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Filed under: OS Updates, Microsoft

Vista SP1 ships next week, Windows 7 in 2010

Windows 7
There've been a thousand and one ways to get your hands on Windows Vista SP1 or various beta versions over the past few months. But Microsoft is set to post the manual installer for Vista SP1 on March 18. If you're not in a hurry, you can wait until April when the update will be available through the Windows Update service.

In other news, Microsoft has confirmed that Vista's successor, which goes by the clever codename of Windows 7, is on track for a 2010 release. We've heard a lot of dates over the last few months, ranging from 2009 to 2011. But Microsoft has consistently said Windows 7 was part of a 3 year cycle. They just didn't really make it clear when the 3 years started. Apparently the answer is, 3 years from the time Windows Vista shipped to consumers. Not the date when Vista development began, or 3 years from the date it was shipped to manufacturers.

Does that mean we'll see a public launch of Windows 7 in January of 2010? Eh, maybe. On the one hand, a lot can happen in two years. On the other hand, when you're trying to retool an operating system as widely used as Windows, you want to spend as much time as it takes getting things right, otherwise you wind up with... Windows ME. What, you thought we were going to make a dig at Vista? How little you know us.

[via Engadget]

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Featured Time Waster

Civiballs is a beautiful, soothing physics puzzle Time Waster

CiviballsI have an absolute weakness for physics games, and while Civiballs isn't the strongest physics-based game, what it lacks in the physics department it makes up for a few times over in style and fun.

In Civiballs, you are presented with a few colored balls, and your goal is to get those balls into the same-colored urn on the level. The "civi" part of Civiballs is that there are 3 sets of levels to play, each representing a different civilization. While the civilization doesn't affect gameplay, the artwork for each level is beautifully themed to it's appropriate era.

To play the game, you are given only one tool - a sword with which to cut the chains that are holding the balls. The puzzle part of the game is in figuring out what order, and with what timing to cut each chain. Do it right, and all the right balls end up in the right urns, with no stray balls entering an urn (a no-no). Do it wrong, and you get to start over again.

Civiballs is not terribly deep on gameplay; the entire game can be completed in about 15 minutes. But if you enjoy this type of game, it will be a very enjoyable 15 minutes.

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