More Microsoft Vista SP1 Release Date Woes

"We will be releasing Windows Vista SP1 in two waves," wrote Nick White, a Vista product manager, in a Microsoft blog posting on Monday. "The first wave will only provide Windows Vista SP1 to Windows Vista Ultimate PCs running the following five languages: English, French, German, Japanese and Spanish." The second wave will follow shortly after, supporting all 36 languages, White said.

According to White, for Windows Update, PCs that run the five initial languages from the first wave only will be provided with Windows Vista SP1.

PCs running Windows Vista Ultimate with any of the other language packs installed will not be offered Windows Vista SP1 through Windows Update until they are released. Once the language packs are released, Windows Vista SP1 will then be offered for installation. Calls to Microsoft for comment were not returned at press time.

Not surprisingly, readers responding to White's blog entry were irate.

"You and your team should be ashamed of yourselves," wrote one reader. "Not only have you defrauded your users who paid more for non-existent or extremely lame "extras," but now many users who may have installed the language packs have to wait even longer for a Service Pack that will (we hope) reduce the pain of using this problem-riddled OS."

The latest debacle follows an accidental release of the 64 bit version of the Vista SP1 RTM through Windows Update on Feb. 22. In an email to ChannelWeb, a Microsoft spokesperson acknowledged the mistake.

"A build of Vista SP1 was posted to Windows Update and it was inadvertently made available to a broad group. The build was intended only for our more technically advanced testers and was meant to only be offered to those with a specific registry key set on their PC."

Kevin McLaughlin contributed to this article.