Windows Surface

bastic

bastic

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Microsoft announced windows Surface.
A windows tablet. One is based on ARM CPU, weights around 600grams and i5 version weighting around 900grams.
One has USB 2, other 3.

They look brilliant!!

And their cover is a keyboard at same time!! It's not one of those plasticky ones you can get from let's say Logitech. It is a soft cover with built in keyboard. Whole cover is 3mm thick!!!!

I hope that pricing is going to be reasonable .

Do I sell my new iPad 4g now or wait...I'm going to get one for sure.

Release is scheduled for fall of 2012, same as release of win8.
 
My first impression was.....looks big! Maybe uncomfortable to hold after a while.
 
Why would you sell now for something that isn't on sale yet.

What if they say it will be £900, would you say 'no way hose' and go and buy another ipad?

Seems daft to me.

The ipad 8GSXi will be out in 4 years time, why not sell and wait for that?
 
Looks interesting. Could genuinely be a competitor to the iPad IF they price it right. While I'd hope they'll take a hit on retail to try make it back in the app store I'm not expecting it.

As I see it unless it's cheaper (by alot) than an iPad, people will buy an iPad,this is where android tablets fall down mostly imo. While apps aren't there atm, they'd come faster if there was a bigger user base.
 
Ploddles said:
Why would you sell now for something that isn't on sale yet.

What if they say it will be £900, would you say 'no way hose' and go and buy another ipad?

Seems daft to me.

The ipad 8GSXi will be out in 4 years time, why not sell and wait for that?
Click to expand...

What is daft for you, may not be for others. My iPad , my decision. Don't like your comment.
 
maninsuitcase said:
Looks interesting. Could genuinely be a competitor to the iPad IF they price it right. While I'd hope they'll take a hit on retail to try make it back in the app store I'm not expecting it.

As I see it unless it's cheaper (by alot) than an iPad, people will buy an iPad,this is where android tablets fall down mostly imo. While apps aren't there atm, they'd come faster if there was a bigger user base.
Click to expand...

It is aimed at windows people...I don't think it will take much of iPad part of market.
Not sure if it will be cheaper as well.....


Ricardo, the bigger one is the one with i5. It does look thick...its more of a full PC in a tablet - for people that like tablet look with PC possibilities... price might be high though
 
Thanks for the clarification. The pic I saw looked very wedgy so I assume that's what you're referring too.
 
if the price is right I could see me with one of them.

Keyboard concept is neat. Means you can type with one still utilising the whole screen and without getting a sore back/wrists.
 
bastic said:
What is daft for you, may not be for others. My iPad , my decision. Don't like your comment.
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Exactly what I was saying. Seems daft TO ME (and I suspect to many others). It is hardly going to make the price of iPads crash so you have nothing to gain really by selling now and waiting x months for it to come out.

Just think of the situation with the announced Canon 1D-X. Should have been out months and months ago but everyone is still waiting. Anyone who sold their camera to get a 1D-X would still be waiting and been without their camera for who knows how long.

Sounds like you only want people to say sell sell sell. If you don't like my comment then ignore it. No need to get snotty about it.:wacky:
 
trencheel303 said:
if the price is right I could see me with one of them.
Click to expand...

I can see that being the same for me, especially it it means companies release versions of apps to run on RT, cut down as required. A "mobile" Lightroom would be great for long trips if only to ingest, sort and keyword then export the catalog once at home.
 
Pricing? probably around £500 for the RT version and up to £1k for the Pro?

Will this bring Microsoft into the Apps market too? or will their tablets expect to run 'proper' windows software? For me one of the big plus points for Android (and I'm sure for others with Apple) is the availability of Apps to suit nearly every purpose, small cheap and there when you want them.
 
Steep said:
Pricing? probably around £500 for the RT version and up to £1k for the Pro?

Will this bring Microsoft into the Apps market too? or will their tablets expect to run 'proper' windows software? For me one of the big plus points for Android (and I'm sure for others with Apple) is the availability of Apps to suit nearly every purpose, small cheap and there when you want them.
Click to expand...

