Microsoft has issued a near-final test version of Widows Vista. Windows chief Jim Allchin said there are 'a lot of improvements since Beta 2,' which was released in May. Among the changes he highlighted on device drivers and improved performance.
Work on Vista is not done, Allchin wrote. "We'll keep plugging away on application compatibility, as well as fit and finish," he wrote. He noted that software makers should use the RC1 release to certify their applications.
The company is aiming to wrap up development work in time to ship the operating system to large companies in November and have a mainstream launch of Vista in January.
Microsoft's big corporate customers are unhappy about the lag between releases. CEO Steve Ballmer has been issuing 'mea culpas', recently at a July meeting with financial analysts on Microsoft's Redmond, Wash., campus. "We will never repeat our experience with Windows Vista again," Ballmer said. "We will never have a five-year gap between major releases of flagship products." Customers don't want to digest a new operating system every year, Ballmer said, but they don't want to wait half a decade, either. Wall Street hasn't revalued Microsoft's stock for years, keeping its share price in limbo as the pace of innovation in its flagship product slowed.
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