Windows 8 Features

The main feature that was shown is the extensively redesigned user interface, optimized for touchscreens as well as mice and keyboards. A new "Start screen", similar to the one in Windows Phone 7, includes live application tiles. It replaces the Start menu, being triggered by the Start button or Windows key, and is also the first screen shown on startup. The user can go to the regular desktop by choosing the "Desktop" tile or a traditional desktop-based application. The Start screen also displays the user's name and avatar.
Windows 8 has a new developer platform according to Microsoft Vice President Julie Larson-Green, who called it "our new developer platform, which is...based on HTML5 and JavaScript." The new applications run in full-screen, but two of them can be displayed side-by-side using "Snap". Examples of new applications that were demoed include a Twitter client, a weather application, a stock-tracking application, an RSS news feeder, and a virtual piano.
The new interface is primarily designed for 16:9 screen resolutions, with 1366×768 and larger screens able to display two Windows 8 applications. 1024×768 screens can display one Windows 8 application in full-screen, and 1024×600 screens can only use the traditional Windows desktop.
Mike Angiulo confirmed at Computex 2011 that Windows 8 will use OEM Activation 3.0 instead of OEM Activation 2.1 (used by Windows 7), which supposedly makes it less prone to cracks.
Windows 8 features a new lock screen that shows the date and time and notifications, along with a customisable background.
Windows 8 will also include Microsoft's Hyper-V virtualization tool. Previously only offered in Windows Server, Hyper-V will now be available in client versions of Windows for the first time. The system requirements for Hyper-V are a 64-bit processor, a 64-bit version of Windows 8, and a minimum of 4 GB of RAM. Hyper-V also requires a 64-bit system that has Second Level Address Translation (SLAT), a feature that helps with memory management. Many of Intel's and AMD's recent processors support this feature, including many of Intel's i-Series processors (with Extended Page Table) and AMD's 10h family processors.
On September 8, 2011, Microsoft announced that Windows 8 has short boot times, because it saves the kernel's memory to the hard disk on shutdown (similar to the existing Hibernate option) and reloads it on startup.