Microsoft is set to unveil Windows 10 at an event on Wednesday that should provide consumers information on how the software company's latest operating system works.
According to Tom Warren of The Verge, Microsoft will hold a special event on Wednesday to explain the potential of Windows 10 at its company headquarters in Redmond, Wash. It will be a chance for the company to show how its latest operating system will run across PCs, phones, tablets and its Xbox One gaming console.
"Microsoft may have shown off the new Start Menu and some various feature additions for power users back in September, but there's plenty more the company is working on," Warren wrote. "Wednesday's event is billed as a consumer-focused one, so we're expecting to get a closer look at how Windows 10 will power laptops, desktops, and gaming PCs in 2015 and beyond."
Warren added that various leaks of Microsoft's digital assistant, Cortana, have surfaced as part of early Windows 10 builds. He expected Microsoft to acknowledge its existence.
"Cortana in Windows 10 will act as the primary search interface, as well as some smart integration in the browser and other applications," Warren wrote.
A new Internet web browser may be unveiled during tomorrow's special event too. According to Alyssa Newcomb of ABC News, that default browser could replace the iconic Internet Explorer, which has left many of its users in a "love-hate relationship" with the web browser.
"I'm expecting a new, stripped down and fast browser but also, for compatibility purposes, Internet Explorer," Patrick Moorhead, an analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy told ABC News.
Microsoft's new browser, codenamed "Spartan" according to Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet, is supposed to work across Windows 10 desktop, Windows 10 mobile and Xbox One. However, Foley's sources indicated that Spartan will not serve as a replacement for Internet Explorer, noting that it will remain available on desktop Windows devices for people who use it.
"Spartan is expected to use Microsoft's own Trident rendering engine, not Webkit," Foley wrote, citing one of her sources. "But Spartan will tell Web sites that it is 'like' Webkit, improving compatibility."
According to ABC News, Microsoft's Windows 10 is expected to focus on increasing productivity and other consumer-friendly features.
"Among the new features are multiple desktops, the ability to work within multiple windows without switching screens and a 'task view' feature," Newcomb wrote.
Newcomb reported that the company skipped over the No. 9 in naming its latest operating system, a fact not lost on many keen Microsoft observers. However, the number skip indicated how the system has evolved, according to a company spokesperson responding to ABC News.
"Windows 10 carries Windows forward into a new way of doing things," the Microsoft spokesperson said. "It is not an incremental change, but a new Windows that will empower the next billion users."
The keynote portion of the Windows 10 event will be streamed online at noon ET/9 a.m. PT from Microsoft's headquarters.
