Windows 9 Preview May Appear in February 2015

By Kevin Parrish
published

The latest tidbit of news coming from the Windows rumor mill is that Microsoft plans to release a preview version of Windows 9 "Threshold" on February 3, 2015. There's no indication that this will be a developer preview or a public one, but given that Windows 9 is expected to ship in April 2015, the latter option seems more likely.

For Windows 8, Microsoft launched the Developer Preview in September 2011 during the BUILD 2011 event. The company then released Windows 8 Consumer Preview at the end of February 2012. Windows 8 went RTM in August 2012 and hit consumer PCs in October 2012. The public beta of Windows 8.1 wasn't released until June 23, 2013, followed by the full release in October. Windows 8.1 Update (8.1.1) arrived in April 2014.

Using this release schedule as a reference, Microsoft is expected to launch Windows 8.1 Update 2 (Windows 8.1.2) sometime this fall, bringing a host of new features like the revised (and beloved) Start Menu, and the ability to run windowed apps on the desktop. This may also be the time period when Microsoft releases the Developer Preview of Windows 9 "Threshold."

The news arrives by way of FaiKee who claims to have obtained a screenshot of Microsoft's plans and posted it on My Digital Life. The tiny smidgen of a schedule reads "Preview Release @ 2015-02-03." That could either mean February 3 or March 2…. you decide.

"OK, seems WZor's "5/15 win9 trial version" is not going to happen..... so here's the part below my last screen-shot," FaiKee writes. "If it's real (couldn't see why it isn't), then you could scrap all previous win9 release speculations."

We know very little about Windows 9; all eyes are glued to Windows 8.1.2 arriving this fall. However, there's speculation that Microsoft will make the platform more desktop friendly. By this October, we should know more about Threshold, especially if the Developer Preview begins to leak onto the Internet.

For now, consider everything about Windows 9 and Windows 8.1.2 to be mere rumor and speculation. Of course, we know they'll eventually make an appearance, but until then, everything is just dips into the rumor pool.

Kevin Parrish
25 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Jerky_san
    And god said every other version of windows will be better than the last but you'll suffer through the evens..
    Reply
  • drethon
    Well 8 was an improvement over Vista but I'm not sure Vista was any better than ME...
    Reply
  • Duckhunt
    windows 8 is annoying , trying to use the touch mouse is annoying.
    Reply
  • Vlad Rose
    Actually, I've never really had any issues at all with Windows 8. The performance improvement is noticeable, the task manager is 'greatly' improved and with a 3rd party app like classic shell, the start menu is back. Metro feels like just an addon program afterwards.
    Reply
  • diffra
    It seems pretty obvious that the date is Q2-Q3 based on the image.
    Reply
  • voltagetoe
    I've got a feeling that Windows 9 will be a cash grab - nothing new or better or more advanced over 7 or 8.1. I predict that it will be pure panic shit of money greed men from the pyramid top.
    Reply
  • Martell1977
    Windows 9 will be what 8 should have been. Be that good or bad remains to be seen. With 7 being a finished and polished versions of Vista, 9 should have a similar relationship to 8. However, 9 will probably walk back the massive mistakes made in 8 in the PC version.

    I've used Windows 8 on all the platforms and only on the PC does it fail. My phone is great with WP8, tablets are smooth and easy to use, but on a PC, without a touch screen, it just get frustrating. I preferred the Start menu because it put everything in one easy to browse place. I don't want to change screens whenever I want to open a program, and I don't want every window at fullscreen. Nor do I want my taskbar filled with things that should be on the menu, as I don't want the clutter. I only want to see it when I need it and I don't want to have to search a screen of tiles for it.
    Reply
  • hannibal
    Tik, tok...
    Win9 is win8 with more eye candy and most bugs killed. So a little bit better version of win8. Same as win7 was a little bit better version on Vista.
    Interesting to see, if the new disk operation system is ready for win9? And does the DX12 also come to win 8.1 machines? Most probably it will, but who knows.
    All is all late 2015 or early 2016 may be the first time to really think hardware upgrades. Maybe we even have 20nm GPUs out then, even better would be if second generation of 20nm GPUs are out, so that the worst mistakes has been corrected also in that front.
    Interesting to see if they continue to produce new os in every 2-3 year from now on. So the win10 will be out 2017 or 2018. About the same time when win7 will be near the end of its support cycle.
    I have been using win8.1 and has been very happy how well it works. Very stable and so on, but I also use Start8 and Modern mix, so I don't see Modern UI menu when I use my Tabletop PC. So this user experience should be quite the same as with win 8.1.2. I have start menu and all programs start in windowed mode. So I expect that win8.1.2 that will be out next autumn will be quite nice from normal user perspective.
    The win 9 will also most likely to allow easier virtualization and other aspect that are more suitable to power users. The MS employees have said that win8 was meant to be the "easy" mode to computer usage and later there should be more power user utilities... Heh... Didn't go exactly how they expected, but as I said win8.1.2 seems to be familiar enough to also those not so computer literate persons.

    Win10 was supposed to be first real cloud os for MS...Let see if they keep on to that plan...
    Reply
  • nitrium
    As others have pointed out, it pretty much MUST say "Preview release @ 2015 Q2-Q3". How can you tell with the bottom missing? Look at the 0 in "2015" - see how the NUMBER is narrower than an O or Q? "O2-O3" wouldn't make sense, but "Q2-Q3" does.
    Reply
  • JD88
    The better not expect anyone to pay for it. I find it hard to believe it could be much better than Windows 8.X in terms of performance. If they are expecting to put the Start Menu back in and charge a full upgrade fee than Microsoft is in worse trouble than I thought.
    Reply