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Acer: Microsoft Surface 'Negative For The Whole PC Industry'
Shortly after Microsoft announced its upcoming Surface tablet, there was speculation that it might sour the company's relationships with OEM partners. Statements from an Acer spokesperson indicate that's definitely the case. The spokesperson told Bloomberg, "On one hand Microsoft is our partner, but on the other, Microsoft’s move makes them compete not only with us but all PC makers. We think that Microsoft’s launch of its own-brand products is negative for the whole PC industry." The company is reportedly considering whether or not they want to keep relying on Microsoft's software products.
Most hardware vendors are Microsoft's bitch, and they have NO ONE to blame but themselves. They've been loving this relationship with them. I don't think PC manufactures can do anything.
If anyone is bad for the PC industry its Acer. Short of those $70 netbooks you find on Craigslist, Acer is the bottom of the barrel.
Is the year of the linux desktop!
So, we have:
- Dell (project Sputnik. Partners with Canonical to sell Linux PCs)
- Valve (Steam for Linux)
- Blizzard (only blasted Windows 8, not announced their contingency plan yet)
- Mozilla (Windows 8 revives the IE browser lockin)
and now Acer
how can you not take the "think twice" line as a threat of defection
Where are they going to go?
Option A) Yes, they could just pick a Linux distro and run with it. But now they're a software company, and they don't want that. Most of these things are publicly traded, and they don't have margin to do a year of no profits while they spin up of a new division without getting killed in the markets.
Or option B) they bitch a little and keep selling Windows.
Stop your crying and focus on your products.
I used to love Acer back in the 1990s as they had quality products. My CRT 19 inch screen lasted until a few years ago and the color quality and craftmenship was amazing. Today?
They are not the same company. I needed a 2nd source of income a few years ago and worked at an office store. Guess which machines had BSOD on display even! Acer. Guess which ones were always returned? Acer. Guess who has no tablet presence? ACER
Samsung and Asus kicked your ass while they were ants to you at one time. Sorry Acer you lost and it is time to stop blaming others like Microsoft and go fix yourself if you want to compete like Samsung did who had little to 0 presence in your market just a few years ago to one of the top sellers today.
http://saveie6.com/
Seems like sour grapes to me. Microsoft picked Asus, Lenovo, Toshiba, and Samsung to launch Windows RT tablets (they also picked HP, but HP declined, and decided to focus on x86 tablets instead). Acer is not on that list, so these words are no surprise. You don't hear any of those companies selected speaking out against the Surface.
Source: http://www.unwiredview.com/2012/07/24/asus-lenovo-toshiba-samsung-to-launch-windows-rt-tablets-this-year-others-await-microsofts-permission-in-january/
Dear Acer ( and everyone else ):
Please give me what I want at a price point I want it at, and I will buy your product. I have no loyalty to any specific vendor, indeed, why would anyone show brand loyalty?
If it works and it's cost effective, I'll buy it. Maybe you should try competing against MS on those grounds. Us consumers would appreciate that, i think.
Sincerely, me.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
You will get a ton of MS apologists on this story telling us how the PC makers have "failed" Microsoft and how MS had no choice but to blaze the trail. This is bullshit. When Windows Vista and 7 were both released we were assured by MS and their hangers on that it was finally touch friendly and anyone that argued that it was just the same old crap was shouted down in comment forums all over the internet. When sane people pointed out the fact that even if you could manage to put up with desktop Windows on a touch screen you still had to put up with the heat and bulk of the x86 chipsets available they also were shouted down. The funny thing was that despite the echoing chorus that Windows was tablet ready, Windows tablet after tablet bombed. Ballmer in a case of extraordinary egg on face even headlined CES with another HP tablet dud. Where is it now?
Then something strange happened. Another company took an idea that MS had failed to execute on for a decade and ran away with the market completely. And now we hear that MS is coming out with its own gear because somehow the OEMs have failed. No. Microsoft failed the OEMs. How were they supposed to compete with the iPad with fucking Windows 7 on a sawed-off netbook? Get fucking real. Of course this wouldn't even be an issue if the internet echo chamber weren't once again running to MS' defense and pointing the finger everywhere but at where it belongs. MS has failed their partners. Fortunately for Acer et al, Surface in both its incarnations is fundamentally flawed. It doesn't know if it's an ultrabook or a tablet. Windows 8 is some kind of weird FrankenOS that doesn't know what it wants to be and WinRT is as sure a dud against the iPad as any number of $79 tablets hanging in blister packs in Walgreens.
