Windows 7 to be Released in October?

According to a post over at Slashdot, the Windows 7 launch date has been leaked, although it’s hard to say right now whether anyone should hold any credence in it. The date mentioned is October 23 of this year, a date that was carelessly thrown out by an Acer executive in Europe. I won’t get into the whole story on things, but Oct 23 does seem like a reasonable date, but there’s so much more to consider in the big picture.

Looking at things right now, Windows 7 is really shaping up to have a clean launch, and there doesn’t seem to be a real hitch holding back its development. After all, the Release Candidate has just been released, and should become available to regular consumers to test out soon. That’s a good sign. Plus, it’s been speculated that the RC/RTM phase could last about three months, and if true, that would place us at an August release date.

So where does that leave October 23? It’s hard to say. If Windows 7 seems really stable right now, is Microsoft simply playing it safe, and are deliberately holding back a launch for a few months in order to make sure every possible important bug is ironed out? After all, the last thing Microsoft wants to see is another Vista launch. Heck, even the consumers don’t want to see that (unless you are a Mac or Linux user maybe, you twisted freaks!).

Oct 23 sounds credible, but this is an OS after all… anything can happen.

Asked whether this confirmed the Windows 7 release date as September 2009, he coyly remarked that ‘when it’s in store it won’t have Windows 7 pre-loaded.’ Microsoft would probably prefer that he had stopped there, but he added: ‘We won’t be actually selling [Windows 7] a day before the 23rd October.’ Then, Acer’s Managing Director for the UK helpfully clarified that while their product will ship with Windows Vista at launch, because it is on sale less than 30 days before the Windows 7 release date, it will be eligible for the ‘upgrade program’ to get a free upgrade to the new OS.”