On December 11, 2007 M$ has made Vista SP1 Release Candidate available for public download at this link.

Great! Wonderful! So what's the problem? According to the instructions posted on the download link:

1. When Vista SP1 RC is successfully installed, there is no way you can get rid of the desktop showing "Evaluation Copy" banner.

2. Vista is programmed to implode after June 30, 2008.

3. This SP1 RC requires the installation of either two or three prerequisite updates prior to installing the service pack itself. Now get this each prerequisite updates will require reboot. It is until after the sequential reboots that you can then install Vista SP1 RC.

If all of that doesn't stop you and you still want to take the leap, Mazel Tov!
i_Xp/VistaUser

P.S. If you're taking the leap installing Vista SP1 RC on your productivity (or as M$ called it primary or mission critical systems) PC - no Mazel Tov for you.

i_Xp/VistaUser

When I was a kid I was tempted to see what the AC voltage felt like.

Am I going to get the S shocked out of me?

I read it wrong and answer it wrong too. So get off my case you peanut.

LOL no not you. In your case it will be a challenge and if all goes wrong you know what to do :-) BTW I doubt you played with the AC voltage while standing in a tub of water LOL

i_Xp/VistaUser

I pulled the trigger on the Service Pack preview a couple of days ago & I can tell you sincerely: so far the system does seem to respond somewhat quicker & the overall performance seem smoother .... while it is easy to attribute this observation to some computer placebo -- one thing I can say is, there doesn't seem to be any deleterious effect from the update deployment & yes this is my Vista production machine, but this is not an endorsement for anyone to blindly install the update on their main machine -- heck, there are still folks out there that won't dare install the actual OS on their production machine & still rate XP as more reliable & better suited to their daily computing needs ;-)

As far as the banner is concerned: there actually IS a way to get rid of the desktop "Evaluation Copy" stamp. Although the procedure seem innocuous, I am not going make the assumption that it is ok to post it here. But let's just say it involves overwriting a file in the applicable system's X:\Windows\System32\en-US folder.

Now time-limit or feature crippling attributes are not really uncommon with computing software. Moreover, it is not the first time M$ had implemented such protocol nor will this be the last time. I also didn't think -- for a second -- that the move would deter the type of folks that typically adopt & install updates as such.

Odds are: many of them have been waiting for the "official" preview for some time & some may even have sampled the various non-validated leaks out there prior to now. So I really don't see the not uncommon move as a problem at all.

Finally the update does not strictly require any of the prerequisite updates mentioned above, although XpUser .... cough .... cough .... VistaUser is not flat-out incorrect.

I for one did not have to install any prerequisite update to get SP1, this is because I downloaded the Standalone Package & executed the installation that way & couldn't be bothered with the couple of additional reboots if I had pursued the Windows Update route for the Service Pack deployment. Now even if I had to .... it wouldn't have been an inconvenience of a substantial magnitude anyhow, since rebooting is often an integral part of many software installation.

If anyone's interested: the direct Standalone Package links for the x86 & x64 Service Pack preview are below.

Vista Service Pack 1 RC - 5 Language Standalone Package

Vista Service Pack 1 RC for x64 Based Editions - 5 Language Standalone Package

Vista Service Pack 1 RC - All Language Standalone Package

Vista Service Pack 1 RC1 for x64 Based Editions - All Language Standalone Package

Good luck guys!

I'm fine. I'll just wait for the release of the final version. =)

Well all in all it is wise to install this on a test machine, not a actual working enviroment. It take a hour or so to install this service pack, that is not including all the reboots, and having to uninstall it after the first official service pack is out.

Jim R

I installed Vista SP1 RC yesterday thru the web update method.

I have Vista Home Premium so I had to install only two prerequisite updates, only one of which required a reboot. After installing the prerequisite updates, I had to wait about 15 minutes before SP1 RC appeared on the Windows update.

I have a localized version of Vista. I had all the previous updates and hot fixes installed before SP1 RC. The web update size was 77.8 MB and update process took slightly over an hour.

After the update and rebooting, everything seems O.K.

Regards

SuatCINI

Does this fix the annoying issues of:

1) Folder views forgetting their settings and defaulting to large thumbs or whatever

2) When deleting a folder on the start menu most of the time you have to right click and Delete it like 2 or 3 times before everything in the folder vanishes then once again to actually remove the folder.

Intel Core2Duo e6600 @ 3.0Ghz
Asus P5B Deluxe
4GB Corsair PC2-6400 DDR2
eVGA 8800GTS 512MB @ 750/1900/2100
Soundblaster X-Fi Fatal1ty FPS
2x WD 500GB SATA2 HDDs
Seagate 750GB SATA2 H