windows8

Windows Blue is aimed at Intel 'Haswell' ultrabooks

Longer lasting Haswell ultrabooks are coming with Windows Blue.

Intel's upcoming Haswell chip will be tied to new technology coming with Windows Blue, according to a source close to Microsoft.

Haswell, due in June, is the next-generation mainstream Intel processor that will power ultrabooks and a variety of hybrids that straddle tablet and laptop designs.

Intel's silicon-level Haswell technology will result in "the single largest generation-to-generation battery life improvement in Intel history," according to a recent statement from Intel CEO Paul Otellni.

But Windows Blue -- an update to Windows 8 that is expected to deliver … Read more

Microsoft ready to update Windows 8 built-in apps

It looks like Microsoft is indeed poised to update almost all its core, Microsoft-developed apps that shipped with Windows 8.

At the start of this month, I posted that Microsoft was expected to provide updates to everything from Windows Mail to Xbox Music sometime in March.

On March 22, Windows SuperSite editor Paul Thurrott discovered there is a stack of updates that are "installation ready" for Windows 8. These include:

Microsoft.BingTravel Microsoft.Camera Microsoft.Bing Microsoft.Reader Microsoft.BingNews Microsoft.windowsphotos (Photos) Microsoft.BingFinance Microsoft.microsoftskydrive Microsoft.XboxLiveGames Microsoft.ZuneVideo Microsoft.BingWeather Microsoft.ZuneMusic (Xbox Music) Microsoft.… Read more

Leaked benchmarks portend shift in Windows 8 'PC' design

The first benchmarks of Intel's upcoming "Haswell" Fourth-Generation Core processors have leaked. But asking how fast future Windows 8 PCs will be is probably the wrong question.

The Haswell chip that Tom's Hardware got a hold of and tested showed only modest central processing unit, or CPU, performance improvements over the latest hardware.

This would seem to indicate the future of Windows PCs -- which in this case means newfangled devices like Microsoft Surface and HP's Envy x2 -- isn't about the desktop anymore.

"The mobile space is where Intel's efforts should … Read more

Internet Explorer 10

Review: The story of Internet Explorer resembles nothing less than the "Ugly Duckling," a maligned and mocked bird that grew into something far more beautiful. Such is the case with Internet Explorer 10 and its roots as Internet Explorer 6.

Microsoft has improved its signature browser in fits and spurts coinciding often with major Windows upgrades over the past 10 years, but IE 10 is the winner that Microsoft fans have long been craving. Fast, standards-compliant, and even future-forward in some ways, Microsoft got it right with IE 10. Still, it has some drawbacks that keep it from … Read more

Microsoft offers developers $100 per Windows 8 app

Up until last year, it seemed to be an unwritten (or maybe written) policy that the Windows client team wouldn't pay developers to write apps for Windows 8.

But that edict seems to have been rescinded. Microsoft is now offering developers $100 for each Windows 8 and/or Windows Phone 8 app they write, up to a total of 10 apps per Store. This limited-time promotion -- which started March 8 and runs until June 30, 2013 -- is known as the "Keep the Cash" offer. (Participants must live within the 50 United States and be at … Read more

Get a Vizio CT14 ultrabook for $599, shipped

Quick update on the refurbished Apple EarPods deal I wrote about last week. Ordered: March 14. Arrived: March 18. Condition: indistinguishable from new. If you're interested, they're still available, though now priced a buck higher at $14.99 shipped.

In other news, I've decided life is too short -- and my eyes are too old -- to waste on an 11.6-inch screen, which is why I'm officially in the market for a new laptop. My HP Pavilion dm1z has served me fairly well, but it's just too small.

On the other hand, I don'… Read more

What does a great Windows 8 gaming laptop need?

A recent question from a reader brought up an issue we've been discussing around the office recently -- the lack of Windows 8 laptops that include both a touch screen and a high-end GPU. Our reader's question, excerpted below:

May I ask for your advice on purchasing a gaming PC? I'm considering the Alienware M14x, but the only thing holding me back is the absence of a touch screen and I can't seem to find powerful laptops with a touch screen. Do you think touch-screen laptops will soon become the standard?

It's true that the … Read more

Lenovo ThinkPad T431s: Thinner, coming in April

ThinkPad is as conservative a laptop design as there is, but that doesn't mean ThinkPads don't evolve.

Announced at Engadget Expand in San Francisco, the ThinkPad T431s is a slimmed-down version of the ThinkPad T series, a line of 14-inch laptops that, previous to the ThinkPad X1, were the thinnest in Lenovo's stable. The T431s may not be as sexy, but it's clearly absorbed some style points from the X1 Carbon: it weighs 3.6 pounds, is 0.82 inch thick, has a carbon-fiber top and magnesium undercarriage, and sports that same redesigned backlit island/chiclet … Read more

What's the best low-power Windows 8 tablet?

While there are some Windows 8 tablets that feature ultrabook-level performance, the majority of them use lower-power Intel Atom processors to keep costs down and battery life up.

Even though memories of the Intel Atom Netbook era may make one gun shy about using a low-power CPU, these systems all still run the full gamut of Windows 8 applications -- and even do a surprisingly good job at handling apps optimized for the Windows 8 experience, including IE10 and Netflix.

These are the Windows 8 "low-power" tablets, as we call them, that we've reviewed so far, all … Read more