[Intel Executive Vice President Dadi Perlmutter] basically said (and I paraphrase from memory here) that Microsoft has a long ways to go on the tablet software front, and that an ARM port will help them get there. And, by the time they get their tablet software sorted—a fresh, tablet-centric UI and much-needed power optimizations—Intel will be ready with an Atom-based chip that can compete directly with ARM in the milliwatt power draw range.
Right now, Atom is significantly more power-hungry (and more high-performance) than the ARM Cortex A8-caliber hardware that’s showing up in Android tablets. But Intel will continue to close that gap with each new process generation. So, by the time Moore’s Law delivers an Atom SoC with the same power profile as A8- and A9-based SoCs, Microsoft will either be ready with a tablet-worthy OS, or it will be further along than it would’ve been if it had been waiting for Intel to catch up.
Windows will not only run on x86 processors, but also certain ARM ones. Specifically, it will support certain ARM system-on-chip (SoC) designs from NVIDIA (with its Tegra family), Texas Instruments (with its OMAP 4 family), and Qualcomm (with Snapdragon).
Windows 8 (or whatever it ends up being called) will include a new shell, apparently known as “Modern Shell” or “MoSh,” that will bring touch friendliness and modern elegance to the Windows platform.
It seems that Microsoft is making all the same mistakes over again. They’ve just introduced Windows 7, and Windows Phone 7. They still have the vestiges of an ARM OS kicking around in Windows CE, and now they are introducing another cludge to try and shoehorn Windows onto mobile devices.
The sum total of their “Windows on ARM” demo at CES was a direct port of Office, and the same for Windows. Perhaps there is more to come this week?
Perhaps Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 will be based on the same OS underpinnings as each other, much like OS X and iOS. But, frankly, I doubt it. Why not just move forwards with Windows Phone 7 more aggressively?
With an expected ship date of 2012 I can’t see this panning out well for Microsoft. iOS and Android will be streets ahead by then. And RIMs new tablet OS might even be gaining momentum. And slowly but surely the reasons to want Windows on a mobile device will continue to diminish as people transition to other mobile solutions for working with Office documents and the like.
Perhaps Microsoft are hoping that NVIDIA’s new multi-core ARM SoC is going to handle all the bloat on Windows 8, and they can unify desktop and mobile that way? If so that is all-together the wrong approach, and even if they did pull that off then it’s already too late.
The overall share of Internet traffic from Windows PCs has dropped slightly in the past two-and-a-half years, from 95.4% to 91.1%. But that’s true across the board for competing desktop OSes as well. Linux usage is down dramatically in 2010, to 0.85% from an all-time high of 1.08% in early 2009. Interestingly, OS X usage is also down, dropping by roughly a quarter of a percentage point since a year ago, from 5.26% to exactly 5.00%. In relative terms, that’s almost exactly the same overall drop as the Windows platform has seen in the same period.
It is clear that all desktop OSs are under attack from mobile OSs.
The mobile Internet is growing at an astonishing rate. This was the most fascinating set of numbers to me, and they’re also the ones that should have Microsoft most concerned.
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Not surprisingly, Apple’s iOS-based devices are the leader in the mobile category, as measured by usage, accounting for 42% of the total traffic from mobile sources. The very close runner-up, at 37%, is a big surprise: Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME), presumably running mostly on Nokia feature phones. Symbian is a distant third at 11%, with Android in fourth at 8%.
42% for iOS versus 8% for Android really puts recent device “activation” claims from certain quarters into perspective.
Windows Phone 7 currently has what is effectively a 0% share. And it’s a few years behind both Android and iOS in every way.
And a hardware button to get the on screen keyboard to pop out!?!
This is the antithesis of Samsung’s Tab. If we had wanted to try and artificially contrive a text book example of how some people get it, and others don’t we could not have done a better job than Samsung and HP have.
I thought we learned that you cannot put Windows on a portable device 10 years ago…
Arty, yes. But utterly useless at selling their phone.
I am not sure whether to laugh (maniacally) or cry.
The very worrying thing, of course, is that Microsoft have unlimited funds dedicated to making more of this stuff in the coming promotional onslaught that will be Windows Phone 7′s slow public death.
As you may know, Parallels currently offers an iPhone/iPod touch app to access files and such remotely, but according to the back of the box, it works with the yet to be released iPad app as well. It also appears (we may get this one wrong) that the iPhone/iPod touch app will be enhanced for greater file access. We’ll have to see and we’re still wondering when this thing’s getting announced for real.
Internet Explorer and Windows users are yet again targeted with emails containing malware.
Not using Windows, or not using Internet Explorer. Or simply not clicking on dubious links in unsolicited emails are the three ways to easily avoid this.
Mac users are not affected. Nor are iPads, any Apple product, or other browsers.
