Windows Phone 7 hits RTM - 'We are ready'

Terry Myerson, Corporate Vice President of Windows Phone Engineering, has confirmed that the internal team has hit the release to manufacturing (RTM) milestone for Windows Phone 7.

"While the final integration of Windows Phone 7 with our partners' hardware, software, and networks is underway, the work of our internal engineering team is largely complete," he said.

Myerson also said that Windows Phone 7 is the most thoroughly tested mobile platform Microsoft has ever released.

"We had nearly ten thousand devices running automated tests daily, over a half million hours of active self-hosting use, over three and a half million hours of stress test passes, and eight and a half million hours of fully automated test passes," he explained. "We've had thousands of independent software vendors and early adopters testing our software and giving us great feedback. We are ready.

Prototypes of the phone were doing the rounds at Tech.Ed earlier this week but Microsoft New Zealand wouldn't be drawn on a release date, only saying that the launch would be this side of Christmas.

If the phone is ever going to stand a chance against Apple and Google, then Microsoft needs to start making a lot of noise about the device sooner rather than later.

The first comment on the blog proves there's still a lot to do in the marketing department: "Congratulations on releasing a mediocre iPhone clone. Meanwhile, Android 2.2 is already in the wild and is doing everything Windows Mobile could have done.