PREDICTION: countdown to failure, Windows 8 RT tablet will be an unmitigated failure.

[Red Storm]

I actually question how much confusion that will actually cause. I think for most consumers, the idea of "tablet" simply goes hand in hand with the idea of an "app store" so much so that the usage model (at least as far as how you 'get stuff' goes) is already defined.

It will somewhat depend on the expectations created by marketing and in-store employees but I wonder how many people would pick up a WinRT tablet and say "Hey, Windows, I can put my other stuff on here" versus "Hey, a tablet, what's on the app store?"

I think after the Windows 8 launch and people buy computers with 8 preloaded, there could be confusion with people buying an RT tablet and wondering why their x86 application isn't installing.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

I think after the Windows 8 launch and people buy computers with 8 preloaded, there could be confusion with people buying an RT tablet and wondering why their x86 application isn't installing.

Yeah, earlier today I was just wondering how you would explain the difference between Windows 8 and Windows RT to the average user. After all they both run on tablets and look exactly the same and you can't do it in terms of architecture because they have no clue what x86 or ARM is.

I do think one major thing RT/8 has going for it is being developer firendly, Microsofts development tools completely blow Apple's and Google's out of the water. Not to mention you can use C#, JavaScript, or C++ for Metro App development so people have the flexibility to use what they know best. Although even if C# was the only option it would still be 1000x better than what Apple offers.

 

[darkewaffle]

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6392/the-windows-rt-review

Win RT review on AT

 

[BladeVenom]

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6392/the-windows-rt-review

Win RT review on AT

Did you notice how horribly slow Window RT is?

Application Launch Time Comparison
Boot Web Browser Mail Maps Games Center / Xbox
Apple iPad (3rd gen) 32.0s 1.0s 2.4s 1.1s 1.9s
Microsoft Surface 27.7s 2.6s 7.1s 5.0s 5.0s

 

[darkewaffle]

It's isolated to the launch times far as I can tell; which will also hopefully be improved as the software and the apps mature. Once they're open multitasking and app performance have both seen largely positive reviews thus far.

 

[ITHURTSWHENIP]

Looks like a big failure to me

http://cdn1.sbnation.com/imported_assets/1267655/HpyZq.jpg

http://cdn2.sbnation.com/imported_assets/1267661/Qv5po.jpg

http://cdn3.sbnation.com/imported_assets/1267691/ZXX72.jpg

http://cdn3.sbnation.com/imported_assets/1267703/uX82d.jpg

 

[amdhunter]

10 in stock at my local Microcenter. Tempted to go pick one up, but afraid of how crappy it will be. I wish there were a convertible or full-Windows 8 version to purchase today.

 

[tfinch2]

10 in stock at my local Microcenter. Tempted to go pick one up, but afraid of how crappy it will be. I wish there were a convertible or full-Windows 8 version to purchase today.

Other manufacturers are selling x86 Windows 8 touch devices today.

 

[BladeVenom]

Looks like a big failure to me

There are 29 Microsoft Stores, while there are 393 Apple Stores. Besides how often do you see Microsoft Stores crowded?

 

[ITHURTSWHENIP]

There are 29 Microsoft Stores, while there are 393 Apple Stores. Besides how often do you see Microsoft Stores crowded?

Who cares? What does Apple have to do with this? When was the last time you saw lines like that for an Android tablet that wasnt 99 dollars?

 

[finbarqs]

When it was the HP touchpad

 

[zerogear]

10 in stock at my local Microcenter. Tempted to go pick one up, but afraid of how crappy it will be. I wish there were a convertible or full-Windows 8 version to purchase today.

Maybe try the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13? I played around with it the other day and it's quite nice. The keyboard completely folds back behind the screen to become tablet form factor.

 

[amdhunter]

Anyone get one today?

 

[Skel]

Anyone get one today?

I received a MS Surface, but I'm not sure I count as I didn't buy it. I know someone within MS that scored it for me.

It's really nice as tablets go. It's missing some apps that I use, and the one I use the most really sucks ass (comixology). I'm told that app will be fixed here soon. I do however like the tablet itself. The closest thing I have to a tablet is the Kindle Fire and honestly it blows that away, of course it's not really fair to compare the two as they really do two different things. The KF I just used for reading comics (which was meh at it's best due to screen size) or kindle books. This on the other hand I have a lot more options with the most important being Office. It's fully armed and operational for what I want.

