Last week was a short work week here in the United States as Friday was a federal holiday for the 4th of July Independence Day weekend.
Despite only having four work days Microsoft got a lot accomplished by releasing three new builds of the Windows 10 Insider Preview (10158 on Monday, 10159 on Tuesday and 10162 on Thursday).
Then late on Thursday evening the Microsoft Windows Team also released the ISO images for build 10162 so that Windows Insiders could download them to use for clean installs of this latest build. According to Gabe Aul, our Microsoft Insiders Ring Master, that build is expected to be released to Windows Insiders in the programs Slow Ring this week.
I suspect that it could be the last build made available to Slow Ring users prior to General Availability (GA) on 29 July 2015 unless Microsoft makes an RTM build available to all Insiders.
Another big piece of news last week was the roll out process for Windows 10 beginning on 29 July 2015. Microsoft’s Windows Chief Terry Myerson explained all the ins and outs of General Availability in a blog post at the Blogging Windows website.
What we learned was that the general public who were able to make a reservation for Windows 10 on their Windows 7 or 8.1 systems using the Get Windows 10 App would begin receiving prompts to install the new OS after 29 July. There are millions of users who have reserved Windows 10 but Microsoft has not provided any specific order for that process once it begins.
However, what Microsoft did let everyone know is that members of the Windows Insiders program will be the first to receive Windows 10 and that roll out will begin on 29 July – the exact date of Windows 10’s GA.
Since Microsoft can already identify the over five million Windows Insiders with their registered Microsoft Account they can easily target those systems for the initial roll out of the release build of Windows 10.
As I stated last week, this staggered roll out makes a lot of sense because Windows Insiders have been upgrading to new builds of Windows 10 since last fall and know much of what to expect.
That brings us to the pretty much guaranteed method you can use to insure you are able to upgrade to Windows 10 on day one of its GA (29 July) – join the Windows Insider Program.
As noted above that testing group will be the first wave of users that will get prompted to upgrade their current installations to Windows 10 while others with and without reservations will have to wait over the course of several days and maybe even weeks to get the upgrade.
If you would prefer not waiting then the one way to get in on the first wave is to become a Windows Insider.
