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Microsoft today released Service Pack 2 (SP2) for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. What’s new:
It includes all updates that have been delivered since SP1, as well as support for new types of hardware and emerging hardware standards.
As we have mentioned before, here are some of the key benefits of Windows Vista SP2:
- Windows Search 4.0 for faster and improved relevancy in searches
- Bluetooth 2.1 Feature Pack supporting the most recent specification for Bluetooth Technology
- Ability to record data on to Blu-Ray media natively in Windows Vista
- Adds Windows Connect Now (WCN) to simplify Wi-Fi Configuration
- Windows Vista SP2 enables the exFAT file system to support UTC timestamps, which allows correct file synchronization across time zones.
For "updates" in the first line, read "bug fixes" and you’ll get the drift – it’s a roll-up of all fixes plus minor feature upgrades which is just what a service pack should be.
Venturing a bit off topic – here’s a quote from the post above that I enjoyed:
Business customers with Windows Vista will find that the transition from Windows Vista to Windows 7 will be significantly more straightforward due to the high degree of compatibility between Windows Vista and Windows 7. If your Windows Vista SP1 deployment is already underway we recommend you continue with SP1 as planned. Then you can deploy SP2 using your systems management infrastructure. If you are in the early stages of deployment or still planning Windows Vista deployment our best advice is that you plan on testing and deploying Windows Vista SP2.
If you are like many of the business customers I talk to, you’ll just keep on installing Windows XP until Windows 7 arrives whereupon you’ll go through an evaluation process while still installing Windows XP until you are sure Windows 7 is not a dud.
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gave his maiden Consumer Electronic Show keynote yesterday and if it was just as soporific as Bill Gates’ past performances, it mercifully skipped the goofy "future tech" skits that Microsoft’s PR folks used to put Gates through. In a nutshell, the message was "Windows 7, Windows 7, Windows 7" plus the obligatory appearance by Microsoft’s Entertainment & Devices chief Robbie Bach to once again whistle past the graveyard and say that everything on his patch was swell.
“I’m thrilled to announce the availability of the Windows 7 beta, which is on track to deliver simplicity and reliability,” Ballmer said. “Windows 7 and Windows Live are part of an incredible pipeline of consumer technology that is making it easier than ever for people to communicate, share and get more done.”
The beta version of Windows 7, Microsoft’s next-generation PC operating system, can be downloaded today by MSDN, TechBeta and TechNet customers. Consumers who want to test-drive the beta will be able to download it beginning Jan. 9 at http://www.microsoft.com/windows7.
Microsoft also announced the global availability of Windows Live, a free suite of communications and sharing applications.
Actually that’s not all the ten thousand different Windows Live applications, but just Windows Live Essentials, the bundle of Windows applications you will have to download to give Windows 7 the same functionality as Windows XP. In which respect there was good news for Dell customers:
In February, to offer a comprehensive experience for consumers to connect, share and personalize their content, Dell will offer preloaded Windows Live Essentials (a free suite of applications for instant messaging, e-mail and photos that complement Windows Live on the Web) and Live Search on a majority of its new consumer and small-business PCs globally.
No word on how much money changed hands, but bear in mind that Dell is paying to put Windows on their PCs so with this deal they are merely getting a discount for also preloading Live Essentials and Live Search. I am sure Microsoft’s lawyers are making sure it is a separate accounting entry however.
Also announced was the Verizon mobile search deal leaked yesterday:
Under a new five-year relationship that covers mobile search and advertising, Verizon subscribers in the U.S. will be able to use Live Search to search for local business and shopping information; access maps and directions; perform general Internet searches; and find ring tones, games, wallpaper and other online mobile products and services.
More succinctly, Microsoft’s Live Search will become the preferred Web search on Verizon mobiles.
Microsoft has announced an extension to the deadline for the small PC assemblers called system builders to be able to get Windows XP. Previously, system builder XP availability was scheduled to end on January 31, 2009, but now Microsoft has instituted "a flexible inventory program that will allow system builders to place their final orders for Windows XP licenses by Jan. 31 and take delivery through May 30:
Distributors say the best part of the new arrangement is that they won’t have to take title to the reserved XP licenses until they’re sold to an end user, which helps them avoid having to sit on inventory for several months, which is a major concern in a low-margin business.
"This is a good solution to support the customers that are standardized still on XP," said Michael Schwab, co-president of D&H Distributing, Harrisburg, Pa. "In this case, people contemplated buying in larger quantities [of XP licenses] and holding on to them. But that would have caused a bubble [from] people buying five months of supply in January."
…
D&H and other distributors are currently talking to their largest customers to come up with demand forecasts. This work is taking on added importance, since most Microsoft channel partners believe that Microsoft will stick to its Jan. 31, 2009, XP deadline."I think that deadline is fixed in stone," said Schwab.
It is all more of the continuing fallout from Windows Vista’s less than sterling reputation, a problem that Microsoft hopes to cure with the delivery of Windows 7. The new May 30th cutoff lends more credence to the rumors that Windows 7 may actually arrive in mid-2009.
Last week Ina Fried broke a story at CNET about a Microsoft effort to buff up Windows Vista’s image by filming Windows XP users with a bad opinion of Vista raving about a new version of Windows called "Mojave" after they were shown a demo. The trick was that Mojave was actually Vista and the test subjects were suitably gobsmacked when they found out. Microsoft apparently liked the reactions so much that they are now on the Web at http://www.mojaveexperiment.com/.
While the idea is modestly entertaining, I’m puzzled about the utility of it beyond demonstrating that the average consumer is easily deceived by both the "madness of crowds" and a slick demo that I’m sure lacked Vista’s more tedious annoyances. More to the point, consumers don’t really have any choice but Vista and it hasn’t seemed to slow Windows PC buying except for a relative few who have newly given Apple a try.
Where Windows Vista has a real acceptance problem is with enterprises who for the most part do have a choice to stay with Windows XP and many are doing so based on their technical and financial evaluations. Mojave would hardly fare so well in a similar demonstration with enterprise CIOs and their technical staffs.