So fear not, dear Acer but have fun posturing. MS has failed you before and they are failing themselves now.
Of course they don't want to rely on microsoft, that was a stupid position to get themselves into in the first place.
Acer already makes a line of Android tablets. If those were selling brilliantly, we wouldn't see Acer voicing any concerns. But they're not selling, and Acer isn't keen they were left out of the initial group (Asus, Lenovo, Toshiba, Samsung) to build Windows RT tablets, selected by Microsoft. It's no wonder Acer was left off the list, given the crappy hardware they produce.
Profits for PC integrators is already strained to the breaking point. The logical conclusion of what MS is doing here is that the OEMs will either diversify like Samsung and Sony or just one by one go under. MS has looked to Cupertino and seen the light. They see that 100 Billion dollar pile of cash Apple is sitting on and they have a pretty clear idea how they got it. And there is nothing Acer or Dell or anybody else can do because win32 is too deeply entrenched and we are nowhere near an heir apparent. WinRT is only available to the blessed chosen few and all MS has to do is just stop selling OEM copies of the desktop version. I'm not suggesting they are about to do this tomorrow but should they choose to, the "partners" that are dependent on PC sales to stay afloat are done.
The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
Microsoft NEEDS to make their own hardware.
That just shows how badly distorted the PC market is.
The OS is just one component of a computer. Microsoft should be just one parts vendor amongst many, then we'd see real competition and innovation.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Time to bring back OS/2!
Is it really a negative "for the whole PC industry" or just a negative for Acer and the other OEM partners?
And do what? Write their own OS and take on Microsoft head-to-head? Release only products with Linux on them? I love Linux, but let's be realistic. Acer obviously isn't happy about Microsoft's entry into the hardware side of tablets, but they have few other options, so they will whine about it and continue selling Microsoft products all the while.
Acer already makes a line of Android tablets.
There are more products available for Acer to manufacture than Android tablets and Windows PCs. They're heavy in the personal computing sector but in addition to owning the largest franchise retail chain in Taipei, they also make storage devices, displays, smartphones, projectors, televisions, and peripherals none of which are dependent on Microsoft's goodwill. In 2011 they only pulled in 200 million on 16 billion in revenue so PC sales are almost certainly not making them a ton of money anyway. They're in a tough spot but it isn't all doom and gloom even if they do stop making PCs.
The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
I don't know, there's something to be said for a standardized platform to ensure your software and hardware can all work together. Even within the industry there are very few vendors when you get down to it: AMD or Intel. AMD/ATi or Nvidia. Intel or Broadcom. The higher you go in terms of complexity, less variety is actually more cost effective; that is, reducing the number of hardware/software permutations leads to an ecosystem where a consumer can be assured that software package X will work with hardware combination X Y Z and operating system W. In a world of dozens of competing graphics chipsets, CPU architectures, and OS platforms, I think everyone would be so busy making sure everything worked together, there would be no appreciable gain in "real competition and innovation."
People won't buy android desktops anymore than they'll buy android netbooks, why? Because if it looks like a PC it had damned well better run PC software, aka windows software, or they will take it back!
This is why I wish the OEMs would sink some cash and back ReactOS, because whether anyone wants to accept it or not there are millions of programs out there that people want and they simply don't want your hardware if it don't run their software. Everything from that stupid little program that came with their camera to all the little funky printers and hardware to bookkeeping, there is just too much time and money invested for most to switch. And don't even bother bringing up alternatives, the cost to switch a user from program A to program B is simply too high and honestly a lot of the current FOSS software just don't cut it, no way you could replace QuickBooks with gnuCash, or some specialized inventory software with a simple spreadsheet, it just won't cut it.
