Starting with 1.2.6 DCS is supposed to go open beta. From what I've been told it's possible to have beta and stable installed side-by-side and that is a common setup for existing testers.
http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=110903
DCS World Open Beta
Moderator: RLG MGMT Team
Re: DCS World Open Beta
Of 1.2.6 and other future releases. From the link I put in the original post, "As DCS World ever increases in complexity and scope, along with a continued expansion of new modules, the testing task has reached the point where we cannot expect our internal and external test teams to catch all the problems in a reasonable amount of time. As such, starting with DCS 1.2.6 we will first be releasing new DCS versions as open beta."
Given that you can have the release version and beta version installed side by side it doesn't cause much pain, lets you see new features, and give feedback so when it gets to release it (hopefully) runs better.
Given that you can have the release version and beta version installed side by side it doesn't cause much pain, lets you see new features, and give feedback so when it gets to release it (hopefully) runs better.