While Microsoft has offered few details about its first planned update package for the Vista OS, it has begun openly referring to the release on its Web site, reinforcing its future arrival. Microsoft officials remain mum on the schedule and details for an initial service pack update for the company’s new Vista operating system, but the software maker has begun openly referencing the planned release in documentation on its Web site.While Microsoft watchers have been predicting the arrival of an SP1 release for Vista since prior to the launch of the OS in late 2006, Redmond is offering very little guidance on what its plans for the update might be.However, the company has gone so far as to start preparing its partners for the eventual arrival of Vista SP1. On June 7, Microsoft posted documentation for a Windows Automated Installation Kit on its Download Center portal that applies to both the company’s much-awaited Windows Server software — code named “Longhorn,” as well as a product dubbed Windows Vista SP1 Beta 3.The Windows Automated Installation Kit (Windows AIK) is designed to help OEMs, system builders, and corporate IT departments deploy the OS onto new hardware, Microsoft said. As part of the announcement, Microsoft posted a document which indicates that Vista SP1 has been under development since at least Feb. 2007, the date amended to the file which provides an informational overview of the download. Some German researchers were also recently able to snag a screen shot from a presentation at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in Los Angeles in mid-May that references Vista SP1 (picture here with German text.)Microsoft officials didn’t immediately respond to calls seeking comment on the details of Vista SP1.When SP2 for Microsoft Windows XP first arrived in Aug. 2004 it set off a wave of discontent as many businesses had problems installing the update. However, it is widely perceived that the release significantly benefited Windows users once it could be swallowed, particularly in the area of improving security.Some Microsoft partners have also alluded to the update publicly.On April 19, Intel CEO Paul Otellini was asked how Vista sales would impact his company’s 2007 sales projections on a conference call, and he replied that “[Vista] deployment [in enterprises] will actually happen when the Service Pack gets released in the fourth quarter time frame, probably the October-November time frame.” In early April, a software patch blog posted over 100 fixes it said are expected to be included in Windows Vista SP1.According to this story by our own IDG News Service, sources close to Microsoft have confirmed that the company is currently testing SP1. The blog poster, former Microsoft employee Ethan Allen, owner of the The Hotfix blog and Web site is predicting that SP1 will include device driver and software compatibility technology that many users had hoped would be available in the OS from the start. Among them could be support for third-party USB and Firewire devices such as digital cameras, in particular products from Sony Corp. that have been having compatibility problems with Vista, Allen said. There also will be patches to improve the TV playback and other Media Center capabilities in Vista, as well as to repair inconsistencies with the power management functions such as sleep and hibernation modes, he said.Allen claims that Vista SP1 will not include a heavy dose of security updates. Security