And there's the key - if MS want to market the device outside of the business world then there'll need to be a whole load of iFart and iBoobieWobble type apps available at launch to get the great unwashed interested. ;)

Seriously speaking though MS will need a solid and useful App library to begin with if they want to make in roads into the Android/Apple markets. I'm actually quite interested in this device, but I have a feeling it won't play nicely with my Macs.
 
if they want anything near 1k for the good one then they can shove it.

Sounds great otherwise. They'll never better the new ipad screen but getting close would be fine. I just want nice speedy transfer of files between devices. As far as apps go they have it all already. Did i see Lightroom running on it? Thatll do for me.

Why would you sell your iPad now and sit around for at least 4 months until the autumn with nothing to use? Most odd.
 
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Slaphead said:
And there's the key - if MS want to market the device outside of the business world then there'll need to be a whole load of iFart and iBoobieWobble type apps available at launch to get the great unwashed interested. ;)

Seriously speaking though MS will need a solid and useful App library to begin with if they want to make in roads into the Android/Apple markets. I'm actually quite interested in this device, but I have a feeling it won't play nicely with my Macs.
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The development tools for Windows 8 have been out a while now, and iirc these will also do RT apps but I'd have to check. So basically if you want to make your money selling a 99p msFart app get coding now.

edit: Yes you can create a "metro" app that will run on basically everything (tablet, pc, phone, maybe even xbox). There's a certain amount of "will run desktop apps too" chatter but I can't see how unless them mean .net apps.
 
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Will be selling my iPad3G and buying a W8Pro Surface the second they are released...love it.

Just got rid of my Macbook Pro and was going to buy an Ultrabook to replace it.....but now I can replace both laptop and iPad with a single device...perfect!
 
It looks awesome, but the only way to be sure is to actually use one.
I said the same thing about the Nokia N97, it looked good, but when I got one, it turned out to be a pile of *****, when it worked it was great, but it spent more time being repaired than used, mostly had software issues.

The moral to this is... don't judge a book by its cover

:)
 
Bambi72 said:
Wonder if they will upgrade the BSOD with a new colour...
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Oooh.. I hope they don't. It would be good to see an old friend I hadn't seen for a good few years again... ;)
 
Bit of an odd one this, especially releasing ARM and core i5 in the same product line.

It has a stylus too, a clear nod to the fact that a lot of people will be using traditional Windows apps with menus or ribbon (eek!) interfaces especially on the i5 version which should run anything your laptop runs. The key to consumer success,will however be Metro finger touch based apps made for that kind of use, otherwise we're back to the old Tablet PC stuff which has even less chances of working now than it did years ago. Also I'm sure that these metro apps will be distributed from a MS "app store" with the dev tools crosscompiling ARM + x86 binaries automagically, otherwise consumers will be bewildered and disappointed by the lack of coherent platform support between the 2 architectures..

I hope they succeed, my iPad needs competition! :)
 
essexash said:
if they want anything near 1k for the good one then they can shove it.

Sounds great otherwise. They'll never better the new ipad screen but getting close would be fine. I just want nice speedy transfer of files between devices. As far as apps go they have it all already. Did i see Lightroom running on it? Thatll do for me.

Why would you sell your iPad now and sit around for at least 4 months until the autumn with nothing to use? Most odd.
Click to expand...

Lightroom does need 8GB+ RAM for bigger RAW files. What is the chance the tablet will have it or even support it? I will bet on 4GB more likely for the pro, or the price will be £1k+. In short they need MPB13 or at least MBA specs, and i5 already seems a bit yesterday.
The concept looks nice though, and I hope apple will take the message on board. MPA should have had this design by now.
 
The Win8Pro Surface specs will be the same or better than the new MBA 11-inch. You can already buy Windows slates with same or better specs.
 
