Setup & Deployment Improvements

• Enables global organizations to more easily deploy SP1 in a multi-lingual environment, as SP1 includes all 36 language packs. However, this change contributes to the increased size of the standalone package.
   
• Enables users to get updated Help content via a separate downloadable package. This package will be released around SP1 release.
   
• Enables support for hotpatching, a reboot-reduction servicing technology designed to maximize uptime. It works by allowing Windows components to be updated (or "patched") while they are still in use by a running process. Hotpatch-enabled update packages are installed via the same methods as traditional update packages, and will not trigger a system reboot.
   
• Improves migration and upgrade scenarios relating to the component that allows alternate text input "modalities" like speech, handwriting, and multi-byte character input editors in applications that were not written specifically to support them.
   
• Improves OS deployment by enabling 64-bit versions of Windows Vista to be installed from a 32-bit OS.  This will allow IT professionals to maintain just a single WinPE image.
   
• Improves OS deployment by supporting the installation of offline boot critical storage drivers. WinPE will automatically look to a hidden partition for drivers.  It will search that partition recursively, and if boot critical drivers are present they will be loaded. Non-boot critical drivers will be picked up and staged, but not loaded prior to the OS coming online.
   
• Improves patch deployment by retrying failed updates in cases where multiple updates are pending and the failure of one update causes other updates to fail as well.
   
• Enables reliable OS installation by optimizing OS installers so that they are run only when required during patch installation.  Fewer installers operating results in fewer points of potential failure during installation, which leads to more robust and reliable installation.
   
• Improves overall install time for updates by optimizing the query for installed OS updates.
   
• Improves robustness during the patch installation by being resilient to transient errors such as sharing violations or access violations.
   
• Improves robustness of transient failures during the disk cleanup of old OS files after install.
   
• Improves the uninstallation experience for OS updates by improving the uninstallation routines in custom OS installation code.
   
• Improves reliability of OS updates by making them more resilient to unexpected interruptions, such as power failure.
   
• Improved instrumentation allows additional data to be sent to Microsoft via the CEIP (Customer Experience Improvement Program) when enabled.  This telemetry data led to the identification of numerous issues that are addressed in SP1 and resulted in improvement in the reliability of OS servicing.  (CEIP is respectful of personally identifiable information and adheres to terms discussed in the EULA.)
   
• After the SP1 version of the OPK (OEM pre-installation kit) is installed, further OPK updates will not be required if a servicing stack update is issued. (The servicing stack is the underlying set of binaries used to update the system). Post SP1, offline images may be updated using the servicing stack binaries contained in the image rather than the servicing stack binaries in the OPK.