14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft is gearing up to release the second wave of Windows 7 RTM downloads via MSND and TechNet, today, August 14th, 2009. The Redmond company started serving subscribers to the portals for its developer and IT professionals Build 7600 of the latest iteration of Windows on August 6th. And from the get go, MSDN and TechNet subscribers were informed that Windows 7 RTM would be rolled up in three waves, a process scheduled to be complete by the end of this month. In total, Microsoft will offer no less than 893 different images of Windows 7 RTM, or of components associated with the gold build of Windows Vista’s successor.
On August 6th, the initial Windows 7 RTM launch wave brought to the table the English Client bits. At the same time, Microsoft offered MSDN and TechNet subscribers a few language packs for the operating system, as well as WAIKs, SDKs, DDKs (Windows Automated Installation Kit, Windows Software Development Kit, Windows Driver Development Kit), as well as Symbols.
Essentially, at this point in time, MSDN and TechNet subscribers can download all Windows 7 Client (x86 and x64) Retail and VL Editions but only in English. At the time of this article the Windows 7 RTM weave 2 releases are not yet live, but undoubtedly all downloads will become available soon.
According to Microsoft, Wave 2, scheduled for August 14th, will bring to the table: “Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard, Enterprise, Datacenter, Web, Itanium (x64 and ia64) – English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese. All Windows 7 Client (x86 and x64) Retail and VL Editions – French, German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese. Checked builds – English.”
A good sign that Microsoft is hard at work laboring to introduce the second wave of Windows 7 RTM downloads on MSDN and TechNet is the fact that there are new releases available, so far only on MSDN, updated on August 13th, 2009. In addition to the initial August 6th bits, customers are now free to download Windows 7 Debugging Symbols Checked Build (x86) - (English) and Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Debugging Symbols Checked Build (x64) - (English).