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Hello, I'm a Mac. And I'm a $248 Win8 PC.

Posted by Unknown on from the boosting-sales-numbers dept.

theodp writes "A little birdie told me which Windows 8 machines would sell out fast. 'Cheep' ones! While no official sales figures have emerged, anecdotal evidence suggests that cheap Windows 8 laptops were a big hit with Black Friday shoppers, leaving some Walmart and Best Buy bargain hunters disappointed at missing out on the sub-$250 deals. So, was the Doctor-Desktop-and-Mister-Metro dual nature of Windows 8 and lack of a touchscreen no big deal to these bargain basement 'Laptop Hunters', or did they not realize what they were buying? Or, as a GeekWire commenter suggests, perhaps they were really just looking to score an ultra-cheap Linux laptop!"

2 of 642 comments (clear)

  1. Windows 8 is a fail by ShakaUVM · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Earlier today, the entire chess club surrounded one of these new $250 Windows 8 machines. They were all poking at the screen, but while it was changing colors on them, it wasn't responding. (Guess what guys? That's not a touchscreen. Those colors are what you get when you poke a normal LCD display.) They were convinced that all Windows 8 machines had touchscreens, though, and so they never used the touchpad.

    And then they tried shutting it down. I was mocking them for a while, as an entire chess club couldn't figure it out, so then they passed it to me and I couldn't figure it out either. Turns out the option to shut it down is hidden behind an invisible menu, hidden behind two other submenus unrelated to shutting things down.

    We eventually had to look it up online, as I expect many people will have to do.

    It was an interesting case study though, in how fucked up Microsoft made the Metro UI.

  2. Re:I can assure you... by ozmanjusri · · Score: 5, Interesting

    At that price, toss it a year from now

    It'll be a race to the bottom for Win8 PC prices now. That's the only way they'll get them off the shelves.

    Windows 8 sales flounder as critics pan clumsy interface

    Windows 8 sales in Australia and overseas are below expectations, with one US expert describing its user interface as "a monster that terrorises poor office workers and strangles their productivity".

    http://www.theage.com.au/digital-life/computers/windows-8-sales-flounder-as-critics-pan-clumsy-interface-20121126-2a2d0.html

    --
    "I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."