When will Windows 7 ship? My prediction: April 2009

runtime "all of a sudden there is Win 7 " three years is hardly "all of a sudden". It' pretty much the historically normal cycle for Windows versions and only one third as "all of a sudden" as OS X which has had 6 versions (10.0 - 10.5) in just over 6 years.

"now all of a sudden there is Win 7 which is supposed to be, pretty much, an apology for Vista" It would have been an apology for Vista if it had been release a year or two after Vista. Vista SP1 was probably an apology for Vista. (Remember that Microsoft's service packs are free.)

@ mike I hate to agree with robertsjoe, but he beat me to it. We're talking Pro IT upgrade paths here. The only reason we "maybe" getting Vista in early 2010 was due to SP1. By "all of a sudden" I meant while Apple was putting out so many versions of OS X, Microsoft was plodding along with Longhorn/Vista... ... the Mac users had a 8 - 12 months between version upgrades. Windows users at our company, until last year, had XP and XP only. Now that we *may* be getting Vista, here comes Win 7 in 2009? Whatever. Paul's predictions change as much as his like/dislike of Apple. I simply agreed with subzero's statement that MS should hold off until sometime in 2010. @ shark: while I agree that Vista SP1 was good, and free (god knows I love MS Service Packs - except, if you'll allow me to step back in time, for Win 2K SP2 which was HORRIBLE I rolled back to SP1 until they got SP3 rolled out), it was still not enough to save the Vista name brand.

OK. Let's put it in perspective Using just the major upgrades (So, 98, 98SE and 98ME all the same) so that we go for the longest reasonable timeframe between versions we have: Windows 1->Windows 2 - 2 years Windows 2->Windows 3 - 2 1/2 years Windows 3->Windows 3.1 - 2 years Windows 3.1->Windows 95 - 3 years Windows 95->Windows 98 - 3 years Windows 98->Windows XP - 3 years Windows XP->Windows Vista - 5 years Windows Vista->Windows 7 - 3 years Aside from Vista being 2 years late the pattern is a new version of WIndows every 3 years so having a new version of Windows come out 3 years after Vista is the normal release cycle. If you want to start planning, you can probably expect that Windows 7 will be replaced with "Windows 8" sometime in 2012.

Now, for those saying Windows 7 isn't a "shake up the industry" huge change, I'd really suggest a history lesson. Let's look at the timing of those Windows releases that caused disruptions because they did major changes to the architecture: Windows 1->Windows 3 - 4 1/2 years (386 protect mode) Windows 3->Windows 95 - 5 years (32-bit preemptive OS) Windows 95->Windows XP - 6 years (Windows NT kernel) Windows XP->Windows Vista - 5 years (security architecture, search and soft-link files) So, we're not due for a "shake up the industry" level OS change yet. The industry and the publc aren't ready and aren't even really taking advantage of all the changes that are already out there.

@Raaj, So if Windows Seven launches and it is less than consumers want, wouldn't that still give the hardcore and regular Mac fans a legit gripe. I can hear it now if Seven is less than stellar. I can tell you what Lindy, RobertsJoe, Ocean, john, and the rest will say. "Microsoft has produced two consecutive duds. Can we say M.E. beta 3! Look how good SnowLeopard looks! More Microsoft customers not buying Seven. Apple's taking the market by storm!" Yeah, I can already hear it. So I would rather have Apple rush Snow Leopard out the door and have Windows Seven be pretty damn stellar. A lot of businesses were planning to upgrade to Vista in 09. I'm pretty sure that has been put off while the market is in a freefall. If they have no money for Vista, they won't have any money for Seven. @timii, Again I would have to say no. If the polish and performance aren't there, then businesses will react to the public word of mouth reaction. Its critical that Microsoft continue to polish Windows Seven. You are going to compound the situation with Vista with Seven feeling "rushed." My arguments is this. What's the rush? Vista is still on pace with XP sales. If consumers aren't rushing out to buy PC's, they aren't going to buy a new OS. This is will be the first time a Windows OS will face a major recession scenario. If sales this holiday season are flat, along with more layoffs in 2009, customers are going to keep their wallets shut. This also is true for Apple, as they are making drastic cuts to spur sales. If the economy is still in the tank by May 2009, then Seven's reception will be met with poor sales. This is not the PR story Microsoft needs. So instead of feeding to Hardcore Windows fans paranoia, take a play out of the playbook of Barack Obama. Patience, pragmatism, and a firm hand. Continue your "A" game. Beta test the heck outta Seven. Make it the biggest public beta to date. Constantly test and retest benchmark scores so that it beats XP, Leopard, and SnowLeopard hands down. Refine every element until we have an RC code that impresses with a blind test. Then you RTM and have the mother of all launch parties. 2010 is fine because all of the best Windows launches are 3 years apart.

Cost is typically the issue if something is not needed. Our systems run fine on XP and a Vista upgrade is just not needed, and would be expensive to buy and implement. We are not avoiding Vista for any other reason. Our Pacs servers run XP and GE owns the software, so GE would be the one to make any upgrade, and they won't for quite some time [FDA stuff mostly]. When we replace our IS actually RIS for Radiology IS], we will certainly insure that we can use Vista. Now, our 3 hospital,Health care system is moving to Microsoft Amalga as it's IS. Many of us see this as a very smart move, not as it's much more affordable, but compatibility is built it for future OSes. This will enable us to upgrade/replace computers with more modern OSes from MS, rather than the need for legacy products.

Paul ( here ) think is expecting Windows 7 to be finalized by April, at the latest. My personal opinion