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MicrosoftEdge

Over the past few months, Microsoft has taken potshots at Google for high power consumption under Chrome. Every bit we've discussed, there's truth to the company's statements. Independent tests have regularly demonstrated that Chrome uses more power than Microsoft Edge, Net Explorer, Firefox, or Opera, though the verbal ratios and scores depend on workload and utilize-case.

Google announced several changes to Chrome 52 for Android this week, with faster video load times, less buffering, and better overall ability consumption direction. A short demonstration video is embedded below:

While these benefits are currently Android-specific, Google isn't going to keep them there. "Since the start of the yr, we've made a 33% improvement in video playback GPU/CPU power consumption on Windows 10," a Google spokesperson told The Verge. "And by Chrome 53, nosotros feel confident that we'll be at parity with other browsers in terms of power consumption for the majority of video playback on the internet."

Meanwhile, at the Hall of Justice Redmond campus…

Microsoft, information technology seems, has gone beyond simply issuing web log posts to call out its ain browser'due south superiority. Start in that location's this tweet from analyst Patrick Moorhead, of Moor Insights and Strategy.

MoorheadTweet

Since upgrading to Windows 10'due south Ceremony Update, I'grand also being prompted with this on my own system:

Edge-Prompt

On the one manus, it'south nice to see Microsoft respecting system defaults subsequently an upgrade, since this kind of behavior got it in hot water with other companies last year. In the past, Microsoft has inverse consumer preferences when installing upgrades or updates.

On the other hand, this kind of insistent nagging is what'due south turned off plenty of people to Windows x in the first place. While I'm willing to requite Edge another shot, post-Anniversary Update, my feel with the browser has not been positive. It's not simply a question of extensions, which Edge finally supports at present — I've had real problems with the browser refusing to shut multiple tabs and lagging on a number of sites where other browsers have no upshot. It's not merely a question of adblock, either; Edge has been problematic for me across multiple testbeds, fifty-fifty with adblock disabled on other browsers.

When Microsoft appear its intent to plough Windows into an OS-as-a-service model, plenty of people predicted that the visitor would either start charging a monthly subscription fee (it hasn't), or would launch attacks against other major distribution platforms (information technology also hasn't). Merely at that place's another, more subtle impact to that mindset that I don't think Microsoft has even considered. When your software is sold as a service, it's never really finished. This, in turn, ways Microsoft's various internal departments (shown below) are in a never-catastrophe tussle to concenter user eyeballs and attention.

In the old days, MS released a new Os with a bevy of new features, marketed the hell out of it as a one-fourth dimension bargain, and then moved on. Now, various applications receive ongoing updates — and all of those applications need to justify their ain being with improved user engagement, satisfaction ratings, and increased time spent in-app. Instead of nagging you to try something one time, MS has an ongoing incentive to keep nagging yous. And, of course, the new tracking in Windows 10'due south telemetry lets it measure whether or not said nagging is effective in a way that previous versions of Windows didn't.

Welcome to the future. Somehow I never imagined it would be this annoying.