Microsoft showed us
the final version of Windows 10 in an event yesterday, and the roll-out will
begin later this year. But what’s new in Microsoft’s latest OS? We take a
quick look at the biggest and most important features of Windows 10.
Free, free, free: For the first time ever, Windows 10 will be a free upgrade for Windows 7, Windows 8.1
and Windows Phone 8.1 users.
As we noted here, Microsoft has taken a cue out of Apple’s book which has been
given OS X and iOS upgrades away for free, to ensure that users don’t have to
shell out money for an OS.
If your PC or laptop is
running Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 and your Windows phone has the Windows Phone
8.1 OS, you will get a free upgrade to the latest version of Windows 10 –
in the first year.
What is not clear is if
users on laptop and desktops will have to pay after the first year. In an age,
where free OS and software is the new mantra, Microsoft has taken the right
step by making Windows 10 free of cost. Hopefully the free upgrade will
continue after year one as well.
No more Windows Phone, it’s all the same: Unity across operating
systems is something that Apple and Google have been going on about for
sometime and Microsoft also clearly believes that this is the way forward.
What this
also means, is that the name ‘Windows Phone OS’ is actually defunct. Also
tablet users can forget the horror of having to deal with something like a new
Windows RT on their devices, which received terrible user feedback.
Windows 10 will ensure
that desktops, mobiles, laptops, tablets, 2-in-1 devices will all run the same
Windows 10 OS, which will be optimised based on the platform. This is great
news for those who are heavily invested in the Windows eco-system and for app
developers who won’t have to create a separate app for mobile or tablet.
Bigger Start Menu, Action Centre: There have been some
improvements thanks to feedback from testers of the Windows Insider program.
The Start Menu is now available in full screen instead of the limited in
Windows 8.1. The Action Centre has quick buttons to switch Wi-fi and Bluetooth
on or off.
There is a new
Notification Centre which is seen above the Action Centre and notifications in
these will be synced across devices. The Notification centre brings you updates
and alerts from your email, weather, news sources you’ve subscribed to and it
also has Cortana built in.
The Control Panel and
Settings menu have been merged into a single folder. Also when using a 2-in-1,
when you go from a desktop mode to a tablet mode, users will be prompted if
they want to switch to tablet mode.
Cortana for Windows: Microsoft has gone a step ahead of Apple by bringing its
personal voice-assistant Cortana to all Windows 10 devices, including desktops
and laptops, which is a massive plus point.
On the desktop, Cortana
will be seen as a search box located beside the Start button. Cortana now
supports 7 languages and can speak in impersonations as well. You can also ask
Cortana to open apps on your desktop such as PowerPoint or Word. You can also
dictate emails in Outlook using Cortana and send them by voice commands.
No comments:
Post a Comment