Slashdot Mirror


Microsoft To Sell Its Own Windows RT Tablet

Glasswire writes "ComputerWorld reports that Microsoft will announce a Microsoft-branded tablet on Monday running the Win RT (ARM-based) subset version of Win 8. MSFT choose not to offer a x86 Win 8 version, which could have given them a performance advantage over ARM-based Apple iPads. A PCMag opinion piece titled 'A Microsoft Tablet Would Be Dumb' says, 'The only real reason to introduce a Microsoft-branded tablet is because Microsoft couldn't get anyone else to make a Windows RT tablet.' No reaction yet from Microsoft's system OEM customers that it will now be competing with."

35 of 288 comments (clear)

  1. Huh? by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A PCMag opinion piece titled 'A Microsoft Tablet Would Be Dumb' says 'The only real reason to introduce a Microsoft-branded tablet is because Microsoft couldn't get anyone else to make a Windows RT tablet.'

    Looks like knee-jerk anti-Microsoftism to me. Nobody has said the same thing about Google branded tablets, despite the reports Google intends to release one in the next month or two. Moreover, several PC makers, noteably Asus, have already announced Windows RT tablets.

    Microsoft have engaged in some sordid business practices, and prior to Windows 7 their desktop operating systems were terrible. But just making up any old crap about them makes you look stupid, not Microsoft.

    --
    You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    1. Re:Huh? by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I hear they make a pretty good games console too.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    2. Re:Huh? by unixisc · · Score: 5, Interesting

      As the GP pointed out, if Google can buy Motorola and own the Xoom and the RAZR, what's wrong w/ Microsoft having its own tablet or phone? In fact, given that most OEMs sub-contract that work out to the likes of Foxconn, LiteOn and other actual manufacturers in China and Taiwan, does Microsoft have anything to lose by doing exactly that, getting someone to make a tablet specifically for them, and then putting their logo on it? They're not even making it, so the end product will be no better nor worse than other vendors. Only difference will be Windows RT vs Android vs iOS, but that's a real Microsoft vs Google vs Apple differentiator.

      Particularly given that since they want to price it higher than either Apple or Google/Mot, chances are that no vendor would want to bat for them w/ such a market disadvantage. So Microsoft is probably pitching this themselves, hoping that their brand name will help sell it.

      Only odd decision of theirs, though - they'd have done better to have gone w/ either Medfield or Fusion, rather than ARM.

    3. Re:Huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Their current-gen console has sold 67 million units, despite reliability problems. Microsoft must be doing something right.

    4. Re:Huh? by equex · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why is it that a person who did something wrong has his record tainted for the rest of his life, but somehow a corporation should be scott-free after it pays its fines?

      --
      Can I light a sig ?
    5. Re:Huh? by UnknowingFool · · Score: 5, Interesting

      My understanding if Google charged for Android and if Google didn't allow OEMs to modify Android then there would be more outcry. Android isn't quite free as Google gets their money from advertising and services and Google is starting to put in more requirements for Android. The main worry here is that OEMs have to pay for Win RT. MS will pay nothing and will be at an advantage in terms of cost. The latest rumor is $80 per tablet. For a $500 tablet, that is a significant amount of money. Second is that MS can relax requirements for themselves for Win RT which OEMs cannot do.

      Besides screwing over OEMs, what else does MS can do? Many OEMs are still a little miffed about Zune where they supported PlaysForSure for years trying to battle Apple only to have MS abandon them with Zune only DRM that locked them out of the market. While music is no longer DRM laden, video and books still have DRM attached.

      The last thing is MS has not been very successful at hardware. Sure mice and keyboards are okay. But Zune was a flop. Kin was a flop. Xbox is finally in the black of almost 9 years of being supported by Windows and Office revenue. If Xbox was a separate company they would have had to declare bankruptcy or leave the business like NEC and Sega.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    6. Re:Huh? by rgbrenner · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Google pulled something off? They have a near monopoly with their search engine. Let's see.. what else... oh.. a few people use gmail... and... ????

