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Updated: Windows 8: everything you need to know

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 08:08 AM PDT

What we know about Windows 8 is incomplete and unofficial - garnered from job postings, rumours and the slides allegedly leaked in June 2010 by a software engineer at HP responsible for OEM relations.

The slides include plenty of marketing ideas rather than technical details, they show that Microsoft has its eye on what Apple is doing to make its operating systems so popular and they declare themselves a work in progress.

Not only is every page marked 'this is not a plan of record' but the opening discussion includes the line "reality: there are currently more ideas than there is time to implement them". That's especially true if the Windows 8 release date is as soon as we think it might be.

Windows 8 release date

Windows 8, say the slides, will be available "for the holiday" - but not which one.

There's a timeline that doesn't have many dates - the one suggesting that the coding would begin in June 2010 is suspect when some sources say the M1 (milestone 1 build) is already done and there's what we assume is a typo that we'd correct to say the third Forum (rather than the second) would be in July. (There are several points where the slides are incomplete or confusing; for instance a pointed reference to "creating great Dell + Windows Experiences" in a deck that otherwise tips the hat - and appears to have been intended for - HP.)

It put the first beta of IE9 in August 2010 ), along with the shipping date for Windows Live Wave 4 which fits other rumours and positions them just after the third Forum.

UPDATE: The first beta of IE9 arrived in September 2010 and Windows Live Wave 4 was released in June 2010.

That makes the forums three-to five months apart; assuming an average of four months - and assuming the chart is to scale and that the dates don't slip - that puts Windows 8 beta release date a little before March 2011 and Windows 8 RTM shortly after July 2011 (a date suggested on the blog of a now-ex Microsoft employee which you can find preserved, with the boxed version following in autumn 2011 - for the holiday).

We've said before that we expect Windows 8 release date to be in early 2012 and we don't expect Microsoft to talk about a date until the Milestone 3 build, which would be around November 2010 by these calculations.

UPDATE: Milestone 3 came a little later than we expected: WinRumors reported on 1 Mar 2011 that the first Windows 8 Milestone 3 build has been compiled by Microsoft. We're not expecting a Windows 8 beta release date some time in summer 2011.

There are several statistics in the leaked slides (typical RAM, network connected TVs, mobile broadband penetration and 4G deployment) that talk about the specs that will be common - in 2012.

Interestingly, the timeline shows Windows Live Wave 5 with a short development cycle that finishes before Windows 8; that matches suggestions that Live will offer more cloud services for Windows 8.

UPDATE: On 25 October 2010, Microsoft Netherlands said "it will take about two years before 'Windows 8' [is] on the market."

UPDATE: On February 21 2011, ZDNet published a slide showing the internal Windows 8 roadmap. Given leaked information on some sites around current build information, the author of the ZDNet piece surmises that Windows 8 will see a mid-2010 RTM.

Windows 8 features

The 'fundamentals' Microsoft is aiming for with Windows 8 include "a fast on/off experience, responsiveness, and a great level of reliability from the start".

The 'big three' are boot time, shutdown time and battery life ("Windows 8 PCs turn on fast, nearly instantly in some cases, and are ready to work without any long or unexpected delays") but Microsoft is also thinking about how long it takes to get things done - how long until you read your first email, see the home page in your browser or start playing media. PCs should feel like an appliance that's ready to use as soon as you turn on the power.

Windows 8 startup

FASTER STARTUP: Windows 8 will show you what slows down startup and if removing an app you don't use improves it

Mobile PCs should resume 'instantly' from sleep (in under a second from S3 sleep), and booting up will be faster because of caching, with a boot layout prefetcher and the ReadyBoost cache persisting even when you reboot.

As only 9% of people currently use hibernate (which will work more quickly in Windows 8 because system information will be saved and compressed in parallel), Windows 8 will have a new Logoff and Hibernate combination that closes your apps like shutting the PC down does and refreshes your desktop like restarting does, but actually caches drivers, system services, devices and much of the core system the way hibernation does.

Turning the PC back on will take about half the time a cold boot needs (and the slides point out that on many PCs the power-on tests take longer than the Windows startup, so BIOS makers need to shape up).

It will be the default option but it won't be called Logoff and Hibernate; Microsoft is debating terms like Shutdown, Turn Off, Power Down and thinking through how the other options for turning the PC off will show up in the interface.

You'll be able to use an encrypting hard drive to boot Windows 8 and they'll integrate with BitLocker and third-party security apps.

Improving battery life will be based on some deep changes to the kernel; removing an interrupt in the kernel scheduler completely and removing more of the timers that interrupt Windows when it's trying to save power.

Windows 8 might get the same option for powering down unused areas of memory to save power that's on the cards for Windows Server, it will block disk reads and writes and some CPU access when you're not doing anything on your PC and PCI devices can turn off completely when they're not in use (assuming the drivers for specific devices support it).

Windows 7 stopped laptops waking up automatically when they're not plugged in; Windows 8 will get a new 'intelligent alarm' that can wake them up for things like virus scans, but only if they're plugged in.

OEMs will get new test tools that check the performance, reliability, security and Windows Logo compatibility of the PC, as well as measuring performance in Outlook and IE. And depending on whether partners have "concerns" about it, Microsoft might give the same tools to journalists, IT pros and users.

Windows 8 multimedia

Windows 8 will have better media playback and recording, but it will balance using hardware acceleration to save battery life and using the CPU when it gives a better result.

Audio will use hardware acceleration more because that does improve battery life. There will be post-processing to take out blur, noise and shakey video filmed on a phone or webcam, and support for more codecs including AVC and as-yet-undetermined 3D video codecs (stereoscopic3D support is coming, for games and for 3D movies in Media Center, but there are format issues).

Microsoft talks about sharing 'with nearby devices'; one way that will work is adding the Play To option currently in Windows Media Player to the browser for HTML 5 audio and video content, so you can play it on any device that supports DLNA, another is APIs to let other software do the same.

That will work with DRM content, if it's protected with DTCP-IP (digital transmission content protection over IP) or Microsoft's own PlayReady and hardware acceleration will speed up DRM decoding.

There's also a new 'remote display' option that will let you send your screen from a laptop to a large monitor (which will use DirectX hardware acceleration and the same multimonitor interface that's already in Windows 7, but for wireless displays as well, which could be an Internet-connected TV - Microsoft refers to 35% of TVs having network connectivity by 2012 and wonders whether to prioritise Internet TV over further improvements to broadcast TV).

Windows 8 Help and Support

In Windows XP the Help and Support centre was a branded hub of tools and links; in Windows 7 it's far more minimal. Windows 8 will go back to the branded experience, with integrated search for support forums run by your PC manufacturer but add the Windows 7 troubleshooters.

It will also link better with the Action Center, with tools that show more clearly what's happening on your PC; what apps are running, what resources are being used (like Task Manager showing which apps are using the most network bandwidth), how and when things have changed and what they can do about it. It will also include an Application Management tool that will let you find what apps are causing performance problems and adjust or remove them.

Windows 8 task manager

IMPROVED TASK MANAGER: Task manager will make it easier to see why an app might not be performing; here the Zune software is using all the network bandwidth to download podcasts, so video in the browser keeps pausing. We hope the white on black isn't the final design!

The Windows pre-boot recovery environment will be simpler, combining the safe mode and 'last known good' options into one interface. It will use what Microsoft calls 'superboot' to remove malware and rootkits

If you have to reset your PC, Windows 8 will restore "all the files settings and even the applications" although you'll have to go to the Windows Store to download apps and get a list of apps that didn't come from the store, so it's not clear how automatic this will actually be.

Devices matter (almost) as much as PCs

One of the reasons that Windows took off in the first place was working more easily with devices - in those days, printers. Support for a wide range of devices is one of the reasons it's hard to other OSes to challenge Windows but Microsoft would like to get hardware manufacturers to do more with the sensor platform and DeviceStage interface it introduced in Windows 7.

With Windows 8, Microsoft wants to see "PCs use location and sensors to enhance a rich array of premium experiences. Users are not burdened with cumbersome tasks that Windows can accomplish on its own. Users are neither annoyed or disturbed by the actions the PC takes. Instead, the PC's behaviour becomes integrated into users' routine workflows. Devices connect faster and work better on Windows 8 than on any other operating system."

The 'current thinking' is for Windows 8 to include Microsoft's own Wi-Fi location service Orion (which has 50-100m accuracy in North America and Western Europe but falls back to using the location associated with IP addresses elsewhere, which can be as bad as 25km).

Orion will be used in Windows Phone 7 (as well as Hawaii, a Microsoft Research project to build cloud-enabled mobile apps which refers to Orion as a 'prototype service'). Microsoft partnered with Navizon in March to use their Wi-Fi and mobile network location database but the slides claim that Orion is buying a bigger database than Navizon's 15 million access points, giving it 40 million compared to Google's 48 million (neither matches the 120 million Skyhook gives the iPhone).

Location will be available to the browser as well as to any app that's written to use it (music players as well as mapping tools), and web apps will get access to webcams.

Microsoft is emphasising the privacy aspect of location and webcam use, with mockups of how apps can ask for location and users can choose to deny it or only allow it once. And it's also asking PC manufacturers how many devices they plan to put GPS in and offering a Device Stage interface for using a PND like a Garmin nuvi as a GPS source for your PC.

