that Microsoft’s virtual XP Mode has been released to manufacturing and will be generally available with Windows 7 on October 22. You may recall that when Microsoft revealed XP mode for the first time in May, it appeared to be lagging Windows 7.
The idea here is for XP Mode to provide a 32-bit virtual XP machine on Windows 7 for running legacy Windows XP applications that for one reason or another did not run on Vista and presumably would fare no better on Windows 7. I have personally run into several small business applications that misbehave oddly on Vista (not counting the numerous device driver incompatibilities which XP Mode won’t fix) and I’ll be interested to see if XP Mode will help. Yes, the vendors that create these applications should fix them, but that is cold comfort for small business users that depend on them. The same also applies to larger enterprises that create their own applications in-house and have been daunted by the task of converting them to Vista/Windows 7.
Note that XP mode will only be available as an add-on for Windows 7 Professional, Ultimate, and Enterprise customers who are using PC’s with microprocessors that support hardware virtualization (Intel Virtualization Technology (Intel VT) or AMD Virtualization (AMD-V)) and not all recent PC’s qualify. Ed Bott explains and provides an Intel list with some AMD lists in the comments. Moreover, even if your microprocessor supports hardware virtualization, your PC vendor has to support it in BIOS as well. If you absolutely need XP Mode, you might well be better off waiting to buy a machine with it preloaded unless you are willing to wade through the swamp.
Microsoft today is celebrating the release to manufacturing (RTM) of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. Microsoft’s Brandon LeBlanc does the honors for Windows 7:
I am pleased to announce that Windows 7 has RTM’d!
As I mentioned previously, RTM officially happens only after sign-off occurs. What happens is a build gets designated as a RTM contender after going through significant testing and meeting our quality bar for RTM. Then, it goes though all the validation checks required for RTM including having all languages of that build completed. If all the validation checks have passed – sign-off for RTM can occur. Today after all the validation checks were met, we signed off and declared build 7600 as RTM.
Not only is RTM an important milestone for us – it’s also an important milestone for our partners. Today’s release is the result of hard work and collaboration with our partners in the industry to make Windows 7 a success. We delivered Windows 7 with a predictable feature set on a predictable timetable that allowed OEMs to focus on value and differentiation for their customers.
I’m sure everyone involved is breathing a big sigh of relief and hoping that Vista will soon be a dim memory. LeBlanc earlier this week detailed all the many ways to get Windows 7, but for most consumers it will be in stores and on PCs on October 22 and for large enterprises with volume license agreements, it will be available August 7 for System Assurance customers and September 1 for the remainder.
As for the RTM of Windows Server 2008 R2, Microsoft’s Oliver Rist provides the details:
The acronym stands for Release to Manufacturing, and it means this latest release of Windows Server 2008 R2 is now blessed by engineering as ready for the manufacturing process. We’re talking final code. Sun shining, birds singing, children dancing in the streets.
With evaluation software available for download in the first half of August and the full product available to customers with Software Assurance in the second half of August, RTM is more than just an engineering milestone. Occurring in lock-step with the release of the Windows 7 RTM, these two platforms are now ready for our partners to start testing and installing on their hardware. And that lock-step isn’t a coincidence, it’s a design goal.
Follow the link for some feature highlights, but bear in mind that the R2 signifies that Windows Server 2008 R2 is a "minor" release. Still, it is Microsoft’s first 64-bit only Windows Server release, or for that matter first 64-bit only operating system.
The long rumored Google operating system for PCs has finally been announced:
It’s been an exciting nine months since we launched the Google Chrome browser. Already, over 30 million people use it regularly. We designed Google Chrome for people who live on the web — searching for information, checking email, catching up on the news, shopping or just staying in touch with friends. However, the operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web. So today, we’re announcing a new project that’s a natural extension of Google Chrome — the Google Chrome Operating System. It’s our attempt to re-think what operating systems should be.
Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010. Because we’re already talking to partners about the project, and we’ll soon be working with the open source community, we wanted to share our vision now so everyone understands what we are trying to achieve.
The Chrome OS is based on Linux and will run on both x86 and ARM microprocessors and Google claims to be "working with multiple OEMs to bring a number of netbooks to market next year." Google’s vision is of a Web operating system running a browser and running Web applications within that instead of traditional PC applications. As for overlap with Google’s Android operating system seen mostly on cell phones, here’s the official delineation:
Android was designed from the beginning to work across a variety of devices from phones to set-top boxes to netbooks. Google Chrome OS is being created for people who spend most of their time on the web, and is being designed to power computers ranging from small netbooks to full-size desktop systems.
Assuming that Google’s vision of a Web operating system and applications appeals to budget netbook buyers as much as shaving the Windows XP license fee, it will definitely impact Microsoft’s Client operating system business which has already been hit by netbooks running the low-priced Windows XP instead of Vista.
However, that is a big assumption since many netbook purchasers are buying them as cheap notebook PCs and expect to run the usual local PC applications (open source or otherwise). As for regular notebook and desktop PC buyers, it harks back to the Linux versus Windows competition for client PCs which so far has not been overly kind to Linux. Still, Google gets points for making things interesting for Microsoft and perhaps they will actually make inroads onto Microsoft’s turf.
Ed Bott has been doing some sleuthing in the license agreements contained in beta builds of retail versions of Windows 7 Home Premium and spotted an interesting cluse:
“If you are a ‘Qualified Family Pack User’, you may install one copy of the software marked as ‘Family Pack’ on three computers in your household for use by people who reside there.”
Microsoft is, of course, enamored of 3 copy "family pack" discounts as witnessed by the now defunct Windows Live OneCare and the Microsoft Office Home and Student edition, but Windows is a different commodity since it is rarely purchased at retail – it usually comes with a PC.
While a Windows 7 family pack might make sense for the few folks still into assembling their own systems, it’s hard to see why Microsoft would bother with an offer like this unless it were to sell a family pack of upgrades to Windows 7 from Vista. If priced correctly that would partially ameliorate my complaint that Windows 7 upgrades should be free for current Vista users.
