Anilrgowda

News outlets have been touting the rumored release of two big Windows Vista patches to beta testers, but the releases have been confirmed this week by a leak of those patches to various Web sites.
The Vista performance and compatibility packs reportedly address issues that some Vista users have been complaining about. Among other things, the fixes are designed to improve Vista’s performance when copying or moving large files or large directories. Issues with Vista’s memory manager — which can cause the system to lose its default gateway address — are also reportedly addressed in the packs.
The running theme of the fixes is to improve the performance and reliability of Vista, as well as compatibility issues with printers, digital cameras, and other devices.
The official updates are expected to be available to the general public on August 14 as a 45-MB download over Windows Update, but impatient Vista users can instead choose to visit any of several sites to download the packs.


However, while the downloads are widely available, they are not yet official releases. That means the software might not contain the same contents as the publicly released Service Pack 1 that will be available over Windows Update next month.
Six Months, 60 Million
The first service pack is arriving six months after Vista’s initial release. Microsoft has sold 60 million copies of the operating system since it was introduced, according to Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner, who said last week that during the first five weeks of sales, copies of Windows Vista exceeded the number of computers that Apple currently has as its total installed base.
According to Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing Group, the software giant’s latest operating system is far more secure than competing platforms — or even previous Windows iterations.
During Windows Vista’s first six months on the market,…