Well, this can’t be a good sign. Samsung has told CNET that the company will not be launching its Windows RT tablet in the United States, citing a lack of demand and consumer confusion. After I spent an afternoon in my country’s largest electronics retailer, it’s hard not to agree with Samsung.
Samsung’s statement to CNET is crystal clear, and leaves little to the imagination.
There wasn’t really a very clear positioning of what Windows RT meant in the marketplace, what it stood for relative to Windows 8, that was being done in an effective manner to the consumer. When we did some tests and studies on how we could go to market with a Windows RT device, we determined there was a lot of heavy lifting we still needed to do to educate the customer on what Windows RT was. And that heavy lifting was going to require pretty heavy investment. When we added those two things up, the investments necessary to educate the consumer on the difference between RT and Windows 8, plus the modest feedback that we got regarding how successful could this be at retail from our retail partners, we decided maybe we ought to wait.
Another issue, according to Samsung, is price. The Korean giant claims that in order to keep the price of Windows RT devices down, it has to make too many compromises. The issue here, of course, is that ARM-based Windows 8 tablets should be cheaper than x86-based ones, since they are simply less functional.
This doesn’t surprise me. I’m going to buy a Surface RT (so I can do a proper review of Windows 8), and as part of my duty as a consumer I wanted to play with a Windows RT tablet to see what performance is like, and whether or not I can justify spending €400 more for the Surface Pro (unlikely). Expecting to see loads of Windows 8 tablets, I went to the country’s largest chain of electronics retailers.
To my utter surprise, they didn’t have a single Windows 8 tablet on display; no ARM, no x86. In fact, they didn’t sell any Windows 8/Windows RT tablets at all! The aisles were lined with Android tablets of all shapes, sizes, and prices. On top of that, the iPads were stacked roof-high; all iPads were fully stocked, and there was even a bargain bin specifically for brand new iPad 3s.
But not a single tablet with Windows 8 or Windows RT. I also noticed – for the first time – that they had reduced the shelf space available to laptops, and that, also for the first time, Apple laptops were intermingled with Windows laptops.
It’s all anectodal, of course, but if I were Microsoft, I’d be worried.
Right now, it’s probably too soon to be pimping Windows RT tablets, as there just aren’t a lot of interesting apps out there. Perhaps if the whole Windows 8 ecosystem takes off on the desktop …
I fail to see how that would help. Windows 8 on the desktop will be Intel based. It is likely that a lot of Windows 8 software never will ship in versions compiled for the RT version as this will be a much smaller userbase. Chanses are the RT platform will see the same succes as Windows NT for PowerPC.
Well,everyone using windows 8 will be exposed to the metro interface and the windows store. Microsoft’s. Hope and dream is that people will get their software from the store. If that starts happening then windows rt on arm starts making sense.
I almost received surface instead of a nexus for Christmas. The giver was being heavily pestered by the sales guy to get the surface. I imagine a number of people ended up getting them as gifts, from people who didn’t understand it wasn’t capable of running all windows programs.
Lest we forget if you currently have a windows app, you’re going to have to completely remake it for windowsRT, it isn’t simply a matter of compiling, or even making a new interface.
After all even MS can’t do it for Office, why should anybody else …they did hack in some touch related crap before recompiling office and dumping it on the tablets.
Sure they’ll eventually get around doing a metro version, but it is mightily unfair that MS is allowed keep the desktop just for office but nobody else can use it…
Can’t and hasn’t are two very different things.
Well “can’t” in this context means within financial and temporal constraints.
I think you are being presumptuous.
If they coulda, they woulda.
Edited 2013-01-14 10:39 UTC
If they had the time, they would have. there is no reason why Office could not be built to work on metro. It is software…nothing is impossible, they just need to work out the GUI changes unnecessary to make it usable and featurefull….check out OneNoteMX if you think it is impossible.
