Microsoft may streamline Windows 8 SKUs

A recently leaked document from HP.com reveals the possibility for Microsoft to be streamlining the Windows 8 SKUs.

This strategy would in the end reduce the number of Windows 8 products on the market, and even though it looks like an undesired move for some consumers, this may prove to be quite an efficient one. Limiting the number of Windows editions would reduce the confusion of consumers and product fragmentation while ultimately facilitating transition to support both ARM and x86 editions.

Even though the editions aren’t announced until closer to the market release date, the people at ZDNet did uncover such information during the analysis of the leaked HP documentation which later unveiled revision notes for an Alcor Micro Smart Card Reader Driver, which, next to a section titled “operating system(s),” lists the following Windows 8 versions:

• Microsoft Windows 8 32 Edition
• Microsoft Windows 8 64 Edition
• Microsoft Windows 8 Enterprise 32 Edition
• Microsoft Windows 8 Enterprise 64 Edition
• Microsoft Windows 8 Professional 32 Edition
• Microsoft Windows 8 Professional 64 Edition

While these could easily be placeholders for more SKUs to come in later during the final Windows 8 Public Beta release, we at least know for sure that Microsoft is going to release 32-bit and 64-bit client versions, a 64-bit server version and the highly-anticipated ARM version.

Source: Fudzilla