Windows 7 was launched officially last week amidst launch parties and fanfare. As always, Microsoft gave its customers an option to get the Windows 7 DVD from retail stores or download the Windows 7 ISO directly from its servers online.

Users who do not want to download Windows 7 ISO images which are widely available on Bit Torrent sites can download the ESD version of Windows 7 setup installer instead. Normally, Windows 7 setup installer that is downloaded via ESD channel is meant for upgrade version license or product key, and hence no ISO for burning to DVD or USB flash drive is provided.

Now the direct download links to the Windows 7 operating system distributed via digital software distribution channel online have been leaked. The installation files of Windows 7 is hosted on the server on domain msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net owned by Digital River, one of the delivery partners for Windows 7.

Similar to 32-bit (x86) Windows 7 setup installer, each editions of Windows 7 has its own different and separate download links, and the setup installer package comes in 3 parts, which is an executable that starts the extraction or unpacking and installation process, plus setup1.box and setup2.box. After extracting all content to a folder named ExpandedSetup, the installation files should be the same with what contains on a DVD.

Personally, I would suggest you to use a download manager to download these files to ensure proper downloading of these huge files.

Windows 7 Direct Download Links

64-bit Windows 7 Professional x64

http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-79946/Win7-P-Retail-en-us-x64.exe
File Size: 75.9 MB
MD5: 73D13A1000069E372F7478CF1C426B7A
SHA-1: 6B7D87BF0BE0D3BAE4A5E4550260BDF6A5600534

http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-79946/setup1.box
File Size: 2.66 GB
MD5: 7B29E21B7F6BC0850E65085205B5EAFE
SHA-1: 47D4131ACD1DA3A96F19244FE4D840EB18C2057C

http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-79946/setup2.box
File Size: 160 MB
MD5: 87DCC913A7BBBFCFA2C2526C2E894F97
SHA-1: 4076CA5224D6D2E7338AB286BF31912D8404E016

After downloading the files, simply double click on the executable, e.g. Win7-P-Retail-en-us-x86.exe to start unloading the box and to install Windows 7. Note that 3 files must be put together in the same directory. You still need a product key to activate installed Windows 7.