Vista Service Pack 2 released to manufacturers

A few months after Microsoft released the Windows Vista Service Pack 2 BETA to the public late last year, the titan of the software business has now announced that it’s closed the BETA in preparation for the real deal. According to Microsoft, the new service pack was released to PC manufacturers yesterday, and will be available to Joe Public later in this quarter (April – June 2009).

As well as including a bundle of all the updates that have been released since Vista Service Pack 1, the new service pack will also include support for new types of hardware, including the ID and vendor strings for VIA’s 64-bit Nano CPU. Among the service pack’s new features are support for Bluetooth 2.1 and the ability to write to Blu-Ray discs natively in the OS. However, it looks as though Blu-Ray movie playback will still have to come via a third-party app.

The service pack also promises to improve Wi-Fi performance, most notably when it comes to resuming your PC from Sleep mode, and Windows Connect Now will be available to simplify Wi-Fi configuration. Meanwhile, Windows Search 4.0 pledges to help give you “faster and improved relevancy in searches.” Finally, Vista Service Pack 2 will also enable the exFAT file system, which Microsoft says will “support UTC timestamps, which allows correct file synchronisation across time zones.”

On the Windows Team Blog, Microsoft’s Brandon LeBlanc said that the new service pack would come in a single installer along with Windows Server 2008 Service Pack 2, which he said will make the new service pack “easy for IT Pros to manage, deploy, and support.”

Are you using Windows Vista, and what would you like to see in a future service pack? Let us know your thoughts in the forums.