But this is why you see MSFT royally fucked when it comes to ARM, because the sword cuts both ways. Why the hell would they want Windows if the device won't run Windows X86 software? Well as we can see from WinPhone the answer is "they don't" so as i see it the OEMs have one of TWO choices...1.-get something like ReactOS running so people can have their software on X86 while they can get out from under Steve "LOL I think I work at Cupertino! herpa derp" Ballmer or get out of X86 altogether and see how old Steve-O likes having to actually BE Apple and do the whole damned thing himself.
Because you can't just slap Linux or Android on an x86 box or laptop and sell jack squat, it just don't work. Dell has tried it, Walmart, Best Buy, Asus, they all tried it and found the exact same thing over and over AND OVER, folks try their software, software don't work, unit goes back. People don't know Operating systems from operating tables folks, that's a fact. I've seen it myself when it comes to netbooks which according to my customers are NOT general use computers but "baby laptops" and as such should run all the everyday stuff they want, only slower because babies are smaller and weaker than big people.
No different that how a tablet is a "big screen i poke and play games on" and a smartphone is a "phone that lets me Google" so too does the X86 desktop and form factor come with notions you simply aren't gonna be able to remove, instead they'll simply hate your guts and bring your units back en masses. Nobody wants to learn how to use Wine, Google for tricks and fixes, learn CLI, all they want to do is go "clicky clicky" and have the software install and go, that's it. that's all they want.
Personally I think the OEMs are getting upset over nothing, surface will end up on woot! at 80% off, Win 8 will be the new MS Bob as the butt of all the jokes, Win 7 the new XP, and hopefully Steve "I heart Apple herpa derpa!" Ballmer will finally flush enough Redmond money down the shitter the board gets his fat sweaty ass out of the big chair and brings someone with a fucking brain to run the company. Hell I'm a little shop owner in BF nowhere and I could run that fucking company better!
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
How about this scenario....
- Tablets are seen as a content consumption device that doesn't really work for Work or creating said content.
- People still want a "real" laptop/desktop and don't want to pay for a touch screen
- Windows 8 flops like a dead fish (yeah, I know it is a mixed metaphor, but it is kind of visual...)
- Developers, Developers, Developers start writing and porting software to Apple and then Linux, as they are the most desired platforms for a Desktop (Read not a tablet)
- Since Linux is easier to customize than Apple, power users start to use it
- Joe Sixpack sees power users using Linux
- And then gnome developers f**k it up more than it is now and everyone moves back to Windows 9
When you don't own your stack, your 'partner' can quickly become your competitor. Google has a long way to go to get there, but maybe a decade from now partners in Android may find themselves in an awkward position too. It is always possible to take the platform and go home if Google goes against your interests, but the result is fragmentation.
Of course, the challenge would be for all the vendors to competently participate in an endeavor like Debian (i.e. a project that while coherent with neutral governance with a nearly zero chance of *ever* getting the ambition to compete commercially with current-day 'partners'), which seems unlikely.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Oh please, just stop with the FUD. You can buy a fairly powerful desktop for $500, the same price as a 'high end' tablet.
Nope. The most common smartphone is an Android. Apple still has the lead in tablets but that probably won't last long either.
This is the "we have more marketshare than Dell, therefore we dominate the entire market" fallacy.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Microsoft gave Acer the last three years to come up with a consumer tablet. And Acer didn't. Sure they made one or two, but those weren't anything ipad-competitive, and Acer didn't market them at all.
So after this many years of the iPad being basically the only marketed tablet, I can respect Microsoft's choice to step up. . .since no one else seems willing to do so.
And yes, in order to do so itself, microsoft needs to make the entire solution, and market the entire solution, and take all of the risk, and force the start screen, and everything else that may be required to compete with the iPad.
And if those tablets are relatively successful, Microsoft will turn it back to Acer-like partners. And if those tablets are very successful, Microsoft will rightfully keep things for itself. And if they fail entirely, then Acer will be right.
It's that simple.
So next time, Acer, try to actually innovate products yourself, instead of yelling at those who try. And stop complaining when someone steps forward to do something that you specifically avoided doing yourself.
Google makes Android hardware, why isn't anyone complaining about that?
Because Google has made their intentions clear in regards to Motorola and apparently their OEMs have faith that they will live up to their words. They've said Moto gets operated like a separate company and gets no special favors. They aren't worried about Moto getting early builds of Android as Google has agreed to give all the OEMs early builds in the upcoming months to a new release starting with the post Jellybean version. As far as the Nexus devices, Asus is making a lot more money off of the Nexus 7 and Samsung makes a lot more money off of the Galaxy Nexus phone despite the co-branding with Google so that pretty much squelches any complaints in that area. Also bear in mind that Android is open source and much Android gear gets made that Google doesn't sanction. If Google pissed their partners off too much they just download the source code and tell Google to get bent. That balances the power considerably. Just look at Amazon.
If you remember right after Google announced the Moto acquisition, there was much murmuring amongst the OEMs but apparently Google set them at ease so of course they aren't worried enough about it anymore to care. In MS' case with Surface they even admitted in their SEC filings that Surface has the potential to damage their OEM relationships. And that's coming from the horse's mouth in a legally binding document. Their OEMs are scared shitless right now.
The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
The following may come across as paranoid, but here goes. This is what I think Microsoft's plan is. I'm not guranteeing it'll succeed, but it's what they want.
* MS has not been able to beat linux in the server room. There's a lot of big bucks in corporate software.
* The problem is that PC's are open architecture, and MS can't stop corporations from running linux on a PC.
* They'd love to follow the Sony game console example and lock out other operating systems from Intel/AMD hardware, but they would run into anti-trust problems. The most they can do is ask OEM's to default to signed UEFI boot on motherboards, with a "legacy boot" option available in the machine setup.
* However, on the ARM platform "everybody does it", so MS has no anti-trust problems demanding that ARM Windows machines be signed UEFI boot only.
* So they bring out Windows 8, which will be deliberately horrible on desktops, but optimized for tablets.
* Tablet sales will take off, and "economies of scale" will kick in, pushing prices down. PC Desktop sales will crash and "economies of scale" will disappear. The price of an Intel/AMD "workstation" will shoot up to $4 K or thereabouts.
* Most people who need a desktop will find it cheaper to emulate a "desktop" by plugging in an external monitor/keyboard/mouse to an ARM tablet.
* Since the ARM Windows tablets will be locked down with signed UEFI boot only, they can't be re-purposed as linux machines.
* MS will probably also set up their machines so that apps can only be bought from an app store where they charge a fee for each app loaded. Good-bye OpenOffice for Windows, etc.
* Don't be surprised if MS follows Sony's example, and lobbies to get unlocked ARM PC's outlawed.
Somewhere, former US senator Fritz Hollings will be smiling.
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
If you want to beat Surface. Make a better tablet. Make it as thin or thinner, or make it cheaper, or target a different market (7in tablet for Windows 8)
Frankly, Surface is what WIndows 8 Tablet needs. It's a well designed thin and light desktop replacement tablet, and If it's under $1000 it'll fly off shelves.
As for Windows RT Surface. I'm pretty sure MS is making that cause not one OEM wants to touch RT with a 10 foot pole. A Crippled Windows 8 lookalike of Windows Phone 8 is just going to piss off consumers.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
No matter it's Acer or ASUS or Dell or HP, their "PC" and "Laptop" business hadn't had any significant upheaval since the 1980's.
The original IBM PC, and IBM's decision to (sort of) "open-source" the hardware design was the one thing that gave birth to all these companies (except for HP).
And ever since that happened, in the 1980's, these companies had been doing the-same-old-thing and for once, I'm glad that Microsoft decides to manufacture and market their own "Surface" - for no other reason than to shake up the entire "PC business".
We, the users, deserve much better devices.
For almost 40 years we are stuck with the same-old-thing (tablets and smartphones only enter the field not that long ago) and I hope that this shakeup will bring us more diversed devices, to make our lives more productive, more enjoying
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Apple devices are so easy to use that anyone who has trouble with them must be utterly stupid - or at least, people think so. Therefore, people who have trouble with them wisely stay quiet and try harder.
xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
You need to take your medications today. Also, put on some reading-comprehension glasses.
Acer specializes in making the cheapest crap you can buy without getting eMachines. If there's a company which can almost be blamed for pushing Microsoft to this point, it's actually Acer.
