Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk

Summary: Microsoft has slammed Intel's senior vice president Renee James over comments made about Windows 8.

By Adrian Kingsley-Hughes for Hardware 2.0 | May 19, 2011 -- 06:38 GMT (23:38 PDT)

Microsoft has slammed Intel's senior vice president Renee James over comments made about Windows 8.

Speaking Tuesday at Intel's Investor Meeting 2011 in Santa Clara, California, James had a lot to say about Windows 8:

"[Windows 8 traditional] means that our customers, or anyone who has an Intel-based or an x86-based product, will be able to run either Windows 7 mode or Windows 8 mode. They'll run all of their old applications, all of their old files - there'll be no issue."

James had a lot to say about ARM too:

"On ARM, there'll be the new experience, which is very specifically around the mobile experience, specifically around tablet and some limited clamshell, with no legacy OS. Our competitors will not be running legacy applications. Not now. Not ever."

However, according to a statement released by Microsoft, it seems James spoke out of turn:

"Intel's statements during yesterday's Intel Investor Meeting about Microsoft's plans for the next version of Windows were factually inaccurate and unfortunately misleading. From the first demonstrations of Windows on SoC, we have been clear about our goals and have emphasized that we are at the technology demonstration stage. As such, we have no further details or information at this time."

Ouch.

Topics: Intel, Microsoft

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42 comments

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RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk

What's that? Sr. Management providing inaccurate facts about tech under their umbrella? NEVER!

bc3tech
19 May, 2011 06:53

Reply Vote
Nothing like a good slug fest..

between old cronies. When the chips are down (no pun intended) it is each man (company) for himself. I am sure both Intel and MS will try to show restraint, but the old reasons for sticking together are disappearing fast.

Check this out also: http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2011/05/intel-takes-pot-shots-at-arm-windows-misses-point-completely.ars

Economister
19 May, 2011 07:16

Reply Vote
- Intel is talking themselves out of partnerships
  
  @Economister
  
  NVIDIA stopped doing chipsets because of Intel's mismanaged partnership. Ditto for AMD (Intel even sold their own branded motherboards with AMD chipsets for a time). Moblin was a flop, as are most of their side projects, and they couldn't keep Nokia interested in developing Meego - Intel probably brought nothing to the table. UEFI support is still in the toilet even though they've been trying to implement it since the 3-series chipsets (P/G/Q35 and its variants), and many server systems don't even ship with UEFI support, instead only shipping with EFI 1.1 (UEFI is EFI 2.0). Verified by Intel was a flop because they couldn't market it well to partners and system builders (and prices were too high), and the EXACT SAME THING happened with their Spring Peak notebook platform. Their partner marketing sucks too - just look at the "success" of Viiv and Centrino. Partner manufacturers found Centrino overpriced so they ended up using their own wireless cards and consumers knew nothing about Viiv. They sold off their ARM division that made Xscale, and IA64 was supposed to be the "new architecture" to replace x86, but they couldn't get that right either, and now it's dead and sold off.
  
  ....but they (currently) have the speed crown for x86 processor cores.
  
  I ask you: do you, or anybody else for that matter, honestly think that's enough in this day and age?
  
  Joe_Raby
  19 May, 2011 08:22
  
  Reply Vote
- Windows 8 on Arm WILL run Win32, BUT, you have to recompile the programs
  
  for Arm. Anything less would be suicide. They need Win32 for MS Office anyway. If MS can pull this off, it will keep them in the game, as it will allow cheaper, high performance, power sipping laptops.
  
  DonnieBoy
  19 May, 2011 08:24
  
  Reply Vote
  - RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
    
    @DonnieBoy theoretically, it sounds like anything written in pure .net will run fine :)
    I wonder what all will need recompilation ... How much would/will the WIN32 API have changed?
    
    aikeru@...
    19 May, 2011 09:20
    
    Reply Vote
  - RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
    
    @DonnieBoy
    Nope. You can always launch the program in a virtual legacy windows. Thats what I do for 32bit apps in windows 7. Its practically seamless. Other than the 9 seconds where the virtual windows pop up the average joe wouldn't even know they started or in a virtual environment.
    
    rengek
    19 May, 2011 10:50
    
    Reply Vote
RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk

Maybe I am misinterpreting this but it almost sounds like Intel may be a bit threatened by ARM?

bobiroc
19 May, 2011 07:33

Reply Vote
- You don't say
 
 @bobiroc
 
 I think that has been patently obvious for some time. Redrawing their road map and accelerating their process shrinking - yeah, I guess you could say that.
 