I have to say I'm really surprised by the touch cover. I expected it to suck, but it's pretty awesome. I didn't think I'll be doing marathon sessions on it, but I could be wrong on that. I was able to get a lot of work done with it this morning that I wouldn't have even thought of trying. It won't be a replacement for my laptop/desktop but it will be a very nice replacement for them on short trips where I need to check work but don't want to pack heavy.

 

[Hugo Drax]

1st Casualty. The bugs described are pretty bad.

http://ozar.me/2012/10/why-im-returning-my-microsoft-surface-rt/

Do not buy a Microsoft Surface RT yet.

I’m typing this with gritted teeth. My 24 hours with the half-baked Surface have been a frustrating challenge, a mix of love and hate. I want want want this to work, but one problem after another have led me to come to the conclusion – a temporary one at least – that this thing just isn’t ready to ship.



http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4708274

Left hand not working with the right hand. Typical of Microsoft.

 

[podspi]

The Surface is definitely not a perfect product, but it certainly is an impressive one.

After reading all the reviews, I went to a Microsoft store to check one out in person, and came away with a better opinion of it than I expected. I was downright shocked at Office's performance, given that it was running on an ARM cpu. Honestly, they've done an amazing job. We have to remember this isn't even running on an Atom CPU, this is Tegra 3.

I do agree that Surface should have shipped with Office RTM though. Microsoft should have synced up their release schedules for Office 2013 and Windows 8/RT. Right now I'm frustrated because I'd love to pick up one of the new Office 2013 subscriptions, but I am not sure how the free upgrade deal will work if I purchased 2010 now.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

There are 29 Microsoft Stores, while there are 393 Apple Stores. Besides how often do you see Microsoft Stores crowded?

funny thing is the Apple store in Santa Clara is right across from the MS store. While the MS store was more crowded than usual, the Apple store was still far more crowded.

And it was easy for me to play with a new MacBook Pro or iPhone 5, but it was impossible for me to get over to the Surface.

 

[Compddd]

Windows 8/RT is the future. Apple will be gone in 10 years

 

[Super56K]

Seeing/reading the launch impressions definitely cooled my interest in Windows 8 for the time being. My gut says this would have been a killer tablet if it launched last year in the wake of the disaster that was the HP Touchpad. But, that's not the case so early adopters of the Surface might feel chaffed after only a few months of ownership. Windows RT has a lot of potential, but it'll take time to realize it.

My knee jerk reaction to the Surface specifically is that it's a pretty mess:

-The touch keyboard/cover looks cludgy to use. It is better for some things than the on screen keyboard, but it's a $120 accessory that doesn't work well in your lap. My iPad's isn't ideal either, but I paid less than $25 for that.

-A big 16:9, low resolution screen making it odd in portrait and landscape. We all knew this, but really it has a marginally higher resolution than flagship android phones...on a 10.6" screen. That doesn't motivate me at all to shell out $500+ (or recommend someone do that) when better devices are right around the corner.

-A kickstand that got everything right aside from being adaptable to your relative angle to the screen. Sure, there will be 3rd party cases and stands, but it's no fun to do that after the fuss made over how great the built in stand is.

-A weak magnetic power connector that is almost certain to be changed in the next generation.

 

[Dominato3r]

Per the press conference today, Ballmer stated that preliminary demand for Windows 8 has increased over/ exceeded Windows 7 demand.

I'm guessing tomorrow we'll get some hard numbers because of their dev conference, but it seems Windows is doing fine.

 

[Chrono]

I was at the MS Store in Costa Mesa. I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of people in the store playing with the Surface tablet. I too wanted to purchase it... but I think I'll just wait for a nice gaming laptop with a touch screen. Pretty awesome seeing all those tablets/laptops/ultrabooks all with Windows 8 and a touch screen though.

 

[vi edit]

I'm very interested to see how this pans out. Microsoft appears to really want to embrace a true "eco system" a la Apple and has the money and resources to pull it off.