Windows 8 location privacy

LOCATION PRIVACY: Web apps can see your location and use your webcam – but you get to control that to protect your privacy

As we've said before, Device Stage will become the standard way you work with devices; Microsoft previewed the options you'll get with a featurephone and a webcam as well as GPS.

Along with GPS, Microsoft is expecting PCs to include infrared sensors as well as the ambient light sensors that are becoming common, and the accelerometers that are in tablets with rotating screens.

Put that together and the PC could know which way up it is, whether there's anyone in front of it - or near it and what the lighting is like in the room. So when you walk into the room your PC notices and wakes itself up so by the time you sit down the webcam is ready to recognise you - and no waiting or having to line your face up with a box on screen.

If this works, the camera will pick your face out of the room, like Photo Gallery finding a face in a picture (hopefully without thinking the face in a picture on the wall is you). When you walk away it goes back to sleep again.

We like the idea of rotation lock buttons on 'Lap PCs' so you can move them around to control a game without flipping he screen repeatedly; again, if you look away from the game, Microsoft envisages it pausing automatically and if you pass a slate to someone it will switch to their account automatically.

What's in: USB 3, Bluetooth hands free and headset profiles (mono and stereo audio).

What's out: Microsoft has no plans to support Bluetooth 3.0 + High Speed, 1394 might be deprecated and Microsoft seems to expect USB 2 ports to be phased out in favour of USB 3 within the lifetime of Windows 8.

What's under consideration: Bluetooth Low Energy (from Bluetooth 4.0). What's not mentioned: Intel LightPeak, although Microsoft does ask if it's missing anything on its list of connectivity.

Windows 8 will know who you are

With better ways to log in to your PC, like your face, Microsoft is considering giving Windows 8 a way to "securely store usernames and passwords, simplifying the online experience".

Your Windows account might connect more directly to the cloud than just having a Windows Live ID, logging into web sites on your behalf; there's very little detail on this but it could revive the CardSpace technology introduced in Vista but not widely adopted.

Windows 8 face login

FACE LOGIN: Forget passwords; Windows 8 will use the webcam to find and recognise your face (probably)

Put it all together and you get some welcome improvements. It's impossible to say if Microsoft can come up with a simple enough programming system to appeal to the developers it wants to create Windows apps to rival Apple's App Store.

Until we see some code in action it's also hard to say if the 'instant on' and better battery life will transform the PC experience to compete with lightweight systems based on Android (or if Microsoft can deliver them) and make the PC scale from the tablet to the heavyweight systems we have today – which Windows has to do if it's going to stay the dominant PC OS.

Everything else here is incremental – as it would have to be if Microsoft really expects to release Windows 8 in 2011, but it's potentially disappointing if it comes in 2012 and there's nothing else exciting in Windows 8.

A Windows app store

More than 30 app stores have launched in the last year and Microsoft isn't the only company copying Apple here; Intel has its own app store for Atom PCs. PC makers like the idea - apparently at the first forum they commented that it "can't happen soon enough".

With an app store, Microsoft hopes to attract more of the type of developers who are currently building smartphone apps and it wants them to create apps that make Windows the best place to use web apps (a job advert last October claimed "we will blend the best of the web and the rich client by creating a new model for modern web applications to rock on Windows".)

According to the slides, "Currently the indication is that app development will move to the Web. There is significant opportunity for Microsoft if hardware capabilities, and OS services and Web could be integrated into a hobbyist developer toolset."

The 'tailored experiences' Microsoft talks about for Windows 8 sound like smartphone apps; the checklist includes fast installation and updates for engaging, social, extensible, ad-supported or 'freemium' apps.

If smartphone-style apps sound too simple to be worthwhile on Windows, Microsoft wants apps to be extensible so you can share information between them - perhaps using a mix of simple apps together. It sounds like the 'mashups' that we were all going to be making online until it turned out you'd have to learn to program.

The Windows Store will be branded and optimised for each PC manufacturer. Your settings will follow you from PC to PC, as will your apps (although some slides refer to this as a possibility rather than a definite plan) - but you'd need an HP ID to log into the 'HP Store powered by Windows' and get your HP-specific apps. Microsoft doesn't plan to make money from the store; the slides call it "revenue neutral".

Windows 8 tablets

The leaked slides are aimed at PC manufacturers who are interested in new form factors - and in getting a share of the iPad market - so it's no surprise one of the key PC form factors is a 9" slate (which Microsoft, having obviously got the point of all those iPad ads, is calling a Lap PC), optimised for web and media, casual gaming, reading and sorting email, IM and social networking.

Windows 8 lap pc

LAP PC: Using the Lap PC to read a magazine and play a driving game

Microsoft promises big improvements to the on-screen keyboard: it will be "easily launched, text prediction is more accurate, the UI is more usable, and throughput is increased for everyone".

There's also the workhorse PC (which is also referred to as a laptop, because Microsoft is only talking about consumers and not business users) and the family hub (an all-in-one touchscreen system that can go in the kitchen or the living room as a media centre) which is for casual gaming, web and media as well as more demanding apps like organising and manipulating media.

Key to making a successful Windows tablet is apps with user interfaces that change depending on the form factor (touch and gestures instead of keyboard and mouse), but Microsoft is also looking at stereoscopic 3D and high colour displays and natural input that uses touch, voice, 3D gestures ("on the horizon"), and facial recognition.

Windows 8 3d support

3D SUPPORT: Windows 8 will play 3D movies and games, but don't ask Microsoft to pick its favourite format yet

Optimising "for smaller screens" will help netbook users as well; Windows 7 gets key dialog boxes to fit on a small screen but not all apps do.



Related Stories



Related Stories

Updated: Windows 8: everything you need to know

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 08:08 AM PDT

What we know about Windows 8 is incomplete and unofficial - garnered from job postings, rumours and the slides allegedly leaked in June 2010 by a software engineer at HP responsible for OEM relations.

The slides include plenty of marketing ideas rather than technical details, they show that Microsoft has its eye on what Apple is doing to make its operating systems so popular and they declare themselves a work in progress.

Not only is every page marked 'this is not a plan of record' but the opening discussion includes the line "reality: there are currently more ideas than there is time to implement them". That's especially true if the Windows 8 release date is as soon as we think it might be.

Windows 8 release date

Windows 8, say the slides, will be available "for the holiday" - but not which one.

There's a timeline that doesn't have many dates - the one suggesting that the coding would begin in June 2010 is suspect when some sources say the M1 (milestone 1 build) is already done and there's what we assume is a typo that we'd correct to say the third Forum (rather than the second) would be in July. (There are several points where the slides are incomplete or confusing; for instance a pointed reference to "creating great Dell + Windows Experiences" in a deck that otherwise tips the hat - and appears to have been intended for - HP.)

It put the first beta of IE9 in August 2010 ), along with the shipping date for Windows Live Wave 4 which fits other rumours and positions them just after the third Forum.

UPDATE: The first beta of IE9 arrived in September 2010 and Windows Live Wave 4 was released in June 2010.

That makes the forums three-to five months apart; assuming an average of four months - and assuming the chart is to scale and that the dates don't slip - that puts Windows 8 beta release date a little before March 2011 and Windows 8 RTM shortly after July 2011 (a date suggested on the blog of a now-ex Microsoft employee which you can find preserved, with the boxed version following in autumn 2011 - for the holiday).

We've said before that we expect Windows 8 release date to be in early 2012 and we don't expect Microsoft to talk about a date until the Milestone 3 build, which would be around November 2010 by these calculations.

UPDATE: Milestone 3 came a little later than we expected: WinRumors reported on 1 Mar 2011 that the first Windows 8 Milestone 3 build has been compiled by Microsoft. We're not expecting a Windows 8 beta release date some time in summer 2011.

There are several statistics in the leaked slides (typical RAM, network connected TVs, mobile broadband penetration and 4G deployment) that talk about the specs that will be common - in 2012.

Interestingly, the timeline shows Windows Live Wave 5 with a short development cycle that finishes before Windows 8; that matches suggestions that Live will offer more cloud services for Windows 8.

UPDATE: On 25 October 2010, Microsoft Netherlands said "it will take about two years before 'Windows 8' [is] on the market."

UPDATE: On February 21 2011, ZDNet published a slide showing the internal Windows 8 roadmap. Given leaked information on some sites around current build information, the author of the ZDNet piece surmises that Windows 8 will see a mid-2010 RTM.

Windows 8 features

The 'fundamentals' Microsoft is aiming for with Windows 8 include "a fast on/off experience, responsiveness, and a great level of reliability from the start".

The 'big three' are boot time, shutdown time and battery life ("Windows 8 PCs turn on fast, nearly instantly in some cases, and are ready to work without any long or unexpected delays") but Microsoft is also thinking about how long it takes to get things done - how long until you read your first email, see the home page in your browser or start playing media. PCs should feel like an appliance that's ready to use as soon as you turn on the power.

Windows 8 startup

FASTER STARTUP: Windows 8 will show you what slows down startup and if removing an app you don't use improves it

Mobile PCs should resume 'instantly' from sleep (in under a second from S3 sleep), and booting up will be faster because of caching, with a boot layout prefetcher and the ReadyBoost cache persisting even when you reboot.

As only 9% of people currently use hibernate (which will work more quickly in Windows 8 because system information will be saved and compressed in parallel), Windows 8 will have a new Logoff and Hibernate combination that closes your apps like shutting the PC down does and refreshes your desktop like restarting does, but actually caches drivers, system services, devices and much of the core system the way hibernation does.

