Windows XP Release 2 coming

10/22/2004 9:27:22 AM, by Ken "Caesar" Fisher

If you thought that Service Pack 2 for Windows XP was the last of the big updates, think again. Speaking yesterday at the Gartner Symposium in Orlando, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said that a number of important security initiatives were underway for Windows, some of which would be part of a pre-Longhorn "Release 2" for Windows XP. Beyond noting this, Ballmer did not disclose any details regarding when we might see R2, or just what it would contain. In fact, he didn't give any time frames for anything, be it Longhorn, Windows Server 2005, Office 12, or when Steinbrenner plans to make his life easier by recruiting Clone War rejects.

Our man on the scene noted that several people understood this talk of Release 2 to be a kind of rebranding of "XP Reloaded," but our gut feeling here is that we're looking at something different. From our talks with Microsoft (both on and off the record), XP Reloaded was nothing but an internal name for what we're seeing now: the big 2004 refresh, featuring not only Windows XP SP2, but also Media Center Edition 2005. It's important to note that in Microsoft's eyes, MCE

2005 is the start of something special, and by special I mean a new OS that won't be relegated to entertainment centers in the home if Microsoft has their way. Think XP Home + MCE. But I shan't get into that now, because there are bigger obstacles to address.

Microsoft has had to change its rhetoric regarding Longhorn for one simple reason: the original plan was too aggressive. Having bitten off more than they can chew, Ballmer is amping up talk of Longhorn now as a kind of cluster or wave of technologies and features-features that may show up before Longhorn, with Longhorn, or long after Longhorn. While the full WinFS implementation is now known to be too grandiose for Longhorn, Ballmer has hinted that other features may be delayed as well. In the case of WinFS, Ballmer said the real deal will ship for free to Longhorn users at the time Longhorn Server ships. I'll put five-spot on late 2007.

Ballmer also considers Windows Server 2005 and Office 12 as part of the technology wave, upon which he hopes scores of IT execs will happily surf as soon as possible. Where's Jeff Spicoli when you need him?

Just as important, Longhorn delays have stretched the company out, and even the much needed release of SP2 can't stave off the future. By most analytical guesstimates, we're just under two years from Longhorn shipping, which means we're at least three years from it being anything approaching common in corporate environments. This massive gap needs to be filled, but how might they do it? For a Release 2 scenario, you have two major options. First, it could just be another massive service pack. But if that were the case, why not just speak of a Service Pack 3 or 4? The vibe we get (and this is a vibe partly induced by a mere 45 minutes of sleep last night) is that R2 is going to be even more of a so-called point release than SP2 was.

That makes us wonder about cost. Would R2 be a commercial product with added security features? Keep in mind that the company is likely still planning to release its own anti-virus application. (This might help explain why SP2's "Security Center" seems to be about as clued in regarding AV status as your average guy on the street. While the firewall and updates improvements have been well received, the AV monitor is a bit of a joke at best, and an annoyance at worst.)

A key point that must be stressed is that, sans software subscriptions, the typical pay-for-play scheme only includes updates that address security flaws. With SP2, we saw not only flaws addressed, but new functionality added that really changed key components of the OS. The question is, is that scenario likely to carry a price tag in the future, or will the font of altruism rush forth with another free update for XP?

All of this is, of course, quite a bit of speculation generated by just a few minutes of pep talk at a symposium for the ubernerds (and I mean that kindly). As always, we'll keep you up to date on what we know, and what we think we know, and what other people think they know.

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