      Stuff that has failed:
      Google+
      Google X (google rebranded with an OSX theme.. it lasted a day)
      Google catalog
      web accelerator
      Google Video (this was going to whip YouTube... planb was apparently to just buy youtube)
      google answers - pay us $10 to answer a question for you researched using google
      google wave
      wiki search
      google audio ads
      google dodgeball (like foursquare)
      jaiku (like twitter)
      google notebook
      google pagecreator
      google buzz
      froogle
      google coupons
      voice search
      google viewer (instead of search results page... display them like a slideshow)
      google checkout
      print ads
      realtime search
      google labs
      google lively
      orkut
      friend connect
      google latitude
      knol
      google health
      igoogle
      google click-to-call
      google sidewiki
      goog-411
      google tv
      google radio ads
      google shared stuff (bookmarking site)
      searchmash
      google search timeline
      google bookmark lists
      google desktop
      fast flip
      google pack
      google web security
      image labeler
      subscribed links
      app inventor
      City Tours
      Google Breadcrumb
      Google News Timeline
      Google Sets
      Google Squared
      Google Talk Guru
      Image Swirl
      Places Directory
      Realtime Mytracks
      Script Converter
      Sputnik.

      OK.. that's enough for now. There's more... that's just what I could remember + what i could find in 5 mintues.

      Why would anyone count on google to pull off *ANY* project over Microsoft. At least Microsoft has more than 1 profitable project.

    7. Re:Huh? by artor3 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      False premise. People who do something wrong are generally forgiven after they've "paid their debt to society". There are some people who choose never to forgive anyone for anything, but those people are sanctimonious assholes who want the world to think that they're perfect little saints.

      If you had, say, stolen a car, gone to jail, and done your time, do you really think it would be fair for others to treat you as a social pariah and refer to you as a car thief in every conversation even twenty years later?

    8. Re:Huh? by Belial6 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You seemed to just list everything but search. Many of them have failed, but the items that didn't fail are on that list as well. "Voice Search" a failure? I use it every day. It is wildly successful.

    9. Re:Huh? by UnknowingFool · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Hardware licensing to OEMs only benefits MS. OEMs have to differentiate themselves somehow or they are just another Win RT tablet maker. They can on price or features in normal Windows. MS is putting in strict requirements for hardware as it is, a reference model is even more restrictive. For Win RT users it's a more uniform experience. For OEMs, there is less choice in what can do.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    10. Re:Huh? by DanFelixPierce · · Score: 5, Informative

      "There are 30 million active Xbox Live accounts, which must make them a great deal of pure profit."

      Go to http://www.microsoft.com/investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Earnings/PressReleaseAndWebcast/fy12/Q2/default.aspx Here you can look at their financial statements for the last few years. Check the line item that shows the Operating income for the Entertainment and Devices Division on the statments going back to 2004. I put together a table:
      2004 (1,220)
      2005 (391)
      2006 (1,284)
      2007 (1,892)
      2008 497
      2009 169
      2010 618
      2011 1,324
      At the end of fiscal year 2011, the entertainment and devices division was still about $2.2 billion in the hole. Now the first two quarters of 2012 were good( a total of $880 million) but look here: http://www.microsoft.com/investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Earnings/PressReleaseAndWebcast/FY12/Q3/default.aspx They lost $229 million this past quarter. That means they are still about $1.5 billion in the hole on this little Xbox venture. And with their Online services consistently losing money( in the billions), they better hope Windows Phone 7 and Windows 8 are huge this year.

    11. Re:Huh? by blind+biker · · Score: 3, Informative

      Google+ certainly didn't fail. It's a social network with tens of millions of users - one of the largest, currently. Most of them share Limited or Extended Circles, so a two-bit analyst will jump to the conclusion that they aren't active, but you see, Google+ has this thing called "circles", and enables users to share only to the circles they want.

      Google wave is an integral part of Google+

      Knol was killed by Google, though it didn't really fail. The blame falls squarely on Google, no doubt, but it was a fairly successful venture otherwise.

      All the other products and services you list don't amount to a hill of beans and aren't worth the electrons to talk about them.

      Missing from your list are little things such as Android, Google Books and Google Scholar.
      I guess you never heard of Android, before...

      --
      "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
    12. Re:Huh? by rgbrenner · · Score: 3

      sorry... starting a project called voice search, discontinuing it, and then starting a new project called voice search does not make the first one a success.

      Google voice search was in 2002.. it died a short while later (nothing worked.. the whole backend for the project was removed).. and then google picked it back up again in 2008.

      so doesn't count.. still a failure.

