Vista’s coming out for retail customers next week, and Microsoft is finally admitting that their are going to be issues with the software when it hits large numbers of users. There’s no real surprise in this announcement, or that Slashdot is all over it. Like a Slashdot commenter, I’m of mixed mind on the news that SP1 is already on the timeline. Sure, we all know there will be big service packs, but most of us would like to think that it will take a little time before enough problems are found to justify their release.

Vista will be a commercial success–the licensing agreements with hardware vendors guarantee that Vista computers will flood the market starting in a few days, but Microsoft really needs to feed the perception of excellence if it wants to expand its brand off the desktop. A fumbled rollout (and big problems shortly after the public release will have to count as a fumbled rollout) won’t kill Vista on the desktop, but might well slow Microsoft’s much-needed brand expansion.

Categories: General computing