Microsoft has done a very good job on Windows 7 and Windows 7’s market share has out broken XP’s. What about the next version?
Microsoft has been showing off Windows 8 from the start of 2011. The video that they put out on YouTube was not very informative but it did give us an idea on what the next version on Windows will be.
At first glance at the video, I was very confused. The interface shown looked really different. At first I thought that it was very confusing and to a normal consumer it was going to be very hard to get around the user interface. The narrator showed of a user interface that looked very different. He showed of something called the metro interface.
The interface made me wonder why they are calling the Operating system Windows. The narrator mostly used the Metro UI, but when he came to the point where he showed of the file browser in Windows 8 (Windows Explorer) he took us to the similar interface that looked exactly like Windows 7. There was a lot of confusion going on in the start and some of them already had their opinions on whether to upgrade or not. But they managed to convince themselves. Because it was just a preview.
Soon, around November of 2011, Microsoft put out developer preview of Windows 8 for the developers to download. Most of the people (Including usual consumers) actually installed it. Most of the reviews on the internet was telling that the whole operating system was confusing. Even for the basics like shutting down the computer. Many people also said that it was like a tablet operating system being used with a mouse and a keyboard. Most people said that Windows 8 will surely push users towards Mac and Linux. After all this talking, let me show you the first screen you see after logging in:
That is what you will see. You see the users name on top left. And you see the word start on the top right.
The whole OS seemed as if it was made for a tablet. When when people found a tile named desktop and they clicked it, it took them back to the old traditional desktop. But when they clicked start to launch a program it took them back to the metro user interface. It never made sense. Start was to start programs. But why did it have to take them to a completely different interface? Everybody had a very tough time getting around. Also, there are two types of apps – Metro apps and Desktop apps. The metro and the desktop apps are launched using the metro screen. The Metro apps are full screen and are especially made for tablets. The Desktop apps run in a windows like a usual Windows 7 app. So it confused the user so badly that they never wanted to use a Windows computer again.
This was a huge problem to us but not Microsoft. The first thing that I could ever think is Microsoft is going to lose their enterprise customers as well, the market where Microsoft was shining. I thought Steve Ballmer does not know how to run a company. Why would any company make a product that is not at all friendly to a market the they are shining in, and Microsoft states that their users, enterprise or home, they are going to love. Microsoft still does not understand that it is not easy to use.
I have been talking about the bad for a long time, let’s get to the good stuff.
Microsoft has introduced a new booting technology that makes windows 8 boot 5x faster. The OS installed with most of the basic programs booted in 5 seconds to the login screen and 2 seconds to the start screen. This was one of the reasons why people might consider getting Windows 8 .
In previous versions of Windows, aero was like a texture and the Windows classic was the one that used to run most of the time. In Windows 8 aero has been made the traditional interface. People don’t need high end video cards any more to run aero. It all works out of the box. This is great as your (and mine) Windows 8 desktop looks cool out of the box.
Microsoft, previously had a program called Windows defender for basic viruses and Windows firewall for firewall. But for advanced malware, you needed to go out and purchase a additional software such as MacAfee or Norton. But in Windows 8 Microsoft has built in all of the security essentials for a operating system and you no longer need to worry about viruses as you get virus protection out of the box and free.
It is very interesting how Windows 8 is going to perform in the outside world as Microsoft has a lot good and bad. Let’s see how it will.
- Hemanth
