Comparing Top 8 Features On Apple OS X Yosemite With Microsoft Windows 8.1

At WWDC, Apple today announced the next update for their desktop OS called OS X Yosemite. While OS X and iOS still remains the separate operating systems as opposed to Windows desktop and Windows Phone, Apple is trying to blur the lines with new iOS like features being added to OS X every year. Let us take a look at the new features announced in OS X Yosemite and how it compares to Microsoft Windows 8.1.

1) Redesigned and refined OS:  Yosemite redesigned and refined with a fresh modern look where controls are clearer, smarter and easier to understand with translucent elements reveal additional content in your app window. App icons have a clean, consistent design and an updated system font improves readability.

In Windows 8.1: Instead of modifying the existing the controls for old style desktop apps, Microsoft has included a whole new modern experience that offers great looks and functionality. Also, this whole translucency thing came to Windows years back and it is now outdated.

2) Notification Center: There is a new Today view in Notification Center gives you a quick look at everything you need to know with widgets for Calendar, Weather, Stocks, Reminders, World Clock and social networks.

In Windows 8.1: Microsoft does not have Notifications Center in Windows 8.1 as in OS X. But the concept of Live Tiles in Start Screen does the same purpose.

3) Spotlight: It appears front and center on your desktop and adds new categories of results, so you can view rich suggestions from Wikipedia, Maps, Bing, App Store, iTunes Store®, iBooks Store™, top websites, news and movie showtimes.

In Windows 8.1: The search experience in Windows 8.1 already offers these features. Also, the Bing visual search is hands down better than Spotlight.

4) iCloud Drive: iCloud Drive stores files of any type in iCloud®. iCloud Drive works like any other folder on your Mac, so you can drag documents into it, organize them with folders and Tags and search for them using Spotlight. With iCloud Drive, you can access all your files in iCloud from your Mac, iPhone, iPad® or even a Windows PC.

In Windows 8.1: OneDrive in integrated in Windows 8.1. It is a much better cloud storage solution than iCloud Storage with lot more features.

5) Safari:  A new streamlined design that, A new Favorites view gives you quick access to your favorite websites, and a powerful new Tabs view displays thumbnails of all your open web pages in one window. Safari also gives you more control over your privacy, with separate Private Browsing windows.

In Windows 8.1: The Internet Explorer in Modern user experience offers similar streamlined design and it includes Private Browsing  options as well.

6) Mail: With Markup you can quickly fill out and sign forms and even annotate images and PDFs from within Mail. Mail Drop allows you to easily send large videos, images or files up to 5GB from the Mail app to any email address.

In Windows 8.1: The default Mail app in Windows 8.1 does not have any feature like Markup. And users can use OneDrive to send files of size in GBs and share links via Mail app. But the experience is not integrated as seen on OS X Yosemite.

7) Messages: Has a new look, Now you can add titles to ongoing message threads so they are easy to find, add new contacts to ongoing conversations, or leave those conversations you no longer want to follow. With Soundbites you can create, send and listen to audio clips right in Messages.

In Windows 8.1: You have Skype as the default messaging application. It offers group chat, screen sharing, video messages and more.

8) Continuity features: In Yosemite, when your iPhone or iPad is near your Mac, Handoff lets you start an activity on one device and pass it to the other. Instant Hotspot makes using your iPhone’s hotspot as easy as connecting to a Wi-Fi network. Now the SMS and MMS messages that previously only appeared on your iPhone appear in Messages on all your devices.

In Windows 8.1: There is no continuity features between Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1. This is the area where you can expect from Microsoft in the coming months where they will try to catch up with Apple.