Impossible is not possible but to expensive, takes to long and binds to much limited resources are. Both, IE and Office, would need to be rewritten. Can you imagine what that means? How long it takes? How expensive that is? That the result would be slowww (let .NET and native differences beside, IE and Office contain years of optimizations which need to be redone) and not portable (no Office for Mac, Office 365 needs to be redone, big changes on customer side are needed making migration expensiveee, etc etc), external plugins will not work any longer, both lose there ecosystem and so on and on and…
With what value? IE and Office are there on RT as of today. Fast, cheap, no rewrite needed. Microsoft picked the most fast and cheap way which is not to rewrite but to port. They picked that for both of there own large apps! They rewrote exactly NONE! But yet prevent others to do the same? And force them to rewrite? For a failed RT/WP strategy which has no customers? A dead market where you cannot make profits to even reach break-even after your expensiveeee rewrite? LOL
For OneNote: Thats a joke-application. No real value there, no big application like Word, Excel, Powerpoint, IE and Outlook are. Speaking of Outlook. The port still did not make it to RT. Cause Microsoft has not even enough resources for a way more cheap port. How does it come you think they would have for a rewrite of something that took a decade to develop? Dream on.
Edited 2013-01-15 08:21 UTC
You’re both arguing the same thing. What do you think “temporal constraints” means?
Count me as one of those confused consumers. As a technology fan, porting Windows 8 to ARM is interesting, but Microsoft has failed to show me why I should buy one. Why would I buy an RT tablet rather than a W8 tablet? The difference in battery life isn’t huge, and Intel is catching up.
Apple sells phones, tablets, laptops, and desktops. The phones and tablets run the same OS, the laptops and desktops run a different OS. Other hardware makers use Android on phones and tablets, and Windows 7 or 8 on laptops and desktops. Should Microsoft be pushing Windows Phone for tablets? Are tablets and laptops fundamentally different types of devices, deserving operating systems and user interfaces optimized for the differences?
Microsoft can make a case as to why you should buy an RT tablet instead of an iPad. They can make a case for RT over Android. What they haven’t done is explain why you should buy RT over Windows 8, or vice versa. Why do they have two products that overlap so much?
Devices like the Asus Transformer are pretty much the ideal portable computing device, in my opinion: a good, full-size keyboard for typing (touchscreen keyboards suck — yes, all of them), detachable for when you want to walk around or lie down on the couch. Sadly, Android is a very poor OS for laptops, as it never was intended for that. Surely some kind of compromise should be possible when the hardware is there.
Windows RT seems like a better idea, but the problem is of course that it’s a crippled Windows 8. Why should people buy something that’s worse than the standard Windows? The answer is, of course, that Microsoft has noticed that Apple rakes in cash from selling a crippled and locked-down consumer OS, and merely emulate that instead of giving the consumers a real advantage. There’s no reason to buy Windows RT (until the software is there), but Microsoft wants to sell it.
Not only that, but e.g. Dell’s newly-unveiled ( http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/01/dell-unveils-… ) Windows 8 – tablet isn’t really much different from the Microsoft’s Surface RT, it weighs in at $499, yet still ships with the full Windows 8 instead of Windows RT — if the price-point and the hardware-features are similar there is absolutely NO point in buying the latter at all. And I don’t doubt for a second that there’ll be lots and lots more of these Intel-based tablets coming out soon.
I do understand Microsoft’s wish to lock people in and to create separate markets, but their execution of the plan with the Windows RT in mind just ain’t working out. Without price, speed, features or app ecosystem advantage it just doesn’t fly.
The latest iteration of the Atom processors are actually quite goof from a performance and power consumption standpoint. Compared to ARM they are neck and neck. given that is there really a reason to use an ARM based platform for a windows tablet?
That’s exactly the point
There is if you look beyond Tablets to Phones, Watches and look what your competition is using.
But lets be clear about that: The architecture is NOT what makes the difference. Its Microsoft’s decision to make win32 on ARM not accessible for 3th parties. Its there and successful used in Office and IE. To not allow 3th party to bring there win32 apps to Win RT is a political decision and it has consequences.
Microsoft is disconnected from reality when the believe they can do without ISV’s. Going against OEM’s and ISV’s at the same time and then wonder both are missing? LOL
Edited 2013-01-14 03:53 UTC
When I bought my dual core Brazos EeePC Linux netbook, I also experimented with the idea of getting the Transformer model with keyboard.
