Windows 8

iHS iSuppli predicts that Microsoft’s ARM-enabled Windows 8 operating system will bring a new series of low-cost laptops stealing possible a significant share from Intel.

At the moment ARM enabled laptops are almost nonexistent. However, the market analyst believes that in 4 years ARM based laptops will account for 22.9% of global laptop shipments from 3% forecast for next year.

The laptops will be priced well under $700 - many in the sub-$500 segment, according to CNET and iHS-iSuppli analyst Matthew Wilkins.
 

Next week Microsoft may present an early build of its next generation operating system Windows 8 to the technical community, according to some rumors.

A Twitter account MSFTtm who previously was accurate reporting Windows 8 build details, says that at its Worldwide Partner Conference from July 11 through July 14, Microsoft will release a Community Technical Preview (CTP).

According to some speculation Microsoft is introducing its Hyper-V virtualization software into its coming Windows 8. WindowsNow.com blogger Robert McLaws alleges he uncovered code for Hyper-V version 3.0 in a leaked, early build of the Windows 8 code base.

According to McLaws there are some enhancements in Microsoft's hypervisor including support for more than four cores on a processor, and there's also NUMA, a new .VHDX virtual hard drive format, plus hardware acceleration, CHCP, and router guard on networking.

Microsoft Corp plans to introduce its own tablet computer running Windows 8. The release of the device will likely be after the official launch of the new operating system which is no earlier than 2012.

According to some reports by the industry sources Microsoft’s tablet computer will be based on Windows 8 and built on the chipset from Texas Instruments ( either TI OMAP 4 or even OMAP 5). The whole device will likely be manufactured by some Taiwanese vendor.

The future of the tablet is ambiguous because there is no full ecosystem so far.
 

This week at technology conferences in the United States and Taipei, Microsoft Corp demonstrated its latest operating system codenamed Windows 8. Meantime, some PC makers were very upset with the requirement imposed by the Redmond company related to the involvement of vendors in the system development.

Microsoft plans to launch the new system with touchscreen features optimized for tablet computers within the following 18 months. But it told chipmakers who want to use the system for tablets to work with only one manufacturer to speed up the delivery.

According to the latest statement of Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft the next version of their operating system – Windows 8 will become available in 2012.  

Microsoft disclaimed comments made by Intel software chief Renée James at Intel's Investor Meeting 2011 at the company's Santa Clara, California, headquarters this week. The Redmond firm said that James’ comments on the next version of Windows were "factually inaccurate and unfortunately misleading."

An Internet Explorer 10 preview was released by Microsoft, little time after the debut of IE9. The IE10 Platform Preview was posted by the Redmond company on Tuesday this week. Microsoft called it "the first step in delivering the next wave of progress in native HTML5 support". An IE10 is widely expected to come as early as September being Windows 8’s default browser.

Winrumors reported that preparing its Windows 8 for the release Microsoft is taking some feature from Mac OS X. Thus, this option adapted to Windows machines will reportedly be named “History Vault.”

Winrumors says that History Vault will be an advanced backup utility similar to Time Machine for Mac OS X. The system will create regular, automatic backups using Windows' existing Shadow Copy feature.

According to the report made by the New York Times this week, CEO of Microsoft Steve Ballmer is expected to make an announcement of new slate devices next month at the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Windows 8 operating system will come in 2012 according to a blog posting on Microsoft’s Dutch website. The posting was quickly removed but not until a bunch of online bloggers had managed to screenshot it. Ina Fried at CNet, particular, has posted the pictures.

In the Dutch post that mentioned the celebration of the first Windows 7 birthday the company said that Microsoft was hard at work on Windows 8 but the release was about two years away.

As news about Microsoft’s Windows 8 plans are quickly spreading the world Tony Bradley from PCWorld magazine expressed his mind on how this could impact individual and business customers who are still hesitant to move to Windows 7 platform from their beloved XP machines.

Today Windows 7 is the fastest selling OS of all time as Microsoft reports that over 150 million units have been sold to date and nothing indicates the pace will slow down due to the fact that some organizations are still deep in thought about whether to transition to Windows 7.

The slides that leaked the Internet and were shown at a number of blogs lift the veil from Microsoft’s next project operating system that will replace Windows 7. The set of slides shaped out the company plans on design and features of Windows 8. Microsoft’s 3 main focuses for Windows 8 appear to be Slate, Laptop, and All-in-One PC with Microsoft detailing “Slate” as a major form factor focus. Additionally, customization areas include Applications, Devices, Multimedia, Help and Support, and UI and Theming.

 It seems that long before Microsoft officially launched its complete version of Windows 7 OS the company was thinking over the creation another better software, Windows 7 and 9. The speculations about the future developments appeared at the time when the sibling of the infamous Vista came to the public in the form of Release Candidate. Now the rumors seem to take more tangible form with the recent ad posted on the Internet where the company reported its need in a specialist that would work at developing Windows 8.

 As Microsoft is making preparations before the official launch of its new operating system Windows 7 the Internet is being filled with rumors about the development of even newer versions of OS under the corresponding names Windows 8 and Windows 9.