Turning the PC back on will take about half the time a cold boot needs (and the slides point out that on many PCs the power-on tests take longer than the Windows startup, so BIOS makers need to shape up).

It will be the default option but it won't be called Logoff and Hibernate; Microsoft is debating terms like Shutdown, Turn Off, Power Down and thinking through how the other options for turning the PC off will show up in the interface.

You'll be able to use an encrypting hard drive to boot Windows 8 and they'll integrate with BitLocker and third-party security apps.

Improving battery life will be based on some deep changes to the kernel; removing an interrupt in the kernel scheduler completely and removing more of the timers that interrupt Windows when it's trying to save power.

Windows 8 might get the same option for powering down unused areas of memory to save power that's on the cards for Windows Server, it will block disk reads and writes and some CPU access when you're not doing anything on your PC and PCI devices can turn off completely when they're not in use (assuming the drivers for specific devices support it).

Windows 7 stopped laptops waking up automatically when they're not plugged in; Windows 8 will get a new 'intelligent alarm' that can wake them up for things like virus scans, but only if they're plugged in.

OEMs will get new test tools that check the performance, reliability, security and Windows Logo compatibility of the PC, as well as measuring performance in Outlook and IE. And depending on whether partners have "concerns" about it, Microsoft might give the same tools to journalists, IT pros and users.

Windows 8 multimedia

Windows 8 will have better media playback and recording, but it will balance using hardware acceleration to save battery life and using the CPU when it gives a better result.

Audio will use hardware acceleration more because that does improve battery life. There will be post-processing to take out blur, noise and shakey video filmed on a phone or webcam, and support for more codecs including AVC and as-yet-undetermined 3D video codecs (stereoscopic3D support is coming, for games and for 3D movies in Media Center, but there are format issues).

Microsoft talks about sharing 'with nearby devices'; one way that will work is adding the Play To option currently in Windows Media Player to the browser for HTML 5 audio and video content, so you can play it on any device that supports DLNA, another is APIs to let other software do the same.

That will work with DRM content, if it's protected with DTCP-IP (digital transmission content protection over IP) or Microsoft's own PlayReady and hardware acceleration will speed up DRM decoding.

There's also a new 'remote display' option that will let you send your screen from a laptop to a large monitor (which will use DirectX hardware acceleration and the same multimonitor interface that's already in Windows 7, but for wireless displays as well, which could be an Internet-connected TV - Microsoft refers to 35% of TVs having network connectivity by 2012 and wonders whether to prioritise Internet TV over further improvements to broadcast TV).

Windows 8 Help and Support

In Windows XP the Help and Support centre was a branded hub of tools and links; in Windows 7 it's far more minimal. Windows 8 will go back to the branded experience, with integrated search for support forums run by your PC manufacturer but add the Windows 7 troubleshooters.

It will also link better with the Action Center, with tools that show more clearly what's happening on your PC; what apps are running, what resources are being used (like Task Manager showing which apps are using the most network bandwidth), how and when things have changed and what they can do about it. It will also include an Application Management tool that will let you find what apps are causing performance problems and adjust or remove them.

Windows 8 task manager

IMPROVED TASK MANAGER: Task manager will make it easier to see why an app might not be performing; here the Zune software is using all the network bandwidth to download podcasts, so video in the browser keeps pausing. We hope the white on black isn't the final design!

The Windows pre-boot recovery environment will be simpler, combining the safe mode and 'last known good' options into one interface. It will use what Microsoft calls 'superboot' to remove malware and rootkits

If you have to reset your PC, Windows 8 will restore "all the files settings and even the applications" although you'll have to go to the Windows Store to download apps and get a list of apps that didn't come from the store, so it's not clear how automatic this will actually be.

Devices matter (almost) as much as PCs

One of the reasons that Windows took off in the first place was working more easily with devices - in those days, printers. Support for a wide range of devices is one of the reasons it's hard to other OSes to challenge Windows but Microsoft would like to get hardware manufacturers to do more with the sensor platform and DeviceStage interface it introduced in Windows 7.

With Windows 8, Microsoft wants to see "PCs use location and sensors to enhance a rich array of premium experiences. Users are not burdened with cumbersome tasks that Windows can accomplish on its own. Users are neither annoyed or disturbed by the actions the PC takes. Instead, the PC's behaviour becomes integrated into users' routine workflows. Devices connect faster and work better on Windows 8 than on any other operating system."

The 'current thinking' is for Windows 8 to include Microsoft's own Wi-Fi location service Orion (which has 50-100m accuracy in North America and Western Europe but falls back to using the location associated with IP addresses elsewhere, which can be as bad as 25km).

Orion will be used in Windows Phone 7 (as well as Hawaii, a Microsoft Research project to build cloud-enabled mobile apps which refers to Orion as a 'prototype service'). Microsoft partnered with Navizon in March to use their Wi-Fi and mobile network location database but the slides claim that Orion is buying a bigger database than Navizon's 15 million access points, giving it 40 million compared to Google's 48 million (neither matches the 120 million Skyhook gives the iPhone).

Location will be available to the browser as well as to any app that's written to use it (music players as well as mapping tools), and web apps will get access to webcams.

Microsoft is emphasising the privacy aspect of location and webcam use, with mockups of how apps can ask for location and users can choose to deny it or only allow it once. And it's also asking PC manufacturers how many devices they plan to put GPS in and offering a Device Stage interface for using a PND like a Garmin nuvi as a GPS source for your PC.

Windows 8 location privacy

LOCATION PRIVACY: Web apps can see your location and use your webcam – but you get to control that to protect your privacy

As we've said before, Device Stage will become the standard way you work with devices; Microsoft previewed the options you'll get with a featurephone and a webcam as well as GPS.

Along with GPS, Microsoft is expecting PCs to include infrared sensors as well as the ambient light sensors that are becoming common, and the accelerometers that are in tablets with rotating screens.

Put that together and the PC could know which way up it is, whether there's anyone in front of it - or near it and what the lighting is like in the room. So when you walk into the room your PC notices and wakes itself up so by the time you sit down the webcam is ready to recognise you - and no waiting or having to line your face up with a box on screen.

If this works, the camera will pick your face out of the room, like Photo Gallery finding a face in a picture (hopefully without thinking the face in a picture on the wall is you). When you walk away it goes back to sleep again.

We like the idea of rotation lock buttons on 'Lap PCs' so you can move them around to control a game without flipping he screen repeatedly; again, if you look away from the game, Microsoft envisages it pausing automatically and if you pass a slate to someone it will switch to their account automatically.

What's in: USB 3, Bluetooth hands free and headset profiles (mono and stereo audio).

What's out: Microsoft has no plans to support Bluetooth 3.0 + High Speed, 1394 might be deprecated and Microsoft seems to expect USB 2 ports to be phased out in favour of USB 3 within the lifetime of Windows 8.

What's under consideration: Bluetooth Low Energy (from Bluetooth 4.0). What's not mentioned: Intel LightPeak, although Microsoft does ask if it's missing anything on its list of connectivity.

Windows 8 will know who you are

With better ways to log in to your PC, like your face, Microsoft is considering giving Windows 8 a way to "securely store usernames and passwords, simplifying the online experience".

Your Windows account might connect more directly to the cloud than just having a Windows Live ID, logging into web sites on your behalf; there's very little detail on this but it could revive the CardSpace technology introduced in Vista but not widely adopted.

Windows 8 face login

FACE LOGIN: Forget passwords; Windows 8 will use the webcam to find and recognise your face (probably)

Put it all together and you get some welcome improvements. It's impossible to say if Microsoft can come up with a simple enough programming system to appeal to the developers it wants to create Windows apps to rival Apple's App Store.

Until we see some code in action it's also hard to say if the 'instant on' and better battery life will transform the PC experience to compete with lightweight systems based on Android (or if Microsoft can deliver them) and make the PC scale from the tablet to the heavyweight systems we have today – which Windows has to do if it's going to stay the dominant PC OS.

Everything else here is incremental – as it would have to be if Microsoft really expects to release Windows 8 in 2011, but it's potentially disappointing if it comes in 2012 and there's nothing else exciting in Windows 8.

A Windows app store

More than 30 app stores have launched in the last year and Microsoft isn't the only company copying Apple here; Intel has its own app store for Atom PCs. PC makers like the idea - apparently at the first forum they commented that it "can't happen soon enough".

With an app store, Microsoft hopes to attract more of the type of developers who are currently building smartphone apps and it wants them to create apps that make Windows the best place to use web apps (a job advert last October claimed "we will blend the best of the web and the rich client by creating a new model for modern web applications to rock on Windows".)

According to the slides, "Currently the indication is that app development will move to the Web. There is significant opportunity for Microsoft if hardware capabilities, and OS services and Web could be integrated into a hobbyist developer toolset."

The 'tailored experiences' Microsoft talks about for Windows 8 sound like smartphone apps; the checklist includes fast installation and updates for engaging, social, extensible, ad-supported or 'freemium' apps.

If smartphone-style apps sound too simple to be worthwhile on Windows, Microsoft wants apps to be extensible so you can share information between them - perhaps using a mix of simple apps together. It sounds like the 'mashups' that we were all going to be making online until it turned out you'd have to learn to program.

The Windows Store will be branded and optimised for each PC manufacturer. Your settings will follow you from PC to PC, as will your apps (although some slides refer to this as a possibility rather than a definite plan) - but you'd need an HP ID to log into the 'HP Store powered by Windows' and get your HP-specific apps. Microsoft doesn't plan to make money from the store; the slides call it "revenue neutral".

