Leaked Screen Shots of New Microsoft Windows 7 OS

Microsoft’s Steven Sinofsky who is in charge of the Windows 7 project had a lengthy interview with CNET in which he revealed only tidbits of information about Windows 7. Later today Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer are scheduled to talk at the D6 conference where they may announce more news about Windows 7.

Sinofsky told CNET, Windows 7 will be available around January 2010 and will replace Windows Vista.

The timing of it depends a lot on what we wanted to achieve, and you’ve certainly heard us, and we’ve been very clear, and will continue to say that the next release of Windows, Windows 7, is about three years after the general availability of Windows Vista, and we’re committed to that, and we’ve signed up publicly to do that.

He said Windows 7 will not be built on a new platform, rather it will be built on the Windows Server 2008 kernel, which will be an evolution of the kernel in Windows Vista. This is to ensure Vista-based programs are fully compatible with Windows 7, unlike Vista which was not been compatible with the previous operating system, Windows XP.

Sinofosky added that Windows 7 will be available in 32- and 64-bit versions. He told CNET:

Finally, we are going to make sure that the release is available both in 32 bit and 64 bit, which is an additional help for maintaining compatibility, particularly with device drivers. As the 64-bit ecosystem catches up, we expect more and more people, particularly enthusiasts, to be running 64 bit.

While we wait to get more confirmation from Gates and Microsoft, check out these screen shots from Crunch Gear.

In the opening day of D6 on Tuesday, Corporate VP Julie Larson-Green demonstrated new multi-touch functionality for Windows 7 as shown in the video attached to this article.

Microsoft took many years to develop Windows Vista, so many people are hoping Windows 7 does not have problems with security, operation or bugs.