Are we on WinXP Beta 2 yet, or not? And has the radical, revolutionary new UI for XP arrived yet, or not? The answer to both of these questions is of course yes and no. Rumours had it that Beta 2 of WinXP could ship to coincide with the Microsoft unveiling (which retained many of the veils) of the product last week. It didn't, although build 2428 did ship on the day. But this build, along with the other recent ones, happily welcomes installers to "Beta 2." The most likely explanation is that XP has been nearly on Beta 2 for several weeks now, and that at least some people within Microsoft reckoned they're pretty close to switch-flipping for most of February. Obviously the people in charge don't think so, otherwise they wouldn't have knocked the official Beta 2 date back two weeks to mid-March, but although the reason given is "we're not hitting our goals," it's not entirely obvious what those goals are.
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