Windows 8 tablets

The leaked slides are aimed at PC manufacturers who are interested in new form factors - and in getting a share of the iPad market - so it's no surprise one of the key PC form factors is a 9" slate (which Microsoft, having obviously got the point of all those iPad ads, is calling a Lap PC), optimised for web and media, casual gaming, reading and sorting email, IM and social networking.

Windows 8 lap pc

LAP PC: Using the Lap PC to read a magazine and play a driving game

Microsoft promises big improvements to the on-screen keyboard: it will be "easily launched, text prediction is more accurate, the UI is more usable, and throughput is increased for everyone".

There's also the workhorse PC (which is also referred to as a laptop, because Microsoft is only talking about consumers and not business users) and the family hub (an all-in-one touchscreen system that can go in the kitchen or the living room as a media centre) which is for casual gaming, web and media as well as more demanding apps like organising and manipulating media.

Key to making a successful Windows tablet is apps with user interfaces that change depending on the form factor (touch and gestures instead of keyboard and mouse), but Microsoft is also looking at stereoscopic 3D and high colour displays and natural input that uses touch, voice, 3D gestures ("on the horizon"), and facial recognition.

Windows 8 3d support

3D SUPPORT: Windows 8 will play 3D movies and games, but don't ask Microsoft to pick its favourite format yet

Optimising "for smaller screens" will help netbook users as well; Windows 7 gets key dialog boxes to fit on a small screen but not all apps do.

Related Stories



Related Stories

Updated: Windows 8: everything you need to know

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 08:08 AM PDT

What we know about Windows 8 is incomplete and unofficial - garnered from job postings, rumours and the slides allegedly leaked in June 2010 by a software engineer at HP responsible for OEM relations.

The slides include plenty of marketing ideas rather than technical details, they show that Microsoft has its eye on what Apple is doing to make its operating systems so popular and they declare themselves a work in progress.

Not only is every page marked 'this is not a plan of record' but the opening discussion includes the line "reality: there are currently more ideas than there is time to implement them". That's especially true if the Windows 8 release date is as soon as we think it might be.

Windows 8 release date

Windows 8, say the slides, will be available "for the holiday" - but not which one.

There's a timeline that doesn't have many dates - the one suggesting that the coding would begin in June 2010 is suspect when some sources say the M1 (milestone 1 build) is already done and there's what we assume is a typo that we'd correct to say the third Forum (rather than the second) would be in July. (There are several points where the slides are incomplete or confusing; for instance a pointed reference to "creating great Dell + Windows Experiences" in a deck that otherwise tips the hat - and appears to have been intended for - HP.)

It put the first beta of IE9 in August 2010 ), along with the shipping date for Windows Live Wave 4 which fits other rumours and positions them just after the third Forum.

UPDATE: The first beta of IE9 arrived in September 2010 and Windows Live Wave 4 was released in June 2010.

That makes the forums three-to five months apart; assuming an average of four months - and assuming the chart is to scale and that the dates don't slip - that puts Windows 8 beta release date a little before March 2011 and Windows 8 RTM shortly after July 2011 (a date suggested on the blog of a now-ex Microsoft employee which you can find preserved, with the boxed version following in autumn 2011 - for the holiday).

We've said before that we expect Windows 8 release date to be in early 2012 and we don't expect Microsoft to talk about a date until the Milestone 3 build, which would be around November 2010 by these calculations.

UPDATE: Milestone 3 came a little later than we expected: WinRumors reported on 1 Mar 2011 that the first Windows 8 Milestone 3 build has been compiled by Microsoft. We're not expecting a Windows 8 beta release date some time in summer 2011.

There are several statistics in the leaked slides (typical RAM, network connected TVs, mobile broadband penetration and 4G deployment) that talk about the specs that will be common - in 2012.

Interestingly, the timeline shows Windows Live Wave 5 with a short development cycle that finishes before Windows 8; that matches suggestions that Live will offer more cloud services for Windows 8.

UPDATE: On 25 October 2010, Microsoft Netherlands said "it will take about two years before 'Windows 8' [is] on the market."

UPDATE: On February 21 2011, ZDNet published a slide showing the internal Windows 8 roadmap. Given leaked information on some sites around current build information, the author of the ZDNet piece surmises that Windows 8 will see a mid-2010 RTM.

Windows 8 features

The 'fundamentals' Microsoft is aiming for with Windows 8 include "a fast on/off experience, responsiveness, and a great level of reliability from the start".

The 'big three' are boot time, shutdown time and battery life ("Windows 8 PCs turn on fast, nearly instantly in some cases, and are ready to work without any long or unexpected delays") but Microsoft is also thinking about how long it takes to get things done - how long until you read your first email, see the home page in your browser or start playing media. PCs should feel like an appliance that's ready to use as soon as you turn on the power.

Windows 8 startup

FASTER STARTUP: Windows 8 will show you what slows down startup and if removing an app you don't use improves it

Mobile PCs should resume 'instantly' from sleep (in under a second from S3 sleep), and booting up will be faster because of caching, with a boot layout prefetcher and the ReadyBoost cache persisting even when you reboot.

As only 9% of people currently use hibernate (which will work more quickly in Windows 8 because system information will be saved and compressed in parallel), Windows 8 will have a new Logoff and Hibernate combination that closes your apps like shutting the PC down does and refreshes your desktop like restarting does, but actually caches drivers, system services, devices and much of the core system the way hibernation does.

Turning the PC back on will take about half the time a cold boot needs (and the slides point out that on many PCs the power-on tests take longer than the Windows startup, so BIOS makers need to shape up).

It will be the default option but it won't be called Logoff and Hibernate; Microsoft is debating terms like Shutdown, Turn Off, Power Down and thinking through how the other options for turning the PC off will show up in the interface.

You'll be able to use an encrypting hard drive to boot Windows 8 and they'll integrate with BitLocker and third-party security apps.

Improving battery life will be based on some deep changes to the kernel; removing an interrupt in the kernel scheduler completely and removing more of the timers that interrupt Windows when it's trying to save power.

Windows 8 might get the same option for powering down unused areas of memory to save power that's on the cards for Windows Server, it will block disk reads and writes and some CPU access when you're not doing anything on your PC and PCI devices can turn off completely when they're not in use (assuming the drivers for specific devices support it).

Windows 7 stopped laptops waking up automatically when they're not plugged in; Windows 8 will get a new 'intelligent alarm' that can wake them up for things like virus scans, but only if they're plugged in.

OEMs will get new test tools that check the performance, reliability, security and Windows Logo compatibility of the PC, as well as measuring performance in Outlook and IE. And depending on whether partners have "concerns" about it, Microsoft might give the same tools to journalists, IT pros and users.

Windows 8 multimedia

Windows 8 will have better media playback and recording, but it will balance using hardware acceleration to save battery life and using the CPU when it gives a better result.

Audio will use hardware acceleration more because that does improve battery life. There will be post-processing to take out blur, noise and shakey video filmed on a phone or webcam, and support for more codecs including AVC and as-yet-undetermined 3D video codecs (stereoscopic3D support is coming, for games and for 3D movies in Media Center, but there are format issues).

Microsoft talks about sharing 'with nearby devices'; one way that will work is adding the Play To option currently in Windows Media Player to the browser for HTML 5 audio and video content, so you can play it on any device that supports DLNA, another is APIs to let other software do the same.

That will work with DRM content, if it's protected with DTCP-IP (digital transmission content protection over IP) or Microsoft's own PlayReady and hardware acceleration will speed up DRM decoding.

There's also a new 'remote display' option that will let you send your screen from a laptop to a large monitor (which will use DirectX hardware acceleration and the same multimonitor interface that's already in Windows 7, but for wireless displays as well, which could be an Internet-connected TV - Microsoft refers to 35% of TVs having network connectivity by 2012 and wonders whether to prioritise Internet TV over further improvements to broadcast TV).

Windows 8 Help and Support

In Windows XP the Help and Support centre was a branded hub of tools and links; in Windows 7 it's far more minimal. Windows 8 will go back to the branded experience, with integrated search for support forums run by your PC manufacturer but add the Windows 7 troubleshooters.

It will also link better with the Action Center, with tools that show more clearly what's happening on your PC; what apps are running, what resources are being used (like Task Manager showing which apps are using the most network bandwidth), how and when things have changed and what they can do about it. It will also include an Application Management tool that will let you find what apps are causing performance problems and adjust or remove them.

Windows 8 task manager

IMPROVED TASK MANAGER: Task manager will make it easier to see why an app might not be performing; here the Zune software is using all the network bandwidth to download podcasts, so video in the browser keeps pausing. We hope the white on black isn't the final design!

The Windows pre-boot recovery environment will be simpler, combining the safe mode and 'last known good' options into one interface. It will use what Microsoft calls 'superboot' to remove malware and rootkits

If you have to reset your PC, Windows 8 will restore "all the files settings and even the applications" although you'll have to go to the Windows Store to download apps and get a list of apps that didn't come from the store, so it's not clear how automatic this will actually be.

Devices matter (almost) as much as PCs

One of the reasons that Windows took off in the first place was working more easily with devices - in those days, printers. Support for a wide range of devices is one of the reasons it's hard to other OSes to challenge Windows but Microsoft would like to get hardware manufacturers to do more with the sensor platform and DeviceStage interface it introduced in Windows 7.

