[Xpider_MX]

No...

do you remember what a firmware is?
Do you have a new firmware with drivers with Dev Preview?

And most incluided apps (Music, Games, etc) are not the final build.

[Laura Knotek]

I'm interested to see how many differences there will be in the final release. I don't have any complaints currently, so I doubt if I will dislike any changes between preview and official.

[plasmid_uk]

People forget that firmware drives the hardware such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and the Camera etc. Tonnes of complaints about these...

Software and firmware go like bread and butter. I'll never touch anything other than the official OTA update. I feel sorry for phone manufacturers, carriers and Microsoft who now have to deal with all of these issues being made public.

[juanitoriv]

Much will have "changed" by then. I think mostly changes to the hubs, which aren't baked into the OS anymore. I hope more changes come to Music, as well as games. I am NOT liking how they represent themselves right now. Ugliness!! All of these things should be addressed by the time OEMs start rolling out the update.

[theefman]

Willing to bet apart from bug fixes this is the final feature set we will see. Anyone thinking the old hubs will return, dream on.

[Kage Maru]

The only thing I've every said was that if GDR3 was anything to go by, this preview update should be the same update they send to carriers to certify and release to the consumers. Now that I have the preview on my phone, I no longer believe that to be the case.

[Naren Parker]

The firmware builds upon the main OS to extend its capabilities. The drivers are all there in the OS. From MS point of view, their software is technically "finished" or more appropriately, RTM'd. Ofcourse you will have constant bug fixes and performance improvements. That's what you get by updating to the intermittent GDR updates due in some time from now. So you have the final release of the OS definitely. But the firmware + OS combo will be released later after thorough device specific testing. Think of it as updating your OS independently of your BIOS. Sure, both need to co-exist...but not necessarily in the same upgrade scenario.

[bionicgt]

Reading all the crap here I feel I don't want the new WP8.1 !! :(

[dkp23]

It is the final build on MS's end. Firmware is just to improve the experience and perhaps cleans stuff up like fixing bugs or rearranging things, but for the most part, the overall feature set is complete.

No different from ios or android OS releasing their OS officially as the final product and receiving multiple firmware updates along the way. So essentially, nothing is a final release because OS's continue to improve through the life cycle.

[drbanks]

Sure. The only difference between the dev preview of GDR3 and the eventual release was the addition of the Nokia changes and a couple months for the carriers to do whatever the heck the carriers do.

I'd be really surprised if this were any different. Yes, expect great things from Nokia as add-ons, but I'm betting this is it.