Vista Updates Hint At Coming SP1 Release

Microsoft has officially released two “hot fix” updates for Windows Vista which address a number of issues in the new operating system. While these don't yet constitute a true service pack release, they are expected to be included in the as-yet-unannounced Vista SP1 expected sometime later this year.

Though both of today's releases been floating around in unauthorized form for a week now, the Vista performance fix pack and the Vista reliability fix pack are not betas and are now official releases.

Neither update is available through Windows Update just yet, though Microsoft says they will be at a “later date” (our money is on Tuesday, Aug 14, Microsoft's next “Patch Tuesday”).

If you'd like to grab the updates before that, you can do so using the links above, just be sure to grab the right version (both 32-bit and 64-bit updates are available).

The Vista reliability and performance updates address quite a few bugs, including:

• The computer stops responding or restarts unexpectedly when you play video games or perform desktop operations.
• The screen goes blank after an external display device that is connected to the computer is turned off. For example, this problem may occur when a projector is turned off during a presentation.
• A computer that has NVIDIA G80 series graphic drivers installed stops responding.
• Windows Calendar exits unexpectedly after you create a new appointment, create a new task, and then restart the computer.
• A memory leak occurs when you use the Windows Energy screen saver.
• When you copy or move a large file, the “estimated time remaining” takes a long time to
• After you resume the computer from hibernation, it takes a long time to display the log-on screen.
• fix for data loss when editing an image file that uses the RAW image format from the Canon EOS 1D and the Canon EOS 1DS

Microsoft has also quietly released pre-beta version of Windows XP SP3 to testers. I managed to dig up a forum post on AeroXP.org which claims to have screenshots of the XP update, though they may well be fake. So far there have been no details on what XP SP3 will fix, nor any timeline for a final release.

[via WindowsNow]