With Windows 8, Microsoft wants to see "PCs use location and sensors to enhance a rich array of premium experiences. Users are not burdened with cumbersome tasks that Windows can accomplish on its own. Users are neither annoyed or disturbed by the actions the PC takes. Instead, the PC's behaviour becomes integrated into users' routine workflows. Devices connect faster and work better on Windows 8 than on any other operating system."

The 'current thinking' is for Windows 8 to include Microsoft's own Wi-Fi location service Orion (which has 50-100m accuracy in North America and Western Europe but falls back to using the location associated with IP addresses elsewhere, which can be as bad as 25km).

Orion will be used in Windows Phone 7 (as well as Hawaii, a Microsoft Research project to build cloud-enabled mobile apps which refers to Orion as a 'prototype service'). Microsoft partnered with Navizon in March to use their Wi-Fi and mobile network location database but the slides claim that Orion is buying a bigger database than Navizon's 15 million access points, giving it 40 million compared to Google's 48 million (neither matches the 120 million Skyhook gives the iPhone).

Location will be available to the browser as well as to any app that's written to use it (music players as well as mapping tools), and web apps will get access to webcams.

Microsoft is emphasising the privacy aspect of location and webcam use, with mockups of how apps can ask for location and users can choose to deny it or only allow it once. And it's also asking PC manufacturers how many devices they plan to put GPS in and offering a Device Stage interface for using a PND like a Garmin nuvi as a GPS source for your PC.

Windows 8 location privacy

LOCATION PRIVACY: Web apps can see your location and use your webcam – but you get to control that to protect your privacy

As we've said before, Device Stage will become the standard way you work with devices; Microsoft previewed the options you'll get with a featurephone and a webcam as well as GPS.

Along with GPS, Microsoft is expecting PCs to include infrared sensors as well as the ambient light sensors that are becoming common, and the accelerometers that are in tablets with rotating screens.

Put that together and the PC could know which way up it is, whether there's anyone in front of it - or near it and what the lighting is like in the room. So when you walk into the room your PC notices and wakes itself up so by the time you sit down the webcam is ready to recognise you - and no waiting or having to line your face up with a box on screen.

If this works, the camera will pick your face out of the room, like Photo Gallery finding a face in a picture (hopefully without thinking the face in a picture on the wall is you). When you walk away it goes back to sleep again.

We like the idea of rotation lock buttons on 'Lap PCs' so you can move them around to control a game without flipping he screen repeatedly; again, if you look away from the game, Microsoft envisages it pausing automatically and if you pass a slate to someone it will switch to their account automatically.

What's in: USB 3, Bluetooth hands free and headset profiles (mono and stereo audio).

What's out: Microsoft has no plans to support Bluetooth 3.0 + High Speed, 1394 might be deprecated and Microsoft seems to expect USB 2 ports to be phased out in favour of USB 3 within the lifetime of Windows 8.

What's under consideration: Bluetooth Low Energy (from Bluetooth 4.0). What's not mentioned: Intel LightPeak, although Microsoft does ask if it's missing anything on its list of connectivity.

Windows 8 will know who you are

With better ways to log in to your PC, like your face, Microsoft is considering giving Windows 8 a way to "securely store usernames and passwords, simplifying the online experience".

Your Windows account might connect more directly to the cloud than just having a Windows Live ID, logging into web sites on your behalf; there's very little detail on this but it could revive the CardSpace technology introduced in Vista but not widely adopted.

Windows 8 face login

FACE LOGIN: Forget passwords; Windows 8 will use the webcam to find and recognise your face (probably)

Put it all together and you get some welcome improvements. It's impossible to say if Microsoft can come up with a simple enough programming system to appeal to the developers it wants to create Windows apps to rival Apple's App Store.

Until we see some code in action it's also hard to say if the 'instant on' and better battery life will transform the PC experience to compete with lightweight systems based on Android (or if Microsoft can deliver them) and make the PC scale from the tablet to the heavyweight systems we have today – which Windows has to do if it's going to stay the dominant PC OS.

Everything else here is incremental – as it would have to be if Microsoft really expects to release Windows 8 in 2011, but it's potentially disappointing if it comes in 2012 and there's nothing else exciting in Windows 8.

A Windows app store

More than 30 app stores have launched in the last year and Microsoft isn't the only company copying Apple here; Intel has its own app store for Atom PCs. PC makers like the idea - apparently at the first forum they commented that it "can't happen soon enough".

With an app store, Microsoft hopes to attract more of the type of developers who are currently building smartphone apps and it wants them to create apps that make Windows the best place to use web apps (a job advert last October claimed "we will blend the best of the web and the rich client by creating a new model for modern web applications to rock on Windows".)

According to the slides, "Currently the indication is that app development will move to the Web. There is significant opportunity for Microsoft if hardware capabilities, and OS services and Web could be integrated into a hobbyist developer toolset."

The 'tailored experiences' Microsoft talks about for Windows 8 sound like smartphone apps; the checklist includes fast installation and updates for engaging, social, extensible, ad-supported or 'freemium' apps.

If smartphone-style apps sound too simple to be worthwhile on Windows, Microsoft wants apps to be extensible so you can share information between them - perhaps using a mix of simple apps together. It sounds like the 'mashups' that we were all going to be making online until it turned out you'd have to learn to program.

The Windows Store will be branded and optimised for each PC manufacturer. Your settings will follow you from PC to PC, as will your apps (although some slides refer to this as a possibility rather than a definite plan) - but you'd need an HP ID to log into the 'HP Store powered by Windows' and get your HP-specific apps. Microsoft doesn't plan to make money from the store; the slides call it "revenue neutral".

Windows 8 tablets

The leaked slides are aimed at PC manufacturers who are interested in new form factors - and in getting a share of the iPad market - so it's no surprise one of the key PC form factors is a 9" slate (which Microsoft, having obviously got the point of all those iPad ads, is calling a Lap PC), optimised for web and media, casual gaming, reading and sorting email, IM and social networking.

Windows 8 lap pc

LAP PC: Using the Lap PC to read a magazine and play a driving game

Microsoft promises big improvements to the on-screen keyboard: it will be "easily launched, text prediction is more accurate, the UI is more usable, and throughput is increased for everyone".

There's also the workhorse PC (which is also referred to as a laptop, because Microsoft is only talking about consumers and not business users) and the family hub (an all-in-one touchscreen system that can go in the kitchen or the living room as a media centre) which is for casual gaming, web and media as well as more demanding apps like organising and manipulating media.

Key to making a successful Windows tablet is apps with user interfaces that change depending on the form factor (touch and gestures instead of keyboard and mouse), but Microsoft is also looking at stereoscopic 3D and high colour displays and natural input that uses touch, voice, 3D gestures ("on the horizon"), and facial recognition.

Windows 8 3d support

3D SUPPORT: Windows 8 will play 3D movies and games, but don't ask Microsoft to pick its favourite format yet

Optimising "for smaller screens" will help netbook users as well; Windows 7 gets key dialog boxes to fit on a small screen but not all apps do.

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Sir Tim Berners-Lee brought in to keep net neutrality peace

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:52 AM PDT

Sir Tim Berners-Lee has been given the task of promoting net neutrality in the UK, with the web inventor working alongside the Broadband Stakeholder Group to expand the current voluntary code of practise for ISPs.

Berners-Lee's main job, according to culture minister Ed Vaisey, is to "expand the agreement to cover managing and maintaining the open internet."

Vaisey has come up with three basic rules that he wants ISPs to adhere to, which are being put in place to make sure the general public have a fair access to the web.

"That agreement should be guided by three simple principles," said Vaisey.

"The first is users should be able to access all legal content. Second, there should be no discrimination against content providers on the basis of commercial rivalry and finally traffic management policies should be clear and transparent.

"The internet has brought huge economic and social benefits across the world because of its openness and that must continue."

Staying neutral

Berners-Lee believes that this can be done with greater transparency. In the meeting he had with a number of key web folk, including the BBC and Google, he said about the net neutrality proposals: "While transparency about traffic management policy is a good thing, best practices should also include the neutrality of the net.

"The web has grown so fast precisely because we have had two independent markets, one for connectivity, and the other for content and applications."

Currently there is no legislation is place by the government for net neutrality, so all rules are being abided on a voluntary bases.

As with most things, it seems that regulation on the issue will only occur if and when an ISP steps out of line.

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Sir Tim Berners-Lee brought in to keep net neutrality peace

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:52 AM PDT

Sir Tim Berners-Lee has been given the task of promoting net neutrality in the UK, with the web inventor working alongside the Broadband Stakeholder Group to expand the current voluntary code of practise for ISPs.

Berners-Lee's main job, according to culture minister Ed Vaisey, is to "expand the agreement to cover managing and maintaining the open internet."

Vaisey has come up with three basic rules that he wants ISPs to adhere to, which are being put in place to make sure the general public have a fair access to the web.

"That agreement should be guided by three simple principles," said Vaisey.

"The first is users should be able to access all legal content. Second, there should be no discrimination against content providers on the basis of commercial rivalry and finally traffic management policies should be clear and transparent.

"The internet has brought huge economic and social benefits across the world because of its openness and that must continue."

Staying neutral

Berners-Lee believes that this can be done with greater transparency. In the meeting he had with a number of key web folk, including the BBC and Google, he said about the net neutrality proposals: "While transparency about traffic management policy is a good thing, best practices should also include the neutrality of the net.

