The Seven Secrets of Microsoft Windows Blue Unknown

Microsoft publicly acknowledged its presence after the release of the ISO installation image file for Windows Blue build 9364. In those who have tried the leaked version, the view is not uniform, some criticize it, others praise it. The leaked version reveals some of the changes that will occur in the Windows ecosystem, Sandro Villinger, a technology media it world contributor, said after digging into it, following his analysis:

I personally don't care if the desktop will disappear quickly. Blue's focus on the modern UI doesn't annoy me. But have these changes made me willing to spend more time in the modern UI environment? Not yet.

I've been using a leaked version of Windows blue these days and found some interesting clues. From these clues, I can feel some of the changes that will happen to the Windows ecosystem. By using various folder and file comparison tools, I dug deep into the leaked version (byte by bit) to try to understand what Microsoft did in the 6 months after the release of Win 8 to the manufacturer.

As you continue to read the following, remember that Windows Blue is clearly still just a semi-finished product, and many of the features currently appearing in build 9364 do not necessarily stick to the final production phase.

1, built-in 3G/4G network sharing

Of the new features of Windows Blue, two are named Tetheringstation and Tetheringmanager, implying some form of 3g/4g network sharing. Related system files indicate that the mobile connection can be shared via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. Unfortunately, in this earlier version of Windows Blue, there is no UI to open this network share. But these two features demonstrate Microsoft's intention to bring smartphones and PCs together.

2, Windows defender has its own modern application

Windows Defender with built-in antivirus software will be updated. There are several places in Windows blue that refer to "Windows Defender modern App", and win 8 has only one folder named "Windows-defender-modern-app" (and this folder has no obvious purpose). I guess this is the case: As Microsoft is rushing to launch win 8, it has to leave the app, which was not finished, to blue. Blue does not now have this application, but Microsoft should already be testing it.

3. Support Barcode Scanner

New DLLs, registry keys, and language files appear in Windows Blue, which support barcode scanners and magnetic stripe readers. What I see is that Windows Blue puts barcode scanners and magnetic stripe readers in the category of "built-in devices," along with proximity sensors, microphones, GPS, and cameras.

I feel that Microsoft is working with some OEM manufacturers to develop built-in barcode scanners and magnetic stripe readers for enterprise solutions.

4, extend the battery endurance time

Windows Blue provides a new power option named "Latency sensitivity hint processor performance" (Latency sensitivity prompts processor performance). Although Blue does not provide more clues, I think this setting means that CPU performance improves when the system is running low latency applications (for example, Metro apps and games). In "Power saving" mode, even if the low latency application is required, CPU performance will remain at 0% (the lowest power) state, and in the "high-performance" mode, the CPU performance will be maintained at a constant state of 99%.

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I use the PCMark 7 productivity suite to run (constant loop) Win 8 and Windows Blue until the battery runs out. In each test, Windows Blue behaved slightly better than Win 8, which I thought was due to Blue's improved power options and the adoption of new, more energy-efficient drivers.

5, lower memory consumption

To improve the overall performance of low-end Tablet PCs, Microsoft has slightly reduced the default memory footprint in Windows Blue. Again, I have compared the total memory consumption on win 8 and blue.

On the same machine, the memory consumption of blue is reduced by about 90MB after 10 minutes of startup (when most startup activity is completed). Not a big improvement, but still a little improved.

6. Support Retina screen

The MacBook Pro uses a Retina display, and I'm sure that a large number of windows-based computers will also use this display. I found that various graphics resources (graphics resources embedded in the DLL and PNG in the Windows folder) were about 25-50% large. For example, the "Win 8" built-in Aero cursor is the largest 48x48 pixel, while the largest in Windows Blue is 64x64 pixels.

Obviously, all modern applications can be magnified, and desktop applications seem to be overlooked. I guess Microsoft is slowly and steadily increasing the resolution of graphics resource files.

7. Basefs and Minkernel with unknown meanings

As usual, when digging around 56,000 Windows files (about 500.01 million of them in blue), I stumbled across something I didn't quite understand, the most interesting of which was basefs and Minkernel.

I think that "basefs" may represent "Base/basic file system" (Base/base filesystem). But what makes me more curious is that it also involves another new term called "Minkernel", which is currently not available in Win 8.