Windows Vista Service Pack 1 Beta Announced

In a recent Q&A with Jon DeVaan, senior vice president of the Windows Core Operating System division at Microsoft, Mr. DeVaan unveiled Microsoft’s plans for the first service pack for Windows Vista.

It was in Redmond, Washington whereby Mr. DeVaan first announced the company’s plans regarding Windows Vista and future service packs for the operating system; as well as a timeline for the first release.

I have taken the liberty of extracting some of the juicier segments of the interview into this news post just for your viewing pleasure:

Question: There has been a lot of speculation around the first service pack for Windows Vista. When will it ship, and why are you just now sharing information on Windows Vista SP1?

DeVaan: We’re targeting the first quarter of 2008, but the exact date really depends on feedback we receive from testers and the work we put into making sure we understand the feedback we receive. We’re making a beta available to more than 10,000 people in the next few weeks – that’s a critical step for us on the road to release, and we’re looking forward to the feedback we’ll get.

Question: So what changes should we expect to see in Windows Vista SP1?

DeVaan: Windows Vista SP1 will contain changes focused on addressing feedback from our customers across a number of areas. In addition to all the fixes delivered via other channels like Windows Update, Windows Vista SP1 will address specific reliability and performance issues that have been discussed on many self-help forums, such as copying files and shutdown time. It will support new types of hardware and emerging standards, like EFI (Extensible Firmware Interface) and ExFat (a new file format that will be used in flash memory storage and consumer devices).

It will also include some management, deployment, and support improvements, such as adding the ability to detect and correct common file sharing problems to Network Diagnostics. Windows Vista SP1 also will include Secure Development Lifecycle process updates, where we identify the root cause of each security bulletin and improve our internal tools to eliminate code patterns that could lead to future vulnerabilities.