Windows 10 : All the new features and changes from Windows 8

Windows 10 running on different screen size 

Microsoft has unveiled Windows 10 — not Windows 9, but Windows 10. The launch event in San Francisco was mostly what we expected: Microsoft wants to make Windows 10 a killer OS for all of those disaffected mouse-and-keyboard users — both normal Desktop users like you and I, and also the big enterprise customers who were rather displeased with Windows 8′s Metro interface.

The Windows 10 Technical Preview was released in Today. The procedure to download Windows 10 Technical Preview is here. Read on to find out about Windows 10′s new features and changes from Windows 8.

For some smaller details, you may want to see our story covering the Windows 10 unveil. Over time we will update this story so that it’s the definitive source of Windows 10 changes and features.

Windows 10 for desktop and laptop users

After the very poor response to Windows 8, and the bitter taste it left in the mouths of millions of users, Windows 10 is a very important release for Microsoft. On the one hand, it needs to rectify Windows 8′s wrongs and offer normal PC users a reason to upgrade from Windows XP or 7. On the other hand, Microsoft continues to lose ground in the mobile sector as well. Windows 10 will actually have to be the jack of all trades, rather than Windows 8′s rather ignominious status as the master of none. How will Microsoft do this? Well, let’s take a look.

The Start menu returns. After a few years of claiming that the Metro-style Start screen was just as good for mouse-and-keyboard use as touchscreen use, Microsoft has finally backed down. Windows 10 will have a Start menu on the Desktop; the left side will look a lot like the standard Windows 7 Start menu, but the right side will have the option of being populated with Metro-style live tiles. The left side of the menu will adopt a new Metro-like look, too — though you may be able to configure it to look like the good ol’ Windows 7 Start menu.

Virtual desktops. In Windows 10, you will have the option of using virtual desktops. Right now you just have one desktop per monitor — but with virtual desktops, you can switch between as many desktops as you like. This is a popular power user feature that has been present on some Linux window managers and via third-party Windows tools for years — but now it’ll be native in Windows 10.

Metro apps on the Desktop. Rather than forcing you into the full-screen Metro interface, Windows 10 will let you run Metro apps on the Desktop in a window. In theory this will mean that mouse-and-keyboard users might now actually use Metro apps, which in turn might kickstart the arrival of some better apps in the Windows Store. Or not.

Windows 10 Desktop, showing a new, very flat Explorer (note the new icon too)

Desktop interface overhaul. It’s not entirely clear yet, but it seems the Windows 10 Desktop will receive a graphical overhaul, to make it even flatter. The leaked Windows 10 Technical Preview shows some flatter icons and thinner window borders — and I suspect we’ll see some further UI changes in later preview builds. (If you recall, the first Windows 8 Developer Preview still looked a lot like Windows 7, and became more flat and less opaque as the development process went on.) Curiously, there does appear to be a drop shadow behind the Explorer window in the Windows 10 screenshot above — Windows 8 got rid of a lot of shadows, so it would be interesting if they made a return.

A new Task View button. Windows 10 has a new button (and Alt-Tab menu it seems) that pops up the Task View interface. It’s meant to improve the multitasking experience for novice users. It basically looks like an improved version of the “stacked cards” view from Windows Vista and 7, which you see if you hit Windows-Tab.

Windows 10 Task View and improved snapping

Improved snapping. The Snap function is also being improved, so that windows can be easily tiled horizontally and vertically. It seems this also ties into the Task View interface, too.

The Metro interface may be removed. In the last few months, there has been rumblings from Redmond that the Windows 10 experience might be formally split in two: A Metro-only experience for touchscreen/tablet users, and a Desktop-only experience for mouse-and-keyboard users. One of the biggest complaints of Windows 8 is the way it forces you into the Metro interface when you’re using a mouse and keyboard, and the Desktop interface when you’re using a touchscreen. It isn’t clear if the Metro interface will be removed entirely from “Windows 10 for the Desktop” — more realistically, to cater for users of hybrids and touchscreen laptops, there’ll just be a check box somewhere for “never show me the Metro interface.”

Lots of other tweaks to the Windows 10 Desktop. In addition to all of the above, the Charms bar is also being removed (from the Desktop interface at least; it might hang around on touchscreen devices). The Technical Preview has a Notifications panel that pops up from the bottom right corner (video above), though I don’t think this is its final format or placement. There will also likely be tweaks for multi-monitor and high-res (hi-dpi) setups, too.

