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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.
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
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.
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."
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.
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.
I have owned a couple of Acer laptops over the years and they were great bang for buck. They were cheap and broke down, but by then I wanted an upgrade anyway. Buying a higher end machine would have still been out of date, I would still want to update, and the resale value would not pay back the difference I initially paid...
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.
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
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 !
I have owned a couple of Acer laptops over the years and they were great bang for buck. They were cheap and broke down, but by then I wanted an upgrade anyway. Buying a higher end machine would have still been out of date, I would still want to update, and the resale value would not pay back the difference I initially paid...
I've got an Acer laptop and will never buy from Acer again.
It kills batteries - after only a year their capacity is significantly degraded. But Acer considers batteries "consumables" so the fact that the charger in the laptop kills them isn't covered by the warranty.
They flatly refused to refund my Windows licence fee (first thing I did when I got the machine was wipe Windows since I have no use for it). Not that long after they did this a French court ruled that they weren't allowed to decline to refund the Windows licence so I guess I should've tried again.
The machine has a DSDT bug, which I reported to them, then I wrote a DSDT patch and sent that to them too in the hope that they might release a new BIOS for the machine to correct it. They won't even acknowledge my emails any more: http://www.nexusuk.org/~steve/acer.xhtml
I find the hardware largely ok, but their complete refusal to provide any kind of after-sales support, even for design defects, would stop me buying from them again.
http://blog.nexusuk.org