It’s rare that Microsoft cancels an operating system after working on it for a while. But much rarer is that, when this occurs, the information about this system comes to see the light of day. However, 2021 could not start more interesting for us, or more worrying for Microsoft. Thus, thanks to a Microsoft leak, we have been able to know one of these strange operating systems that were canceled by the company before its launch. This is Windows Core Polaris , or also known as PolarisOS.
PolarisOS is an operating system that Microsoft was working on a few years ago until 2018, when it was canceled. The project was replaced by Windows 10X, which suggests that this system was going to be a kind of lightweight Windows for tablets and computers with few resources. An improved version of Windows 10 in Mode S that never achieved the success that Microsoft expected.
PolarisOS available for download
This same weekend an old compilation of PolarisOS appeared on archive.org , specifically build 16299 of this system, exactly the compilation in which it was canceled. This system, it seems, was designed to work on both desktop and laptop PCs, targeting low-resource devices such as low-end processors and low RAM.
The leaked image is only prepared to work on ARM devices (it is not known if it would have worked on x64) and it does not bring anything other than the operating system as such. Not even a shell. Therefore, it cannot load anything even if we install it.
It is real? The person who has uploaded this image asks not to be asked about its origin. However, those who have downloaded it and made it work assure that it is a real system, although nothing can be done with it. In addition, this user has already uploaded confidential real versions of Windows before, so Polaris does not have to be an exception.
Andromeda, another canceled OS from Microsoft
Before focusing on Windows 10X, Microsoft was working on two operating systems that never saw the light of day. On the one hand we have Polaris, the system we just talked about that was focused on computers with few resources, both desktop and laptop. And on the other side is Andromeda .
Andromeda has been heard of once more. This operating system, also based on Windows Core OS, was being designed for dual-screen devices and smartphones. However, Microsoft also decided to shelve and unify it, along with Polaris, in a new operating system. And so Windows 10X arrived.
Windows 10X is Microsoft’s new operating system designed for ARM devices (laptops, tablets, etc.) and for dual-screen devices (although we won’t see this until next year). This new operating system will see the light of day in the spring of this year, at least in a simpler version. In 2022 it will be when we can take full advantage of the full potential of Windows 10X, when it begins to work on dual-screen devices.