MWC 2012: All apps free during Windows 8 Consumer Preview

Microsoft just announced that all apps in the Windows 8 app store will be free to download during the Windows 8 Consumer Preview.

Speaking at the launch event, Antoine Leblond, corporate VP of Windows web services, made the revelation while demoing the app store on screen.

"A number of essential apps will ship with the Consumer Preview but they're all subject to change," he added. "And we're adding apps all the time so you'll want to keep checking back into the store."

Apps are good

"Apps bring the OS to life – it's alive at a glance. We wanted to scale these apps across many dimensions, screen sizes, usage scenarios etc," added Steven Sinofsky, Microsoft's President of the Windows division.

"We want apps in that environment to work together. Currently you get a lot of islands of apps and that's not the right way.

"So in Windows 8 you have control over apps. Apps work together and everything is cloud connected, which is a very important part of how we thought about Windows 8 from the very beginning."

Microsoft launched the Windows 8 Consumer Preview (which is a posh way of saying public beta) at MWC 2012 in Barcelona - and we've only gone and done a hands on Windows 8 review for you as well.

In Depth: Windows 8 Consumer Preview: what's new?

Windows 8 Consumer Preview: what's new?

So now we can all get a flavour of Windows 8 with the new Windows 8 Consumer Preview. We've taken an in-depth look at the new OS in our Hands on: Windows 8 review here and interviewed Microsoft about its new Windows.

But what's changed? Well, pretty much everything. Last September's Developer Preview was a simple demonstration for, yep, you've guessed it, developers, to show them how Windows 8 Metro apps would work.

While we could glean a lot from that version, it was nowhere near feature-complete. It wasn't even significantly near.

This new Consumer Preview version brings a whole raft of product changes and improvements. Microsoft said today that it has made over 100,000 code modifications since the earlier build. Of the new version, Microsoft says that "with the added features, it represents a more complete view of the capabilities of Windows 8."

"With Windows 8, we reimagined the different ways people interact with their PC and how to make everything feel like a natural extension of the device, whether using a Windows 8 tablet, laptop or all-in-one," said Steven Sinofsky, head of Microsoft's Windows division.

As with the earlier preview, the new beta build still doesn't have a version for ARM processors – it's x86 for Intel and AMD-based systems only.

However, Microsoft did demo the OS working on ARM hardware at the Consumer Preview launch during Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

ARM vs x86

As Mary Branscombe explains in our Hands on: Windows 8 review, it's therefore hard to get a complete grip on what the ARM experience will be like.

As Sinofsky said previously, there will be no third-party apps on the Windows on ARM (WOA) desktop, though there will be third-party Metro apps.

WOA will also have baked-in versions of the key Microsoft Office apps – this Consumer Preview version doesn't and Windows for the x86 platform won't.

Microsoft says that "Windows 8 has progressed across every dimension" from what we've seen before.

The user experience for touch plus keyboard and mouse is now complete, says the software giant. The Consumer Preview is compatible with mouse and keyboard as well as touch.

The new Window Store is now open (also in a pre-release beta version) with the Windows 8 Consumer Preview and, as we reported earlier, all apps are now free. The store has a variety of new Metro style apps from both third-party developers and Microsoft. The store will offer recommendations

The Consumer Preview also gives you the ability to take your apps and settings with you across multiple PCs.

The Consumer Preview offers the ability to sign on with a Microsoft Account (the new name for your Windows Live ID or Microsoft Passport). That basically means you can store all your stuff in the cloud – you can keep your settings in sync across devices, use cloud storage plus use Windows Live services like Hotmail and Calendar (the Windows Live name appears to be doomed).

Of course, your stuff is also available on Windows Phone as well as your Windows PCs.

The OS also features another preview version of the new Internet Explorer - Internet Explorer 10 Platform Preview 5. The browser has been reworked so it performs across all Windows 8 devices. The interface can be edge-to-edge in Metro and it's all nicely hardware accelerated.