"The web has grown so fast precisely because we have had two independent markets, one for connectivity, and the other for content and applications."

Currently there is no legislation is place by the government for net neutrality, so all rules are being abided on a voluntary bases.

As with most things, it seems that regulation on the issue will only occur if and when an ISP steps out of line.

Related Stories



Related Stories

Sir Tim Berners-Lee brought in to keep net neutrality peace

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:52 AM PDT

Sir Tim Berners-Lee has been given the task of promoting net neutrality in the UK, with the web inventor working alongside the Broadband Stakeholder Group to expand the current voluntary code of practise for ISPs.

Berners-Lee's main job, according to culture minister Ed Vaisey, is to "expand the agreement to cover managing and maintaining the open internet."

Vaisey has come up with three basic rules that he wants ISPs to adhere to, which are being put in place to make sure the general public have a fair access to the web.

"That agreement should be guided by three simple principles," said Vaisey.

"The first is users should be able to access all legal content. Second, there should be no discrimination against content providers on the basis of commercial rivalry and finally traffic management policies should be clear and transparent.

"The internet has brought huge economic and social benefits across the world because of its openness and that must continue."

Staying neutral

Berners-Lee believes that this can be done with greater transparency. In the meeting he had with a number of key web folk, including the BBC and Google, he said about the net neutrality proposals: "While transparency about traffic management policy is a good thing, best practices should also include the neutrality of the net.

"The web has grown so fast precisely because we have had two independent markets, one for connectivity, and the other for content and applications."

Currently there is no legislation is place by the government for net neutrality, so all rules are being abided on a voluntary bases.

As with most things, it seems that regulation on the issue will only occur if and when an ISP steps out of line.

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Android browser is '52 per cent faster than iPhone'

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:31 AM PDT

A new independent study has found that the Android Chrome browser is 52 per cent faster than the iPhone's native Safari.

Using the Android browser on Gingerbread (2.3) on a Google Nexus S and Safari on iOS 4.3 running on an iPhone 4, web optimisation firm Blaze found that Android loaded websites 52 per cent faster than iOS.

iPhone's Safari managed to load websites faster than Chrome only 16 per cent of the time, leaving Android winning out on 84 per cent of the 1,000 test sites.

16 per cent of the time it works faster all the time

In practice, there's not much between the two OSes' load times – Android's median load time came in at 2.1 seconds, while the iPhone managed 3.25 seconds.

It's also worth noting that Blaze, which undertook the tests, worked on "a fast Wi-Fi connection" at times when network usage was low.

On mobile-optimised websites, there wasn't much between the two browsers; Android was only 3 per cent faster than the iPhone's browser, with average load times for each coming in at around two seconds.

One interesting point that the study threw up was that despite boasting improved Javascript engines, neither iOS 4.3 nor Android 2.3 exhibited significantly better load times than previous versions.

Assumptions

The researchers noted in their study that a lot of their assumptions had been proven wrong, stating:

"We assumed that similar hardware specs and the same WebKit foundation would make iPhone and Android's browsers perform equally. We assumed that a faster JavaScript engine equals a faster browser.

"All of these assumptions have been proven wrong when we actually measured those scenarios."

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Android browser is '52 per cent faster than iPhone'

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:31 AM PDT

A new independent study has found that the Android Chrome browser is 52 per cent faster than the iPhone's native Safari.

Using the Android browser on Gingerbread (2.3) on a Google Nexus S and Safari on iOS 4.3 running on an iPhone 4, web optimisation firm Blaze found that Android loaded websites 52 per cent faster than iOS.

iPhone's Safari managed to load websites faster than Chrome only 16 per cent of the time, leaving Android winning out on 84 per cent of the 1,000 test sites.

16 per cent of the time it works faster all the time

In practice, there's not much between the two OSes' load times – Android's median load time came in at 2.1 seconds, while the iPhone managed 3.25 seconds.

It's also worth noting that Blaze, which undertook the tests, worked on "a fast Wi-Fi connection" at times when network usage was low.

On mobile-optimised websites, there wasn't much between the two browsers; Android was only 3 per cent faster than the iPhone's browser, with average load times for each coming in at around two seconds.

One interesting point that the study threw up was that despite boasting improved Javascript engines, neither iOS 4.3 nor Android 2.3 exhibited significantly better load times than previous versions.

Assumptions

The researchers noted in their study that a lot of their assumptions had been proven wrong, stating:

"We assumed that similar hardware specs and the same WebKit foundation would make iPhone and Android's browsers perform equally. We assumed that a faster JavaScript engine equals a faster browser.

"All of these assumptions have been proven wrong when we actually measured those scenarios."

Related Stories



Related Stories

Android browser is '52 per cent faster than iPhone'

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:31 AM PDT

A new independent study has found that the Android Chrome browser is 52 per cent faster than the iPhone's native Safari.

Using the Android browser on Gingerbread (2.3) on a Google Nexus S and Safari on iOS 4.3 running on an iPhone 4, web optimisation firm Blaze found that Android loaded websites 52 per cent faster than iOS.

iPhone's Safari managed to load websites faster than Chrome only 16 per cent of the time, leaving Android winning out on 84 per cent of the 1,000 test sites.

16 per cent of the time it works faster all the time

In practice, there's not much between the two OSes' load times – Android's median load time came in at 2.1 seconds, while the iPhone managed 3.25 seconds.

It's also worth noting that Blaze, which undertook the tests, worked on "a fast Wi-Fi connection" at times when network usage was low.

On mobile-optimised websites, there wasn't much between the two browsers; Android was only 3 per cent faster than the iPhone's browser, with average load times for each coming in at around two seconds.

One interesting point that the study threw up was that despite boasting improved Javascript engines, neither iOS 4.3 nor Android 2.3 exhibited significantly better load times than previous versions.

Assumptions

The researchers noted in their study that a lot of their assumptions had been proven wrong, stating:

"We assumed that similar hardware specs and the same WebKit foundation would make iPhone and Android's browsers perform equally. We assumed that a faster JavaScript engine equals a faster browser.

"All of these assumptions have been proven wrong when we actually measured those scenarios."

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Buying Guide: Best laptop speakers: five to buy

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:30 AM PDT

We're increasingly using our laptops as portable media players - from watching a film in bed to listening to music while we work or surfing the web away from home.

Although there are a few exceptions, most laptop speakers are small, underpowered and just not up for the task of playing media in all its glory.

As it is, the best speakers for a laptop are standalone external units created by some of the biggest names in audio technology.

We've gathered together five of the best laptop speakers on sale today. They come in all shapes and sizes but they have one thing in common: they'll transform your enjoyment of music and sound on your laptop.

1. Logitech Speaker Lapdesk N550

As well as poor sound reproduction, laptops have the problem of getting very hot whilst in use - especially when they are being used to watch high definition movies - and this can make them uncomfortable to use on your lap.

N550

The Lapdesk N550 offers an elegant solution to both problems by combining high-quality stereo speakers with a laptop tray. The speakers connect to the laptop via USB, and buttons along the side let you alter the volume. The sound quality is a huge improvement on a laptop's standard speakers, and it's an excellent marriage of convenience and function.

£36.22 from Amazon

2. Altec Lansing InMotion AIR

When looking for the best speakers for laptops it doesn't mean that you have to settle for speakers that are attached by wires. These speakers connect to your laptop via Bluetooth - which offers enough bandwidth to transmit audio wirelessly without any noticeable loss in quality.

InMotion air

Altec Lansing has a 70 year history in audio technology - and its expertise is evident here in the great sound and build quality of these speakers. One of the benefits of using a laptop is freedom from wires, so why let your speakers hold you back?

£180, sellers listed at Altec Lansing

3. Creative Gigaworks T20 Series II

These laptop speakers are the most traditional. You need to plug them in to both the laptop and the mains power, and they lack the stylish design of the other speakers we've looked at. However, what they lack in portability and aesthetic charm they more than make up for in sound quality.

Creative t20

The Gigaworks T20 Series II speakers have been professionally designed and tuned for the best possible audio experience. Highs and midranges in particular are extremely well reproduced here.

£55.10 from Amazon

4. Altec Lansing Orbit IML237

If you've got an ultra-portable slim laptop or netbook that you take everywhere with you, then you're not going to want to get speakers that end up being twice the size of your machine.

Orbit iml237

The Altec Lansing Orbit speaker combines very good audio quality with a compact design that lets you easily carry it around with you.

£13.95 from Amazon

5. Mimi Qube Wifi Speaker

The Mimi Qube Wifi Speaker is another good looking single speaker laptop speaker and you can connect it wirelessly to your laptop with the included wireless dongle.

Mimi qube

Even better, you can buy standalone speakers and connect an unlimited number of them wirelessly to your laptop - allowing you to surround yourself in music.

£34.22 from Amazon

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Buying Guide: Best laptop speakers: five to buy

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:30 AM PDT

We're increasingly using our laptops as portable media players - from watching a film in bed to listening to music while we work or surfing the web away from home.

Although there are a few exceptions, most laptop speakers are small, underpowered and just not up for the task of playing media in all its glory.

As it is, the best speakers for a laptop are standalone external units created by some of the biggest names in audio technology.

We've gathered together five of the best laptop speakers on sale today. They come in all shapes and sizes but they have one thing in common: they'll transform your enjoyment of music and sound on your laptop.

