Report: Windows 9 Set for April 2015 Release, Microsoft Likens Windows 8 to Vista

Windows 8.1 update expected in April

posted by Vivek Pal in Windows

Microsoft launched its Windows 8 operating system in 2012. Windows 8.1 was released last year, free of charge, and aimed to fix some of the issues that customers had with the original release. However, Microsoft is already moving forward with the next version of its OS and is looking to distance itself from the Windows 8.x name as soon as possible according to Paul Thurrott.
 

Thurrott writes:
 

Windows 8 is tanking harder than Microsoft is comfortable discussing in public, and the latest release, Windows 8.1, which is a substantial and free upgrade with major improvements over the original release, is in use on less than 25 million PCs at the moment. That's a disaster, and Threshold needs to strike a better balance between meeting the needs of over a billion traditional PC users while enticing users to adopt this new Windows on new types of personal computing devices.

The next OS will reportedly be called Windows 9 and is tipped to launch in April 2015. The new OS is in currently in development under the codename "Threshold" and the first tidbits about the OS will be discussed during the Microsoft BUILD conference in April 2014.

Some details of Threshold have surfaced including the fact that the Start menu will return, it will mark the introduction of Metro 2.0, and that the OS will be able to run Metro-style apps on the desktop with desktop apps.

Microsoft is also tipped to be trotting out the latest update to Windows 8.1 at BUILD in April. That update is said to be substantial and offered to Windows 8.1 users [again] for free.

Thurrott reports that one of the most interesting things about Threshold is that it casts Windows 8 in with Vista as an OS that just didn’t click with consumers. Source: WinSuperSite