Asus makes pretty good stuff, but go to their website to download drivers. They don't really stay up to date on that do they? Sure, they show a product love for a few weeks after you buy it, but it's just too much work to have a script file which says "All laptops using NVidia chips should get the new NVidia driver when we add it to the server".
Dell, they will continue selling servers and infrastructure to companies. For users who don't get tablets or laptops, they'll sell those too. For users who will now get a Microsoft Surface, they'd have gotten a iPad or a cheap assed laptop otherwise.
HP is kinda like Dell except they don't depend as heavily on PC (unless you're a shareholder whinging about how PC sales are down, when the real sales on are the big stuff).
I can go on and on, but let's be honest, this isn't going to bother the vendors selling :
a) Budget crap "Timmy needs a computer honey... this one on the shelf looks pretty, and it's cheap too. Let's get it"
b) Corporate budget crap "We have to get PCs for 50 telephone sales people, does XX have anything?" (dell's market)
c) Server sales.
Asus will be the worst hit by this I think. But they'll differentiate by offering 900 models of Windows 8 machines each year to choose from, including ones with quad hex-core i7s and GTX900 in threeway SLI that can cook an egg from across the room.
Surface product is not going to be the fastest. It won't be the sexiest. It won't be the most amazing. But it will be the one which Microsoft ships one or two models of each year and for people like myself who are sick of buying cool gadgets and not being able to find cases or accessories for them, this will be perfect.
Acer should quit bitching and learn from this. Make less shit machines and start focusing on how they can make a smaller number of machines which people don't feel screwed for buying afterwards.
How to get quality software to Linux. There is tons of it now, but not for the consumer.
Not for the enterprise consumer, but for anything anyone needs a computer at home for, Linux has more than enough software for anyone's needs.
GiMP is not Photoshop
True, but photoshop isn't for the home market, the damned program costs as much or more than the computer it's running on. Most non-professionals using photoshop are using a pirate version. There's no need to spend $700 to edit the photos you shot with your cell phone.
There is no real possibility of editing video.
Google says you're wrong.
Open/Libre Office is not, for the average consumer, an alternative to MS Office.
What does the average user need an office suite for? Writing grandma, cropping photos, balancing the checkbook. Oo is perfectly capabe of doing anything the average non-enterprise user needs. Why would a home user spend a couple hundred dollars on a program they would seldom use?
The overall experience is not particularly high quality (I use Linux every day, it isn't).
Then you're running the wrong distro; I see that here often. One fellow was saying last week that he couldn't play MP3s on his Linux machine, well DUH, he was running Red Hat. You don't use a server OS for a desktop client, you use the right tool for the job. There is no "Linux", there are a LOT of Linuxes. I'm running kubuntu, and it's not as pretty as Windows 7 (I have that on a notebook) but otherwise it's superior in every way to Windows.
If Linux lacks quality, why do you use it every day? I call bullshit, friend. If Linux wasn't better than Windows, nobody would use Linux because the computer already has an OS when they buy it.
Free Martian Whores!
I tried to use Linux at one point, and ran into this limitation... the only mature production software available for Linux right now is Blender, and that's only one part of the pipeline. There is high-end production software available for Linux, but for the most part it's proprietary and/or expensive. (By expensive I mean $5k+.) Very few small production and visual effects shops even consider Linux as a result. Even if they could afford the software, they generally can't afford the staff. A lot of Linux pundits cite the cost savings of Linux while also pointing out that you can customize it as much as you want, and in the process ignore the fact that you need to have staff to customize and support it. As a result, most production and visual effects shops run Windows and/or OSX. Many do in fact run both, of course. Some of the same OEMs that build a lot of hardware for Windows machines also build hardware for OSX. The problem isn't that the OEMs can't build quality hardware, the problem is that most of their market doesn't want to pay for it. Hence the level of quality varies widely throughout the market. At the low end you have cheap throwaway crap, and at the high end you have the AlienWares with the Porche designs as well as the MacBook Pros. Apple just stays out of the throwaway market. Microsoft is realizing that there are some advantages to being fully vertically integrated, and they've probably been trying to hide their envy about Apple's ability to act like a monopoly as a result of it, even though Apple doesn't actually have a monopoly based on market definition.