I'll start out by saying that nearly everything about the MS ecosystem works very well for me. I have a Surface Pro and a desktop running Windows 8.1 along with a Windows Phone. The integration between all of my devices has been great. SkyDrive makes my life so much easier than before. I never really realized how much time I spent trying to keep all of my programs, settings, and files in sync across devices until it started to become seamless over the past year. At the moment I only have a two gripes...
1) The Xbox Music app needs a lot of work. What annoys me most about it is that it does not follow any of the other MS Media programs standards. For example, the star rating system (0 to 5 stars) is recognized by Windows Media Player, Windows Media Center, and even Windows File Explorer. Lots of third party apps recognize the embedded ratings as well. However, the Xbox Music app doesn't even have an option to use these ratings even in the name of backwards compatibility. Instead, it replaces the rating system with a "like" and "dislike" option. What a useless rating system. Why the hell would I buy, download, and save a song that I don't like? Also, playlists created in Windows Media Player (including automatic lists) are not understood by the Xbox Music app. I can import lists, but it maintains them separately once they are imported. My solution has been to not use the Xbox Music app, but that could be a problem down the road for devices that don't support desktop apps like Xbox (it's already an issue for my phone, but I don't play music on my phone much). Considering how well everything else works I can't believe they haven't created a consistent experience for something as obvious as music. Music is probably the most common thing that an average user would benefit from having synced across their devices.
2) MS is ignoring Windows Media Center and even removing valuable functionality from it in Windows 8 versions. I use Windows Media Center to watch and record Verizon FIOS TV with a cable card on my PC. It's about the only software product that can be used for this purpose because MS is big enough that the Media companies trust them to respect and enforce whatever copy protection flags are applied to the content. It's frustrating because in my opinion MS should be integrating it into their ecosystem not killing it off. For example, an optional USB 3.0 external cable card tuner for the Xbox One and a version of Windows Media Center on the Xbox One would be amazing. Also, Windows 8, Windows RT, and Windows Phone devices could run as Media Center Extenders (viewers) to stream live/recorded TV from a Media Center PC or Xbox One with Media Center. This sort of functionality would be a natural evolution to Windows Media Center and it would blow away MS's competitors products. Instead of moving forward MS is going out of their way to cripple functionality that was already there in Windows 7.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram