Windows Vista SP 1 Beta 1 Is Released Next Week

Microsoft surprised most of us by unofficially announcing the release of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 Beta 1 mid-July.

We were led to believe the Service Pack was delayed with a beta release at the end of the year, but now it sounds like it will be released around the same time as Windows Server 2008. The expected release date is November 2007.

So what can we expect in Windows Vista Service Pack 1?

• Performance tweaks lessening the amount of time it takes to copy files and shut down Vista machines

• Improved transfer performance and decreased CPU utilization via support for SD Advanced Direct Memory Access (DMA)

• Support for ExFat, the Windows file format for flash memory storage and other consumer devices

• Improvements to BitLocker Drive Encryption to allow not just encryption of the whole Vista volume, but also locally created data volumes

• The ability to boot Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) on an x64 machine

• Improved success rate for firewalled MeetingSpace and Remote Assistance connections

Besides the few features mentioned the service pack is more about fixes and enhancement of existing features.

Thanks to Arpit Jacob from Clazh.com to write about it.