14 DAY TRIAL // With Windows 7 evolving toward the Release Candidate milestone, Microsoft remains mute on the platform's post-Beta development process, making no attempt to clarify the chatter around the progress done with the pre-RC builds of the operating system. Information leaked in the wild now indicates that Windows 7 is up to Build 7079. At the same time, there is also talk of Windows 7 Build 7105 having already been compiled over in Redmond. The software giant offered absolutely no confirmation related to Windows 7 releases from the RC branch following the availability of Beta Build 7000 on January 10, 2009.
Windows 7 Build 7079 has 6.1.7079.0.090407-1902 as the complete build string according to Wzor. The version number reveals that the code for the milestone was wrapped up on April 7, 2009, just a couple of day ago, and only a few days after Windows 7 Build 7077, which has already been leaked in the wild and made available for download via torrent trackers. At the same time, Microsoft is reportedly past Build 7078.0.090406-1758 with Windows 7, compiled on April 6, 2009.
While offering information on how to bypass the upgrade block of Beta and pre-RC builds of Windows 7 from being transitioned to full-Release Candidate, Microsoft mentioned Build 7100 of the next iteration of the Windows client. It is uncertain at this point in time, whether Windows 7 RC will in fact be Build 7100, but reports indicate that Build 7077 is the official RC-Escrow. Escrow is a label used in the development process to signal the fact that any code changes have been frozen, and that the focus has moved on confirming that fixes for reported bugs are in place, and that no regression issues have been created with the latest changes. Microsoft was expected to offer the RC-Escrow of Windows 7 in April, with the full-RC planned for May 2009.
But at the same time, the software giant apparently also compiled Windows 7 Build 6.1.7105.0.winmain.090404-1235 on April 4, 2009. Although the Build number is reported as real, I can confirm that the alleged Builds labeled 7105 leaked in the wild are fake at this point in time. The latest development milestone of Windows 7 that has indeed made it to BitTorrent websites is Build 7077.
Even if Build 7100 ends up being the fully fledged RC of Windows 7, fact is that there is nothing stopping Microsoft from compiling builds from the RTM branch, even ahead of delivering the release Candidate to the public. The same was the case with Windows 7 Beta. The Redmond company had started on the RC-branch in December 2008, approximately a month before Windows 7 Beta Build 7000 was in fact available for download as a public release.
