Yes, Windows 7 Release Candidate is still sporting the Betta fish, but then again, examples of fauna featuring the RC moniker are bound to be scarce. Compiled on April 21, 2009, the Release Candidate for Windows 7 has made it into the wild, and is now available for download via torrent trackers.

Build 7100 is labeled Release Candidate in the End User License Agreement. More specifically, the EULA refers to Wind7_RC.1_Ult_NRL_en-US. At the time of this article Microsoft continues to offer no official details on the RC development milestone of Windows 7, providing no information on the build string or on the availability deadlines.

Still, the generalized consensus among various third parties is that Windows 7 Build 6.1.7100.0.winmain_win7rc .090421-1700 is none other than the fully fledged Release Candidate of the next iteration of Windows. Both the 32-bit and 64-bit flavors of the platform have made it onto P2P (peer-to-peer) networks, and the official release from Microsoft is just around the corner. The company will offer Windows 7 RC Build 7100 to the public on May 5, with MSDN and TechNet subscribers scheduled to get the bits a tad earlier (but not at this point in time).

32-bit Windows 7 RC Build 7100 is accompanied by the following information: MD5: 8867C13330F56A93944BCD46DCD73590 and SHA1: 7D1F486CA569EFFFFB719CFB48355BB7BF499712. At the same time, the 64-bit of the Release Candidate for Windows 7 comes with MD5: 98341AF35655137966E382C4FEAA282D and SHA1: FC867FE1AB2E0A9796F9E4D155B44EA6998F4874. Microsoft only allows Windows Vista copies to be upgraded to Windows 7 RC. Windows XP to Windows 7 Build 7100 transitions are blocked by design, and Windows 7 Beta or pre-RC Build upgrades to the Release Candidate milestone, although also blocked, can be circumvented.