Microsoft has really botched its Download Center with an upgrade introduced this week, handicapping the UX unnecessarily. As highlight of the upgrade, consider the fact that software giant managed to make Microsoft downloads less relevant on the Microsoft Download Center.
Sure, the new design is Metro-cute, and I’m talking about Windows Phone 7’s Metro UI, not the other kind of metro. But that’s what people will get when accessing the new Download Center, a dose of cute, because they’re certainly going to have a tough time finding anything else they might be looking for, namely actual downloads.
If you ask me this is a poorly executed job, based on a faulty concept to begin with. I’m having a really hard time understanding some of the ideas behind the Download Center upgrade, especially so called enhancements that have NOTHING to do with actual downloads.
“Welcome to the new Microsoft Download Center! We have added new features and content areas to help you discover more of what Microsoft has to offer,” reads a message from the company.
Personally I fail to see the new features that Microsoft is referring to, or any improvements to the old features of the Microsoft Download Center.
If there are new features, they’re either extremely well hidden, or irrelevant enough to me as a user that I’m actually unable to see them. Is the company speaking about the sorting and filtering options? Then the NEW features are risible at best.
Why would anybody consider it a good idea to integrate the Microsoft Download Center with Microsoft Store and the Windows Phone site, and additional of the company’s online properties, IS ABSOLUTELY BEYOND ME. Is the company so desperate to push Microsoft Store products that it stoops so low as to use the Download Center to attract some extra eyeballs?
For one of my searches, several printers were offered among the rest of the results. How do you DOWNLOAD A PRINTER, you ask? Apparently you don’t, but the results redirect users to the Microsoft Store where they can BUY the device. Nice one, Microsoft, subtle!
And don’t get me started on the relevance of the results returned to searches. Well, come to think about it, do get me started!
How is Windows 7 SP1 not the first result to a “Windows 7 SP1” search? And what’s Editor’s Choice? How is the download for the first service pack for Windows 7 not even in the top five results? Seriously, Microsoft?
Do users really need to sort results and apply filters, digging through irrelevant results in order to get to the Windows 7 SP1 standalone download when they actually searched for Windows 7 SP1 in the first place? And then Microsoft folk are left scratching their heads and unable to answer why is Google besting them at search.
You know what’s the first result on Google.com for a
“Windows 7 SP1” search? You guessed it it’s the standalone
Windows 7 SP1 download page on the Microsoft Download Center.
Really, Microsoft? Really!?
The NEW Microsoft Download Center is actually designed to discourage people from searching, finding and downloading, taking them on wild and pointless rides to the Microsoft Store to buy merchandise, or to Windows Update, or to the
Windows Phone website.
I sincerely hope that this new Microsoft Download Center is nothing but a joke. A very poor one at best.
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