Microsoft sets date to release Windows Vista to OEMs

Microsoft is expected to give Windows Vista to PC vendors earlier than customers expected to ˝get a jump on the Christmas season,˝ Ethan Allen, a Microsoft beta tester and administrator of The Hotfix Web site, said in an e-mail Monday. The information also is posted on The Hotfix site (http://www.thehotfix.net), and corroborated by another beta tester. Christmas is Dec. 25.

Microsoft has not provided a time frame for when Windows Vista would be in the hands of Microsoft´s OEMs (original equipment manufacturers), Michael Burk, product manager for Windows Vista at Microsoft, said in an e-mail Monday.

Company executives have said the OS would be generally available on PCs in time for the 2006 holiday season, which is late November to late December in the U.S. PC manufacturers would need access to Windows Vista earlier than that in order to ship it on hardware by that time.

Microsoft also plans to give developers a second beta of Windows Vista on Dec. 16, 2005, Allen said. The company has said it would make available Beta 2 of the OS before the end of the year but did not specify a date for that release.

Burk said via e-mail Monday that Microsoft is still determining when it will release the second beta of the OS, based on feedback from testers of Beta 1 and a Community Technology Preview of Windows Vista released earlier this month. The first beta of Vista was made available in July.

In the meantime, Microsoft is readying the official launch of Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 at an event in San Francisco Monday, Nov. 7. The company is expected to get Visual Studio 2005 in developers´ hands sometime this week on Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) ahead of the official release, according to Allen and information on a discussion forum on Microsoft´s Channel 9 Web site. Channel 9 is a site that provides information and forums dedicated to fostering discussion between Microsoft and its developers and customers.

Representatives from the Visual Studio team at Microsoft´s public relations firm Waggener Edstrom Inc. did not return calls or e-mail Monday morning.

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