5.5 million of which watched the version posted on YouTube

Sep 5, 2011 18:11 GMT  ·  By

The number of views for the first Windows 8 preview video which showcased the new Metro look and feel of the operating system has grown to almost 6 million, Microsoft revealed.

At the time of this article, Building "Windows 8" - Video #1 on YouTube has been viewed by at least 5,531,944 people.

The 6 million figure shared by Steven Sinofsky, President, Windows and Windows Live Division must take into account additional views, especially considering that the video is available from additional sources.

According to the Windows boss, users should not rush to make up their mind about Metro in Windows 8 until they actually get to play with the operating system.

“We also know that even with that much background, until you can touch the software it is going to be difficult to develop a complete picture. Many products look better or worse until you can use them. I’m fairly certain that in this case we have a lot of upside,” he stated.

Sinofsky has already promised that the Windows 8 testing program will be expanded soon, and that in the coming months more and more users will get to take a pre-release Build of the OS out for a spin.

Users that watched the Windows 8 metro video, as well devoured the information shared via the ‘Building Windows 8’ blog, have already started providing feedback to Microsoft.

“In many of the comments, people primarily focused on Metro as what I would say are the graphical elements of the user interface—it was Metro v. Aero. We’ve seen a clear turn where Aero is the past and Metro is the future. And with that a strong desire for the existing Windows experience to take on a new look or a Metro redesign,” Sinofsky said.

“These comments are usually focused on style and looking "old" or "new." Generally, those details of the visual styling come later in the engineering process, but we wrongly assumed that this was known. Stating that, we could have short-circuited this concern.”