    13. Re:Huh? by Pi+Is+A+Rational · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The whole aspect of M$, Krapple, MAFIAA, etc. just makes you look childish. To me, it proves that you are unable to draw a point without using tired, old cliches. Yes, these corporations have all done awful things, it's no longer a secret. But, using the silly nicknames in what is supposed to be a serious discussion really drags it down.

    14. Re:Huh? by ilguido · · Score: 3, Informative

      Just completely forget that there is, oh I don't know, the XBOX.

      The whole XBOX business has been a cash sink for Microsoft. Don't forget that the Entertainment division collects the royalties from Android makers (that is hundreds of millions for free) and still it is in the red ( http://cdn.geekwire.com/wp-content/uploads/xbox.jpg ).

  2. The light dawns by overshoot · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That helps clear up the mystery of why MSFT raised the price of RT for OEMs.

    --
    Lacking <sarcasm> tags, /. substitutes moderation as "Troll."
  3. competing with whom? by kbdd · · Score: 3, Interesting
    'The only real reason to introduce a Microsoft-branded tablet is because Microsoft couldn't get anyone else to make a Windows RT tablet.' No reaction yet from Microsoft's system OEM customers that it will now be competing with."

    You have to make up your mind. Either MS could not find anybody to make an RT tablet, or they will have competitors in the RT tab;let market. It cannot be both.

    I am no fan of Microsoft, but I tend to like them better when they are the underdog. It seems it brings the better out of them.

  4. x86 please by grasshoppa · · Score: 4, Interesting

    As a network administrator/system operator/analyst/jack of all, I want an x86 tablet please. Why? Because I need a windows tablet in the enterprise that I can manage like a computer.

    RT is nice...for the consumer space...I guess. But I really want a windows tablet for the enterprise space please.

    --
    Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
    1. Re:x86 please by l0ungeb0y · · Score: 5, Informative

      No -- you want administration tools that you can use to manage an enterprise's corral of tablets and smartphones. Surprisingly, Apple offered this for the iPhone years ago as part of their OS X Server package that allowed for the adding/removing of apps and permissions for all registered devices on the network. Not sure if it still exists in Lion Server -- but it stands to reason it should.

      Expecting them to come up with a brand new Tablet OS just for your IT dept needs did give me a chuckle though.
      But rest assured, I'm sure they'll rip-off Apple (as usual) and come up with a device administrator for you to play with.

  5. Well, what do you expect? by Bananatree3 · · Score: 3, Funny

    This is ./ , what doe you expect from us you...you...Anonymouse Coward!

    1. Re:Well, what do you expect? by starless · · Score: 5, Funny

      This is ./ , what doe you expect from us you...you...Anonymouse Coward!

      dotslash?
      Is that slashdot's evil counterpart from a parallel universe?

    2. Re:Well, what do you expect? by History's+Coming+To · · Score: 3, Funny

      +1, In The Agoniser

      --
      Please consider this account deleted, I just can't be bothered with the spam anymore.
    3. Re:Well, what do you expect? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yeah, over there it's a well edited, properly moderated, fully functioning technology discussion website. It also has a goatee.

  6. Re:This summary is terrible by Daniel+Dvorkin · · Score: 5, Informative

    "MSFT choose"? Seriously?

    Using business and other organizational names as collective rather than singular nouns is more common in British than in American English, but both usages are increasingly acceptable on both sides of the Atlantic. Your objection is silly, unless of course you're complaining about the use of the stock ticker symbol in place of the company name, which I agree is an abomination.

    --
    The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
  7. At $80+ OEM cost only Microsoft can afford to... by guidryp · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If previous reports of >$80 for OEM WinRT are correct, only Microsoft can reasonably afford to build low end Windows RT tablets, as the $80 becomes prohibitive software cost for low end tablets (where WinRT will compete). For Microsoft it is just inter-divisional funny money.

    How do HW OEMs compete with a $200 Kindle Fire (or rumored Google Branded $200 tablet) when saddled with $80+ OS?

  8. Re:Why not Windows 8? by Glasswire · · Score: 5, Interesting

    From the post: "...running the Win RT (ARM-based ) subset version of Win 8."
    Clearly implies Win RT is based on Win 8, but a subset, since you cannot run legacy Win apps and is missing many other full Win 8 features.
    Full Win8 is only available in x86 version.

