Longhorn has been on of the hottest subject at WinHEC this week and there have been revelations more or less every day. Surely an attempt to steal focus from Apple’s launch of Tiger OS X which we has reported on earlier. One the most interesting news during WinHEC is that Microsoft will release a new testversion (build) of Longhorn. The earlier build was released during last years WinHEC event and now it’s time for Build 5048 to reveal itself. At Winbeta they’ve had the oppurtunity to test the new version and publilshed an article with quite a lot of screenshotsand information on the present status of Longhorn.
Among other they’ve added a new theme in Build 5048 a.k.a. Aero. We get to see more screenshots which shows Microsoft’s plans for a more advanced graphical user interface (GUI), which other than that is quite similar to Windows XP’s. At Winbeta they’ve also managed to activate DWM (Desktop Window Manager) which is a key function in Longhorn’s new GUI. By using the graphic cards circuit it can draw more powerful effects without any direct performance hits. Below you can find an example on what you can do with DWM activated.
Build 5048 is of course a far from ready build of Longhorn but it is always interesting to see how far they’ve come in the development.
:: Read more on Longhorn build 5048 at Winbeta
