A Quick Peek at the Coming Win8 Packaging

OK, so GA is coming in a little under three months, on October 26, 2012. According to The Verge, this is what the packaging for Windows 8 will look like when boxed versions of the new OS appear on store shelves that day.

Images of the Windows 8 (left, white) and Windows 8 Pro (right, dark) boxes

Source: The Verge (8/7/2012)

From what blogger Salvador Rodriguez reports about this leak, the colored graphic at the left-center on each box represents its new “Windows 8-style UI logo,” which also appears in monochrome form on the spine of each box. I’m guessing that the colors inside the window panes are just fancy dress-up for the box art, and that the simple monochrome logo will continue on unchanged. No real word yet about what’s actually inside the box, and if it will include more than one DVD to accommodate the Windows 8 bits (as I look at the ISOs for the Release Preview, if MS wants to provide both 32- and 64-bit versions, it will probably need a separate DVD for each one).

No more crazy plastic shells for OS media, though. Having fought (and occasionally lost) against the prior enclosures for Vista and Windows 7, if I have to open one of these boxes, I’m reasonably confident I’ll be able to find my way to their contents without risking injury or frustration! This finally gives us something completely positive and complimentary to say about Windows 8 that everyone can agree on.