previews

Businesses looking to support Windows 8 ARM tablets may find a few features missing in action.

Ahead of today's launch of the beta dubbed the Windows 8 Consumer Preview, Microsoft has revealed that certain features used to manage Windows-based devices won't be available for the ARM platform.

"ARM-based tablets running Windows 8 are ideal for workers who are constantly on the go and need a long-lasting battery, Microsoft said in its Windows 8 Consumer Preview Product Guide for Business document released today.

"ARM-based tablets use less power than 32-bit and 64-bit devices and workers can rely … Read more

Windows 8 will hit the market in the fourth quarter, according to a Fujitsu product road map.

Touting its upcoming notebooks and tablets in a press conference yesterday, the company displayed one slide that showed a Win8 launch destined for "Q4 2012." Revealed by Italian blogging site NetbookItalia (English translation), the slide also showed a tablet with a Metro user interface, suggesting that Fujitsu is prepping a Windows 8 tablet for the same time frame.

In fact, as some reports have pointed out, the slide may actually be referring specifically to the debut of the Fujitsu tablet, meaning … Read more

The next beta of Windows 8 will apparently give us a healthy dose of Metro apps, whether we want them or not.

Microsoft plans to release the Windows 8 Consumer Preview--basically, a pre-release version of the new OS available to anyone who wants to download it--on February 29. Microsoft is reportedly finalizing the Metro apps that will be bundled with the new OS. Citing "sources familiar with Microsoft's plans," the Verge revealed the current list as:

These are just the apps known so far, so there could … Read more

Windows users can grab some Angry Birds and a host of other games when Microsoft's Windows Store opens for business later this month.

The new store is slated to launch in preview mode by the end of February at the same time the Windows 8 Consumer Preview debuts.

Citing a "source familiar with Microsoft's plans," The Verge has spilled the beans on which games will be among the first titles to pop up in the store. Though Pinball and Solitaire will automatically come with the Windows 8 Consumer Preview, several other games will be available for … Read more

Windows 8 may kill the Start menu button, the Super Bowl spawned tons o' tweets, and Facebook admits that deleted photos can still be accessed.

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded:

Microsoft has already cooked up a special Bing page tempting users to check out its upcoming Windows 8 "Consumer Preview."

The first clue is the video of a betta fish swimming from one edge of the screen to the other. Thought of as Microsoft's mascot for beta versions of new operating systems, that particular fish swam its way onto the desktop of the beta for Windows 7 in 2009.

But other more obvious clues are the hot spots and links scattered across the screen that refer specifically to Windows 8 Consumer Preview. Since the page is still … Read more

Say goodbye to the Windows start button. Microsoft has gotten rid of it from the latest build of Windows 8.

Hitting the Web over the weekend, screenshots of the new Windows 8 build display the "super bar," but without the start button orb on the left, according to The Verge. Build 8220 will be the final version released before the beta, now known as the Consumer Preview, debuts before the end of the month.

Until its untimely (or timely) death, the Windows 8 start button located in the Metro UI offered access to the search, share, devices, and … Read more

Adobe Systems has released a second advance look at Photoshop CS6 that shows new work to give a hardware boost to the image-editing software.

The graphics processing unit (GPU) speeds the Liquify tool, which lets people smear images in a finger-painting way, according to a Zorana Gee, a Photoshop product manager. She demonstrated the change in a YouTube video, the second in what looks to be a series of previews of the software. An earlier Photoshop CS6 preview showed new raw image editing tools adopted from the Lightroom 4 beta, a darker user interface, and improvements to brush size selection. … Read more

Microsoft is already testing the waters with the next version of its popular Office suite.

Office 15 officially made its debut as a technical preview yesterday, available to a small number of early testers who will provide feedback that can influence the final release.

And though the technical preview program is already full, a beta of the new Office suite will surface for everyone to play with later in the summer.

A Microsoft blog posted yesterday by PJ Hough, corporate vice president of the Microsoft Office Division, spilled very few beans about the new suite codenamed Office 15. And those … Read more