Windows 7 SP1 Beta Leaked Online

Once again commercial software has found its way onto the Internet after a build of Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) surfaced online on a selection of Torrent sites, along with screenshots of the upgrade.

Based on information gathered from screenshots, the build date is 27 March and the build string is ‘build 6.1.7601.16537.amd64fre.win7.100327-0053″. A writer for the technology blog GeekSmack posted screenshots of the installation process and his experience with the download, describing the installation process as “much faster than the install process for service packs on Vista”.

Windows 7 has so far been a much more successful launch than the much-derided Vista OS. According to recent figures from web analytics firm Net Applications, the operating system now accounts for one in 10 computers accessing the Internet, representing 10 percent of the market share. Vista, by comparison, took 16 months to reach the same point after its release. However, the firm also noted Windows’ overall market share dipped half a percentage point from February, down to a 91.6 percent market share.

The leak comes a day after Microsoft released details for Exchange Server 2010 SP1, which arrives in June.

Microsoft originally announced the worldwide launch of Exchange Server 2010 in November 2009, on the opening day of the TechEd Europe conference in Berlin. The company said it would bring a number of changes to user interface, integrated archiving and includes “fixes and tweaks”, as team member Michael Atalla wrote on the Microsoft Exchange Team Blog. “I also wanted to flag some of the feature enhancements we’re excited to bring to you with SP1, including archiving and discovery enhancements, [OWA] Outlook Web App … improvements, mobile user and management improvements, and some highly sought-after additional UI for management tasks,” he wrote.

In addition to upcoming and leaked service packs for Windows 7 and Exchange Server, Microsoft also announced an update for its Xbox 360 gaming console that enables support for USB devices. The system update was released over Xbox Live on Tuesday. Microsoft’s Major Nelson, who authored the tweet, also noted users can have two devices connected to the console at a time, enabling up to 32GB of simultaneous storage, and explained the system won’t just configure the device once it is connected to the console.