While most of you, Apple fans and haters alike were probably focusing on the events that went on at WWDC earlier today, Microsoft also had their own little event, Teched. At it Microsoft revealed that they are working on service pack 1 (SP1) for Windows 7 and expect to have a public beta version available in July.

There’s been lots of speculation of the possible release date of Windows 7 SP1 and this is the first official news we have of a beta release. Word has it that Microsoft is trying to rush the release of SP1 to try and get more and more businesses etc… to adopt Windows 7 who aren’t generally early adopters like most consumers. Normally you will find that businesses and large corporations wait until SP1 is released to ensure all the bugs and fixes have been ironed out.

I don’t think this is necessary and Microsoft even said it themselves that there is no need to wait for SP1 since Windows 7 is already stable.

SP1 will not contain any new features that are specific to Windows 7 itself. For Windows 7, SP1 will simply be the combination of updates already available through Windows Update and additional hotfixes based on feedback by our customers and partners. In other words, customers can feel confident about deploying Windows 7 now!

Microsoft’s Gavriella Schuster said in a blog post

The Windows Server 2008 R2 is also getting a service pack beta as well and it does have one or two new features. According to the Windows Server Division blog, it will include Remote FX (which provides a virtualized 3-D graphical experience for remote users on both thick and thin clients), along with Dynamic Memory  (this gives users more control over memory usage on a physical host and the ability to dynamically distribute it to virtual machines without remote service interruption). The service pack will also feature virtualization tools that will help users prepare for cloud computing.

The official release of SP1 is expected by the end of 2010, it could possibly be in November. So IT admins should be ready for the SP1 beta next month which will give them a chance to carry out any compatibility and integration testing in preparation for making the transition to Windows 7 SP1.