Come and Get It! Windows 7 RC Publicly Released

Microsoft has released Windows 7 Release Candidate to the public. The company says that there’s no reason rush in downloading it as it’ll remain available till at least through July 2009 and that it’s not limiting the number of product keys, but we know you guys want it now for its snazzy wallpaper goodness.

The RC is available in both 32- and 64-bit versions, with the former weighing in at 2.36 GB and the latter 3.05 GB.

As we reported earlier, the RC will expire on June 1, 2010. Starting on March 1, 2010, PCs still running the RC will begin shutting down every two hours.

The system requirements for the official Release Candidate are the following:

1 GHz or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
1 GB of RAM (32-bit)/2 GB of RAM (64-bit)
16 GB of available disk space (32-bit)/20 GB (64-bit)
DirectX 9 graphics device with Windows Display Driver Model 1.0 or higher driver

So, what are you waiting for? Click here to open the official Microsoft Windows 7 RC download page.

Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.

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49 Comments Comment from the forums

theuerkorn

Can we make this the last post of the Windows 7 hoopla? Seriously are there any more unimportant features left that can be posted?

Don't get me wrong, I will likely upgrade by end of year, but this is a bit out of hand right now.
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I have installed The beta on less hardware than what is recommended and the experience is great... I find it more responsive than Windows XP!!! Will see if the RC does the same! Compared to vista that just took so long just to check some emails. My Mom seems to Love windows 7 too she never calls me for problems anymore... I'm a Mac fan, but this version looks promising! For once... great job Microsoft!!
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tpi2007

I'm downloading it now and I'm getting very good speeds of 770 - 777 KB/s (64% done, started less than half an hour ago.)

I might ask: are they doing this download speed on purpose ? Well, of course not, there are too many factors diciding the download speed. But anyhow, it's a curious thing to have all these sevens :D
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omarbadr36

tpi2007I'm downloading it now and I'm getting very good speeds of 770 - 777 KB/s (64% done, started less than half an hour ago.)I might ask: are they doing this download speed on purpose ? Well, of course not, there are too many factors diciding the download speed. But anyhow, it's a curious thing to have all these sevens770? wow
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Ciuy

does the RC update itself?
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Marcus Yam

theuerkornCan we make this the last post of the Windows 7 hoopla? Seriously are there any more unimportant features left that can be posted?Don't get me wrong, I will likely upgrade by end of year, but this is a bit out of hand right now.I understand your feelings that there's a little bit of Windows 7 overload right now, but this new OS will be one of the most important things to happen to the PC industry in years. It's also one of the only interesting things happening in news right now. So, there will be more Windows 7 news coming because there's still progress to report on before it hits retail shelves, plus it's related to the industry that we cover here.

But I'll do what I can though to see if we can boost our coverage of the recent Mac OS X Snow Leopard beta just to keep things even. :P
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leo2kp

When you get a product key for Windows 7, does that also work for the XP portion of it?
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Greatwalrus

Marcus YamI understand your feelings that there's a little bit of Windows 7 overload right now, but this new OS will be one of the most important things to happen to the PC industry in years. It's also one of the only interesting things happening in news right now. So, there will be more Windows 7 news coming because there's still progress to report on before it hits retail shelves, plus it's related to the industry that we cover here.But I'll do what I can though to see if we can boost our coverage of the recent Mac OS X Snow Leopard beta just to keep things even.
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
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dacman61

When are they going to drop the 32-bit versions of the OS?! We've had 64-bit hardware out there in the wild for many years now. It's time to say goodbye to anyone hanging on to their old 32-bit systems. I still have an AMD Athlon XP 3000+ PC that runs Windows XP just fine and will never plan on running anything newer on it because it is unnecessary for something that old. Does anyone else agree?
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radiowars

dacman61When are they going to drop the 32-bit versions of the OS?! We've had 64-bit hardware out there in the wild for many years now. It's time to say goodbye to anyone hanging on to their old 32-bit systems. I still have an AMD Athlon XP 3000+ PC that runs Windows XP just fine and will never plan on running anything newer on it because it is unnecessary for something that old. Does anyone else agree?I agree that we should, but it seems Microsoft WANTS two versions. Personally, I don't really mind, vause both are the same price. But better driver support gor 64bit would be nice.
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