I'm not saying that's the only reason, it just kind of makes sense to hedge your bets. If people don't warm to W10 by offering it as a free upgrade in the first year they can prevent it effecting past years profits, if people flock to it then that's also good for Microsoft as like you point out they can monetise those users via the Windows Store and other stuff. Seems like a win/win scenario to offer it for free.
Greetings! No trick, its a frequent practice in accounting. The revenue or expense should be recognized at the proper time, regardless on when the actual money changes hand. In Microsofts case it would be a nightmare to make all the changes for past years.
I think that Microsoft is past hedging their bets; this is the equivalent of pushing all their chips to the centre of the poker table. They have to make this work. Windows 10 offers developers the promise of one-app-to-rule-them-all (and in the ecosystem bind them): write once, cover all devices from PCs to tablets to mobiles. That is an attractive offer only if there are users actually using Windows 10 PCs, tablets and mobiles. So Windows 10 has to be pushed everywhere, Android-style. If they pull it off, they're quids in. There's a universal market for devs, and there is subscription-based cloud services: steady renewable income. Stock already went up 10% on cloud business performance alone. Moreover, $2100,-- tickets for this year's /Build/ conference were sold out in 45 minutes, whereas last year it took more than a day. People seem interested... An analyst on Cnet stated that Google has the attention spam of a 3-year old, and Apple thinks it is invulnerable. If Microsoft pulls it off, this could be as big as the launch of Windows 95 twenty years ago (I remember those days --it was wild! People --not geeks, but ordinary people-- queueing in shops and going crazy over an operating system. We've never seen that again). My worry however is that Microsoft has a painful habit of snatching defeat from the claws of victory.
like apple then? Well I took the plunge and installed this in a VM on the work computer to see how it fairs. First impressions are good. I absolutely despised W8 for the record. As soon as W10 opened i knew exactly where everything was and how to get there using conventional methods in windows. A big plus in my opinion! The icons look shocking though! Like a 2 year old has made them. I was able to map to the network drives the same way as W7 so another quick plus. Made some changes to keyboard types etc and again, very easy to find and set. I actually like where they have put the metro tiles now. A very good compromise! My 3 monitors were picked up without issue and I can quickly go from a single screen VM to a triple screen VM with 2 clicks. I like that! So far, first impressions are good. I will install a few programs I use at work to see if they are compatible but I am liking it so far! I just hope you can change the icons!
The icons are pretty naff, but they've changed a few times over the course of the build so hopefully they're just placeholders and they'll get better
yeah, thats what I am hoping. Good news is my work software installed without issue and the whole experience is rather pleasant!
To us non-accounting types it seems like a trick, to me revenue or expense should be counted when the money changed hands and not dependant on whether something is called an 'update' or 'upgrade' and regardless of how much those cost or don't cost. Sorry can't agree with you there. Any company or CEO would be crazy to make an all or nothing gamble, shareholders would run a mile. Welcome to the "modern" world of computers. More and more companies seem to be following this trend of tailoring icons and the way we work towards a more mobile friendly environment.
Here's hoping that they will improve the icons. Apple recognised the importance of hiring a graphic artist like Susan Kare for the Macintosh icons. Microsoft should do the same.
There's also a cool little video that shows how you can plug/wirelessly connect a Windows 10 mobile phone to a monitor/TV, hook up a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and use it like a full-fat PC, because its apps resize on the monitor to appear and function like desktop apps (this is a feature of the new W10 mobiles coming out, as it requires some extra processor grunt). http://www.neowin.net/news/windows-10-mobile-continuum-turns-your-phone-into-a-desktop-pc And you can still pick up and use the mobile to make/receive calls at the same time. How cool is that?!?
Is it just that i have a one track mind or does the "edge" name conjure up thoughts of something less technical for other people to?
http://gizmodo.com/windows-10-will-be-the-software-brains-behind-diy-arudi-1701221203 This excites me.
True, and them ditching WMC isn't exactly a surprise... it's not like they ever did anything with it... Hell have they touched it at all since it launched with XP MCE?
I downloaded it for free when I got Windows 8 upon its release. Between VLC and Winamp, I've never actually used Windows Media Center. As soon as I get around to purchasing a TV Tuner card for my media PC, I plan on installing XMBC to run things on that computer. In the meantime we just stream various television shows through Chrome.
Media centre is/was ok. I used it for quite a while with the media browser plugin to improve its appearance. I made the switch to xbmc a few years ago and haven't looked back. WMC could easily rival xbmc if MS had kept it updated, but they didn't, so it was already looking dated a number of years ago. The one place WMC has xbmc beat though, is its ease of setting up tuner cards, I've found xbmc very complicated on my admittedly ageing dvb tuner card (not that I actually use it with virgin/tivo).
