Windows as a service doomed?

[neroas]

If you think of it, will this really work? So Windows will be upgraded for the lifetime of the device, great - you never have to pay for upgrades on the device.

Issue: The lifetime cannot mean as long as it last, perhaps as long as the manufacturer supports it. Windows 10 free upgrade while it sounds great, if your device is no longer supported by the manufacturer - well you will have to get a new device if the upgrade doesn't pan out and the manufacturer won't support windows 10. Windows 7 came out quite a while ago and for example a laptop may not have any updated drivers and very possibly will not work with Windows 10 at all.

Phone and Tablet: Besides the phones and tablets Microsoft manufactures, they are NEVER going to get this market, way too late, and even if they did manage, manufacturers are only going to support them software wise for a short period of time, not to mention pay for a Microsoft license for the device.

Their tactics lately have for sure affected their trust.

I predict Windows as a service will not work and expect a strategy shift at some point. They want it both ways, they want to charge for an OS AND want to make some marketing bucks on top of it.

[TylerM4]

Yes, it'll be interesting to see where this goes.

Tho I think they'll make it work. Apple has been using this model for years very successfully. If you want to know what things will be like for windows 10 in the future you could look at what apple has been doing. Microsoft has changed terminology and presented it differently to avoid people calling them out on it, but it's the exact same model once you open the hood and take a look around. Only difference is that Apple does nothing special/different for enterprise customers and only really embraces the home user.

Manufacturer support doesn't really apply here. The manufacturer supports the hardware, not the operating system. Things get blurry with drivers, but remember that most PC manufacturers don't write the drivers (the chipset manufacturer does that). Also, Microsoft's theme here is that a win10 driver is a win10 driver - they only need to write it once.

Never say never when it comes to phones. Nobody would have predicted RIM's fall from grace 5 years ago, and when's the last time you heard about nokia? While I tend to agree that Microsoft has an uphill battle, I like to point out the success they've had with the XBOX when released in a very similar market. MS is offering some sweet integration, they have the financial ability, and Microsoft Connect does look very interesting especially when paired with Office 365 and cloud storage. It's a long-shot, but I wouldn't call it impossible for a win10 phone to be successful.

Microsoft has already been very successful in the tablet market tho. The MS Surface Pro is huge. It's become the tablet that most other manufacturers compare themselves to right up there with the iPad. HP, Lenovo, Dell, etc have all been playing catchup and all have their own knock-off copies of the Surface Pro now, while Microsoft is already on it's 4th generation of this form factor.

Having said all that. I do agree - I think there will be a windows 11 someday.