It’s alright Andrew, you can disrespectfully disagree with me if you like.

Judging by the early leaks of Windows Blue that we’ve seen, you’re certainly right it appears Microsoft are doubling down on the “Metro” interface.

I don’t think Windows Blue will go back to Windows 7 any more than Windows 7 went back to XP, what I’m fascinated in is how Microsoft are preparing the ground for retiring Windows 8 with a minimum loss of face.

Whether the final version of Windows Blue is radically different to Windows 8 remains to be seen, I suspect it depends on what Microsoft chooses to do with Windows Phone and the Surface.

Device drivers are an interesting problem, Windows 8 certainly didn’t have as many problems as Windows Vista where the changed security requirements blocked a lot of devices which worked fine under Windows XP or NT – for vendors, their problem is hardware margins are so thin that they don’t have the money to rewrite software for legacy equipment.

Interesting days.

They’re doubling down on the new Windows 8 ‘Metro’/Modern interface, not abandoning it. Windows Blue (8.1) is mainly about filling in the missing gaps in the new interface that Microsoft didn’t get time to complete before they released Windows 8 (all of those moment when you’re using the new interface and then you get thrown back into the desktop to complete a simple task). The Windows 7 way of doing things isn’t coming back I’m afraid. Hopefully the PC makers deliver the proper hardware this time around.

So yea, I’m going to have to respectfully disagree with you on this one.

Meh, Ed Bott is probably Microsoft’s biggest apologist. He’s still in the denial phase.

Have a read of the stuff Ed wrote about Vista – he was probably the last stalwart defending the system long after everyone else had given up on it.