The battery duration was almost the same, both were multicore and have proper GPU available, not the Intel joke.
In the end I went with the EeePC, because I was getting the freedom of a full operating system at half of the price of the Transfomer.
The purpose of RT should be to kill the desktop for the majority, most users dont need the desktop with its full exposure to an internet full of malware and viruses, and bundleware (where apps daisey chain install other unrelated apps).
Thus RT should be cheap enough to gather up the general body of people. RT should even run on x86.
Unpopular with techies yes, but it is what is needed.
However, having the RT like experience on an x86 system just kills the purpose of having an x86 device in the first place – the apps are not there.
> internet full of malware and viruses, and bundleware
Hach, Windows, yes. The security decisions still hit there customers bad but at least they succeeded to get into customers mind that a state like this is the norm.
> but it is what is needed.
For Microsoft to not lose new markets and be stuck in old shrinking ones. But that’s what happened cause Surface and WP failed.
I don’t think the Samsung’s issue and the retail space issue you experienced are because of the same thing.
Samsung has made the decision to test Windows RT devices out in other markets before doing a push into the US market. Given the way Microsoft has handled the RT situation, I don’t blame them.
Intel I think really surprised everyone by how quickly they were able to retrofit Clovertrail for Tablets and have it perform decently (Battery Life/Performance).
My Acer W501 gets like 9-10 hours of battery life (like 18+ when docked) and is actually thinner and lighter than my Surface RT. And its running Intel Atom which performs imho better than the Tegra 3 in the Surface RT.
Microsoft made the ARM decision when Intel was in disarray with regards to their mobile strategy. I wonder if they could’ve foreseen how Intel would aggressively be pushing into lower and lower power usage today, would they still decide to go with ARM?
Re: Sales channel issues:
I think the shortage of touch based Windows 8 products at launch is an OEM issue regarding the supply chain. They simply didn’t seem to pour enough money into touch based products (Touch Ultrabooks, Tablets, Convertibles). This only highlights the sheer incompetence of OEMs and their tonedeafness to reality.
I can understand a short supply of Touch Ultrabooks (Touch Panels add to the cost of Ultrabooks which is already astronomically high, seriously, I am not dropping $1,400 – $1,700 for anything. I don’t care how Ultra it is)
I just think OEM’s didn’t really have much faith in the convertible form factors (multiple OEMs have said they were surprised by the demand for them) and they put all their eggs in the non-Touch Ultrabook basket.
I concur that this is extremely dangerous for Microsoft if OEMs do not go all in on touch based models.
I’m optimistic though, some OEMs (Vizio, Lenovo) seem to be getting it. I expect in the coming months the roll out issues to be sorted out. Not because of faith in OEMs, but because I genuinely believe Microsoft does not play around when it comes to selling Windows.
Intel needs to be weakened in the PC space, they lack effective competition, they charge very high prices. Windows on ARM creates pressure on Intel.
Charge high prices? You think $50 for a dual core cpu is too high? That’s the price of dinner for two in the US and that cpu can easily last you 10 years. It also provides more computing power than a $5000 server cpu could offer 10 years ago.
That’s about twice what nVidia charges for a 1.3GHz Tegra 3 quad-core CPU: http://www.isuppli.com/Teardowns/News/pages/Low-End-Google-Nexus-7-…
So yes, $50 is overpriced.
Yawn…. a comparison to ARM, how surprising.
$50 over 10 years = $5 per year. Businesses spend more on toilet paper.
How many industries offer you products that exponentially increase in power while decreasing in price?
Calling Intel cpus overpriced is the epitome of First World Problems.
http://first-world-problems.com/
($50-$21) x 50 million units = $1.45 billion. You try explain to your company execs why you want to spend an extra billion and a half dollars on a project with little to no added benefit, and you’ll get laughed out the door.
Edited 2013-01-13 19:36 UTC
50 million units? Which company would that be? Wal-mart is the largest employer and they have around 2 million employees.
