Microsoft putting final touches on Vista SP2

Microsoft released last week to testers what is believed to be the release candidate for Vista's second service pack, which means they are right on schedule to make a public launch of the pack by early April.

The Vista Service Pack 2 started its testing phase last October and is without a doubt the last big update it will push to the OS before it releases Windows 7 later this year. The service pack will update both Vista and Windows Server 2008, and will require SP1 as a prerequisite to avoid making it cumulative and therefore much larger in size.

Besides bundling all post-SP1 updates and security fixes, SP2 is expected to add a number of features including: Windows Search 4.0, Bluetooth 2.1 support, Blu-ray media recording, Via 64-bit CPU support, Windows Connect Now for Wi-Fi connections, improved power management policy, and improved audio and video performance for streaming high-definition content, among others.