  9. This isn't a troll just an observation by Grayhand · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why is it that Microsoft can't seem to do anything until some one else does it and it's usually Apple? Apple used a windows environment before Microsoft. Zune came after virtually everyone else had a music player so it never had much of a chance. Now they suddenly decide it's time to get into tablets? FYI there are other examples, just making a point. Just seems like a poor business model to wait until market saturation to launch a product. If Apple launches a TV can we expect a Microsoft TV a few years after? I didn't include things like a portable OS because they have tried that before but it didn't take off where as Android and iOS have done well. They just seem to wait until others take the risk then get their feet wet once the pool is full.

    1. Re:This isn't a troll just an observation by wvmarle · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't have the feeling that the tablet market is exactly saturated. Sure there are many players, but it's a fast growing market, and there is definitely place for more players.

      Whether MS has what it takes to compete in that market, that's a totally different matter.

      And by the way, Apple launched their first-ever mobile phone offering in a mature, and far more saturated market than the tablet market is now. I can't say they didn't do well. So launching a new product in a saturated market is not a recipe for failure - you just have to offer something good that can compete with the rest.

      That the Zune was a flop was not because the digital music player market was saturated, it was more because it was a lesser offering than the iPod.

    2. Re:This isn't a troll just an observation by hey! · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Why is it that Microsoft can't seem to do anything until some one else does it and it's usually Apple?

      Corporate culture. Microsoft is famously a competitive environment, but from what I've read it's not companies like Apple that's the enemy, it's other projects at Microsoft that might siphon resources from yours. When an outside vendor introduces a successful product, nobody can say, "it'll never sell." When the product is *wildly* successful, like the iPad, it can even overcome "we tried that before and it doesn't work."

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  10. Kin, Zune, Nokia... Ballmer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Look, we can all see this will flop, but when it does, can this time the shareholders dump Ballmer?

    He makes terrible choices, and that impacts their products. They have talent in Microsoft, they have money, they have a market to leverage, yet time and time again he fails to marshal them.

    So at some point the shareholders have to say enough and dump him.

    Oh and BTW, the Acer A700 tablet has sold out on pre-order. That's the *Android* Quad Core Tegra 3, with bigger than HD screen (1920x1200), so Windows RT will face incredibly tough competition out there.

  11. RT ? by vlad30 · · Score: 3, Funny
    It only requires 5 words to bring down a leader

    Doesn't Windows look Really Tired

    --
    Your'e all thinking it, I just said it for you
  12. Re:This summary is terrible by Nerdfest · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The stock symbol usage seems to come from those who have started thinking the worth of a company whose product you use is not the product but the value of the company. Personally, I think a company that makes obscene boatloads of money is charging too much.

  13. Microsoft releases actual cow turd as phone by David+Gerard · · Score: 4, Funny

    AXLE GREASE, Down Under, Tuesday (NTN) — Desperate to stay competitive against iPhone and Android mobile devices, Microsoft has released a two-pound lump of actual cow faeces that they claim constitutes a phone.

    Windows RT, in development for several years, strips the mobile device down to its fundamental essence: futility, annoyance, malfunction, inconvenience and a socially unacceptable odour. Confounding analyst expectations, the turd is in fact shined.

    US mobile carriers hailed the turd as the perfect physical complement to their world-famous customer service. “This powerful product will promote our growth!” said John Harrobin of Verizon Wireless. “We’re marketing them as edible.”

    “We think we can really work the brand equity,” said Steve Ballmer, modelling the optional shoulder-length rubber gloves. “Everyone works with our stuff all day every day. They know who Microsoft is and what we do.”

    “How about making our customers actually swallow our bullshit physically?” said John Harrobin. “Windows Mobile 7 was my idea.”

    --
    http://rocknerd.co.uk
  14. Er ..... a little bit selective? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Search
    Adwords
    Adsense
    Gmail
    Youtube
    Google Docs
    Maps
    Android
    Chrome
    Google Earth
    Analytics
    Blogger

    Anyone who can beat Microsoft comprehensively at browsers, phone OSs, and search shouldn't be dismissed.

  15. Re:This summary is terrible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Personally, I think a company that makes obscene boatloads of money is charging too much.

    No. Any company making boatloads of money is charging exactly the right amount.

    Too little and you go broke. Too much and nobody is buying, and you go broke.