Nice try though.
Er, yeah, someone made a comparison to something which was directly comparable. Colour me surprised.
Uh no it’s like comparing trucks to trains.
They can’t do the same work. Software is not cpu independent so they can only be compared for specific cases. Price is relative to use, not between the two. Or can I save myself some money by tossing my Intel chips in the garbage and running all my software on ARM?
If you’re building a tablet or a phone, yes. Which was the entire point.
Well, that nets you a low-end Celeron processor with very, very poor GPU and no extras. For less than $50 you could in theory buy a quad-core ARM-processor with a more powerful GPU, integrated DSP capable of hardware encoding and decoding a handful of different codecs, usually there’s WIFI/bluetooth/SATA/etc. integrated — think of lower cost for the motherboard thanks to fewer needed components — and lower thermal output.
Of course, they’re not directly comparable, but generally ARM SoCs net you a lot more features and speed than a similarly-priced Intel-processor. On the other hand, ARM-vendors do not sell their SoCs to individual people and there are no motherboards to slap them on to, so I wonder how much of the asking price for the Intel-processors come from all the logistics and packaging needed to sell to end-users — I doubt it’s an entirely negligible amount.
ARM doesn’t have a machine architecture standard such as x86 has (IBM PC), so no wonder there is little to no homebrew when compared to x86. At a fundamental level, from a software perspective, every PC looks the same. There’s a BIOS mapped at a certain address which has certain standard functions you can invoke, every PC has a standard ISA and (later) PCI bus interface that is largely probed in the same way, etc. ARM lacks that. Even a single ARM CPU model can be implemented and firmware-coded to wildly different behavior (which is why bootloaders and firmware blobs are often times highly vendor-specific).
IBM’s (and their clone maker’s) contribution is easily taken for granted, but it was by no means a small thing in the industry.
Indeed. Standardization is one thing ARM really, really needs in order to become a more attractive a choice in general, and only once standardization is achieved will it really be viable for proper enthusiast-use.
I could certainly imagine a future where e.g. the SoC and its RAM are just soldered-on to a motherboard and enthusiasts buy the bundle as-is as that would certainly ease things for the manufacturers and vendors, but for that to happen there must be a proper spec for booting the devices in a standard way and for accessing their resources. Also, it would require the manufacturers to actually start providing up-to-date drivers for their systems.
Alas, given the almost complete lack of interest from the SoC-manufacturers towards enthusiast-/desktop-markets and even actually-working software such a future is likely FAR away.
On of my disappointments with Win RT is that I really wanted a full featured laptop with an ARM version of VS.
Can you imagine how slow VS would be?
VS2010 runs pretty well for small projects on a 1.2 GHZ Core 2 Duo and even the older P4 processors.
The CPU only spikes really when compiling and a fairly modern OS (Windows 7+ because WPF runs awfully badly on XP) it seems to work well enough.
I wouldn’t want to attempt working on “The Beast” (93 project solution which brings my 8 core Xeon machine to its knees) on such a machine, but smaller projects are fine.
You too?!
I had such a project but with Eclipse.
It is a ghastly over-engineered piece of crap, I reckon I could easily get rid of 10 projects given a bit of refactoring time.
A $50 dual-core Sandy Bridge Celeron will beat a $1000 Core 2 Duo from 5 years ago. What bastards they are selling for me that much power for the price of dinner at Applebee’s.
In theory I could buy it but I couldn’t run my software on it so there really is no savings for me, now is there?
Bashing Intel over prices is just freaking silly. If you want to see market without competition then have a look at the US cable market. Intel not only competes with AMD and Intel but also with their existing cpus. It’s not like cable TV where you have to pay for it every month and when you stop paying your hands are empty.
If you’d actually cared to read the comment you would’ve noticed that I wasn’t bashing Intel. But the way you respond so terribly defensively to even the mildest of criticisms about Intel says a few things about.
Maybe they’ll make something cool in its place like a dual-boot Android/ChromeOS tablet.
Called it!
If this comes as a shock to anyone i would be amazed.
