It’s good to know that the SP1 will include all previously released updates for Windows Vista. However, the first
Service Pack is not supposed to bring anything new to the Vista table. Instead, it will focus on improvements regarding security, reliability and performance. The list is quite long (as it should be), so here are the highlights:
– Includes application programming interfaces (APIs) by which third-party security and malicious software detection applications can work with kernel patch protection on x64 versions of Windows Vista. These APIs help ISVs develop software that extends the functionality of the Windows kernel on x64 computers without disabling or weakening the protection offered by kernel patch protection.
– Improves the security of running RemoteApp programs and desktops by allowing Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) files to be signed. Customers can differentiate user experiences based on publisher identity.
– Improved Windows Vista reliability in networking configuration scenarios.
– Improved reliability of systems that were upgraded from Windows XP to Windows Vista.
– Increased reliability and performance of Windows Vista when entering sleep and resuming from sleep.
– Improves the speed of copying and extracting files.
– Improves the time to become active from Hibernate and Resume modes.
– Improves performance of Windows Internet Explorer 7 in Windows Vista, reducing CPU utilization and speeding JavaScript parsing.
– Improves the logon experience by removing the occasional 10-second delay between pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL and the password prompt displaying.
– Addresses an issue in the current version of Windows Vista that makes browsing network file shares consume significant bandwidth and not perform as fast as expected.