Windows 8 system requirements

Windows 8 Consumer Preview works on any Windows 7 PC. Here are the basic requirements:

• Processor: 1GHz or faster
• RAM: 1GB (32-bit) or 2GB (64-bit)
• Hard disk space: 16GB (32-bit) or 20GB (64-bit)
• Graphics card: Microsoft DirectX 9 graphics device or higher

Additional requirements to use certain features:

• To use touch, you need a tablet or a monitor that supports multitouch.
• To access the Windows Store and to download and run apps, you need an active Internet connection and a screen resolution of at least 1024 x 768.
• To snap apps, you need a screen resolution of at least 1366 x 768.

We'd recommend you don't install it on your main PC or, if you have no other option, you create a new partition to install it on so you don't ruin your current Windows installation.

The Windows 8 Consumer Preview is available worldwide for download in English, French, German, Japanese and Chinese (simplified)

Download it at http://preview.windows.com and check out our Hands on: Windows 8 review.

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• Exclusive: Microsoft: 'It's the complete vision for Windows 8'

Windows 8 Consumer Preview Available for Download

Adventurous Windows users can now download the Windows 8 Consumer preview from Microsoft's web site using the link provided below. The preview version of the new OS is available for 32-bit and 64-bit PCs, and can be downloaded either in ISO format (for buring to a DVD or converting to a USB stick using the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool) or as a setup file, which Windows Vista and Windows 7 users can use to pull down the OS from the Internet.

If you prefer to explore these things vicariously (there's no shame in it, really), our coverage of new Windows 8 features has been fairly extensive up until now - you can find all of our previous Windows 8 articles by following this link. A more complete, in-depth look at the Consumer Preview is forthcoming, and should be ready at some point next week.

Source: Microsoft

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Windows 8 Consumer Preview: The Four Corners

During Microsoft's Windows 8 Consumer Preview Event at MWC today, Microsoft demonstrated some of the new features in the CP release out today. While the Metro UI obviously lends itself to use on a touch enabled tablet, Microsoft was clear to point out that it works just as well with a keyboard and mouse. Bezel gestures and regular multitouch gestures on the screen make sense on a tablet, but how do you get access to the multitasking UI, charms bar or other Windows 8 features if you have a traditional (non-touch) notebook? Through hot corners of course.

The traditional Start Menu is gone and has been replaced by a hot corner. Move your mouse to the lower left screen corner and you'll get a tiny popup that you can use to launch the Start Screen. The lower right corner lets you zoom in/out of the start screen, while the upper left corner lets you quickly switch between apps (just click to switch to your last app, or click and drag to reveal the task switcher). Finally, the upper right corner is used to reveal the Windows 8 charms bar.

Gallery: Windows 8 Consumer Preview: The Four Corners

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AMD Releases Video Driver for Windows 8 Consumer Preview

In conjunction with today’s release of the Windows 8 Consumer Preview, AMD has released a new set of drivers specifically for Windows 8. Dubbed the AMD Catalyst driver for the Windows® 8 Consumer Preview, it most notably includes full support for Windows 8’s new WDDM 1.2 features. The rest of AMD’s software features are also supported, including Overdrive, CrossFire, and Eyefinity.

Radeon HD 7000 users will be out of luck for the time being, however. These drivers do not support GCN GPUs; drivers for that will be released at a later time. Considering AMD has yet to publish a WHQL certified Win7 driver for GCN it’s safe to assume that will happen before we see a Win8 driver, particularly if AMD plans on having Direct3D 11.1 support ready for the Consumer Preview.

Source: AMD

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Windows 8 Consumer Preview: A Quick Look at Battery Life

With each new operating system in recent history, Microsoft has promised better battery life. We tested this back in the early days of Windows 7 and found that while Vista was generally a step back relative to XP, Windows 7 fixed much of what was wrong and even managed to beat XP in several tests. With the Windows 8 Consumer Preview now available, we thought we’d run a quick test on a laptop to see if things have changed much. Let’s just get this out of the way, shall we?