A proper WP touchscreen notebook is cheaper than a tablet.
http://dicksmith.com.au/product/XC8588/asus-f202e-ct063h-touch-enab…
It sounds like Microsoft is getting a well-deserved backlash for their lock-down/WinRT/Metro tactics. It’s nice to see them on the receiving end for a change, instead of smothering all competition with their market presence and weight alone. The only problem is… their main competition (Apple, Android) is just as locked down… but if Windows keeps holding traditional x86 machines by the balls and Android continues to dominate tablets and ARM systems, then at least theoretically we should benefit from one not growing too much stronger than the other.
What do you mean “Android is just as locked down”? Apple iOS probably is but certainly not Android.
Fair enough–but do you know of an easy, sure-fire way of rooting my LG Optimus V to install an alternate Android mod without risking damaging it? Or even just gaining root? I don’t. And I’ve looked.
Methods of rooting involve knowing such seemingly completely unnecessary information as the exact model of screen used by the phone, connecting the phone to a computer (typically Windows is used in guides), following a long series of commands exactly, and uploading an alternate firmware. And that’s just to get root access!
That is pretty much the definition of “locked down.” Having to hack the living shit out of something and jump through hoops just to get root.
Android is not quite as locked on a higher level as iOS, but at a lower level it sure as hell is.
Edited 2013-01-13 17:50 UTC
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1197991
Three seconds on Google.
Edited 2013-01-13 17:53 UTC
I can say that in my time owning the phone, all of my Google searches led to much more complicated guides than that. I don’t know how well it’ll work, but thanks–I’ll try it when I get the chance.
Unfortunately for now it’ll have to wait, because I can’t risk bricking my phone without the ability to just get a proper replacement ASAP if something goes wrong.
Look for the Gordita Root exploit by jcase. Very robust.
Come on. Rooting an Android device is as complicated as doing a file-transfer on Windows Phone.
I rooted dozend of Android devices and never bricked one. Granted I have experience but clicking a few times the next Button isn’t that difficult. The whole rooting process is simple, straith forward and like replacing the vendor’s Android version with CM doesn’t require hacking-skills. The two biggest problems are the need for another computer and the lose of warranty.
And if something does happen? I am shit out of luck with no phone. Sorry, but I can’t risk that.
If something goes wrong you can restore the original vendors image. But yes, there is always those 0.% left that your phone is dead. If you like to be 100% you shouldn’t carry around your phone. Way more % lose there phone by dropping it off accidental somewhere, throwing it into water, run across a thief or burn there device in a microwave then bricking it cause of rooting. Put your device into a safe and that safe into another safe and you have 99.9% security.
Now you’re just trying to come up with lame excuses to run the risk of damaging a phone, in an effort to make it seem like theft, loss or physical damage are more likely to happen. Sorry, but I’m not buying it. Not when the act of doing it alone raises the chances of… well, an unsuccessful jailbreak.
Something tells me that if more people were adventurous and rooted/modded their phones, then a higher percentage would be damaged in the process. As it stands, very few people do it–and even then I doubt that any company would tally up and publicly release statistics on the percentage of their products sold that were reported or found to be tampered with and damaged in the process.
Also, 99.5% of the time my phone is not in use while I’m away from home, it is in my case attached to my pants or belt, concealed by my shirt. So while the chance of loss in some way can never be lowered to 0%, I am pretty damn confident in my capability to protect my belongings. To those many people who easily lose their things or get them stolen, well, it must suck. But I have never been one of them.
Maybe I am one of only a select few people who actually looks out for their possessions.
Edited 2013-01-15 19:06 UTC
It’s not Android or Google that dictates such locked efforts, it’s the manufacturers that do it of their own volition, and since not all manufacturers do it it’s disingenuous to blame Android for it.
True… but the reality is, if you get an Android phone or tablet computer, you are effectively buying a locked down system. That was my point; all of Microsoft’s competition–the products that are on the shelves to buy–are locked. Maybe the OS itself is not that way stock, but when someone buys something that runs it they are certainly not getting “stock Android.”
