Microsoft dropped the hardware requirements for Windows 8 a month ago, but may of the choice bits were buried amongst the 1000-page sea of technical jargon and general obscura. The brave souls over at WithinWindows ostensibly just emerged from the depths with the choicest pearls of compatibility wisdom.
What can we expect from devices running Windows 8?
• Touch devices: all will be required to detect five points of touch, which is good for 99 per cent of multitouch uses.
• NFC devices: all will be required to have a designated (read: a visual) zone for functionality. That way, your father won’t be rubbing his phone along the back of his laptop phone in search of a link.
• Tablets and convertible PCs: All will have five — and only five — hard buttons. Power, rotation lock, Windows button, volume up, volume down. Any devices without keyboards must support Windows key+power as the new Ctrl+Alt+Del. Oh, and all screens will be 1366×768!
• Intel-based devices: all must resume in under two seconds.
There are a few other gems you can expect as well, so be sure to check them over at WithinWindows.
Dave
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 10:38 AMhmmm, seems logical. And it’s just for starters anyway. The screen res will eventually go up.
MotorMouth
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 12:42 PMThe screen res can’t be right. My Dev Preview is already running on a 1600 pixel screen and also works fine when I plug it into my HD monitor. That must be a minimum size. IN fact, that is just what the original article says –
“Here’s what a bare minimum Windows 8 tablet would look like:
Storage: At least 10gb free space after the out-of-box experience completes
System firmware: UEFI
Networking: WLAN and Bluetooth 4.0 + LE (low energy)
Graphics: Direct3D 10 device w/ WDDM 1.2 driver
Resolution: 1366×768
Touch support: At least 5 touch points, must pass all tests
Camera: 720p
Ambient Light Sensor: 1-30k lux capable w/ dynamic range of 5-60K
Magnetometer
Accelerometer: 3 axes w/ data rates >= 50Hz
Gyroscope
USB 2.0: At least one controller and exposed port
Speakers”
Frank
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 1:28 PMThat is minimum spec resolution. Dev preview supports higher resolutions.
FJC
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 1:41 PMThought a camera button like WP would be in there.
Considering the current Samsung W7 tablet is selling for around $1500… The cost of W8 tablets based off the x86 architecture, IMO will be easily over AU$1000. Going to be tough in challenging iOS and Android tablets regarding price.
MotorMouth
Wednesday, January 18, 2012 at 10:32 PMWin8 will also run on ARM, so the problem will be Intel’s, not Microsoft’s.