Microsoft gave a pleasant surprise over the weekend for all of the Vista SP1 testers out there. Earlier last week they provided a “refreshed” version of Vista SP1 to a group of 15,000 Beta testers who’ve been part of the SP1 program for quite awhile. A few days later Microsoft decided that they wanted more feedback, and therefore made the Vista Service Pack 1 RC Refresh available to the public.
For the curious minds: The new build number is 6.0.6001.17028 and it will show up as version 744 in the system properties.
I jumped on the download because I wanted to see if it fixed an issue I was having with Vista SP1 RC when attaching an external monitor. The first thing I had to do was uninstall Vista SP1:
Open the Programs and Features control panel and select View installed updates. In the Microsoft Windows section, right-click Service Pack for Windows (936330) and select Uninstall. Please wait one hour after uninstalling a previous version of Windows Vista SP1 before installing Windows Vista SP1 RC Refresh. The installer service needs to clean up and complete the uninstall prior to installing the RC. Failing to do this can result in installation errors when installing the RC version.
Uninstalling took about 45 minutes to complete, and then the process of reinstalling Vista SP1 took another hour or so. Make sure you set aside plenty of time for this process, because most of the time the computer is in an unusable state.
Now I don’t know for sure whether the bug that I mentioned above has been fixed, but I haven’t had it happen thusfar. It’s kind of been an intermittent problem, and I’ll have to give it a week before I know for sure.
As far as other changes go I haven’t noticed much, but in general after testing Vista SP1 I would have a hard time going back to a PC running Vista without it. Searching for files is so much faster with the Service Pack installed, and file transfers are definitely speedier. I can’t wait for the final version which should be out within the next couple months.
Important note: Installing a pre-release version of SP1 will cause the operating system to expire on June 30, 2008. An “Evaluation Copy” message will also appear on the desktop, but uninstalling the pre-release version of SP1 will remove all of these restrictions. This is just a way for Microsoft to ensure that people will install the final version when it comes out.
Download Vista SP1 RC Refresh [via Download Squad]
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Tags: Pre-Release, Software, Windows, Downloads, Features, Windows Vista SP1
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I agree. The refresh of SP1 definitely speeds things up substantially. Apart from faster transfers my desktop just has a snappier feel to it. Documents open faster, etc. Another thing I have noticed is that my internet connection seems faster. I’m not sure whether that is part of what SP1 is supposed to do but websites definitely load faster.
Good to hear that the file transfer is faster. For the life of me, I don’t understand in this day and age of large files, how MS could release an OS that had slow file transfers.
The only thing that comes to mind is that they never substantially tested file transfer speeds against XP. Naturally you would think that they would test everything, but that’s never possible.
It appears there is no full file so you can do multiple computers like you could with the RC, and you have to do this through Windows Update.
Because they have the market by the balls, that’s why
No, they would’ve known. They just had a date to hit and couldn’t afford to do a thing about it. I worked for a similar company that had promised dates to hit and trust me, they are aware of all the bugs
But whatever doesn’t get fixed in time, is just……tough. “We’ll get it on the next ver.”
Well, there is a full download available, just not by Microsoft. It just takes some searching around. I’ll just say to search for Windows6.0-KB936330-X86-wave0.exe
Did the searching and the only link found points to a non existent file. Must have been removed.
Did you do yours via Windows Update?
*cough* [depositfiles.com] *cough*
Looks like the link posted by the above user works.
No, I did not do my via Windows Update because I did it before the update was even posted. It automagically appeared on my desktop.