 Economister
 19 May, 2011 07:50
 
 Reply Vote
 - RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
 
 @Economister
 
 Let's just hope they do not react like the way they did when AMD was moving into the prime time. You know make under the table deals and threats to anyone wanting to use anything but Intel Processors or spreading FUD about compatibility issues.
 
 I wonder if there is any information about the actual performance of an ARM chip compared to Intel or AMD. I know they are low energy and efficient but do they stack up in processing power or are they more suited for mobile devices that generally do not need as much horsepower.
 
 bobiroc
 19 May, 2011 08:10
 
 Reply Vote
 - I am curious about some of those questions myself
 
 @bobiroc Opinions seem to be all over the map. The (apparently) more knowledgeable ones seem to think that the RISC vs CISC differences are not as significant as they used to be, but it may also depend on the work load. The only thing I know for sure (in itself a hazardous statement) is that this time the fight will be fairer, because the importance of support for all the legacy stuff is less important with the transition to mobile than it was all those years ago. I AM looking forward to the fight. We all want more power and longer battery life. So may the best "man" win.
 
 Economister
 19 May, 2011 08:34
 
 Reply Vote
RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk

Windows 8 will be another Vista that's inevitable. Will it be better than OS X and Linux? No instead it's trying to catch up with old Linux distros and OS X Panther

shellcodes_coder
19 May, 2011 07:42

Reply Vote
- Conclusions out of thin air
  
  @shellcodes_coder
  
  I am not a MS fan but I applaud what they appear to be trying to do. If they can pull something really worthwhile off, all the power to them. If they fail, well, then it is anybody's guess, but I think your post either reflects ignorance or is simply flame bait.
  
  Economister
  19 May, 2011 08:10
  
  Reply Vote
  - I agree that MS still has a chance, but, it is not looking good. They are
    
    still arguing about what they are doing. And, I do not like the talk about the Arm version being crippled.
    
    DonnieBoy
    19 May, 2011 08:17
    
    Reply Vote
  - RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
    
    @Economister Flame bait...
    
    ItsTheBottomLine
    19 May, 2011 13:39
    
    Reply Vote
- RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
  
  @shellcodes_coder Still trying to catch up? Are you kidding? For desktops Microsoft is still years ahead of Linux. Even the Linux community has largely acknowledged that - look at the fact Ubuntu is pretty much moving to abandon the desktop in favor of mobile devices. Though more and more Ubuntu is a bad example of Linux ideals if you ask me and becoming more like M$ than even they perhaps realize. As far as OSX goes - try to get any company other than Apple to support it - but hey if you want to use an obscure OS with marginal support that comes chained to over priced hardware by all means it's your call ;)
  
  ITSamurai
  19 May, 2011 08:32
  
  Reply Vote
  - RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
    
    @ITSamurai
    Yeah, only no-name companies like Adobe, EA, Mozilla, Google, and Microsoft support OSX... oh wait.
    
    DeusXMachina
    19 May, 2011 09:32
    
    Reply Vote
- RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
  
  @shellcodes_coder
  
  Dipstick comment. Shows you know little about any of the OSes you refer to in your intellectually deficient post.
  
  dcristof
  19 May, 2011 09:09
  
  Reply Vote
- RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
  
  @shellcodes_coder Since Vista essentially went nowhere, I'd suggest the comparison s better made agaiinst win 7: It's nothinig but Vista re-arranged anyway. Win 7 has nothiing to draw me toward it except for it being all that's available anymore. XP iis geting tougher and tougher to find these days. At least XP came with documentation, something missiing with win 7.
  
  tom@...
  19 May, 2011 09:22
  
  Reply Vote
  - RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
    
    @tom@... No documentation? Its got some of the most in-depth documentation I've ever seen.
    
    vel0city
    19 May, 2011 13:03
    
    Reply Vote
- RE: Microsoft slams Intel's 'Loose Lips' Windows 8 talk
  
  @shellcodes_coder
  
  Has a chance????? Last time I check most of the desktops in companies are windows based. Ditto for the tech jobs. I go where the work is. I don't care if its windows, Trash-80s or a pencil drawing of a computer screen. If there's no money in it don't bother me with it. I have mortgages and car payments to make you know.
  
  And I'm willing to bet you made the same remark about windows 7.
  
  rengek
  19 May, 2011 10:56
  
  Reply Vote