Windows 8 and its form factor

Posted by Guidomq on April 15, 2012 10:24 am 10

I am particularly excited about windows 8 coming out and really look forward to it's release, I think it's awesome innovative and going in a whole new direction. Its innovative that brings touch interface in a different way, unlike android ,which is too close to IOS and ultimately not well unified, and IOS which is the bog standard or sort of default feeling of modern mobile devices.

Even with windows 8 having the apparent detriment of having the "old" desktop UI with the metro UI on one system is still shows a bold move by Microsoft to do something daring and different, which is so rare these days. Personally , I think it is beneficial to have the desktop as part of the system as it allows for a smooth transition which helps in grounding the user to the changes that have been made. But that's just my opinion.

Ultimately, windows 8 is for touch, or should I say METRO UI is for touch and thus the form factor is it is presented on should match. I really struggle to see it working with a mouse at all it just doesn't feel right. I am individual who does not have an iPad or an android tablet or any other tablet because I currently do not see the use, I feel they should not necessarily replace laptops and desktop computers but be on par in their functionality, when computing "moved" from desktops to laptops, they were not as significantly different as tablets are to laptops these days and I think that is unnecessarily so. Undoubtedly and evidently there is a market for this separate from factor ,the tablet, thus having three "devices" laptop, tablet and phone. which each have their own use, and aren't unified hardware. But for a lot of people ,I presume, like minded as me, spending £400 (I'm from England) on an iPad and another £600 roughly on a good laptop seems, for the functionality when comparing the two items, seems excessive. Especially for what you get out of it the ability to carry a less weighty browser and some apps, then have to return to the laptop when doing word processing or writing a dissertation or using powerpoint or even just storing files and running heavier programs. Why not just have the two in one form factor that achieves both, I want to do everything on my tablet that I can do on my laptop and vice versa, I want the freedom to choose what I can do with it and not be limited or reduced to some subsidiary version of word processing when writing an essay, on a tablet and equally not have to have the whole laptop and keyboard when I'm just on facebook.

Thus i think windows 8 manufactures have an opportunity to capture this type of consumer ,who make up a large proportion of the market, by combining the laptop and the tablet in one form factor, much like the Asus transformer prime. I think that is the perfect form factor windows 8. With intel already postulating laptops with touch screens (http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OKMAVA4bUWM) it is not that far removed from a laptop with a touch screen to have one that functions the same but simply has a removable screen therefore becoming a tablet, this could even run WOA version of windows 8 when not attached to the keyboard/ base.

With ultrabooks and laptops getting thinner as with tablets getting thinner this only seems logical, it's the perfect form factor that fits in perfectly with windows 8. This has already been tried with lenovo, with one of their models where the screen detached and ran an lunix based OS when detached then windows 7 when attached.(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhSXqY_kcXc) this concept, with obviously a better design, would be perfect for windows 8. I hope this is something that companies do not shy from trying and using as part of their windows 8 models because I feel it would be some innovation, which seems to be quite rare these days, except for apple bringing out new screen resolutions every couple of years, of course.

Thanks for taking the time