Okay, that’s a pretty poor showing, but what’s really going on here? We’re using the same Sandy Bridge laptop that we tested back when SNB first launched, a Compal unit with an i7-2820QM processor. So the hardware hasn’t changed, but battery life is much worse right now—and that last part is important: right now. We did a few tests of battery life with the Windows 7 preview and it didn’t look that great, but drivers and optimizations weren’t finalized, and Windows 8 CP is definitely in that same category. But there’s more to the story than just Windows 8.

As part of the Windows 8 CP experience, we’re also given the privilege of running the Internet Explorer 10 Consumer Preview (IE10CP). As we’ve noted in the past, the choice of browser can certainly have an impact on battery life, and that likely goes double when we’re looking at beta software for the OS and browser. I also performed an in-place upgrade from Windows 7, so it’s possible that could negatively impact battery life as well.

I've only had a chance to run the battery drain test once so far, so consider the above results very preliminary. I'm going to test it again, as well as going back and retesting with Windows 7 (and IE9) to see if there's any other changes. While I continue to look into battery life over the next few days to see if perhaps I missed something, for now it doesn’t look like Win8 CP is going to do anyone any favors in that area.

And just as an aside, I know that Windows 8 isn’t final by any stretch of the imagination, but while the UI seems like it would work great on a tablet I’m ready to go on record as saying it sucks for traditional desktop and laptop users. Without a touch interface, Metro feels weird at best and downright awful at worst. What’s more, getting a touchscreen for a desktop or laptop isn’t actually something I’m clamoring for. Does using a 24” or 30” touchscreen on my desktop sound enjoyable? Not at all, and a 15” laptop touchscreen wouldn’t be much better. Maybe it would help me build up a bit of arm strength, but that’s about the only upside. Add on fingerprints—a personal pet peeve that smartphones and tablets still suffer from—and I’m more than happy to stick with the “boring” old Start Menu. That’s just my initial impression of course; anyone else have similar—or different—feelings after playing around with the Win8 CP?

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Windows 8 Consumer Preview Event Scheduled For Feb 29

Windows aficionado Paul Thurrott has just confirmed that the Windows 8 Consumer Preview event will be held in Barcelona, Spain on February 29, 2012. Coming from Mr. Thurrott, we would be inclined to believe that this is not a rumor.

There have been a lot of leaked screenshots of the supposed Consumer Preview build 8220 (or build 8225 if the @BuildWindows8 Twitter feed is to be believed) floating around the interweb these past few days. Some of the more aggressive changes include the disappearance of the iconic Windows Orb, or the Start Button as some of us still lovingly like to call it. Others are more subtle like changes to the Metro-styled start screen and a new translucent UI for Charm bar.

I quite like the Consumer Preview moniker being used this time around. The consumer-centric branding, just like the Building Windows 8 blog, demonstrates Microsoft's commitment to actively communicate progress on the OS and gather feedback from end users and developers. 

The Consumer Preview should ideally be a feature-complete release, with future builds focusing on performance, stability and usability enhancements, rather than any major new features.

In any case, the wait shouldn't be too long now.

Source: Supersite for Windows

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Netgear at CES 2012: Consumer Networking, Storage and Media Products

It is almost a week since CES got over, but I still have a few meetings from the show that are pending coverage. There isn't much point in just rehashing press releases, and I take the extra effort to gather the right information that readers want. Given that most of my focus is on HTPCs and media streamers, I did talk with Netgear in detail about their plans for that market segment. But, before presenting that, let me take a small detour to write about the other interesting products.

WNDR4700 Media Storage Router

This router was honoured with a CES Innovations Design and Engineering award. It is quite different from any of the routers from other companies because of the addition of an internal hard drive slot. The model comes barebones or with a 2 TB hard disk installed internally. With the ability to act as a backup target for both Macs and PCs, it is an interesting alternative for users hooking up an external hard drive to the USB port of their routers.

