Microsoft Surface

[S14DB]

Surface by Microsoft (http://www.microsoft.com/surface/en/us/default.aspx)

News was a buzz today with a secret release party Microsoft was holding after the stock markets closed.
Looks just like a Win8 tablet to me. Crashed during the press demo lol.

[kandyflip445]

It's about time. This may be my first tablet worth buying.

The song in the video is awesome.

[exitspeed]

Yeah this looks pretty legit. This will be pretty rad. Obviously this will have 360/720 integration down the road. Wonder how much its gonna cost.

[TheWolf]

Cost, battery life, apps, and ship date not revealed.

Color me less than impressed at this "finished" product.

Why not hold your super secret press conference when you've got something to sell? Who's going to remember "microsoft surface tablets" come november?

I went to view the video on the OP's link but it said I needed a more modern version of silverlight to play it. In the world of youtube, flash, and html5.. if you can't pick one of those to show a video to a customer, you still don't get it.

[Daniel.]

Cost, battery life, apps, and ship date not revealed.

Color me less than impressed at this "finished" product.

Why not hold your super secret press conference when you've got something to sell? Who's going to remember "microsoft surface tablets" come november?

I went to view the video on the OP's link but it said I needed a more modern version of silverlight to play it. In the world of youtube, flash, and html5.. if you can't pick one of those to show a video to a customer, you still don't get it.

I'm not too concerned about apps. Microsoft is going to get support from developers whether they have to pay them or not.

Overall, this is a great tie into the rest of the living room/home entertainment ecosystem that Microsoft is building with the xbox.

[TheWolf]

I'm not too concerned about apps. Microsoft is going to get support from developers whether they have to pay them or not.


Yet as MS said a few days ago, apps written for Windows 8 RT (tablets running on arm including the new cheaper surface) will not work on anything else. ARM will only have the metro interface. No desktop behind it. No X86 apps will work on arm and no arm apps on x86. Because of that, windows 8 surface pro will run your normal apps but they "left out" how the touch features work on them and hence why you might need that stylus input.

So what will WindowsRT run? Windows phone apps are a "good idea" but MS hasn't said anything more than that. No windows x86 apps. No demo's. A "touch friendly office" is all that's been said with no demo of that either. Sounds like all the same limitations of Android but none of the apps.

[HyperTek]

somehow this will be overshadowed by the next Ipad, just you wait and see . The mass of zombie audience will flock to apple. lol

btw i like microsoft, always been good to me.

[Flipzide]

somehow this will be overshadowed by the next Ipad, just you wait and see . The mass of zombie audience will flock to apple. lol

btw i like microsoft, always been good to me.

I doubt the target audience for Microsoft is the core Apple users that upgrade ipads/iphones every generation. Those guys are far gone. People that will buy the Surface will probably be Android users and people who still haven't purchased a tablet.

That said, I'm excited for the Windows 8 Pro tablet. Why buy an ultrabook when I can get it in tablet form? I can't wait to see if ASUS comes out with a Win8 Transformer.

[kandyflip445]

I doubt the target audience for Microsoft is the core Apple users that upgrade ipads/iphones every generation. Those guys are far gone. People that will buy the Surface will probably be Android users and people who still haven't purchased a tablet.

That said, I'm excited for the Windows 8 Pro tablet. Why buy an ultrabook when I can get it in tablet form? I can't wait to see if ASUS comes out with a Win8 Transformer.

I'm actually typing on a Zenbook right now. I bought the UX31 when it first came out and I might end up selling it to buy the Pro version when it's available.

I don't really care to have the huge amount of apps on Android. I would like something more along the lines of my Zenbook with touch capability. Though Asus did show some impressive new devices possibly coming out. Like the one with a screen on the front and back. I think come Christmas season I will have to take another, closer look at what's available.

[2slow2go]

Surface presentation FAIL - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1zxDa3t0fg)

presentation fail

[s14tan]

Surface presentation FAIL - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1zxDa3t0fg)

presentation fail


LOL I was gonna post the same video.

[sephiroth99]

Yet as MS said a few days ago, apps written for Windows 8 RT (tablets running on arm including the new cheaper surface) will not work on anything else. ARM will only have the metro interface. No desktop behind it. No X86 apps will work on arm and no arm apps on x86. Because of that, windows 8 surface pro will run your normal apps but they "left out" how the touch features work on them and hence why you might need that stylus input.

So what will WindowsRT run? Windows phone apps are a "good idea" but MS hasn't said anything more than that. No windows x86 apps. No demo's. A "touch friendly office" is all that's been said with no demo of that either. Sounds like all the same limitations of Android but none of the apps.

Developers can publish their Metro apps on both Windows 8 and Windows 8 RT by using the new WinRT runtime. The same program can be build for the two targets from the same codebase. see this blog post: Building Windows for the ARM processor architecture - Building Windows 8 - Site Home - MSDN Blogs (http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/02/09/building-windows-for-the-arm-processor-architecture.aspx)

So if the devs are smart, they can have their apps on both ecosystems.

[FRpilot]

I heard microsoft pissed off a lot of their hardware partners (asus, samsung,acer, dell, etc) by letting only them know a few days before the press conference that they were going to be selling a tablet.

i've been looking at a samsung galaxy or asus tablet running android but maybe i'll hold off. I've been thinking a tablet running windows would be exactly what I need. Android is great and runs fine on my phone, but for a tablet I prefer it to run windows and pretty much be a secondary laptop. idk if i would buy a tablet made by microsoft, but if samsung released a tablet running windows i'd probably get that (of course it depends on specs and i do like ms surface 10.6" vs current samsung 10.1'' screen)

[EDacIouSX]

ehhhhhh it looks cool, makes me want to get one but I don't know if I really want a tablet. i mean that keyboard's the only real reason i'd get it cause i freaken hate touch screen.