Recently Microsoft released Windows 8.1 preview during the BUILD Conference in San Francisco on June 26 for selected professionals and for the public. The final version of the Operating system will be available to the general public by the late 2013 as per sources from Microsoft. The company is not providing any Software upgrades or service packs for its operating system which they normally instead they come up with the new OS with inclusion of new APIs and enhancements suggested and recommended by the general public and the experts. Tammi Reller, head of marketing and finance for the Windows, said:   [more]

“It will deliver the latest new innovations across an increasingly broad array of form factors of all sizes, display, battery life and performance, while creating new opportunities for our ecosystem. It will provide more options for businesses, and give consumers more options for work and play.”

What new features included in Windows 8.1 Preview?

These are some of the new features I personally came across in my Microsoft Surface RT which is running Windows 8.1 Preview

Feature 1: Resizable Tile Sizes

Windows 8.1 provides option to resize the tiles with 3 different options like Small, Medium, and Wide. Windows 8 supports only 2 sizes which are Small and Large when compared to the new sizes in Windows 8.1.

Feature 2 : Tile Group Header

This feature is super cool, as to group the application under one roof and name the group which will help the business users to organize the required applications under one cap.

Feature 3: Start Button

This feature is pretty known and expected to be released in the Windows 8.1 preview. Industry experts keep speak about getting back the Start button in this operating system.

Feature 4: Enhanced PC Settings

The updated PC Settings gives you access to all your settings on your device without having to go to the Control Panel on the desktop. We can do the customization directly over here, instead to go over to the control panel.

Feature 5 : New Personalized Experience

Windows 8.1 preview offers more color and background to the start screen including some of then with the motion enabled. We can customize the desktop background  as your start screen background to have unique look and feel.

Feature 6 : Enhanced Windows Store

Windows 8.1 gets a new look of Windows Store which is designed to make it easier and user friendly to navigate and browse the applications of your interest. Also pretty awesome feature integrated with this release is the updates that are available for the application installed will be automatically installed at the background.

Feature 7 : Snapped View

Windows 8.1 preview has an enhanced version of Snapped View where we can divide the screen 50:50 instead of the previous version of Windows 8 which has limited screen sharing option. With this feature we have option to have multiple apps shared in the screen.

Feature 8 : Enhanced Search

With the enhanced search in Windows 8.1, instead of selecting the app and do a search Bing now powers an aggregated search with Settings, Files, Web Images and Web Videos along with SkyDrive as well.

Feature 9 : Outlook RT 2013 Integration

This is a killer feature as far as I consider, as a business traveller my Microsoft Surface RT is my companion on the go. Having Outlook RT gives me complete access to my much important mail and also the traditional customization that is required to keep my mail box easily organized.

Feature 10 : Customized App Switching

This feature is more important when we want to customize the application switching between recent application opened and also prevent the charm bar or app switching bar from being appearing in the device slide.

Still we have many features and APIs that are released which we will see in detail in our upcoming articles. Windows 8.1 is still under preview and the main release will be expected to be by late 2013.