I’m looking at this from a product/consumer perspective, and it still stands true.
Edited 2013-01-13 22:05 UTC
But as I said, not all manufacturers do it, and even then not all manufacturers do it for all of their products. Generally the Chinese Android-phones and lower-end ones are not locked, and the higher-end ones by the usual suspects are.
And there are lots of offers on various events to unlock your locked Android device for you. Most times without extra payment even. But you can also grab none of the commercial unlock-offers. See that as additional service offered for those who see a value or even know what unlocked means. Majority doesn’t know, doesn’t care and maybe its better to protect there phone from them just like I usually not give out the root-password for Internet-computer users if I maintain there system cause that may bring bigger problems then benefits for them.
The point is unlocking Android is easy and even official supported (OHA goals) unlike at WP and iPhone where its a find-exploit vs exploit-closed game all of the time.
Edited 2013-01-14 04:09 UTC
Get back to me when there is any value in a Windows tablet.
There is value in such already, you’re just being too immature to notice it.
I can’t exactly speak for him, but who knows–maybe there really *is* no value in a Windows-based tablet for him? Just because something is on the market being sold doesn’t mean it is automatically of value to everyone… people have different needs. Buying decisions aren’t necessarily dictated by maturity. Although a lot of people buy based purely on impulse and marketing hype without a second of actual research, which in my opinion is about the worst thing anyone can do… but the companies love it.
But he never stated that he was talking about him, it was written like he meant that there’s no value in a Windows-based tablet in general. The thing is, a Windows 8 – tablet can do more-or-less all the same thing an Android – or an iOS – one can — atleast when the amount of available software catches up — so in general there’s either value in all of them or none of them. The difference in value then mostly boils down to hardware-features, with a cheap tablet being the optimal point for some and an expensive one being the optimal point for others.
It seems majority agrees with him and not you since majorty doesn’t buy a windows phone or tablet but Android and iOS. Taken that into account I think his opinion is closer to the majority of customers (>95% that is) then your opinion is.
Edited 2013-01-14 04:15 UTC
No, I am being realistic. There is no value in a Windows tablet for me.
RE: Windows tablet?
by WereCatf on Sun 13th Jan 2013 12:32 UTC in reply to “Windows tablet?”
Get back to me when there is any value in a WindowsRT tablet.
There, fixed it for you. (You forgot the “RT”
No, it was not forgotten at all.
The value is Office. Office on a tablet (and not some third party crap replacement on Android or iOS) will completely change my workflow for the better. I can revise and check my translations on the couch instead of behind my desk. I can’t use laptops on the couch either due to a neck injury.
So yeah, lots of value.
that’s more complex.
Consumer/home demand for office features (mostly for educational purposes i believe) seems to be more alligned with what alternatives offer, same thing with photoshop and other classical windows must haves. So unless the crisis pushes most peope to work from home i don’t see this as a deciding factor.
Office may be of value to you since you seem to need it for what you do but that’s an exception. Office isn;t necessary for typical user who i just fine with something that probably does the job for little or no cost to them.
Which is absolute non-sense. No sane person in this world will ever write anything longer than two paragraphs on a tablet.
It’s like browsing the internet with your television using the supplied remote without a fully-sized keyboard. Yes, it works, but it is utterly unpractical.
Microsoft had to cut down orders for the Surface from 4 million to 2 million orders, they sold only 700.000 units and Windows 8 doesn’t even show in the stats of Global Stat Counter.
http://gs.statcounter.com/press?PHPSESSID=0bci4doeggq618kp73esf1e7b…
Yet there are people who think that Windows 8 is a successful design.
If I were Microsoft, I’d have a look at companies like digital, Commodore or even now Sony who also thought it’s a sensible decision to ignore your customers.
Adrian
Even if they write more then a few paragraphs the question stays if you need all what Microsoft Office has for that or if something offering lesser features (what Tom called crap) is enough too?
Microsoft Office on Surface RT is already such a limited offer since it does not support everything Office on the desktop does (Macros eg). Then there are some features in those alternates that may give customers an important advantage. Like google docs and Office 365 being accessible and sychronized from/at any device without rich client.