People already expect too much from their tablets, lord knows what they will expect from something supposedly aimed at business use and called "Pro", to even think of running heavy duty software like image editing is just going to lead to disappointment for those who try and a slating for MS.
 
mid_gen said:
The Win8Pro Surface specs will be the same or better than the new MBA 11-inch. You can already buy Windows slates with same or better specs.
Click to expand...

I suppose the side by side review headline will be 'Surface to Air Missile'!
 
Steep said:
People already expect too much from their tablets, lord knows what they will expect from something supposedly aimed at business use and called "Pro", to even think of running heavy duty software like image editing is just going to lead to disappointment for those who try and a slating for MS.
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Core i5 processer, 4GB RAM, SSD primary storage. Unless you are crunching a lot of big RAW files it will be more than adequate.

It's not a replacement for a serious workstation PC, nor is it being touted as one.
 
daugirdas said:
Lightroom does need 8GB+ RAM for bigger RAW files.
Click to expand...
You sure about that? I've never been able to get LR to use more than 2G of memory. Photoshop yes, but LR only 2G max (and I have 16G here....)
 
mid_gen said:
It's not a replacement for a serious workstation PC, nor is it being touted as one.
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No, but there will be plenty of people out there who will expect to be able to use it as one. Blimey, there are plenty of posts on PotN from people expecting the iPad to be able to run Lightroom.
 
Looks good but until they are out then it is all speculation.

The problem for any tablet to compete is that most people have invested in a system and will be loathe to switch over.

I probably have £200 invested in iPhone/iPad apps. I would need a serious reason to move over to another platform now.

Also this brings the development of app problem. As with everyone else developers go where the money is and at present that is apple. This means that they will target there first and everywhere else second. Hopefully MS will come with a big, well stocked app store, and a good system for developers, if not they could have issues.

The tablet market is not in the pros the money is in the man on the street. Apple have this sewn up with their walled garden. Some find it frustrating but the AVERAGE person loves the no hassle, everything works and loads due to the process Apple have in place.

Me I don't think MS will win. They can't mimic apple as people will moan about the walled garden, but they need a smooth no crash no error process on everything to get the average person.

I hope they can do it, but am not sure it's possible.
 
ding76uk said:
Also this brings the development of app problem. As with everyone else developers go where the money is and at present that is apple. This means that they will target there first and everywhere else second. Hopefully MS will come with a big, well stocked app store, and a good system for developers, if not they could have issues.
Click to expand...

Form a devs point of view, the MS tools are some of the best I have ever used, and the documentation is excellent. Apple on the other hand, I have found the documentation hard to read and the tools a bit confusing. And that's before you consider Objective-C which is....well different.

That said this clearly means squat, as devs still flood to Apple as they can make the money there.

The app store won't be well stocked initially, but so long as the core or facebook, twitter and angry birds is there I think the rest could follow reasonably fast (assuming people actually buy these, but look at windows phone....)
 
I think the Surface looks fantastic, and the keyboard will be a huge bonus for anyone wanting to do any real business work on a tablet, nice to see a generic USB 3 connector on there too.

Microsoft may only get it out a little later in the year, but maybe they have a 4G system that will work in the UK unlike Apples USA only version :)

maninsuitcase said:
The app store won't be well stocked initially, but so long as the core or facebook, twitter and angry birds is there I think the rest could follow reasonably fast (assuming people actually buy these, but look at windows phone....)
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As I understand it MS having been seminars with DEVs about the Windows Store for a while now, and on the video I saw one of the big points was how much money as a percentage they get from each app sold, which is going to be much higher than from the apple app store, around 80% for the DEV if I remember correct. The windows store will be integrated into IE10 too.

Microsoft said:
Our individual registration fee will be $49 USD ($99 USD for companies).
We will share up to 80% of the revenue generated from app sales.
The revenue share base is 70%, but when an app achieves $25k USD in revenue—aggregated across all sales in every market—that app moves to 80% revenue share for the lifetime of that app.
Click to expand...
 
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Wifi only is fine, it's a lot cheaper to buy a small wifi/3g router than extra it seems to cost to buy a 3g version of a tablet.
 
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