By Kate Solomon on Thursday, 2nd September 2010

After a lengthy wait and lots of teasers, sneak peeks and previews, Windows Phone 7 is finally complete. The OS is ready to go and has been released to manufacturers for integration with the handset hardware and networks.

Microsoft says that Windows Phone 7 is “the most thoroughly tested mobile platform Microsoft has ever released”, which will be a relief to anyone who ever used the bug-fest that was Windows Mobile. According to Terry Myerson who published the blog post announcing the news, the company had 10,000 devices running automated tests every day, more than half a million hours of active use, over 3.5m hours of stress testing and 8.5m hours of fully automated test passes. No wonder we’ve been waiting a while.

This means it can’t be much longer until we see the Win Pho handsets hit the shelves for the first time, then we can see whether it lives up to the hype, find out if it has any effect on the app ecosystem, get connected with our Xbox Live accounts and see for ourselves whether the batteries really can handle all those apps and widgets running simultaneously.