Thoughts on Metro and Windows 8 for AV production.

Does anyone remember Zune, Microsoft’s answer to the ipod and itunes? Believe it or not, this platform was easily superior to Apple’s offerings but it was ‘too little too late.’ Interestingly enough, the Xbox, Windows Phone, Windows 8 and Microsoft Office borrowed the design aesthetic of Zune. The Zune team can sleep well knowing that their work ended up on millions and millions of desktops.

Metro was the name of this design style until a copyright problem with the name forced MS to call it something else, but it will always be Metro to me. After using Windows 8 for the last few months, I would like to throw my two cents’ in the ring concerning the design and general usability of Metro and Windows 8. First off, the good: In a production environment, Windows 8 has up to 30% performance gains over 7. This is a huge positive and well worth the upgrade for us production guys.

For a few years now Apple has been accused of using skeuomorphism too much in OS X. Personally, I don’t think skeuomorphic is a bad word and sometimes may even be the correct route to go from a design usability standpoint. For those who are not familiar with skeuomorphism, it is basically creating real world analogies in the software world. An example is a picture of a floppy disk icon for the ‘save’ command instead of simply using the word ‘save’. It is certainly time to move on from some of these icons since they have not been relevant in several years.

The original idea behind Metro was to leave the older ideas behind and focus on data first, giving users an at-a-glance, relevant data. To be honest, I kind of like it. There are live tiles that update in real time with new email, stock reports or whatever other data you may want. Let’s not forget the fact the Nintendo Wii had live tiles years ago. As I used Windows 8 over time, the flat look became boring. I do like the square edges over the rounded ones Apple likes to use, but when I look at Windows phone 8 I have to wonder does this

really give me any more usefulness than this?

Hard to say I suppose, and as a gamer I LOVE the Xbox smart glass and integration. At first , Xbox music seemed pretty exciting, but it pales in comparison to Google music and Spotify. But then I hit some snags. As I installed needed programs, my Metro home screen got REALLY messy. It puts EVERY icon that is installed on the home screen and you have to remove it. For example, if you install a program you get the uninstaller, all the utilities and the program right there in your face and you have to remove it. Also, it feels very odd to jump back and forth between Metro and the traditional desktop. Compare all this to the simple elegance of OS X and MS has a tough sell.

So the question is, should those who do AV production make the switch? I think if you have the driver support for your hardware, then the performance increase alone is worth the price. Take your time and do your research, of course. It certainly is a mixed bag.