Microsoft highlighted a number of customer migrations it says signify that users are gearing up to switch to the year-old OS.

Microsoft Tuesday assumed sales of Vista have hit 88 million and the company highlighted a figure of customer migrations it says signify that users are gearing up to change to the year-old OS in spite of recent surveys that say many are taking a careful approach.

Company officials say the ebb and flow of new contracts and expiring contracts means the overall number of volume licensing copies of Vista doesn’t alter radically from quarter to quarter.

In addition to the 88 million copies of Vista sold, Microsoft said 42 million PCs now have Vista licenses via amount licensing contracts signed by corporate users. Microsoft used the same 42 million number back in July when it discussed Vista uptake at its annual meeting for monetary analysts.

The Vista numbers were tabulated during Microsoft’s first fiscal quarter, which ended Sept. 30. The monetary results of that quarter were reported October. 25.

The numbers of copies sold represents nearly a 47% boost over the 60 million copies sold that was reported…

Microsoft is hard at effort beating away at the first service pack for Windows Vista.

But at the equal time the Redmond company is test driving the refresh in order to estimate the evolution of development milestone releases in respect to the quality standard that will recommend SP1 for the final open. Just the past week, a preview of the first release Candidate of Vista SP1 went to just about 15,000 testers. Still, Microsoft is also hosting on-location events focused around Vista SP1.

With just 88 million copies of Vista shipped to channel partners global, White felt the need to clarify SP1. “What is Windows Vista SP1? Windows Vista SP1 is an update to Windows Vista that addresses feedback from our clientele. In addition to formerly released updates, SP1 will contain changes inattentive on addressing specific reliability and performance issues, sustaining new types of hardware, and adding support for numerous emerging standards. SP1 also addresses some management, deployment and support challenges”, he stated.

Last month, Microsoft was the host of a Windows Vista SP1 Beta Install fair in Redmond. At the opening of December, the company is doing a recur of the event, but…