In building Windows 8, Microsoft set out of take advantage of some new technology and revisited some old assumptions to totally rethink the boot experience of the new operating system, by making it accessible and better suited to devices without keyboards.
According to Billie Sue Chafins, a program manager at Microsoft, the
Windows 8 setup process,
including entering your product key, joining a wireless network, and
setting up a default account, will be accessible using the soft
keyboard. Users who buy a new PC that comes with Windows
8 pre-installed will likely encounter the “Specialize” phase of
setup on the first boot. This is where machine-specific information and
drivers are installed on the system. In the past, users would go through
a series of screens with a visual appearance distinct from other phases
of setup. Now, the visual experience will be seamless from POST, to
boot, to setup.
By leveraging the
capabilities of UEFI and working together with the ecosystem, Microsoft's goal
is for the PC to power up to the manufacturer’s logo and stay on that
screen all the way from POST to Windows logon UI.
Firmware renders the logo during POST, the logo persists on screen when
Windows boot takes over, and remains through OS boot:
Many users customize their machines by changing OS
settings, booting from a physical device, or performing boot
troubleshooting in Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE)
Microsoft did a thorough inventory of all the advanced
features available and designed an experience that gives a consolidated
view of the functionality users may want before entering the OS. Unlike in
previous versions of Windows, the advanced boot options in Windows 8
can be reached easily, are simple to navigate, and look and feel
harmonious.
For example, some users may have multiple copies or versions of Windows
installed on a PC. In Windows 8, they will be presented with a
high-fidelity touchable UI where they can select which OS to
boot with a single tap (or mouse click, or tab-key navigation).
There
are often reasons to change the default OS, or someone may want to change
the countdown window before the default OS starts. Changing these
settings today is cumbersome, as users have to edit the Boot Configuration
Data (BCD) store. In Windows 8, instead of remembering bcdedit commands, or changing settings
in msconfig (though these options are still available), users can easily
configure the default OS and timer settings right within the boot UI.
In case users may need to boot into Windows RE to
troubleshoot a startup problem or to restore Windows to a previous
restore point, here are the available options:
For users who may u need to launch a command prompt window from within Windows RE
(to check the access control lists (ACLs) on some files, for instance), Microsoft has made the soft keyboard available from the command prompt in
Windows RE if you need that:
Many users boot to devices, for example, to a bootable
USB stick. Today, this requires entering the BIOS boot options menu
which could be under one of many Function keys, depending on the
hardware/firmware vendor. But with UEFI firmware, the OS can call back
into firmware to enumerate the BIOS boot options. This means that
advanced boot options that were formerly only available from BIOS menus
will be available alongside the Windows-provided functionality.
Things may go wrong with hardware from time to time, so
there was no way to completely rid the world of the “BSOD.” Here is is:
