TAIPEI, Taiwan — June 1, 2010 — In this day and age, it’s pretty tough to imagine a world without portable electronics such as media players, e-readers, PCs and slates. Imagine your morning commute on a bus or train, workout routine, layover at an airport, or even zoning out without your favorite TV show, album or website keeping you company.
To coincide with Steve Guggenheimer’s keynote at Computex Taipei, Microsoft announced the Windows Embedded Compact 7 public community technology preview (CTP). Windows Embedded Compact 7 is the next generation of Microsoft’s widely used Windows Embedded CE platform, which provides OEMs with the tools and technologies to deliver specialized devices.
With the recent release of Windows Embedded Standard 7, Microsoft brought the power of Windows 7 and Windows Media Center to embedded devices such as set-top boxes, Blu-ray Disc players and televisions — ushering in the next generation of connected media devices. With the release of Windows Embedded Compact 7, Microsoft Windows Embedded is taking another innovative step forward by bringing the power of Windows 7 across another family of specialized devices, such as slates, portable media players and others.
For consumers, Windows Embedded Compact 7 will provide a fantastic experience, offering the ability to share and manage content across networked devices. In other words, it allows entertainment devices connected to the Internet around your home to share content on the fly. Think about that next time the latest viral video shows up on your favorite streaming website and you want to share it with the family.
You’ll be happy to know Windows Embedded Compact 7 will also come with a powerful update to Microsoft Internet Explorer, including support for Adobe Flash 10.1, a simplified media player with tons of codecs, easy library management, and seamless integration with Windows 7-based PCs.
Windows Embedded Compact 7 will also provide a simplified work experience for enterprise users, including an easier way to connect to corporate e-mail, calendar and contacts through Microsoft Exchange 2010 AirSync or Microsoft Exchange Server support. To make on-the-go life even easier, it also includes Microsoft Office and Adobe PDF viewers to access documents, and Windows 7 Device Stage to transfer files between PCs and portable devices.
This release will continue the momentum of Windows 7 technology impacting the experiences that can be delivered on devices by providing a toolkit for hardware manufacturers and developers that will enable them to quickly bring to market reliable and uniquely rich and branded devices.
Windows Embedded Compact 7 provides new tools and technologies such as Platform Builder, Visual Studio and Expression Blend to ensure OEMs and developers have everything they need to create something incredible. There’s even the ability for developers to use Microsoft Silverlight technology for customized and branded experiences on the device or outside of the browser, as well as support for multicore and the latest ARM-based architecture used extensively in portable consumer electronics.
Interested in the Windows Embedded Compact 7 Public CTP? It’s currently available to the public at http://www.windowsembedded.com/compact7, so go get it! The platform is expected to be released to manufacturing in the fourth quarter of this year, so be sure to keep an eye out for additional details.
Make sure to be a part of the excitement by keeping an eye on the @msftweb Twitter account for more news on Windows Embedded Compact 7.
