On Wednesday my University played host to a low key live demo of the Windows 8 operating system, in a free for all lecture that took place over the course of an hour. In that time we were introduced to and shown the workings of Microsoft’s latest plaything, which left a lasting if not wholly positive impression. First, we were shown a trailer. This trailer, to be precise:

Which left me feeling a bit fluttery in the stomach thinking I’d stumbled into a Windows 7 demonstration for the chronically out-of-the-loop, but no, the speaker reassured us we were indeed there to see Windows 8. After a PowerPoint presentation outlining its new key features, several things stood out to me:

1. a move from the NFTS file syste, to Protogon, although this would have been far more interesting if we had been told how Protogon operates. As of yet no meaty information has been released, but this is definitely an element to keep an eye on.
2. ‘Windows to Go’, the ability to store your entire operating system on a flash drive and, from what I gathered, run it off of it as well. The speaker proposed the idea of computers essentially being empty shells that we could attach our flash drives to, carrying our entire desktop with us wherever we went. An interesting concept and not a terrible one, either.
3. Metro, the new interface, which is absolutely rubbish if you’re running Windows 8 in a desktop environment.

The features of Windows 8 were, the speaker stressed, designed with touch screen in mind. Metro, which looks almost identical to Windows Phone 7, is pretty, swish and modern, and it wants you to poke and prod it with your fingers until the sun goes down. Operating it without touch capabilities, however, rendered it clunky, awkward and quite slow. Switching between applications required either a deft Alt-TAB or swiping sideways from the left hand side of the screen – no equivalent to OS X’s Expose was on show, which was pretty concerning and gave the impression that switching between applications would soon become tedious and unwieldy. In the current build, it is not possible to exit an application unless you access the Task Manager – the iconic “X” in the right hand corner of the screen is conspicuously missing. Presumably, Microsoft will iron out this kink before the roll out next September.

In terms of native applications, Socialite is your Facebook base and Twitter is chirping away on the start screen as well, further integrating the social networking experience with our desktops. Internet Explorer soldiers on and a Windows Marketplace will be launched specifically for the OS, providing downloads of Microsoft Office and other home products as well as third party offerings. Everything meshed well together and was aesthetically pleasant, but there were no advantages over the browser versions apart from push notifications to your computer’s (or tablet’s) lock screen. Given the number of changes Facebook is about to push through as of October 12th, Socialite may even have to be revamped altogether to keep up and stop itself becoming obsolete in the eyes of Internet consumers, where every hour is like a day and every year is a lifetime.

Given that what we were shown was not the final version of Windows 8, many of my grievances may yet be sorted. The biggest concern, voiced by nearly all those in the audience, was the lack of desktop support. Windows 8 can be installed on Intel machines as well as tablet devices, but the emphasis on touch is so glaring that using it with a keyboard and mouse feels like a massive step backwards from Windows 7. I wonder if perhaps Microsoft should have developed Windows 8 for tablets alone, and focussed on a few improvements for an upgrade of its desktop OS while the public at large is still in a transition phase between old favourites and new toys.