Download Free, Pre-Activated Copies of Vista

Being the loyal adept of a business model based on proprietary software, a free operating system is not exactly something that Microsoft customers can expect from the company. But of course that there are always exceptions to confirm the rule. And the free copy of Windows Vista up for grabs via Microsoft Download is an illustrative example in this context. That's right, a completely free copy of the latest Windows client, time-bombed of course, but free nonetheless.

Microsoft continues a tradition debuted after the launch of Internet Explorer 7. Because two different versions of Internet Explorer cannot coexist under normal circumstances on the same Windows machine, let alone be used simultaneously, the Redmond giant turned to an alternative solution to make the lives of web content developers and designers a tad easier. The company released Internet Explorer Application Compatibility VPC Images.

The images are essentially nothing more than Virtual Hard Disks designed to integrate with Virtual Server 2007. This is precisely the case of the latest IE Application Compatibility VPC Image containing Vista. The VHD brings to the table a pre-activated copy of Windows Vista with Internet Explorer 7. And just as with the previous releases of the Application Compatibility VPC Images, the Vista VHD is also time-bombed. According to the software giant, the June 17, 2008 release of the IE image containing Vista is set to expire on September 9.

But until that point the operating system is fair game. It can be downloaded for free from Microsoft and used in a virtual machine running under Virtual PC 2007 until September. At that point in time Microsoft is bound to make available new releases of IE Application Compatibility VPC Image to replace the ones that have expired.

The Internet Explorer Application Compatibility VPC Image containing Windows Vista is available for download here. (look for the downloads labeled IE7-VIS1.exe, IE7-VIS2.rar, and IE7-VIS3.rar.)