One of the strangest things that I have heard recently is that Microsoft is porting their Windows operating system to the ARM platform. By itself, that wouldn't seem all that strange. ARM is clearly an up-and-coming platform for which many different companies are writing a ton of software. The strange thing about this move by the Redmond Washington giant is that the port is almost completely unnecessary.
ARM processors, while having made great strides recently, cannot compete with x86 class CPUs made by Intel, AMD, and VIA. This isn't a state secret. What's worse is that their current performance levels cannot handle the work load of even a modest Windows based PC. Windows itself is a behemoth that would likely cripple common ARM CPUs. Windows Phone 7, however, is already running on ARM CPUs, which makes it seem a bit odd that Microsoft would be porting their NT based line of operating systems to ARM. What's more interesting about this move is that Windows NT 5/6/7 do not have touch based UIs. The current UI (the same one that has existed in some form since Windows 95) is poorly suited to touch input, rendering the system almost worthless on most ARM based machines.
iOS and Linux have been successful on mobile platforms for a multitude of reasons. Chiefly among them is the UI they employ. The two mobile operating systems have user interfaces that work well with fingers and styluses. Also, let's note that Apple makes its own hardware, which makes the software cost a null point. Linux based mobile operating systems (MeeGo, Android, WebOS) are pretty much free for the taking. Windows will always cost an arm and a leg.
Everything that I have mentioned so far should make it rather obvious that Microsoft is an also ran in the mobile business of today. If Microsoft really wants to compete, I would recommend that they go ahead and move back to their Xenix roots, open source their UNIX-based platform, move their new mobile UI to that platform, and let the market dictate a winner. This would give MS a fighting chance in the mobile space, and their profitability would come in with offerings like a mobile office suite. A mobile office suite could also prove lucrative on platforms like Android, WebOS, and iOS.
I guess in the end that Microsoft is just too embedded in an old software paradigm that is proving increasingly dated. People do not want to pay the amount of money the Redmond is asking, and more importantly they want to be on platforms that offer something fresh, innovative, and easy to use. If anything, Microsoft's offerings are proving to be the antithesis of what customers are currently demanding.
6 comments:
"Windows will always cost an arm and a leg"
That's true. I just wonder if they would have ported their software, in case they had not purchased all those Novell patent.
But there's Windows 7 for Phones, I'm guessing not many of those phones run Intel? So surely it's not that big an effort.
On top of that Microsoft can't afford to give away the server market and that is where ARM is heading next where its power to performance ration is superior to current Intel/AMD offerings?
If makes every sense for them as an OS company to take this step.
Well, mango apollo, windows phone 7 is not an NT based OS, and as such it isn't quite what I am talking about. The next part of this that you missed is that while the server market is switching to ARM, it's also switching to less expensive software stacks. The companies that switch to ARM based servers are not Microsoft customers and likely never will be.
Also, the only advantage Windows has on the Intel platform over, well, just about anything else, is the large amount of desktop/professionnal/games software available. Since those software won't be available for the ARM release of Windows, I wonder why anyone would want that operating system. They already had the same problem with both PowerPC and Itanium releases of Windows, it's like they do not learn...
Thank you for being smug and patronising but what you cluelessly (yes I can be rude too) ignore is that if Microsoft don't have an OS in the sector and on the platform they can't get any of the market. They have to be in the game to play. Meaning they have to come to ARM.
@Pierre
And if there is Windows port that brings the Windows API to ARM why on earth won't the app's that run on those API be available. You actually point out another reason Microsoft have to be on that platform not a reason for them to ignore it.
In fact the worst thing that could happen is Microsoft actually produces something new and arguably innovative as a result of some of their research projects and it runs on ARM and it brings the Windows API. Lots of ifs but they can't afford to be at the party and really need to bring something good to it for once. (Which at a big jump to the Kinect they have for a change shown they can do.)
Apart from trying to get some atention (they miss it a lot) , i think they are afraid of ARM getting into the desktop for thin terminals, , i can imagine banks and a lot of companies that need simple, low cost and low power consuming terminals, that could be a place where ARM could find a place and right now there is one main solution for ARM only and is not from Redmond.
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