Poor Vista. Interest in Windows 7 and the new Windows Strata "cloud OS" has left the current version of Windows getting little attention. Microsoft VP Mike Nash pulled customers back into the present with the announcement that Vista Service Pack 2 will be released to a select group for testing just two days before Halloween.With quite a few customers still holding on to XP, Microsoft knows that the whiff of another service pack for Vista might be enough of an excuse for them to continue their upgrade procrastination. Nash addresses this problem in the blog:

One question I know that you will ask is "should I wait for SP2?" The reality is that Windows Vista SP1 is a great platform that is both available on new Windows PCs and available as a free download for systems that are running the "gold" release of Windows Vista. While we will recommend SP2 when it ships, your best bet today is Windows Vista SP1.

Most likely, the availability or timing of Windows Vista SP2 isn't going to sway XP users one way or the other. The veil over Windows 7 is already lifting, and the odds seem good that it will ship next year. If your company is on XP and you haven't already started a switch to Vista, you might as well hold on until Windows 7 and save yourself the trouble of switching twice.

For customers already using Vista, SP2 should be a nonevent. Vista SP2 mostly seems like a pretty low-risk roll up of items that have been available for a while, including Windows Search 4.0 and Bluetooth 2.1. According to Nash, the same service pack will apply to both Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. Still, there's always the chance of another fiasco like AMD-based HP systems had with XP SP3. If only there was some way to prevent those problems...oh yeah, there is. Testing.