14 DAY TRIAL // Amid preparations of new updates for the Windows Phone 8 devices, Redmond-based software giant Microsoft is said to be working on the next major mobile OS release, which should land on handsets as Windows Phone 9 as a major redesign of the entire platform.
Apparently, the company is back to the drawing board with the new operating system flavor, and will be building it from the ground up again, the same as it did three years ago when it moved from Windows Mobile to Windows Phone.
According to a recent article on mobile-review, Microsoft is considering a new user interface for the upcoming software, which could land on devices as Windows Phone 9.
No specific info on what the UI redesign would include has been provided as of now, but it seems that there is the possibility for it to be different from the Metro UI currently present on both the mobile and desktop Windows 8 releases.
Rumor has it that Microsoft has just started working on this new UI, and that it could have it ready for deployment only sometime in 2015.
Furthermore, it seems that the interface will be destined for both smartphones and tablet PCs, a move that was somehow expected, given Microsoft’s focus on bringing Windows and Windows Phone closer to one another.
What remains to be seen, however, is whether the upcoming platform release will be the same for both handsets and slates powered by ARM (whether Windows RT and Windows Phone will merge, as UnwiredView notes).
One way or the other, owners of the current generation Windows Phone 8 devices might see the upcoming OS flavor being released to them as well, considering Microsoft’s recent commitment to 36 months of support for them.
However, should Windows Phone 9 come with higher hardware requirements, such as full HD screens, quad-core processors and 2GB of RAM – support for which will be included in the upcoming Windows Phone 8 GDR3 update – this might not happen.
With no official confirmation on this available for the time being, we’ll have to take the info above with a grain of salt, but we’ll keep an eye out for more news on the matter, so stay tuned.