Microsoft owns/manages:
1) the number one desktop OS
2) the number one office producitivity suite (office)
3) by volume, probably the highest number of server backends
4) the most widely accepted corporate email server/client
5) one of the most popular gaming consoles
6) a popular (but fading) email/cloud environment in Live/Hotmail/Skydrive

That's a lot pieces that touch a huge number of users on a daily basis.

Being able to unify productivity, social apps, and personal stuff between home, office, and on the road between desktops, laptops, tablets and phones is huge. And MS seems to have finally started to embrace this with the Win8/WP8/RT deployments.

Will be very interesting to see where they are at in 18 months from now.

As someone heavily investing in the Apple environment I'm very intrigued by the WP8 devices and OS.

 

[hans030390]

I purchased one. Probably the best new product I've used in many, many years. I was interested in it, sure, but was not planning on purchasing it. Once I got my hands on one, though...couldn't resist!

Sure, Office is still a preview version, but Microsoft will be giving you the full version for free when it's released! That's really awesome of them, and I love that I can use the tablet for work if needed. I'm glad they went ahead and included the preview version instead of waiting, and they do notify you when you open the application that it is a preview version and that it will eventually update to the RTM version for free.

The touch keyboard works surprisingly well, and I'm a touch typist that's used to a mechanical keyboard. I only find it problematic when trying to enter passwords, as I'm not quite up to par on it without seeing what I'm typing in real-time.

Some of the apps take a bit to load, but I'm sure that will be ironed out over time. Either way, the tablet doesn't FEEL slow. Plus, once you have something open, multitasking is extremely easy.

The low resolution screen is a non-issue. Sure, you can tell it's not as high resolution as the iPad, but it's still a fantastic looking screen. Touch works perfectly.

Speaking of touch, it does take a bit of time to learn your way around the OS. A lot of the touch gestures and operations are different than what you'd expect if coming from iOS or Android. But, once you get used to them, they work really, really well! It's actually quite enjoyable to use. Sometimes it's a bit tricky navigating around in the desktop mode with touch, but it works well enough. If you have the touch cover, it's a non-issue thanks to the tiny track pad.

I haven't encountered any issues related to bugs or stability.

The more and more I use Windows 8, the more I like it. Sure, it does at times feel like it's a split personality OS that has some integration issues, but I find these concerns disappearing as I become more acclimated with the environment.

On my PC, I primarily use the desktop environment. It works perfectly well, and I have no issues using the start screen instead of the start menu. Works the same in the end. On my Surface, I primarily use the Modern UI. However, I can switch to the desktop mode if need be, and that also works just great! The more you use it, the more you appreciate that you have the exact same OS running on multiple devices...and they all work perfectly well!

The only REAL complaint I can offer about Surface is the app selection. But, what do you expect? I have some worries that the ARM development won't pick up as well as it should, but it's already picking up fairly quickly. For now, it's a pretty poor tablet as far as having many high quality apps available goes, but that should hopefully change quickly. Once it does...I think Windows 8 has the potential to take over the market. Maybe.

Long story short, Surface is way better than I expected it to be. Once you use it and Windows 8 across multiple devices for a while, you'll probably feel the same way.

 

[tdawg]

I went to the Microsoft store last Sunday to play with Surface and see the other touch ultrabooks and the VivoTab. The store was packed, which I was happy to see.

While waiting for line of people to dissipate so I could actually play with a Surface device, I played with a Sony touchscreen ultrabook, which I thought was very nice, and the VivoTab, which I thought was outstanding. Super light and a nice keyboard dock.

My favorite part of Windows RT is that I was able to pull up Hulu.com and nbc.com/snl and play any video / show I wanted without the website telling me that "this video is not available for your device."

I'm still waiting on Surface Pro and right now am looking at that versus the Samsung Ativ Smart PC Pro, but I could probably coexist pretty nicely with Windows RT as my laptop and android tablet replacements.

 

[cmdrdredd]

I have to compare the Surface Pro to the Samsung ATIV Pro and others before I determine which will be my choice. It's tough to wait. From pre-release specs it seems like the Samsung will be lighter&thuinner with a larger battery. However the Surface Pro will probably use the same Magnesium casing which is pretty nice.