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IE10 may get a new test build for Windows 7 soon

Internet Explorer 10 for Windows 7 is still alive, Microsoft officials confirmed. And another test build is coming in November.

Mary Jo Foley
Mary Jo Foley has covered the tech industry for 30 years for a variety of publications, including ZDNet, eWeek and Baseline. She is the author of Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft plans to stay relevant in the post-Gates era (John Wiley & Sons, 2008). She also is the cohost of the "Windows Weekly" podcast on the TWiT network.
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Mary Jo Foley
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It's been almost a year and a half since Microsoft released a test build of Internet Explorer (IE) 10 for Windows 7. Since that time, Microsoft officials have refused to comment as to why there were no further builds or when a final version of IE10 for Windows 7 would be available.

On October 17, there was finally a ray of hope for those IE10 loyalists wanting Microsoft's latest browser on Windows 7. In an IEBlog post, Microsoft officials said a new preview of IE10 for Windows 7 would be out some time in November 2012.

Microsoft delivered its most recent preview of IE10 for Windows 7 in June 2011.

There's no updated word as to when the final IE10 for Windows 7 will be out. But at least there's finally official confirmation the product is still alive.

A leaked Microsoft roadmap from late last year led some of us to believe Microsoft was planning to deliver IE10 for Windows 7 at the same time as IE10 for Windows 8 was released to manufacturing. But that turned out not to be the case.

IE10 for Windows 8 will be generally available on October 26, as it is built into Windows 8.

Update: This just in from my ZDNet colleague Ed Bott: The coming November preview is a full browser with the UI. This isn't just another developer preview, according to Microsoft officials.

This item first appeared on ZDNet's All About Microsoft blog under the headline "Microsoft commits to a new preview test build of IE10 for Windows 7 in November."