Microsoft officials confirm that the firm and its partners are going to allow Windows 7 users to downgrade not just to Windows Vista, but also to Windows XP.

A Microsoft spokesperson stated that users will be able to downgrade from Windows 7 to XP without a problem, according to BetaNews.

Users of Windows 7 may skip Vista entirely when downgrading, this news comes after Microsoft would continue to support XP until April 30th 2010, the Win 7 Professional to XP Pro downgrade OS will also discontinue on the same day.

Microsoft hasn't detailed exactly how downgrade rights will work with Windows 7, the firm has yet to reveal its plans for downgrades from Windows 7, the in-development successor to Vista, noted Michael Silver, an analyst with Gartner. Downgrade rights are hugely important for Windows 7, Silver said.

So far, no formal announcement has been made on the General Availability date for Windows 7.

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