Windows 10 May Not Arrive Until Fall 2015
On Thursday during the Credit Suisse Technology Conference, Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner provided more details about the Windows 10 "Threshold" roadmap (doc), reporting that the upcoming operating system may not appear on retail shelves until Fall 2015. We've heard this before, so it's no surprise. However, now we have an official timeframe rather than one generated from rumor and speculation.
According to Turner, Microsoft will talk more about the Windows 10 end-user experience in early spring. After that, the company will release a "developer preview" in early summer, and then launch the retail version of Windows 10 in late summer or early fall. Previous rumors pointed to a Q2 2015 or Q3 2015 release for Windows 10.
Mary Jo Foley added that a Technology Preview of Windows 10 will be shown in January. The company also plans to preview the Windows 10 mobile build that will work on ARM- and Intel-based hardware in late January. As for the "developer preview," she believes Turner meant that the company plans to reveal more regarding developers during Build 2015, which is expected to take place in the last week of April 2015.
In addition to Windows 10, Foley also believes that the touch-based apps for Office will be released alongside Windows 10 next year. These will allow customers to use Office apps (Word, Excel, etc.) on the Start screen rather than the desktop. With Windows 10 focusing more on the desktop user, these apps will likely make life easier for consumers working on a Windows tablet or phone. Touch apps for Office are already available on iOS and are in beta for Android.
During his presentation on Thursday, Turner said that Windows 10 is very unique, that it's different than any other Windows platform the company has developed thus far.
"We have actually taken those four OSes across our embedded operating system, which is basically for our Internet of Things and all embedded devices, our mobile operating system for our phones and phablets and tablets, as well as our laptop and desktop operating system and our Xbox operating system and built that single kernel across all of those entities," he said. "And the beautiful thing about that is it allows you to have one platform for drivers and apps."
Windows 10 is shaping up rather nicely. The company just recently released a major update to the platform for Insiders, but Microsoft won't provide another major feature update until the beginning of 2015. The latest Insider build, version 9879, includes improvements to Internet Explorer, gesturing and windowing, the ability to hide the Search and Task View buttons, and more.
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Kevin Parrish has over a decade of experience as a writer, editor, and product tester. His work focused on computer hardware, networking equipment, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, and other internet-connected devices. His work has appeared in Tom's Hardware, Tom's Guide, Maximum PC, Digital Trends, Android Authority, How-To Geek, Lifewire, and others.
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dimar MS should make the new OS highly customizable. Release a tool so people can theme and mod it as much as they wish. Buy Classic Shell and let it be the Start Button, then work to improve it further. Also MS should concentrate on Explorer, add tabs, and add dividable file navigation windows similar to Total Commander..Reply -
SkyBill40 Pushing it back is of little consequence for me seeing as I'm perfectly happy with W8.1. I will say that W10 does look rather promising, but I never understood all the fuss about the "start" button/menu. To each their own, I guess.Reply -
kawininjazx ReplyMS should make the new OS highly customizable. Release a tool so people can theme and mod it as much as they wish. Buy Classic Shell and let it be the Start Button, then work to improve it further. Also MS should concentrate on Explorer, add tabs, and add dividable file navigation windows similar to Total Commander..
Why would they buy classic shell when that program is just a rip off of their own start menu?
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josejones I just hope that Windows 10 will get rid of the old now obsolete AHCI interface originally designed for regular disc hard drives that inherently caps out at 600 MB/s making SATA for SSD's soon to be obsolete and instead provide NVMe drivers for M.2 and PCIe SSD's so that the flood gate of SSD performance can see its full potential:Reply
20 to 40 g/ps SSD's
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1843654 -
Christopher1 ReplyPushing it back is of little consequence for me seeing as I'm perfectly happy with W8.1. I will say that W10 does look rather promising, but I never understood all the fuss about the "start" button/menu. To each their own, I guess.
Agreed. Microsoft should take the time they need to make Windows 10 as close to perfect as they can.
They should also try to make sure that Windows 10 can still use Windows 8.1 drivers (since a lot of NVidia cards released in the past 10 years just dropped off the support list) with no issues. -
coolitic Microsoft shouldn't rush it.Reply
If they mess W10 up, then everyone is going to be super pissed. -
coolitic Microsoft shouldn't rush it.Reply
If they mess W10 up, then everyone is going to be super pissed. -
CosmicTwister Usually they sell a new version and soon thereafter they come out with one that works. I'll wait for Windows 11.5.6.1 version 2345.172374 before I buy. Guess that will put me somewhere near 2017.Reply
Unless Windows 10 allows me to teleport I will not be buying it or even trying to get a hacked version. No sir I'll wait or go Mac -
velocityg4 I just hope they improve the handling of larger fonts. Every time I work on a computer with 125% or 150% font size you get cut off windows and buttons that don't look or work right. Low resolution handling needs to be improved so that dialogue boxes don't get cutoff. They also need to improve handling of high dpi "retina" displays. So you get a crisp look not tiny text like Apple does.Reply