The Future of Windows

The next major version of Windows—named Vista—is scheduled for release sometime in 2006. It promises a new way to look at computer security, a 3-D graphics desktop and a re-engineered storage system to make finding all of your files more intuitive.

Just now in beta release—many of Vista ’s features are subject to change—its not a bad idea look at the road ahead and get a sense of what we’ll need to do to get ready for this new operating system (OS). As always with a major Windows’ release, users at home or in small office/home office (SOHO) settings will have to weigh the costs of implementation versus the benefits.

Some Major Features of Longhorn

Its apparent, looking at Microsoft’s pricing structure for Windows XP and Windows 2000, that they’ve found a price point they like; expect to pay anywhere from $90 to $100 USD for a “Home” edition and closer to $200 for the “Professional” version of Vista. Pricewise, we expect no substantial changes.

So, let’s look at some of the features promised by Vista, the better to make our decision.

  • Aero: Codename for Windows new “user experience”, which attempts to move users further away from the older “desktop” paradigm for Windows 9X and towards what Microsoft describes as a “task-based” interface—like Windows XP, only more so. Instead of looking for files and folders in “file cabinets”, you’ll look at specific jobs you wish to accomplish.
  • Avalon: The new look for the Windows desktop; using 3-D hardware acceleration—not unlike certain video games—it is the first thing you’ll notice about Longhorn. This interface will require more graphics power than offered by motherboards with integrated graphics chips. A dedicated AGP video card, with at least 64MB of video RAM, would appear to be a minimum configuration at this stage.
  • Sidebar: Running on the right of your screen by default (one assumes you can move it to the left if you wish), the sidebar features dynamic and/or streaming content from both your hard drive and from the Web.
  • WinFS: Windows Future Storage is perhaps the most exciting technology in all of Vista and apparently one of the more difficult to implement. As Paul Therrott’s SuperSite for Windows describes it: “This storage engine builds on NTFS and will abstract physical file locations from the user and allow for the sorts of complex data searching that are impossible today. For example, today, your email messages, contacts, Word documents, and music files are all completely separate. That won't be the case in Longhorn.”
  • Setup: Current plans call for an installation routine lasting no more than 15 minutes; in our experience, Windows XP takes 40 to 50 minutes to install (depending on various hardware factors).
  • Palladium: Requiring special hardware—enhanced CPUs and security chips on the motherboard—Palladium promises to protect your PC’s data against viruses and trojans, spammers and other nefarious malware, all within a set of user-defined parameters.
    For a more detailed look at Vista’s features and what they mean, see the links at the end of this article.

Conclusion

It’s too soon to tell what impact Vista will have on all of us. We’ve heard grand (and grandiose) plans from Microsoft before, though let us also note that this type of vaporware (products promised, but never delivered) is common throughout the software industry.

The encouraging news is that Microsoft is not trying to rush this OS out the door, as they have with previous, buggy versions of Windows 9X. Expect to see more features added and subtracted before the final release in 2006.

Until then, we’ll all just have to wait and see what happens next.

Update:

As it happens, several of the above key features promised for a final release of Vista—notably WinFS among others—have been already been postponed until after release or dropped altogether.

The other thing to consider is Windows XP—by the time Vista is released in late 2006, XP will have been on people's desktops for close to seven years. Since the release of Service Pack 2, the OS has been pretty stable and quite a bit more secure. That being the case, Microsoft is gonna have to come up with some pretty compelling reasons to upgrade; with those key features deferred or removed, that won't be an easy sell.

Want to know more?

Paul Thurrott's SuperSite for Windows
Longhorn Becomes Shorthorn
The History of Windows
Longhorn Blogs

Updated: December 14, 2005