1. Logitech Speaker Lapdesk N550

As well as poor sound reproduction, laptops have the problem of getting very hot whilst in use - especially when they are being used to watch high definition movies - and this can make them uncomfortable to use on your lap.

N550

The Lapdesk N550 offers an elegant solution to both problems by combining high-quality stereo speakers with a laptop tray. The speakers connect to the laptop via USB, and buttons along the side let you alter the volume. The sound quality is a huge improvement on a laptop's standard speakers, and it's an excellent marriage of convenience and function.

£36.22 from Amazon

2. Altec Lansing InMotion AIR

When looking for the best speakers for laptops it doesn't mean that you have to settle for speakers that are attached by wires. These speakers connect to your laptop via Bluetooth - which offers enough bandwidth to transmit audio wirelessly without any noticeable loss in quality.

InMotion air

Altec Lansing has a 70 year history in audio technology - and its expertise is evident here in the great sound and build quality of these speakers. One of the benefits of using a laptop is freedom from wires, so why let your speakers hold you back?

£180, sellers listed at Altec Lansing

3. Creative Gigaworks T20 Series II

These laptop speakers are the most traditional. You need to plug them in to both the laptop and the mains power, and they lack the stylish design of the other speakers we've looked at. However, what they lack in portability and aesthetic charm they more than make up for in sound quality.

Creative t20

The Gigaworks T20 Series II speakers have been professionally designed and tuned for the best possible audio experience. Highs and midranges in particular are extremely well reproduced here.

£55.10 from Amazon

4. Altec Lansing Orbit IML237

If you've got an ultra-portable slim laptop or netbook that you take everywhere with you, then you're not going to want to get speakers that end up being twice the size of your machine.

Orbit iml237

The Altec Lansing Orbit speaker combines very good audio quality with a compact design that lets you easily carry it around with you.

£13.95 from Amazon

5. Mimi Qube Wifi Speaker

The Mimi Qube Wifi Speaker is another good looking single speaker laptop speaker and you can connect it wirelessly to your laptop with the included wireless dongle.

Mimi qube

Even better, you can buy standalone speakers and connect an unlimited number of them wirelessly to your laptop - allowing you to surround yourself in music.

£34.22 from Amazon

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Buying Guide: Best laptop speakers: five to buy

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 07:30 AM PDT

We're increasingly using our laptops as portable media players - from watching a film in bed to listening to music while we work or surfing the web away from home.

Although there are a few exceptions, most laptop speakers are small, underpowered and just not up for the task of playing media in all its glory.

As it is, the best speakers for a laptop are standalone external units created by some of the biggest names in audio technology.

We've gathered together five of the best laptop speakers on sale today. They come in all shapes and sizes but they have one thing in common: they'll transform your enjoyment of music and sound on your laptop.

1. Logitech Speaker Lapdesk N550

As well as poor sound reproduction, laptops have the problem of getting very hot whilst in use - especially when they are being used to watch high definition movies - and this can make them uncomfortable to use on your lap.

N550

The Lapdesk N550 offers an elegant solution to both problems by combining high-quality stereo speakers with a laptop tray. The speakers connect to the laptop via USB, and buttons along the side let you alter the volume. The sound quality is a huge improvement on a laptop's standard speakers, and it's an excellent marriage of convenience and function.

£36.22 from Amazon

2. Altec Lansing InMotion AIR

When looking for the best speakers for laptops it doesn't mean that you have to settle for speakers that are attached by wires. These speakers connect to your laptop via Bluetooth - which offers enough bandwidth to transmit audio wirelessly without any noticeable loss in quality.

InMotion air

Altec Lansing has a 70 year history in audio technology - and its expertise is evident here in the great sound and build quality of these speakers. One of the benefits of using a laptop is freedom from wires, so why let your speakers hold you back?

£180, sellers listed at Altec Lansing

3. Creative Gigaworks T20 Series II

These laptop speakers are the most traditional. You need to plug them in to both the laptop and the mains power, and they lack the stylish design of the other speakers we've looked at. However, what they lack in portability and aesthetic charm they more than make up for in sound quality.

Creative t20

The Gigaworks T20 Series II speakers have been professionally designed and tuned for the best possible audio experience. Highs and midranges in particular are extremely well reproduced here.

£55.10 from Amazon

4. Altec Lansing Orbit IML237

If you've got an ultra-portable slim laptop or netbook that you take everywhere with you, then you're not going to want to get speakers that end up being twice the size of your machine.

Orbit iml237

The Altec Lansing Orbit speaker combines very good audio quality with a compact design that lets you easily carry it around with you.

£13.95 from Amazon

5. Mimi Qube Wifi Speaker

The Mimi Qube Wifi Speaker is another good looking single speaker laptop speaker and you can connect it wirelessly to your laptop with the included wireless dongle.

Mimi qube

Even better, you can buy standalone speakers and connect an unlimited number of them wirelessly to your laptop - allowing you to surround yourself in music.

£34.22 from Amazon

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New Official Nintendo Magazine website launches

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 06:23 AM PDT

The new Official Nintendo Magazine website has launched, boasting a new look and promising to deliver what Nintendo gamers truly deserve.

The Official Nintendo Magazine – like TechRadar, part of Future Publishing – is shiny and new and available at http://www.officialnintendomagazine.co.uk/ for your delectation.

That, if you don't already know, is just in time for the UK launch of the eagerly anticipated Nintendo 3DS handheld on 25 March.

Re-launch

"We're re-launching ONM to give existing fans the web site they truly deserve, but also to give new Nintendo 3DS fans a brand new home where they can share their passion for Nintendo gaming," said John Houlihan, Editor-in-Chief of the CVG network which includes ONM.

"We're aiming to make ONM the number-one destination for Nintendo fans boththrough great content and with a bigger forum, which includes improved moderation and advanced community tools, we're hoping it'll become the biggest, friendliest and safest Nintendo community in the world."

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New Official Nintendo Magazine website launches

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 06:23 AM PDT

The new Official Nintendo Magazine website has launched, boasting a new look and promising to deliver what Nintendo gamers truly deserve.

The Official Nintendo Magazine – like TechRadar, part of Future Publishing – is shiny and new and available at http://www.officialnintendomagazine.co.uk/ for your delectation.

That, if you don't already know, is just in time for the UK launch of the eagerly anticipated Nintendo 3DS handheld on 25 March.

Re-launch

"We're re-launching ONM to give existing fans the web site they truly deserve, but also to give new Nintendo 3DS fans a brand new home where they can share their passion for Nintendo gaming," said John Houlihan, Editor-in-Chief of the CVG network which includes ONM.

"We're aiming to make ONM the number-one destination for Nintendo fans boththrough great content and with a bigger forum, which includes improved moderation and advanced community tools, we're hoping it'll become the biggest, friendliest and safest Nintendo community in the world."

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New Official Nintendo Magazine website launches

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 06:23 AM PDT

The new Official Nintendo Magazine website has launched, boasting a new look and promising to deliver what Nintendo gamers truly deserve.

The Official Nintendo Magazine – like TechRadar, part of Future Publishing – is shiny and new and available at http://www.officialnintendomagazine.co.uk/ for your delectation.

That, if you don't already know, is just in time for the UK launch of the eagerly anticipated Nintendo 3DS handheld on 25 March.

Re-launch

"We're re-launching ONM to give existing fans the web site they truly deserve, but also to give new Nintendo 3DS fans a brand new home where they can share their passion for Nintendo gaming," said John Houlihan, Editor-in-Chief of the CVG network which includes ONM.

"We're aiming to make ONM the number-one destination for Nintendo fans boththrough great content and with a bigger forum, which includes improved moderation and advanced community tools, we're hoping it'll become the biggest, friendliest and safest Nintendo community in the world."

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Firefox 4 release date revealed

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 06:21 AM PDT

The final version of Firefox 4 is set for a 22 March launch following not one, not two but 12 betas.

Mozilla developers attended a meeting with the company last night, after which Damon Sicore, senior director of platform engineering, posted on a Mozilla developer's message board:

"Today's triage session concluded with all systems go for a Firefox 4 launch on 22 March."

All systems go, except…

There's a slim chance that bugs in the software may be discovered between now and then, however, which may mean further delay to the release.

Sicore continued, "We will continue to have triage sessions on a daily basis to watch for major issues; however, at this point, we've concluded RC1 will become Firefox 4 final."

Firefox 4, which was originally intended for a November 2010 launch, comes out of beta just a couple of weeks after the final release of IE9, the final version of which was made available on 15 March.

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Firefox 4 release date revealed

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 06:21 AM PDT

The final version of Firefox 4 is set for a 22 March launch following not one, not two but 12 betas.

Mozilla developers attended a meeting with the company last night, after which Damon Sicore, senior director of platform engineering, posted on a Mozilla developer's message board:

"Today's triage session concluded with all systems go for a Firefox 4 launch on 22 March."

All systems go, except…

There's a slim chance that bugs in the software may be discovered between now and then, however, which may mean further delay to the release.

Sicore continued, "We will continue to have triage sessions on a daily basis to watch for major issues; however, at this point, we've concluded RC1 will become Firefox 4 final."

Firefox 4, which was originally intended for a November 2010 launch, comes out of beta just a couple of weeks after the final release of IE9, the final version of which was made available on 15 March.

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Firefox 4 release date revealed

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 06:21 AM PDT

The final version of Firefox 4 is set for a 22 March launch following not one, not two but 12 betas.

