Microsoft to introduce its own tablet today?

Tilted

Tilted

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Microsoft has scheduled a media event for this afternoon (this evening for those of us on the east coast). There's building speculation that they're going to introduce their own tablet computer.

While I wouldn't rule that possibility out, it doesn't seem likely to me that they would develop, market and sale their own tablet. Their business model has worked well in the past, and that's understating things. That business model has, for the most part, been to develop and maintain the operating system and allow hardware makers to develop and market a variety of devices for that operating system. I don't see where they'd benefit big picture from having their own consumer tablet hardware, and Microsoft is a company that can afford to think big picture.

My suspicion is that MS is going to put out a generic tablet meant to help developers develop Windows RT apps ahead of a big push for Windows RT tablets later in the year. I don't think that tablet will be for the consumer market, I think they'll leave the hardware side of the tablet market to the likes of HP and Dell while they themselves focus on the operating system and cultivating an app / content ecosystem for that platform. They could choose to go with the Apple business model in this case, but it would surprise me if they did. I think MS understands the importance of not competing with your business partners (e.g. HP and Dell) when trying to build macro market share.

At any rate, I look forward to Microsoft's announcement - hopefully it's something cool.
 
somdfunguy

somdfunguy

not impressed
I'm guessing it is going to be about a new media service on Xbox. Combine that with a smart glass device. It's too early for a RT tablets and they would have done gaming announcements at E3. I think next week they have a win phone announcement as well.
 
Tilted

Tilted

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somdfunguy said:
I'm guessing it is going to be about a new media service on Xbox. Combine that with a smart glass device. It's too early for a RT tablets and they would have done gaming announcements at E3. I think next week they have a win phone announcement as well.
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It may be too early for RT tablets, but developing a healthy ecosystems for that platform is perhaps the most important aspect of their upcoming tablet push. And yes they have a phone event coming up - I thought it was this week?

Have you read that they're doing their own smart glass device? I thought that was mostly an app initiative to allow interoperability with other platforms (e.g. Android, iOS). I might have missed part of that story though.
 
somdfunguy

somdfunguy

not impressed
Yeah it is this week. Seeing how they chose LA this leads me to believe it has something to do with media delivery. Bringing Xbox live to the nook has also been tossed around.
 
Tilted

Tilted

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somdfunguy said:
Yeah looks nice. I like the keyboard/cover. I'm watching it on TWIT.tv



Surface by Microsoft
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I can't wait to get my hands on one of these to see if they really pulled it off. So many have tried, so many have failed. This looks pretty good so far, but it's hard to know until you interact with one - so much depends on the smoothness / ease of the GUI / OS and the quality of the apps / content ecosystem. I'm cautiously excited about this push from Microsoft.
 
Tilted

Tilted

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I've been thinking that, if the Android platform hadn't gotten real momentum in the tablet market by the time Microsoft started its tablet push that Android would be in trouble in that market. Great, effortless integration between a desktop OS and a mobile OS isn't as important with smartphones. But with tablets, it's going to be pretty important and that's one place where Microsoft is going to have a big advantage over Android. I could see Microsoft becoming an important player in the tablet market relatively soon. Still, it's all about the user experience - the specs aren't the key anymore, other than for techies. Just gonna have to wait to see.
 
Tilted

Tilted

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Nickel said:
Wow! Looks nice!
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That looks like the pro version. It's bigger and purports to be nearly as powerful as high-end ultrabooks. They also have a smaller (i.e. thinner and lighter) version that's presumably less powerful. It seems that the keyboard / covers for the two versions are different also.
 
Tilted

Tilted

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No definitive pricing info yet. :frown:

The Windows RT version (the smaller one) will supposedly be available when Windows 8 is. The Windows 8 Pro version will supposedly be available 3 months later.
 
Nickel

Nickel

curiouser and curiouser
Tilted said:
That looks like the pro version. It's bigger and purports to be nearly as powerful as high-end ultrabooks. They also have a smaller (i.e. thinner and lighter) version that's presumably less powerful. It seems that the keyboard / covers for the two versions are different also.
Click to expand...
Of course, and the cool looking fancy one will probably be super expensive. :lol: The keyboard/cover design is something Apple should've come up with for the iPad.
 
Tilted

Tilted

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The recent shift in Microsoft's marketing strategy for the Surface was a decent clue, but they as much as admitted yesterday in their earnings release and conference call that the Surface tablet has been a flop. They took nearly a billion dollar write down on Surface inventory and they've reduced the base price of the Surface RT by $150 to $349. They had announced the latter earlier this week or last week I think.
 
ylexot

ylexot

Super Genius
Pretty sad really. A guy that I work with has one and loves it. Of course, now I may be able to pick one up for cheap. I've seen lots of reviews that it really is a good tablet/computer.
 
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