Did Microsoft have an excellent 12 months in 2018? Unsurprisingly there’s no straightforward reply to that query, however one factor we will say firmly from the outset is that Microsoft has undoubtedly had its ups-and-downs this 12 months. But do the peaks outweigh the troughs? Let’s dig in and discover out.Windows woesThe apparent place to start, and probably the most obtrusive blot on Microsoft’s tech panorama for the 12 months, was clearly Windows 10’s most up-to-date huge improve.Sadly, the October 2018 Update has been probably the most problematic and buggy replace ever launched for Microsoft’s OS, outdoing even the notorious Anniversary Update. And that’s saying one thing – chances are you’ll recall that the latter had an excellent variety of gremlins crawling round contained in the works, together with points with PCs freezing up and issues with webcams and Kindles, to call just a few.Well, the October 2018 Update blew that out of the water, turning into the primary replace to truly need to be totally halted whereas Microsoft labored on curing points which pertained to minor issues like, er, deleting your recordsdata and stuff. In the top, the replace was paused for over a month.And when it resumed in November, we noticed one other challenge pop up regarding Windows Media Player. And then one other downside with Intel drivers (once more). And then one other – effectively, you get the concept…Suffice it to say, we’ve by no means recognized such a problem-plagued replace. And do not forget that Microsoft has been banging the drum about how nice and streamlined its rollouts have gotten – and the way AI helps hone them. So that makes all this doubly embarrassing, actually.If that is synthetic intelligence in motion, then shade us artificially unimpressed.Edge of tomorrowAnother main improvement for Microsoft in 2018 was that the agency lastly admitted that it had received issues mistaken with the default internet browser for Windows 10. The firm has been pushing arduous with Edge for an excellent whereas now, however to no avail – certainly, this 12 months noticed Microsoft’s browser going backwards by way of market share.Really, Edge by no means recovered from the impression that the browser was unfinished when it first launched – lacking key parts like extensions – and numerous bugs since then haven’t helped issues.So it was time to wave the white flag, and whereas Microsoft isn’t killing off Edge as such, the browser will successfully comply with in Chrome’s footsteps, adopting Google’s Chromium rendering engine (and abandoning the proprietary EdgeHTML browser engine).When this was introduced, all of a sudden it made sense why Microsoft had been surveying Windows 10 testers about why they use Chrome slightly than Edge, and what they significantly like about Google’s browser.The finish result’s that Edge will profit from higher compatibility with web sites and companies that are all constructed to play properly with Chromium, provided that Chrome is the highest canine internet browser by a protracted, good distance.And the hope for Microsoft is that this larger reliability will lastly persuade the ever-growing numbers of Windows 10 customers to undertake the working system’s default browser – and never simply them. Because Edge will probably be coming to different variations of Windows, and platforms akin to macOS, plus updates will probably be delivered extra often. And these modifications ought to assist with driving adoption in themselves.There’s a protracted method to go earlier than Edge reaches a significant degree of market share, but when the browser can start to carve out a compelling case for itself, who is aware of – Google may begin to get slightly involved. Particularly if the parents who are typically hit by Chrome’s memory-hogging points, that are nonetheless kicking round to some extent – particularly for these with decrease spec machines – discover Edge working extra easily on this entrance.So whereas that is an admission of defeat on the face of it, at the least Microsoft has had the sense and guts to implement this modification in fact, and it may doubtlessly work out effectively in the long term.Super SurfaceThere undoubtedly wasn’t any whiff of defeat on the entrance, with Microsoft’s Surface gadgets serving to it to leap into the highest 5 US PC producers for the primary time ever, placing the corporate forward of Acer and Asus, at the least on the agency’s house turf (although not globally).In Microsoft’s newest fiscal outcomes (for the quarter working up till the top of September), Surface income was up 14% year-on-year, and gross sales had been up 16% within the earlier quarter, with