The router also comes with all the high end features expected from a flagship model (simultaneous dual band with 450 Mbps in each channel, four GbE ports and two USB 3.0 ports for additional storage needs). Availability is slated for summer this year, while pricing is set to be announced at a later date.

XAVB5101 Nano Powerline Kit

Netgear also announced a small 500 Mbps powerline adapter, the XAVB5101 Nano. Its exceptionally small form factor ensure that the unit doesn't become a wall wart like most of the other powerline adapters that I have seen. The internal chipset is still from Atheros Qualcomm. We have been evaluating a number of powerline adapters based on that chipset, and initial testing results seem to indicate that there is not much of a performance improvement over the 200 Mbps kits in noisy line conditions (which could be all the time, if the end user is unlucky!).

In any case, if you are exploring powerline networking options and want something small and sleek, the XAVB5101 is a nice option. It will be available later this quarter for $120.

Apps for Networked Devices

While D-Link was concentrating on the cloud aspect for the control of networking equipment, Netgear seems to have hit upon apps as the way to move forward. Recognizing that many consumers install DD-WRT or Tomato on their routers, Netgear is providing an incentive for the developers of those firmwares to develop apps for their routers (and other products) to enable specific functionality not present in the original firmware.

In addition to router apps, Netgear also envisages that the 'Smart Network Cloud Application Platform' will include their NAS devices and media players. Netgear provides a SDK for developers to join in, and more information can be found here.

I saw some apps in action, running on a WNDR3500L v2. This seems like an interesting endeavour, and I am looking forward to see the types of apps which will eventually turn up for the various devices in the Netgear ecosystem.

Media Streamers

Readers who have followed my coverage of the NTV550 probably know that I was deeply disappointed with the way Netgear handled the product's firmware development. It looks like the NTV550 will get one more firmware update in February and then, will no longer be supported in terms of new firmwares. Unfortunately, I don't think one firmware update can fix all the issues that the unit currently suffers from. That said, the NTV550 is probably the cheapest Blu-ray enabled (unofficially) media streamer you can get, and it does work well enough in specific usage scenarios.

We also reviewed the Netgear NTV200 late last year, and were quite impressed for the range of OTT premium services supported for the price. Netgear just made the deal a whole lot sweeter at CES by adding Hulu Plus to the list of supported channels. The only premium service of note which the Roku 2 units have, but the NTV200 doesn't, is Amazon VoD. Netgear indicated that support was being planned for Amazon VoD too, but wouldn't commit on dates. The new killer feature of the NTV200 is undoubtedly Intel WiDi. Consumers wanting to take advantage of WiDi have often been forced to buy a separate unit with just a H.264 decoder in it, costing more than $50 usually. With the WiDi app, the NTV200 is able to replace the dedicated WiDi unit. I am very excited by this development, and Netgear deserves lot of credit for bringing this feature to the NTV200.

The Roku 2 comes in four different varieties (Roku 2 XS, Roku 2 XD, Roku 2 HD and Roku 2 LT) with pricepoints ranging from $50 to $100. The NTV200 has settled down to $50 at most retailers, and in terms of features it compares favorably to the Roku 2 XD priced at $80. Netgear seems to be preparing (but wouldn't confirm officially) another model based on the same chipset as the NTV200 and hopes to release it soon at $80. Tagged as the NTV210, it will include a USB port for local media support. Personally, I don't believe that the NTV200's chipset is powerful enough for local media streaming requirements. So, it will be interesting to see whether the NTV210 is at least better than the Roku 2 XS in terms of local media compatibility. Of course, our current recommendation for the best balance between local and online media support lies with the WDTV Live Hub / WDTV Live SMP, with the latter being available for less than $100. Can the NTV210 upstage the WDTV Live SMP? That will be something to wait and watch.

In addition to the above, Netgear also introduced a range of other products such as range extenders and DSL/cable modem/router combos. Hit up the source link for a detailed list.

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