I couldn’t care less about Office. So no value to me.
given Intels power advancements (latest Atoms more power efficient than A15) Windows RT looks to be a completely unnecesary adventure and Balmer must have known it, probably simply trying to appease stock holders.
Given the fact that MS can ammortize its investments with WP8 anyway, the move can even be rationalized.
Windows 8 tablet consumer value will only be fully exploited when practical x86 tablets convertible to fully ergonomical laptop form factor appear. They will take place of laptops and if with this move MS controls hommemorage in the PC market they can declare success.
Sure, I can’t wait to see it explained how spending half a billion on advertising surface and angering developers can be rationalized.
e.g. by showing OEMS how serious MS is about the change Win8 introduces. Also, x86 version of Surface will ride this wave too.
Wait…so you think Surface x86 is going to be a hit? You really think the masses are going to run out for a $900 64gb tablet that requires a $100 keyboard to use Office without fingers?
If that one plays the role of a laptop decently, why not.
The race is still totally valid. It’s performance, power AND price, intel only wants to compete on the first two. The next interesting move will be the release of the aarm64 socs. At the moment the only thing the intel platform does on mobile devices is to cut the profitability per unit for the device manufacturer. Its the same with windows as well.
Edited 2013-01-13 15:15 UTC
I see the same thing in China and in Hong Kong where I work. Android everywhere (Samsung) most Apple stores empty except for a few people who come in just to use them for free. Microsoft? who? that is what it seems like, on the major electronics streets I have seen one or two ads for Windows 8 devices.
On this site, we obviously care a bit more than the average person what the operating system is, but most users really couldn’t care less.
Ask the average user what OS their iPad runs, and they wouldn’t be able to tell you.
The problem is that Microsoft is so proud of Windows the brand, that they insist on plastering it everywhere, on everything. The problem with that is that nobody’s really sure what “Windows” means anymore.
They had a new brand: “Surface”. What they should have done is removed all mention of WindowsRT from everything, and just named the device in a readily understandable way. Something like “Surface Ultralite”, and “Surface Pro”.
That way people just know that if they buy the ultralite, they get less, and if they buy the pro, they get more.
The problem here is that the average consumer could care less about ARM vs Intel CPU architecture.
So Microsoft’s got a problem explaining it to them.
No surprise, there.
I disagree – I think the average consumer could not care less. They just want to know if the tablet can do the standard tablet stuff well and at a good price. The more discerning may be interested in battery life and screen quality. While the chipset influences these factors, the architecture itself is of no interest to consumers.
Microsoft missed an opportunity here.
You have to wonder what kind of deals Intel had with Microsoft.
Obviously desktop applications are possible on ARM… it has been proven.
So why the artificial limit?
Microsoft thinks customers are too stupid to know the difference between RT and 8… thinking customers might complain that they can’t run quicken or photoshop?
So what do you do?… You try to differentiate artificially.
You call it RT instead of 8, and you say up front, no desktop apps on RT. That should be a big enough difference for users and they’ll be able to understand it right?
Wrong.. now it looks like OEMs think customers are too stupid to even attempt to explain the difference after Microsoft went out of their way to exaggerate the difference.
HA HA HA
If Microsoft had faith in their developers they’d create tools to make fat binaries just like OSX did with PPC and x86.
Microsoft has no such faith in their developers and it is Microsoft’s fault.
They bent over backwards ensuring backward compatibility release after release and it is finally coming around to bite them in the ass.
Why the artificial limit? Cause they try to push .NET in? As of today win32 apps are portable and there exist many native applications running on win32 and OSX/Linux. Microsoft’s .NET is a patent mine-field unlike win32 and the posix-compatibility offered there. Microsoft actively controls and protected the .NET story. If they are able to move there ecosystem over they have strong ways to fight off competition. The whole .NET stack is a vendor lockin. That’s why they tried hard to push it into the internet with Silverlight and later, once that failed, onto there ISV’s. Good this failed too.
Edited 2013-01-15 07:58 UTC