It's official: Windows 7 coming 22 October

 

Gallery

By Stuart Turton

Posted on 3 Jun 2009 at 08:29

Microsoft will launch Windows 7 on October 22, a day ahead of the date widely predicted.

The software giant confirmed the release at the Computex conference in Taiwan, bearing out comments from Acer's vice-president Massimo D'Angelo who let slip during a press conference that the company would have machines running Windows 7 on 23 October.

Microsoft has already confirmed that it will release the code to manufacturing (RTM) in early August, giving PC manufacturers time to deliver systems to retailers.

The October release date represents a quick turnaround for the company, which had previously claimed that Windows 7 would arrive "within three years of Windows Vista," putting it on course for an early 2010 release date.

However, Microsoft says the quality of the code has allowed it to move ahead of schedule. Indeed, the Beta and Release Candidate have been impressively stable.

Windows 7 will available in five flavours: Starter, which is aimed a netbooks, Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise and Ultimate. Starter was originally crippled by an arbitrary three-app limit, meaning only three applications could be run at one time.

The company has since backed down on this stance, perhaps with one eye on a growing raft of challengers including Google's Android - which Acer plans to release on a netbook in the Summer.

Pricing has yet to be confirmed, though rumours suggest Microsoft will offer free Windows 7 upgrades to people who buy Vista-loaded machines a month before launch.

Anybody looking to give Windows 7 a whirl can try the free Release Candidate, which won't expire until 1 June 2010.