I guess this explains why they were giving them away at a trade show in May. Storage costs were higher than any potential revenue!

http://www.telecoms.com/163542/micro...urface-tablets

The i pad killer :yawn:

Microsoft are failing these days, whoever though of RT and windows 8 design should be sacked

Indeed. MS, as a latecomer to the party, had the fine business examples of Apple IOS and Android in the tablet market, including how to make quality hardware, what the public regard as the best software design, and the two hugely successful app stores... yet they try to foist Windows 8 on that same public, complete with its 'my little computer' looks, lack of apps and two fingers up to everyone who uses it as a PC OS!

The sooner Windows 8 fails and the bigger the hit to the company, the better I'll like it. Only then, perhaps, will they bother to look at what is successful and ask the customers what they want today.

Why was RT a bad idea?

ARM-powered devices are growing at a huge rate and causing big dents into the market share Windows-capable devices, so it was the right thing to make a Windows variant that can run on them.

Additionally a lot of people agree that Windows 8 makes a poor desktop OS but a good tablet OS, the design suits the touch interface.

It is a stable OS, too. And actually once people actually use it then usually come round to liking it and enjoying the benefits it has over previous versions of Windows, though that is not to say that there are still elements that require a big re-think.

I think that cheap chromecast helps stuff RT's walled garden chances.
Its fine for an already successful iPad to limit your choices, but RT as a newcomer has consumer aversion written all over it.

It was far too late.

Current tablet processors aren't powerful enough to run Windows, not even a cut down version.

Windows is seriously bloated, so it takes up too much space on a tablet's small hard disc.

Usability wasn't considered a priority when WinRT and Metro were designed. Metro doesn't have enough discoverability. It doesn't have enough visual clues. So it's very frustrating - difficult to learn and awkward to use.

WinRT was competing with iOS and Android, both of which have fully established hardware, operating systems and apps. WinRT had none of these.

The Surface tablets were vastly overpriced.

By the choice of name and its advertising, Microsoft deliberately misled customers into thinking that SurfaceRT tablets could run Windows EXE programs. They forgot that disgruntled customers talk to friends and post on the Internet.

There were also various factors regarding the discouragement of potential WinRT/Metro app developers.

Shouldn't they flood the market with cheap tablets now? Wasn't the idea of tablets to be 'cheap' alternatives to laptops and desktops. I remember how Sky managed to dominate satellite TV. It wasn't by having expensive hardware! Apple is a strange glitch to this of course.

I have a Nexus 7. If I'm honest the reason I got it was it was really good value. I had no intentions of buying a tablet up until they announced the specs and price.

Microsoft haven't given up on the Surface and are determined to continue with the next generation.

Apparently tomorrow a Surface 2 is about to be announced with possibly 3 models including an 8" mini version (though that model will probably be a later release). Plus several new accessories planned, such as a docking station etc.
http://winsupersite.com/hardware/surface-2-preview

The ARM processors are cheaper than Intel I3,5,7 processors. If they had priced the Surface RT accordingly, they could have done a bit better. I use both Surface RT and Surface Pro and I must say I prefer the RT, simply because I do mostly "tablety" things with it and for that ARM is quite enough, the tablet is lighter, lasts longer, and does not heat that much. But there's Intel Atom that should give you all that, plus ability to run Win32 programmes, so it will be a problem, I think. MS is terrible at marketing their products. They tell you, why buy a tablet and a laptop, buy just one device that can be both. And then they tell you, buy just a tablet, anyway.

Do they involve the sofa and TV?

He's apparently leaving of his own volition now:

Steve Ballmer Has Some Big Regrets As He Leaves Microsoft
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...n_3961355.html

Browsing, checking emails, playing games. Having Office is nice, too.

So if such words exist it is exactly the same as 'Laptoppy thing's' be it slower and more cumbersome.

And smaller screen, and no proper keyboard.

It depends on what exactly you are doing with it. I have an ultrabook, which is relatively light (1.16kg), comparable to Surface Pro actually, which is what, 0.9kg, and I still rather use the tablet than the ultrabook or the Surface Pro.

No keynote today of the launch at 3pm for the surface 2

But for me it all went wrong at the original surface keynote back in June 2012
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ervY6As5OcI

Didn't help that they held the launch back to try overshadowing the iPad Mini's launch, only for Apple to also announce the iPad 4 on the same day, which specs-wise completely blew the Surface RT out of the water.

For its price segment the Surface Pro hasn't actually done that badly all things considered, so maybe MS will have a bit more luck this time. Not that I'm holding my breath, mind...

Big blow for MS in the UK today.
The tesco hudl tablet has gone down well in the press and stolen any limelight of the MS launch and from what I have just been reading the press are certainly still criticising the surface and its lack of sales.

Looking at what they are offering, it doesn't make me go wow as any upgrade/gamechanger!
Honestly thought they would scrap the RT, its too expensive for what it is.
The pro, having tried Myself and may be faster, but still not for me.
W8 metro and lack of decent apps still not helping it either and will not improve the the situation.
Best bet for most MS users still will be to buy a laptop rather than the Pro and get what the user really wants, a Windows desktop PC.

Microsoft never seem to learn from their mistakes in the hardware market. Their KIN series of mobile phones were an unmitigated disaster, and the original Surface tablet was an epic fail.

They seem so desperate and throwing more money away by releasing a Surface 2 is not making things any better. People just aren't interested, even though MS have tried very hard to get the public interested, with wide-scale price campaigns and various price cuts.

They are too busy rushing to play catch up and aren't making compelling products. There's something about the Surface which makes it uninteresting compared to a Google Nexus tablet or an Apple iPad. And I don't think Windows OEMs are too happy about having to compete directly with Microsoft, especially when most of them are making better products than the Surface. Microsoft's flops are deterring people from investing in the ecosystem at the expense of Microsoft's hardware partners. It's a total mess.

iPad and Android tablets had an advantage of having the stores with phone apps to begin with. MS keeps bringing new technologies which meant starting from zero. Didn't help at all. I like WinRT, I wrote several apps for it, but how long will it stay before they find something else.

Aren't they going to at least unify Windows Phone 8 apps and Windows RT apps?

I was in John Lewis last week and they has a surface RT and surface pro on display. Both locked so you couldn't play around with them. I would be livid if I were Microsoft, but this is typical of the sort of mismanagement and lack of detail they have had.

You never see this with Apple devices, they are always on a display and 90% of the time connected to the internet. I also notice Samsung now always make sure they have working devices on display.

Microsoft had a massive opportunity to fill the gap that Android has now taken in the lower end of the tablet market but I think they missed the boat.

I can't see the surface winning in direct competition with the iPad at the high end, even in business you would think the windows machine ought to have an advantage but I don't think this is really the case anymore with the way you can distribute software these days.

I went into JL yesterday and you are right, they are locked and their display is non existent compared to the iPad, Samsung and some of the other Manufacturers. Im sure it was not like that when it first launched.
Not all JL stores have the surface, my other local one does not and I have yet to see it in my local Currys. Do wonder what they spent that extra $898 million advertising on.

I asked the Assistant in the technology section why they were locked, he just unlocked it for me, but gave no answer.

Read this yesterday evening and it sums the whole surface fiasco up nicely, sad really but true;
http://www.engadget.com/2013/09/23/m...same-problems/

The quote below sums up the entire situation in just two succinct sentences:


The original Surface OS should have been fully thought out first and having two separate and incompatible OSs thus brought about situation whereby the write off of a billion dollars has just occurred.