What is Windows RT? Redmond, we have a problem
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http://www.winsupersite.com/article/windows8/windows-rt-redm...
Not very surprising, given the makeup of HN.
Perhaps it is easier to sell something called "Windows" to enterprise customers?
They should've left the PC OS alone, and build a different one for tablets and smartphones. Then whoever wants a phone or tablet with Microsoft's OS could've gotten that, and whoever still wanted a PC (the vast majority of people right now) would've gotten an OS made specifically for PC's.
But of course they would've needed to charge more reasonable prices for these licenses, too, not the ridiculous $100 amount they charge for a Windows RT license right now. And Microsoft has always been afraid of cannibalizing itself with a cheaper product of their own, even if that product would ultimately be part of a much larger, higher volume market.
Either way, they can't go around charging $100-$200 for OS licenses anymore, when there's a vast market of Android devices out there that come with a virtually free OS, and with the increasingly popular Macs that require only $29 for the new version of Mac OS X.
Splitting the Desktop OS with a Surface OS throws out any advantage Microsoft has with Windows. Combining them ensures a large user base for the app marketplace.
Whenever I see Windows RT, I think "Reduced Technology".
Jokes aside, I won't be developing for the next Windows because WinRT development still looks like a painful process.
Edit: fix freaking iPad auto correct typos.
Deciding what to do with the large screen real estate is challenging though. There's no chrome and the entire screen needs to be filled in with an app's components. Without a designer working, it's very difficult to put together a nice looking app.
On the design challenge I'll give you a tip. Fill the screen with content. If you don't have enough of it, create new views. I'll give you an example: imagine the main output for your app is some tabbed data; instead of showing as it is plot some graphs and add some buttons to flip the view to reveal the data. The key is to think visually.
The "Built on NT technology" boot screen does not mean "Built on New Technology technology".
- 'Windows 8' is Microsoft's next version of Windows! It uses the shiny new Metro UI. You install apps from the Windows App Store (or whatever they call it).
- 'Windows 8+' is a special version of Windows 8 that can run apps written for older versions of Windows.
Both versions of Windows 8 support Office!*
* For Windows 8 vanilla, re-skin the Office apps so they look slightly more like Metro, or at least so they don't look like Windows 7 desktop apps. Hide the fact that they're running in the desktop environment. Include Outlook.
I had no idea that if you just bought Windows 8 you couldn't run older software, but had to have RT.... or am I backwards?
EDIT: Googled. RT is the restricted version where you can only install apps from the new Windows Store.
Do they themselves even know what the design is called now? Even big open source projects are more consistant than this.
Given that, it doesn't make sense to call them two different things since their only differentiating factor is whether they run "old"-style apps.
Why on Earth would they?
They have complex product lines tailored around a B2B strategy. Their customers need time to test the product. There was a "consumer preview" version for download. There was a "Release to Manufacturing" version for download. The nature of their business is to roll out products with no-surprises. Microsoft is releasing the product with fanfare, but minimizing drama.
The pile of FUD is built upon an edge cases.
People with a library of disks are the exception in the age of the internet. For those who haven't noticed, Macbooks don't come with a DVD drive anymore.
I suspect that few people will anticipate running existing Windows software on ARM devices. Most won't. For the same reasons people don't expect to run Photoshop on an iPad or AutoCad on a Windows Phone - most people don't run much on their devices other than what is pre-installed and what they download directly to it. I also suspect that Microsoft has mined it's huge trove of data, and concluded that this is the case.
Consumers will not expect to run Windows software on ARM devices because they don't know what ARM devices are. What they will expect is that something that is called Windows and comes from Microsoft does indeed run Windows software.
Not exactly, both devices may look similar, and be called Surface, but they are two different devices, with very different hardware. That probably makes everything much more complicated.
One is a little bit higher speced, but other than that the only real difference is the CPU architecture, which is really nothing that any consumer should have to think about.
Different storage, different screen, different architecture, different battery life, different capabilities (run x86 vs Metro-only), and yet you fail to see that they are very different...
> The issue is that Microsoft is selling the same device with two different operating systems.
How can you call it "the same device", when everything is different, and they are targeted for different people?
