Windows 7 RTM was Never Released. Expected by July end.

There are lots of rumors from blogs and leaked torrents over the web, that claim RTM has been leaked. It’s all Fake! There was a confusion which is now cleared by Microsoft official, “Its’ not ready yet, How can it goto Manufacturers?”.

In actual what happened was, recently Microsoft bloggers were all excited about a build with build number 7600; seeing how previous builds were stuck in the 7200 range, bloggers proclaimed the leaked 7600 build as the RTM – ofcourse, without any confirmation from Microsoft.

To counter the confusion, Microsoft’s Brandon LeBlanc cleared it up, and he specifically stated that Windows 7 has not yet hit RTM.

The original RTM estimation from Microsoft is the second half of July, so they’ve still got more than one-two weeks to hit the milestone. LeBlanc further stated all the important upcoming dates when it comes to Windows 7’s release process. He also warns against leaked builds, stating that they might contain malware, and that you really shouldn’t believe everything written on the internet.

Here is a quote from WindowsTeamBlog highlighting Facts:

Windows 7 will be available in many languages from around the world. For us to consider RTM “done”, it requires that all languages be completely finished. So there is a lot of work that needs to take place for us to finalize all languages of Windows 7. We also need to get to a point of “global readiness” with our partners. Our partners being ready for Windows 7 is extremely important to RTM. As Steven Sinofsky mentions in this blog post in May, RTM isn’t a single point in time. It’s the beginning of the next “process” for Windows 7. At RTM our partners begin their final preparations for Windows 7, including testing and building images for new PCs. RTM is essentially the final “stage” of engineering for Windows 7 before it hits the market at General Availability (GA). As Steven notes, engineering continues on Windows 7 from RTM until GA on October 22nd.

Another thing to keep in mind is that when we do a specific build internally of Windows 7 we have an extensive step-by-step validation process to ensure quality. This process takes time. Just because a single build may have “leaked” it does not signal the completion of a milestone such as RTM. As always, don’t believe everything that you read on the Internet – except this post ;-).

This is the first time in history that Microsoft responded to “Leaked Rumors”. Earlier to this, they always were silent.