Microsoft revealed today some more details on its Windows 8 developments by discussing the improvements made to its new Task Manager. In a post to the Building Windows 8 blog, group program manager Ryan Haveson explained that the team assessed how people were currently using the Task Manager and then redesigned it with the focus of optimizing for the most common scenarios, using modern information design, and not removing functionality.
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‘Windows’ Stories
HP Making of Elite Tour 2011 Roundup [our complete Video tour of HP Houston campus]
Recently HP invited SlashGear and a handful of other USA-based publications as well as a few arms full of international publications to take a tour of their HP Elite PC testing facilities. What we got to see was no less than the harshest of tests on notebooks and desktop computers from their Elite line of computers, all of it in agonizingly complete detail. What we’ve got for you here, just incase you’ve missed anything, is a complete round-up of our tour. There’s also a couple of b-roll videos, one of them explaining some imploded buildings on campus, just for the fun of it.
BlueStacks App Player released: Run Android apps on Windows
BlueStacks has released its App Player alpha for Windows, allowing PCs and Windows-based tablets to not only run Android apps but, thanks to Cloud Connect, share software between the platforms. A free download, BlueStacks allows software coded for Android phones and tablets to run - either windowed or in full-screen - on Windows computers, with no modification to the original software.
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iPads less desired than Windows tablets, says study
According to new study by Boston Consulting Group, there's a surprising amount of interest in tablets running Microsoft's Windows operating system, more so than iPads. Sales figures for Windows tablet PCs versus iPads certainly don't support the survey results, but the interest is perhaps generated from Microsoft's recent preview of Windows 8, which won't be hitting the market until next year.
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Windows Phone 7.5 Mango Review [Video]
It’s time for the second coming of Windows Phone 7, a mobile OS that by all means deserves a fair shot at the global market share, but hasn’t quite risen to the ranks of iPhone or Android glory – at least not yet. What we’re going to do in this post is give the first really big refresh of Microsoft’s current mobile OS, Windows Phone 7.5 Mango, a good rundown and review. Because the vast majority of our readers are not yet Windows Phone users, I’ll be padding the review with some features that’ve already been in place for some time – but the focus will, indeed, be on the new list of upgrades as presented in this newest, tastiest flavoring of Windows Phone.
Samsung Series 7 all-in-one PC revealed
Today it's been announced by Samsung Electronics America that the Samsung Series 7 All-In-One PC does exist and will be coming out to the consumer market soon. This desktop computer will combine a minimalistic design profile at 16mm thin on a 23-inch display with advanced technology for work and play. You'll find an Intel Core i3 or Intel Core i5 processor inside with Windows 7 Home Premium backing you up until you get a taste of Windows 8 in the very near future - working great with this full-touch display. Last time we spoke of Series 7, it was the Central Station and the slate as well as the Chronos notebooks and their lovely displays, now we get to see all those magical components re-arranged into a cool all-in-one today!
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HP Making of Elite Tour kicks off with PC Spin-Off reassurance [Video]
This week we’ve been invited by HP to participate in their very first Making of Elite Tour. This tour is one where we get to see many moments in the process between HP creating a device in their Elite line and getting it ready for store shelves. That said, it was pretty obvious right off the bat what the first question on everybody’s mind would be given the recent news HP had for the world regarding the very sector of HP that we were about to dive into. Public Relations head Mike Hockey knew the situation and gave us a once-over before the questions were even asked.
Why the Windows 8 Tablet Market will dodge the iPad
Just this past week we learned for the first time, or rather confirmed for the first time, that Windows 8 would be made to work not only on devices so large as servers carrying massive amounts of data, but devices so small as a tablet PC. We got the chance to take a look at an early iteration of a Windows 8 tablet as provided by Samsung and we got a taste of what it would mean to be working in a fully optimized Windows-based tablet environment. What I’m seeing here is not simply another contender in the already well-dominated by Apple tablet market. I’m seeing a whole new door being opened up for operating systems to thrive in the keyboard-less touch-display world.
Windows 8 ready for Full HD tablets already in pipeline [Video]
Windows 8 paves the way for Full HD tablets, Microsoft has ensured, with execs hinting that high DPI (dots per inch) models are already being readied behind the scenes. Microsoft's BUILD conference may have started with a bang, in the shape of the big Windows 8 reveal, but there are tidbits aplenty from the sessions afterwards. The company has added native scaling support for Metro apps, istartedsomething reports, which Jensen Harris of the Windows User Experience team suggests is in preparation for 208 DPI slates and above.
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ViewSonic ViewPad 10pro Hands-on [Video] – Launch Time!
What you’re about to see is a video that actually contains a bit of hands-on time with three tablets, the ViewSonic ViewPad being the only one of the bunch we’d not yet gotten to see in-person before. The initial international launch of the tablet trio ViewSonic ViewPad 7X, 10pro, and 7E took place on the first of September, and this look at the set comes right beside the display-intensive company’s announcement of a release here in the USA. This isn’t the first time we’ve come across the 10pro for certain, the idea that a Windows 7 tablet would be able to also run Android being a rather enticing value proposition for developers. Have a look at what it’s all about and see if it’s the tablet for your dual-OS future.
Windows 8 focus on HTML5 not “legacy” Flash
Microsoft has followed in Apple's footsteps and distanced itself from Flash, putting its energies into HTML5 in Windows 8. The Windows 8 Metro IE10 browser - accessed through the touch-friendly interface - is designed to be plugin free, the Windows engineering team suggests, relying mostly on HTML5. "Providing compatibility with legacy plug-in technologies" the team argues, "would detract from, rather than improve, the consumer experience of browsing in the Metro style UI."
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Microsoft talks Xbox LIVE on Windows 8
Microsoft has been talking more about its plans to integrate Xbox LIVE into Windows 8, pulling together its PC and gaming divisions as well as streaming entertainment. Spokesperson Major Nelson confirmed to developers at BUILD this week that they would be able to create Windows 8 specific titles that hook into the same Xbox LIVE systems as their Xbox 360 counterparts.
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