I'll tell you what happened to me last week. I was talking to a friend of mine who is a dentist (he was showing me his new dental office). He told me that he wanted to buy a new Windows Tablet, so he could keep using the software he uses today in his dental office. He read about the new tablets, and wanted to buy a $500 Surface. I warned him that those $500 tablets won't run his software (a desktop application) and he seemed to be really confused about why a Windows tablet won't run a program he currently uses in a "Windows PC". I had to explain him that the lower-cost Surface running Windows RT is similar to an iPad, and that what he really wants is the higher-cost Surface running Windows 8.
So, when you say: >the only real difference is the CPU architecture, which is really nothing that any consumer should have to think about., You are very wrong, they NEED to understand that before they buy the device. Otherwise, a lot of people will be very disappointed.
Everything is different? These are two tablets with almost the same name, presented on the same web page next to each other and hence targeting the same people. They look almost identical. They have exactly the same screen size and aspect ratio. Same types of connectivity as well. One is higher specced than the other. More storage, more memory, faster CPU and a few other details. These are clearly two variants of the same device.
And Microsoft itself has made it very clear what the main difference is: Some obscure sub division within their Windows OS lineup. Take away "RT" and "8 Pro" and the names are identical.
It's as if Apple was offering two versions of the iPad, one running iOS and another one running Mac OS.
People expect their computers to run Office. They will.
People expect their computers to run Facebook. They will.
People expect their computers to run email. They will.
The Geek Squad will say, "Windows RT is not backward compatible, but it includes Office, Facebook, and email."
Mom will get it.
I hope MS will come up with some kind of "cross-over coupon" for those who brought RT thinking it was a full version of the OS with Office included (which is why people are buying it). Cause if not, there are gonna be some VERY pissed off customers.
Go to Best Buy, Future Shop, Radio Shack (The Source)...heck, even visit a Microsoft store and ask the "horrific, unexplainable, daunting" question: "What is the difference between Windows RT and Windows?
You will "shockingly" get a pretty simple answer: Windows for low-end devices, containing only the new interface and can only run apps available on the marketplace.
I think we need to have a little more faith that consumers aren't complete morons, and if this little dilemma causes a major issue...well, it will probably save MS money because consumers will be calling Apple tech support instead.
Edit: No complaints yet, but I'm not calling Apple consumers morons - I mean Apple doesn't have the obfuscated product line to confuse consumers.
RT is iOS. 8 is OSX. Maybe the confusion will go away if you relate it to Apple's products?
People need to be shaken, this has been the huge motive for Windows 8 all along - full OS on tablets. Windows RT is an unfortunate compromise for ARM processors.
Windows 8 is not Windows 7, it's the next version of Windows. This brings changes like it always has. Windows RT is not a traditional PC OS, it's Windows 8 with the desktop cut out. It runs Windows 8 apps but not Windows 8 programs. The easy way to say it is, Windows 8 is the successor to Windows 7, and Windows RT is a tablet OS. I'm not seeing how my statement is wrong.
Trust me, I like Windows 8 just as much as you seem to. Check my comment history to see for yourself. But the question is "how do we explain it easily to a clueless customer?" and the answer is "by not getting bogged down in semantics that would turn a clueless customer away." People will see once they start using it, the hard part is getting them to start using it.
Maybe calling it "Windows for Tablets" or some such would work, but that name is a bit cumbersome. Other variants that I can think of sound too negative.
You're the second person to reply saying that.
Well, you can't avoid compromises. The best you can do is choose which ones you will accept. And if you don't choose, then unexpected tradeoffs will be thrust upon you.
This customer confusion over RT is just fruit from that seed.
While I take post-pc to mean Post-Desktop (and possibly laptop), Apple has cleverly separated its Mac personal computer line from "PC"s, allowing it to sound the death knell for Windows PCs, but not for its "delightful" Mac computer line up.
Because that never happens here.
So mobile devices aren't computers?
If this is true, I think this is a major strategic mistake.
I (think) I know the answer, but that definition brings up more questions than it tries to answer.
If Windows 8 was designed so much for touch that even the desktop version of it shows a touch interface by default,
why don't they use Windows 8 on a surface??
So essentially they let Dell, Lenovo, HP, ... have a first go at building and selling tablets that can run the “normal” Windows 8. Surface then is just a reference implementation of sorts – it needs to be good and compelling and show off the platform particularly well. But it shouldn't make big sales (and the price point will probably be chosen to reflect that too) to avoid bad blood between the usual manufacturers and MS.
Ok, this I really, really, do not understand.
Playing media is a large use case of mobile devices. Why the heck would they sell a mobile device that cannot play movies?