Bottom line of all of this is, I don't care when the patch is, Make it polished and take the time you need. The key here is keep us in the loop. Don't let weeks go by without status reports on current progress. Especially as the time grows closer and closer to the expected release window(not date, Window). The longer people go with no information the more speculation there will be,

SE stomp the speculation, give us facts. It's a simple as a "We're right on schedule!" or "We've encountered some issues, and the patch may be delayed for X time." A weekly status report would be nice, I'm sure you have Daily, weekly and monthly steering meetings to ensure they you are hitting your goals, just share the high and low points. High level, no details and commitments.