Windows 10 Rumor Roundup: Consumer Preview in January

Microsoft has announced that it won’t release any more technical preview versions for its upcoming Windows 10 before the beginning of next year, but this does not mean that it’s not working on the new version of the operating system for the rest of the year. The current build (9879), made available in November, has received a few fixes recently, and an interim build (9888) of the OS – not meant for the public – was also leaked online, being the first that has its kernel version changed from 6.4 to 10.0. ZDNet asks the rhetorical question: What’s next?

Well, according to the rumors circulating for months around the internet, Microsoft plans to release a “consumer preview” version of its Windows 10 operating system as early as January 2015. There will be no new technical preview fixes released, but a new version of the preview itself will be made available around the same time, followed by new versions to be launched each month. The first technical preview of next year might be the one with Cortana integration turned on, ZDNet says.

The next version of Microsoft’s mobile operating system – supposedly also being called Windows 10 – will be showcased next month, around the 20th or 21st, during a press event that’s going to be held in Redmond. The mobile OS will be released as a preview for developers sometime later, followed by regular updates and fixes to be released later on. According to the rumors heard by ZDNet, the new Windows 10 mobile OS will work not just on ARM based phones and tablets, but also on less powerful Intel-based mobile devices.

Microsoft also plans to release the second test build for its Windows 10 based server operating system, the Windows Server Next. An initial test build of the OS was released back in October, and no new additions and fixes were launched ever since.