Smartphone and PC? Microsoft’s merger of both worlds coming soon!

The technology approach is proven, and the ambition has long been there, so there's a chance this time for the merger of PC and mobile to actually happen. Microsoft has long desired to create universal Windows—Windows on every device imaginable. After several failed attempts, it’s trying again—this time with pocketable PCs that will be able to run standard desktop Windows apps, not just Windows Mobile apps.

Microsoft’s technology approach to universal Windows—in fact, to a universal PC where a smartphone transforms into a full PC when connected to large monitors and other periperhals at your desk—looks like it could actually work this time, unlike the failed attempt several years ago known as Windows RT whose limitations are too many to recap.

Does this universal PC matter?

I think it does, because both the PC and mobile worlds are simultaneously intertwining and seeking to blast off their current innovation plateaus. You can see that desire to morph in the hybrid tablet/laptop devices (aka 2-in-1s), keyboard-equipped tablets (aka tabtops, like the Surface Pro and iPad Pro), Chromebooks running Android apps, Windows Continuum-based pocketable PCs like HP’s Elite x3, and other experiments that have shown up in the last few years.

None of those experiments have taken the market by storm. 2-in-1s and tabtops have inspired niche audiences, but no more than that. Chromebooks remain small-time after a decade of sales. A few years ago, tablets like the iPad seemed poised to replace the laptop for most users, but their sales stalled, and they remain a companion device instead. And Continuum-based pocketable PCs suffer the same problem as Windows RT did: They can’t run real Windows apps, so why bother with them?

Microsoft hopes to change that with its Windows-on-ARM effort, porting Windows 10 to the ARM chip used almost universally on smartphones, tablets, and other mobile devices. This time, it’ll be the real Windows 10, not a limited subset, and using emulation it will be able to run most standard Windows apps (the .msi and .exe files we are used to), not just those that use Microsoft’s new Universal Windows Platform’s .appx format.

Technically this would be Windows OS running on smartphones; adjusting its user interface and those of its apps automatically depending on the screen resolution being used. Apple has achieved this already with the iOS universal apps automatically adjusting between the iPhone and iPad devices. But Microsofts's Universal Windows would be able to adapt from smartphone to tablet to big-screen desktop—a big contrast to Apple, which is keeping the Mac out of its universal PC dreams.

Such kind or level of flexibility and adaptability would be a change in the computing ecosystem similar to the explosive revolutionary change that appeared on the scene with the birth of the smartphone nearly a decade ago. The result is in a possible equal degree of seismic shift in both user behavior and application capabilities as we saw with the births of iPhone and Android mobile OS.

Just imagine that you no longer have multiple devices with different capabilities, but one device that adapts itself and its apps based on the peripherals you have connected to it. That would be terrific and that's where technology is evolving towards pretty soon.

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