Microsoft confirms Windows 10Xs demise
Microsoft confirms Windows 10X's demise, quickly teases 'significant update' to Windows 10
Microsoft admitted last week that it would not launch Windows 10X — the concept operating system it first announced in 2019 and months later rebranded as a competitor to Chrome OS.
The admission corroborated a report earlier this month by Petri.com, which claimed that 10X "will almost certainly never arrive" based on "people familiar with the company's plans."
Microsoft later confirmed that the report was accurate.
"Rather than bringing a product called Windows 10X to market in 2021 as originally planned, we're leveraging lessons learned along the way and accelerating the integration of critical foundational 10X technology into other parts of Windows and products at the company," according to John Cable on May 18.
Cable buried the 10X news in the second half of its announcement of the launch of Windows 10 21H1 the following day.
Windows Parts 'R Us
Microsoft is not known for refuting rumors, but for ignoring reports sourced from within the organization, particularly those that rely on the company's inner workings, circumstantial evidence, and/or outright speculation, as many do. Even rarer are the occasions when Microsoft admits to setbacks in previously announced plans.
There is nothing surprising about that at all. Industry chit-chat is akin to arcade Whack-a-Mole, and confirming errors is, at best, embarrassing, and at worst, potentially detrimental to the stock price.
Windows 10X was announced in October 2019 as "the best of Windows 10 built to enable unique experiences on multi-posture dual-screen PCs." It was to power a new hardware category of two-screen, foldable tablet-notebook hybrids designed by Microsoft and its partners.
Microsoft's entry, the Surface Neo, was subsequently withdrawn.
Microsoft spun a different story in May 2020, claiming that the "world is a very different place than it was last October when we shared our vision for a new category of dual-screen Windows devices" — presumably referring to the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent remote working and remote schooling — the new OS would be used to "pivot our focus toward single-screen Windows 10X devices." That sounded to many like an invitation to compete with Chrome OS and Chromebooks.
Thus, the most recent 10X declaration was just the latest in a series of expectation resets. Rather than a new streamlined operating system running on novel hardware or emphasizing cloud computing, Windows 10X would be cannibalized for parts — digitally chop-shopped — with some components allocated to Windows 10 and others, presumably, scrapped entirely.
Naturally, Microsoft stated it differently.
"After a year of research and conversations with customers, we realized that the technology in Windows 10X could be used in more ways and serve more customers than we initially imagined," Cable asserted. "We determined that the 10X technology should not be limited to a select group of customers."
That's some serious chutzpah — telling customers just 19 months after discussing Windows 10X that the project, while dead, would live on as salvage handed to its Windows 10 ancestor because, well, it was the right thing to do.
There is no doubt that circumstances have changed since the introduction of 10X. The fact that everyone now understands the term "pandemic" and has memorized its definition demonstrates this. Additionally, it is almost certain that customers surveyed by Microsoft indicated they had more pressing concerns than showing interest in a new operating system during the crisis. After being rejected, Microsoft decided to offer customers 10X anyway, albeit in fragments.
Microsoft, it appears, will not stop there.
Down with Windows 10! Up with Windows ... what?
Earlier this week, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella teased future Windows news with excerpts from a 30-minute recorded keynote for the company's Build developer conference. "And we're about to share one of the most significant Windows updates in the last decade," Nadella added. "We look forward to sharing more information with you very soon."
What that will be is unknown, although reports have surfaced of a reimagining of the Windows user interface (UI) and user experience (UX), as well as of a June event at which Microsoft may unveil changes more sweeping than those introduced in 2015 with the launch of Windows 10.
It's more than a little strange that, just days after admitting the impracticality of one proposed OS evolution, Microsoft's CEO promised another. (To be fair, by prefacing news of "one of the most significant updates" with the 10X admission, Microsoft effectively eliminated speculation that Nadella's promised refresh would be Windows 10X.)
However, it is entirely in Microsoft's DNA to push forward with whatever Windows plans it has, whether it is a simple UI/UX overhaul or something more significant, such as the early abandonment of Windows 10, which was dubbed the "last Windows ever" by its maker, in favor of a Windows 11 or 2022 successor later this year. (Unsurprisingly, Microsoft has not uttered the "last Windows" line in years.) Microsoft has always attempted to dress up Windows, to make it more seductive than it is entitled to be as a personal computer operating system. This appears to be the case.
If one asked IT administrators to rank changes or improvements to Windows 10 and gave them a list that included "a new UI" or even the ambiguous "five great new features," we're willing to bet they'd rank them near the bottom. Change has always been anathema to enterprise, which places a premium on stability and utility; change is what has created friction between Microsoft and its commercial customers over Windows 10, which is constantly evolving and updating.
Microsoft demonstrated its understanding of customers' concerns in 2020 and this year, with two consecutive minor upgrades. However, those were quickly obscured by the decision to halve support for Windows 10's Long-term Support Channel edition, implying increased, not decreased, change. And now, whatever Nadella hinted at Build, comes to fruition? Additional change?
Computerworld has grown increasingly perplexed by Microsoft's desire to constantly rework, redesign, rebuild, and refresh Windows — as if to cater to consumer-centric enthusiasts hungry for more cult of the new — when its core customers, truly its only customers, want what they have now, only better.
The demise of Windows 10X appears to be a brief glimpse of rationality. Minor victories.
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