Windows 10 for touchscreen tablet/hybrid users

So far, we know relatively little about the Windows 10 experience for tablet, touchscreen, and hybrid users. It is likely that the Desktop will be removed (or at least made very hard to access) so that touchscreen users only have to interact with the Metro interface. It would make sense if Microsoft made it so tablet/touchscreen users never had to venture out to the Desktop to access the Registry Editor or Control Panel (both of which are hard to use without a mouse and keyboard).

Here are some other possible tweaks to the Metro side of things:

The Cortana digital assistant is making the jump from Windows Phone. Cortana, Microsoft’s answer to Siri, will reportedly be coming to Windows 10. She will probably be accessible from both the Desktop and Metro, but presumably her ability to understand natural language will be more useful for people on the move, or without a keyboard. If Cortana is capable of understanding (and executing) complex filters, she could be a very useful addition to Windows 10. (Imagine being able to say “Cortana, show me all of my photos from my 2011 trip to Mexico.”)

Start screen tweaks. While the Start screen will still look much the same in Windows 10, many of its elements will be tweaked. Live tiles — the big, resizable icons that show updates and notifications — will be reportedly be upgraded, so that you can actually use some features of an app from the tile, without having to open it up. Live folders from Windows Phone 8.1 Update 1 may also make the jump to Windows 10.

Notifications. While the leaked Technical Preview has a Notifications tray on the Desktop, I suspect the final version of Windows 10 will have some kind of Notifications panel in the Metro interface as well — probably resembling the Notifications panel from Windows Phone 8.

One Windows: Windows for all, Windows Phone, etc.

Windows 10: Other general updates, tweaks, and rumors

In addition to forward-facing UI changes to the Desktop and Metro, Windows 10 will of course have lots of under-the-hood changes. The most notable so far seems to be one-click upgrading: With Windows 10, upgrading to the next version (Windows 10.1, Windows 11) should be a simple matter of clicking one button.

Will Windows 10 be the last major version of Windows? Coincidentally, the change to a one-click upgrade cycle also suggests that Windows 10 will be the last major version of Windows (at least for a while). Microsoft has been trying to shift its sizable bulk towards a faster release cycle over the past couple of years, so that Windows and Windows Phone can evolve more rapidly — just like iOS, Android, and OS X. One-click upgrades would be a sure sign that Windows 10 is moving away from major overhauls and towards smaller, iterative updates like OS X.

Will Windows 10 be free? There is a persistent rumor that Windows 10 will a free upgrade for Windows 8 and 8.1 users. Most recently, the head of Microsoft in Indonesia reportedly confirmed this with a website called Detik. There is also a rumor that Microsoft will offer some kind of carrot to get Windows XP users to upgrade from their 13-year-old operating system. In both cases, I think it’s wishful thinking that Windows 10 will be free — Microsoft derives a lot of its money from Windows licensing — but it might be heavily discounted in some special cases. At the Windows 10 unveil event, there was no mention of pricing at all.

Updated: The staging site for the Windows Technical Preview download page was discovered over the weekend. As you can see in the screenshot below, there’s no mention of “9″ at all.

Universal Windows apps. In theory, we should begin to see the arrival of truly universal Windows/Windows Phone apps on Windows 10. It still isn’t entirely clear what Microsoft’s vision for universal apps is, but I suspect we’ll hear more about it at the September 30 event. The idea of buying a single app and running it across all of your Microsoft devices (including the Xbox One) is rather sweet, but I think it depends on…

At the Windows 10 unveil, Microsoft made it very clear that it’s working on a single platform that will span every device type and screen size — from 4 inches to 80 inches. Microsoft is all-in on the “universal app” idea, where you find, buy, and update all of your apps from a single location. Because of the common platform, developers will be able to write apps that run on all Windows 10 devices.

… the merger of Windows Phone and Windows RT. So far, despite the leak of the Windows 10 Technical Preview a few weeks ago, we know very little about the Metro interface. One possibility is that the Windows 10 Technical Preview is actually just for mouse and keyboard users, and that Microsoft is working on another preview build for mobile devices. This ties in neatly with a rumor that Microsoft is currently working on merging Windows Phone with Windows RT.

Why is it called Windows 10? We saved the best question ’til last. Why did Microsoft skip Windows 9? When asked at the Windows 10 event, Microsoft refused to answer, instead saying something along the lines of: “When you see how awesome Windows 10 is, you’ll see why we called it Windows 10.” I doubt even Microsoft knows why it’s called Windows 10. I really, really hope it has nothing to do with Microsoft wanting to maintain parity with Apple’s Mac OS X.

We’re sure there will also be lots of other underlying improvements to Windows 10 – little tweaks, support for new kinds of hardware, improved high-DPI support — but we won’t discover them until we actually get our hands on the Windows 10 Technical Preview.