Michael D

Not quite, The CPP consisted of Beta2 and RC1 only. Pre-RC1 and RC2 were
however made available to many on a first come basis until their (MS) set
limit was reached. There was no promise or even a mention of RC2 when I
signed up and paid my $6.00 for the DVD's, only that they would ship Beta2
and send RC1 when it was released.

"Bill" <bill@c.a> wrote in message
news:MYqdnbOvTeC8ycPYnZ2dnUVZ_qydnZ2d@golden.net...
> "Michael D" <michaeldh8@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:%23y%23MQXpCHHA.3228@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
>> RC2 was never a part of the CPP.
>
> RC2 most definitely was part of the CPP.
>
> But it was limited to a specific number of CPP members (first 200,000
> downloads). It was not widely advertised, but it was available to all CPP
> members who got there in time to grab it before the threshold was hit. Of
> course, technical beta testers had access to it as well as earlier and
> later builds.
>
> Personally, I think RC2 should have replaced RC1 for testing since it was
> such a bit improvement and really gave a good indication of RTM
> performance and compatibility for those looking to code for Vista final. I
> don't know why RC1 is still available[1] when it's not a good
> representation of the final product. Perhaps Microsoft wants to limit use
> of RC2 since it's fairly stable, but again since it's time-bombed, I don't
> see why it makes any difference.
>
> 1 - available until November 30 2006.
>