In recent developments, Microsoft finds itself grappling with the repercussions of years marked by stagnation and user dissatisfaction. The company’s operating system, Windows, has faced criticism for its lack of optimization, excessive bloat, intrusive advertisements, and the controversial integration of AI features. As a result, Microsoft has acknowledged its missteps and is taking steps to overhaul the OS.
MSN Weather: A Case Study
The built-in weather application, MSN Weather, serves as a microcosm of the broader issues plaguing Windows. Recent tests reveal that this “app” can consume up to 1.2GB of RAM while idling, all while bombarding users with advertisements as they check the weather. Despite being part of a paid operating system, MSN Weather is laden with promotions, raising eyebrows among users.
Visually appealing and feature-rich, the app offers a wealth of information, including live radar overlays, hourly forecasts, air quality indices, and even moon phases. Its accuracy is commendable, drawing data from various global providers, primarily Foreca. However, the question arises: is the app worth the resource drain it imposes?
When compared to its competitors, such as Apple’s native weather app on macOS, the shortcomings of MSN Weather become evident. Apple’s offering is equally stunning and informative, yet it operates ad-free and consumes only about 250MB of memory—five times less than its Windows counterpart. This discrepancy stems from the fact that MSN Weather is not a standalone application but rather a web wrapper that continuously pings multiple browser tabs in real-time.
Upon further investigation, the Task Manager revealed that MSN Weather operates with eight Chromium-based subprocesses, indicating that users are essentially viewing a website rendered through WebView 2. Ideally, native Windows applications should conform to the WinUI framework, which Microsoft is gradually transitioning to from Win32 and UWP. The company has committed to updating all native apps within Windows to the Win32 standard, which promises to enhance optimization significantly. However, it remains uncertain whether this overhaul will also eliminate the intrusive advertisements.
While navigating the app, users may encounter various ads, including promotions for Adobe Acrobat, LendingTree, and Spotify. Despite these distractions, the app’s interface remains responsive and aesthetically pleasing, earning Microsoft commendations for its design. Yet, the distinction between Microsoft and MSN in this context adds another layer of complexity to the situation.
Although Microsoft has pledged to revamp all native Windows 11 applications, it has not explicitly confirmed whether this commitment extends to MSN-branded services like MSN Weather and MSN News. Given that these services are referred to by their functional names within the operating system, there is a strong possibility that these resource-intensive applications will also receive upgrades in the future. For the time being, users may find it more practical to rely on their mobile devices, particularly those who sought to remove the weather widget from their taskbar shortly after its introduction.
