Vista Gets Official Release Dates

[Garritan]

Microsoft has set November 30 as the release date for Vista (and Office 2007) to business customers and January 30, 2007 as the date for the official launch to consumers and The World At Large.


Five years, three months and five days after Windows XP made its debut, Microsoft will usher its next-generation OS onto the stage.


APC has been advised by a very well placed source that January 30, 2007 is about to be announced as the official release date for Vista.


In addition, in a move that mirrors previous side-by-side launches of Microsoft's OS and Office suite (in the 95 and XP waves), Office 2007 will also touch down on that day.



Read more here (http://apcmag.com/node/4258)

[Brian2112]

Well the good news for me is that my new box will be "100%" ready for it, and the manufacturer of my sound card (ECHO) told me today that the drivers are being developed already - even for older models that are out of production.
If all our software will be ok with it, this will be great! I will be able to use all 4 gigs o' RAM - AND you can even use a USB stick to add "memory" to your computer for system rescources to chew on.
Cool Stuff!
Thanks for the update GG!:D

...2112:)

[Houston Haynes]

I guess we've waited this long - three more months is not big deal. :-)

RC2 is a pretty nice build. I've gotten a lot of traction with it and the chipset on the motherboard. I'm really looking forward to the time I can get my FireWire audio interface working with it. (FW-1884)

[Brian2112]

I'm really looking forward to the time I can get my FireWire interface working with it.

Is your Firewire straight out of your MoBo or through a PCI slot? What kind of trouble are you having with firewire?

Thanks Houston,
2112:)

[Houston Haynes]

Nothing with FireWire - as in the 1394 stack... it's about the audio driver for my FW-1884 - they're still working out issues, that's all.

[lukpcn]

AND you can even use a USB stick to add "memory" to your computer for system rescources to chew on.

Really ??? Can I read something about it somewhere ????

[Brian2112]

Really ??? Can I read something about it somewhere ????

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/features/default.mspx

Hit the "Performance" text
Scroll down to 'Windows Ready Boost'

...2112:)

[TomcatII]

I guess the pertinent question here is, is this the 32 bit version only or does it also include the 64 bit version?

Tom

[Brian2112]

I guess the pertinent question here is, is this the 32 bit version only or does it also include the 64 bit version?

Tom
I believe it "supports" both. I don't think there is a different "X64" type version (except for testing) - I could be wrong though....

[TomcatII]

The "rumours" I've been seeing around the web are that the 32 bit version would be the one released at the first of the year and that the 64 bit version wouldn't be coming out until around june or july of 2007 BUT, those are JUST rumours...

Tom

[Houston Haynes]

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/features/default.mspx

Hit the "Performance" text
Scroll down to 'Windows Ready Boost'

...2112:)

I'll be the first to say "Holy CRAP!" You can get an 8GB USB 2.0 Flash Drive for about $150... that's a LOT cheaper than system RAM (aside from the ability to circumvent architectural limitations). I'd be very interested to see how this plays out when it comes to sample playback... it would be cool to be able to allocate pre-load to the fastest RAM, and the rest to "stream" from the USB key(s).

*()

I read an online review for an 8GB Flash drive where the user said that he got a lot more use from his laptop while playing movies and TV shows from his USB drive simply because he wasn't hitting the hard drive - saving on heat and power consumption. Perhaps that will be the place to put a full feature film length video file, and then have the system play back from the USB Flash drive, and save on system resources fetching the video from the hard drive. The possibilities are intriguiging.

[Richard Berg]

Keep in mind the streaming performance of flash memory is slower than hard disks. You also need to be careful about wear cycles (every write reduces its lifespan).

Where this technology really excels is latency. Even the slowest flash memory is 2 orders of magnitude faster than hard disks for random access.

[Pat Azzarello]

I guess we've waited this long - three more months is not big deal. :-)

RC2 is a pretty nice build. I've gotten a lot of traction with it and the chipset on the motherboard. I'm really looking forward to the time I can get my FireWire audio interface working with it. (FW-1884)
That great news Houston.

For those that care why there's a three month window...
OEM's like Dell, HP, Sony, etc. need time after Microsoft has finished to ready their production lines. In addition, the millions of DVD's that are necessary to put in boxes for consumer launch need time to be created. This work has to be scheduled well ahead of time.

Although I'm a Microsoft employee, as a member of this forum my opinions and information should be considered personal and not that of Microsoft. Even so, I endeavor to give you the best information at my disposal, and often can get information and provide context beyond what you can find on web sites.

[Houston Haynes]

Keep in mind the streaming performance of flash memory is slower than hard disks. You also need to be careful about wear cycles (every write reduces its lifespan).

Where this technology really excels is latency. Even the slowest flash memory is 2 orders of magnitude faster than hard disks for random access.

Right on - it might have its limitations for DAW/audio use today, especially for those people (like me) who simply switch off the cache completely. However, as flash drive lifespan and through-put improves, things will change. Another intriguing option would be to set up a few USB flash drives in a RAID array, which could multiply read and write performance.

~|