It's getting pretty solid.

Until there’s a press release on the Microsoft website, the speculation and analysis will continue. A recent news report has a Microsoft executive committing to a hard date.

“We feel confident that we will deliver Windows 7 with our partners on Oct. 22,” Bill Veghte, senior vice president for Microsoft's Windows business, said to Dow Jones.

That’s the best piece of information we have yet regarding Windows 7’s release date, which also falls right in line with what we’ve heard before from Acer.

Of course, that could just mean that Windows 7 will hit RTM (release to manufacturing) on that date, except Dow Jones’ headline read, “Microsoft: Windows 7 To Be Generally Available Oct 22.”

Microsoft then later clarified to Gizmodo, “General Availability (GA) is when consumers can actually purchase the software and PCs with the software preinstalled.”

This, along with all the guesses pointing at October, seems to indicate that Windows 7 will be out well in time for the holiday shopping season.