If you’re interested in the interface formerly known as Metro (IFKaM), it’s an exciting time. A lot has happened in the last couple of weeks.
Perhaps the most exciting news is that the first Windows 8 tablets using the Intel Atom (Clover Trail) processor have started hitting the shelves, with many more coming in the next few weeks.
Nor are things are boring in the Windows RT space.
- The first Windows RT tablet with LTE capabilities will be available this week from AT&T. You’ll find the press release here.
- Microsoft released new firmware for Windows RT devices. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the firmware update improves performance. This is something we will be investigating in the near future.
- Microsoft added Windows RT to its Compatibility Center. You can go there to find a comprehensive list of devices that are compatible with Windows RT. Because TouchXPRT’s scenarios focus on media creation and manipulation, we were particularly interested in cameras, media players, and TV devices.
With so much news, TouchXPRT needs some news of its own. When we released the community preview, we gave permission to publish results – the first time that’s happened for a benchmark that was not final. Now we are going to be creating an online database of results from the community preview. Look for it to go live next week.
With so many new devices and updated old ones, there’s a lot out there to test. We hope that you’ll share the results of your testing, and submit them to the database. The more results we get, the more valuable the database will be.
One final note: Microsoft released its first security patches for Windows 8 on Tuesday. If you are running Windows 8, whether on a touch device or not, check them out.
Eric
