Microsoft has recently achieved the milestone of Release To Manufacturing (often abbreviated simply as RTM) for the Windows 7 product. This is the last step before the final shipped product arrives on store shelves.

As most of you know, Windows 7 will be widely available on October 22, so you can be sure to see tons of deals on laptop and desktop computers. It is a given that all the OEMs (ex: Dell, HP) and online retailers (ex: NewEgg, TigerDirect) will be offering some really good deals come later October – so watch for that.

The RC of Windows 7 is still available for download, and will continue to be until August 20. Product keys for that will be available until March 2010.

For those that want to get ahead with announcements concerning technical resources for the OS, it’s suggested you subscribe to Microsoft’s Springboard Series Insider.

If you are using Windows 7 now and wanted a way to provide feedback to Microsoft now, the easiest method is to use input.microsoft.com. Yes, you need a Windows ID (ex: Hotmail account), and once in the system you can weigh in your opinion on a boatload of different stuff:

…so if you wanted a voice, there you go. There’s no better way.

Remember all those complaints that Microsoft never listened to its user base? That’s certainly not the case any longer.

Lastly, if you want to see the blogs authored by Microsoft concerning the Windows 7 product, they are all here: http://windowsteamblog.com/blogs/

Big name players post blogs there, including but certainly not limited to: AMD, nVidia and Lenovo to name a few.

Did you find any of these resources useful?

Microsoft put a huge effort into not only informing but listening to the audience (that’s you) concerning the Windows 7 product. Do you find any of it useful or was it not what you were looking for? Weigh in with a comment or two.