Windows 7 turns one year old tomorrow, October 22nd, 2010, and the operating system has certainly come a long way since it was introduced.
Launched on October 22nd, 2009, the successor of Windows Vista managed to become the fastest selling platform in history, having hit a peak of almost 10 copies sold every second earlier this year.
In the second half of July, Microsoft confirmed that Windows 7 had already
sold in excess of 175 million copies, but the company has been largely silent on the commercial success of the product since mid-2010.
However, if I was to go out on a limb, I would say that Windows 7 has long passed the 200 million sold copies mark, and that it is on track to hitting the estimated 300 million licenses sold milestone by the end of the year, especially considering the holiday season.
According to Internet metrics company
Net Applications, Windows 7 is currently the second most used operating system worldwide after Windows XP, with a market share of 17.10% at the end of September 2010.
Windows 7’s usage share outpaced Vista’s in July 2010, with XP’s successor now down to 13.35%. Windows XP remains the top dog on the OS market, with over three times the share of Windows 7, namely 60.03%.
One year after the release of Windows 7, the software giant is focusing on building the first upgrade for the platform, which will be only a minor refresh, and on the next iteration of Windows.
Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) is in beta development stage at the time of this article, although reports from third-party sources indicate that it might have reached
Release Candidate Escrow in September and that the fully-fledged RC is just around the corner.
Microsoft has yet to confirm officially any details related to the future of Windows 7 SP1, beyond saying that it will be finalized and offered to users in the first half of 2011.
The Redmond company is also not breathing a single word on the successor of Windows 7.
Windows 8 has reportedly hit Milestone 1, but so far this is also nothing but speculation, as there’s no confirmation from Microsoft on the matter.
And users should not expect anything to change until mid-2011, when the first Beta for Windows 8 is expected to drop.
Your friend already tried Windows 8?! 
