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Windows 8 ads hit US screens: Death Metal, exploding laptops

Someone get a small kid in here, I can't work this

Microsoft’s Windows 8 TV ads have started running in the US.

Microsoft started running the spots during peak-time viewing for US sports audiences on Sunday, just 12 days before the launch date of the Windows 8 OS on 26 October. Pre-orders have been open since Friday.

The ad pushes touchscreen PCs hard – showing off only one actual tablet-tablet.

We see PCs with keyboards and touchable screens from Lenovo and Acer plus one tablet, which could be a dockable screen or a pure-tablet – it’s not clear.

If you watched the opening of the Summer Olympics and Paralympics then you’ll recognise the ad's opening: the countdown using numbers from daily life.

The first few seconds feature an exploding laptop. We get it, Microsoft.

Everything’s wrapped in a template made familiar by Apple with its launch of the iPad and iPhone: a short, catchy music track and fast images of product.

Microsoft's track of choice: The Eagles of Death Metal offering I Only Want You.

We close on a Microsoft ads staple: a young child, a delightfully impish poppet living in a Boden-Ikea showroom photoshoot. She is the future and so, too, is Windows 8, we're told. The glossy ad is also without a doubt trying to convince the recalcitrant typers and clickers who make up Windows core user group that the new operating system is "so easy a child can use it".

As we know, Microsoft is facing a watershed moment here: it needs to introduce touch – both on PC and the new tablets – to the consumer body of Windows PC users, without alienating those who've become accustomed to keyboard and mouse.

The ad is part of a $300m campaign awarded by Microsoft to Burger King and Virgin Atlantic promo shop Crispin Porter + Bogusky.

So far, the Windows 8 interface has divided developers. Some have said they hate the Metro UI, which to their minds forces touch at all costs at the expense of the traditional desktop, while other devs have given the thumbs up to Metro and the downloadable apps. The former spirit is on display in this spoof. ®

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