Mozilla developers attended a meeting with the company last night, after which Damon Sicore, senior director of platform engineering, posted on a Mozilla developer's message board:

"Today's triage session concluded with all systems go for a Firefox 4 launch on 22 March."

All systems go, except…

There's a slim chance that bugs in the software may be discovered between now and then, however, which may mean further delay to the release.

Sicore continued, "We will continue to have triage sessions on a daily basis to watch for major issues; however, at this point, we've concluded RC1 will become Firefox 4 final."

Firefox 4, which was originally intended for a November 2010 launch, comes out of beta just a couple of weeks after the final release of IE9, the final version of which was made available on 15 March.

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Latest TechRadar Buying Guides go on sale

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:57 AM PDT

TechRadar's popular Buying Guides have been given a overhaul – with the next two magazines on PC components and phones sporting the spiffy new design.

The latest issues of the Techradar PC Upgrade and Phone Buying Guides are about to go on sale, featuring even more up-to-the-minute reviews and a stunning new design.

The PC Upgrade Buying Guide features reviews of more than 160 components and goes on sale 22 March.

April arrival

The Phone Buying Guide is on sale 1 April and is loaded with essential buying advice and more than 100 smartphone reviews.

So if you are looking for the definitive look at phones or want to know the cream of the component crop for your dream home-built PC, then wander into your local news agent and pick up a copy.

Or you can head over to My Favourite Magazines and subscribe.

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Latest TechRadar Buying Guides go on sale

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:57 AM PDT

TechRadar's popular Buying Guides have been given a overhaul – with the next two magazines on PC components and phones sporting the spiffy new design.

The latest issues of the Techradar PC Upgrade and Phone Buying Guides are about to go on sale, featuring even more up-to-the-minute reviews and a stunning new design.

The PC Upgrade Buying Guide features reviews of more than 160 components and goes on sale 22 March.

April arrival

The Phone Buying Guide is on sale 1 April and is loaded with essential buying advice and more than 100 smartphone reviews.

So if you are looking for the definitive look at phones or want to know the cream of the component crop for your dream home-built PC, then wander into your local news agent and pick up a copy.

Or you can head over to My Favourite Magazines and subscribe.

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Latest TechRadar Buying Guides go on sale

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:57 AM PDT

TechRadar's popular Buying Guides have been given a overhaul – with the next two magazines on PC components and phones sporting the spiffy new design.

The latest issues of the Techradar PC Upgrade and Phone Buying Guides are about to go on sale, featuring even more up-to-the-minute reviews and a stunning new design.

The PC Upgrade Buying Guide features reviews of more than 160 components and goes on sale 22 March.

April arrival

The Phone Buying Guide is on sale 1 April and is loaded with essential buying advice and more than 100 smartphone reviews.

So if you are looking for the definitive look at phones or want to know the cream of the component crop for your dream home-built PC, then wander into your local news agent and pick up a copy.

Or you can head over to My Favourite Magazines and subscribe.

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Leaked images of iPhone 5 cases surface

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:15 AM PDT

Mock-ups of a case said to be made for the iPhone 5 have hit the internet.

If these are indeed cases made for the new Apple handset, the iPhone 5's design seems to vary very little from that of the iPhone 4.

The blog that originally posted the images, Hardmac, reports that these cases "would be prototypes of the iPhone 5 cases, based on the mockup that was provided by Apple."

Not exactly concrete

By the sounds of things, Hardmac's source hasn't actually confirmed that these designs are based on a mock-up provided by Apple, but did tell the site that these are cases for the iPhone 5.

If that's the case, the iPhone 5's shape, button placement, camera, flash and SIM card slot remain unchanged from the 2010 model.

The only thing that is for sure is that whoever this case manufacturer is hasn't exactly been hard at it. We could have designed these cases in our sleep with our left hands while shackled to a charging rhinoceros.

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Leaked images of iPhone 5 cases surface

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:15 AM PDT

Mock-ups of a case said to be made for the iPhone 5 have hit the internet.

If these are indeed cases made for the new Apple handset, the iPhone 5's design seems to vary very little from that of the iPhone 4.

The blog that originally posted the images, Hardmac, reports that these cases "would be prototypes of the iPhone 5 cases, based on the mockup that was provided by Apple."

Not exactly concrete

By the sounds of things, Hardmac's source hasn't actually confirmed that these designs are based on a mock-up provided by Apple, but did tell the site that these are cases for the iPhone 5.

If that's the case, the iPhone 5's shape, button placement, camera, flash and SIM card slot remain unchanged from the 2010 model.

The only thing that is for sure is that whoever this case manufacturer is hasn't exactly been hard at it. We could have designed these cases in our sleep with our left hands while shackled to a charging rhinoceros.

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Leaked images of iPhone 5 cases surface

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:15 AM PDT

Mock-ups of a case said to be made for the iPhone 5 have hit the internet.

If these are indeed cases made for the new Apple handset, the iPhone 5's design seems to vary very little from that of the iPhone 4.

The blog that originally posted the images, Hardmac, reports that these cases "would be prototypes of the iPhone 5 cases, based on the mockup that was provided by Apple."

Not exactly concrete

By the sounds of things, Hardmac's source hasn't actually confirmed that these designs are based on a mock-up provided by Apple, but did tell the site that these are cases for the iPhone 5.

If that's the case, the iPhone 5's shape, button placement, camera, flash and SIM card slot remain unchanged from the 2010 model.

The only thing that is for sure is that whoever this case manufacturer is hasn't exactly been hard at it. We could have designed these cases in our sleep with our left hands while shackled to a charging rhinoceros.

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Hands on: Sky News app for iPad review

Posted: 17 Mar 2011 05:14 AM PDT

The Sky News app for iPad represents a bold step for Sky, who should be praised for merely adapting their popular iPhone app for a bigger screen. It's fabulous to look at, slick to use and intuitive to boot, but questions remain about the content it is offering.

Sky has pumped huge investment into its apps, and the broadcast giant currently offers up some of the most impressive offerings in the Apple App Store.

And the Sky News app for iPhone will, for a while at least, represent one of the crown jewels of Sky's efforts in applications.

Top stories

From the very first page it is clear that this is a big step in terms of the user interface. The Home screen offers a series of pictures of differing sizes, with the main story immediately being pushed to the forefront and the other stories spreading down the page.

These pictures represent the main stories of the day, and clicking on each on brings up what can probably be termed a hub page for that story. We'll look at those pages in a minute.

Also on offer on the home page is a 'live' option that streams Sky News to your iPad as it happens. We were trying out the app over Wi-Fi and the quality was great.

Sky news app for ipad

To the top left of the screen is an option to switch from the top stories view to a timeline view – which (as the name suggests) allows you to chronologically list the stories rather than look at the more editorialised view.

It does this by placing the latest story to the right and you can scroll back left across the timeline. It sounds obvious and it is – intuitive, nicely designed and well thought through.

Sky news app for ipad timeline

Back on to the hub pages, and we get a taste of just how powerful an experience the Sky News app for iPad provides.

The page groups the relevant content around the story. Obviously the top story today across the globe is the crisis in Japan, and the grouped coverage is comprehensive.

There is a central report and around the outside is a timeline of how the story unfolded, supporting graphics and graphs, galleries of the harrowing images and maps, along with other video reports on some of the other aspects of the story and text reports.

News story hub

One criticism that is likely to be levelled at the Sky News app is that the text reports do feel a little after the Lord Mayor's show – this is an app that doesn't seem particularly fond of the written word, but it's been shoved in there for a sense of completeness anyway.

Throughout all of this content there is the option to have video running live, either blown up to full screen or in the corner as you take a peek at the supporting content.

The whole application feels futuristic; it's immediately nice to play around with and, as we said, easy to use. It is clear that this is a video-led app that is wonderfully suited to the fine screen on an iPad.

iPad event home

But there are three huge issues that have to be considered when you look at the Sky News app for iPad

First up, and perhaps not as critical as it seems on the surface, this will become a paid for app at some point this year, but only if you are not a Sky subscriber – subscribers pay nothing.

Is this a massive barrier? Definitely for those who are just after news and don't pay for satellite TV; but Sky is confident that it has enough subscribers with iPads to mean that the app will be a success.

Secondly,this is an online application. If you check out the news on the underground or on a train through areas with patchy coverage this may not be the app for you. Sky News has decided that it is all about the now (the app is updated every minute) and isn't interested in offering offline content.

Sky news for ipad - graphics

Which is a shame, because you think the combination of the two would not only give an obvious boost in terms of commuter worth, but also give that pesky text a much-needed larger role.

And onto the third issue – which for many people is a potential dealbreaker: The Sky News app for iPad only focuse on the major news stories.

That means if you like tech news on a day when Steve Jobs hasn't taken to the stage, then you might as well not bother. If you are looking for the Chelsea score from last night, then you might not find it and if you are interested in anything from the world of entertainment, weather or the quirky section, give up now – they aren't going to be there.

It's a crying shame, but it appears that the sacrifice made in order to bring a brilliant experience to the main stories means that there is not enough in the tank to focus on anything else.

Unhelpfully, when TechRadar asked about this narrowing of the news agenda,Sky pointed out that there are other apps available – which rather missed the point of a news app.

This is a wonderful application, beautifully designed and fun to use – but by focusing so entirely on a few topics, it may well find that it's missing out on a huge audience who want to look beyond the headlines but not beyond the news.

But, presumably, that's something that can be rectified.

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at 2:21 AM

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