issues apparently ticking alongside very properly.Doubtless the Surface Go – which represented a Surface gadget being provided at a extra palatable worth for the primary time in a very long time – helped push gross sales. And the Surface Pro 6, regardless of being one thing of a disappointment in some respects, appears to have offered fairly effectively initially, at the least going by one analytics agency’s observations (though it wouldn’t have been included in Microsoft’s most up-to-date fiscal figures anyway).What was disappointing in regards to the Surface Pro 6? It wasn’t an enormous step on from its predecessor, and whereas the gadget did up the efficiency ante, that’s just about a minimal baseline for any improve.The incontrovertible fact that Microsoft didn’t see match to grace the newcomer with a USB-C port, nonetheless sticking with aged USB 3.0 tech, must be considered in a dim mild. Even so, the Surface Pro 6 nonetheless stays an excellent Windows hybrid machine – it’s simply not a lot of a transfer ahead from final 12 months’s pill.Cloud coverAnother huge Microsoft success got here within the type of the cloud this 12 months. In the agency’s final monetary outcomes, CFO Amy Hood famous that there was “continued demand for our cloud offerings”, and that business cloud income was up 47% year-on-year, hitting a powerful $8.5 billion (round £6.7 billion, AU$11.8 billion) for Q1 (fiscal 2019). Azure income development additionally hit a majorly spectacular 76% improve.Two screens are higher than one?To spherical off, we additionally heard one thing fascinating on the dual-screen telephone or ‘pocketable computer’ codenamed Andromeda which Microsoft is rumored to be creating. It has been delayed and placed on the back-burner, however that’s not a disappointment – it’s an excellent factor.Mainly as a result of Microsoft is outwardly taking the time to get not simply the prepared, however the OS, and maybe most significantly, the software program ecosystem. Launching a brand new gadget in a barren wasteland of apps being an apparent mistake the corporate isn’t about to repeat.The different purpose for the delay is that Microsoft is outwardly prioritizing a brand new dual-screen pill (codenamed Surface Centaurus) which may doubtlessly be much more thrilling. News emerged that the corporate seems to be backing a larger-screened gadget – providing extra computing flexibility, together with utilization as a digital journal, laptop computer with a digital keyboard on the second show, or just a large pill – and we may see a reveal subsequent 12 months.Let’s hope this one doesn’t go the best way of the Courier, an idea Microsoft deserted virtually a decade in the past.(Image: © Microsoft)Concluding ideasMicrosoft had a slightly combined 12 months. There had been undoubtedly excessive factors by way of the Surface vary and breaking into the highest 5 PC distributors within the US, even when the most recent iteration of the Surface Pro is unimaginative in some ways (and did nothing on the design entrance). Major headway was additionally made within the cloud recreation.However, Edge floundered badly in 2018. Microsoft’s determination to modify the browser’s engine to Chromium to resolve compatibility points – and open it as much as a number of platforms and never protecting Edge tied to Windows 10 – could appear to be the ultimate admission of defeat, however may effectively be a wise transfer to stoke larger adoption and entice these denizens of the online on the lookout for the solidity of Chrome in another browser.Windows 10, nevertheless, was the particular low level of the 12 months with the most recent replace. The rollout of the October 2018 Update has felt shambolic at instances – to not point out severely sluggish – and is especially embarrassing provided that Microsoft has been doing quite a lot of boasting about the way it has streamlined these upgrades utilizing fancy-sounding AI and machine studying tech.Overall, 2018 was a strong sufficient 12 months for Microsoft. That mentioned, it’s clear that wanting ahead, the corporate can’t afford any extra missteps with Windows 10. Microsoft must make an enormous effort to make sure that the pair of updates arriving in 2019 run much more easily than the October 2018 Update, lest the reliability of Windows 10 – and Microsoft’s inner design and testing processes – begins to be questioned.Also, it’d be good if the subsequent one wasn’t referred to as March 2019 Update (or no matter month it occurs to reach in). Come on Microsoft – kind your mind-bogglingly unimaginative naming scheme out.Two of Microsoft’s Surface gadgets make our greatest laptops of 2018 checklist