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Microsoft Surface Struggles to Ship A Million Units
zacharye writes "While some see potential in Microsoft's Surface tablet, most industry watchers appear to have written off the device at this point. Orders were reportedly cut in half following a slow launch, and Microsoft's debut slate has been hammered time and time again by reviewers and analysts. The latest to pile on is Boston-based brokerage firm Detwiler Fenton, which estimates that when all is said and done, Microsoft will have sold fewer than 1 million Surface tablets in the slate's debut quarter."
Still better than 25,000.
With the surface pro's battery life at an estimated 4 hours. We can expect that to fail as well.
That's not the party line, citizen.
To offset political mods, replace Flamebait with Insightful.
I think the actual biggest reason for this is people who wanted a tablet already got a different product from Samsung or Motorola or Apple and they're not going to spend all that money again just to switch. MS came into the game WAY too late.
Also we're at the verge of a netbook-caliber tablet crash where everyone realizes they all suck and stop buying them. They're too fragile, they don't have a DVD drive, they're harder to type on, the screen is tiny, they get dirty with fingerprints, they don't run 99% of software ever written, everything they do on it is designed to cost money, the browsers don't display pages correctly, the battery life is a lie, most don't have USB flash drive capabilities, they don't work with the majority of printers, and it's difficult to do meaningful work on them in any way shape or form. That's actually slightly more cons than netbooks and they went from boom to flop in approximately 2 years.
Sounds like the a tiny, caseless computer for hackers and wannabe hackers designed mostly by volunteers is going to outsell a flagship product from one of the most powerful companies in the world.
Microsoft has no clue what users actually want, film at 11.
When is Microsoft going to learn to make a truly consumer-oriented device other than the XBox? Not with support for Office (that takes up most of your space apparently), not with support for Outlook, but to do the things people are using other tablets for.
Every time they release a product, the marketing is so heavily geared to Office/Outlook/Exchange I have to wonder if Microsoft is aware of the fact that loads of people use computers for things that don't involve their business applications.
If your marketing is focused on how I can do spreadsheets and connect to my corporate Exchange server, then you have no idea of what it is I'd be looking to use this kind of device for. Because I don't want either of those features.
It just always seems Microsoft is so focused on their business tools, that the result is too much focus on that. And it always seems like they launch a product after someone else has been successful with it, and then miss some of the attributes of the other product which make it successful in the first place.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
at this point it may not matter. microsoft may already be mortally wounded like Motorola was a couple of years ago.
As much as I'd love to bash on Microsoft for a while, I must say that there seems to be some FUD floating around here. You have reviewers generally praising the hardware and the OS while at the same time advising readers to stay away because of the struggling App ecosystem. Good luck attracting developers that way.
Seems to me that MS could drop the price to make it a loss-leader and watch them fly off the the shelves, if they wanted.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
As a refugee from HP, I have to say that I derive immense joy from the "at least they did better than HP" comment in this story. EXCELLENT! (And yes, I'm hugely into schadenfreude.) Now, I just have to wait a bit before I hit "preview" because it seems that any post that comes before all others is somehow considered inherently suspect, and gets modded down. (I suspect that if Einstein had posted E=MC^2 that way, it would have been modded "Troll," even if it were directly applicable to the topic being discussed.)
But yes...it does seem like this is the Zune all over again. Late to compete against a mature product that defines a market space, and by most accounts inferior to that main competitor...only the Zune was actually price-competitive if I recall correctly. At least with Windows Mobile, they've had multiple products to unsuccesfully compete against over the years...Palm, then Blackberry, then the iPhone.
Okay, it's been 5 minutes...someone MUST have posted SOMETHING by now...(hits 'Preview')
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
Most Honest reviews of the surface are actually pretty positive. I think the main problem is that it's $650 by the time you add the touch cover. And most of the reviews say you need the Type cover to get a really good experience, which is even more expensive. For the price you can get a decent ultrabook that runs all your old windows programs, and is about the same size. Only thing missing is touch, which although nice, isn't a must-have feature. Most people are probably awaiting the Surface Pro, if they are thinking of buying a surface at all, because then you can run all your old Windows Software. If you can't run your old software, you could just get an iPad or a Nexus 7/10.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
The fact that after so many years of backwards-compatible Windows versions they launched their first tablet device with a desktop environment that wouldn't run anything other than Office was a huge "wtf" to me. So now in the first few months of it's life Microsoft have polluted the Surface brand as the little tablet that couldn't. I thought the Pro might still stand a chance in the face of this until I read the 64Gb edition would cost $900 and have a 4hr battery life. Ultrabooks, despite being slightly larger, seem to be much more capable for the same price. I don't know what Microsoft was thinking. They p'd off their hardware partners to launch this?
Then you're not paying attention. Most of the reviews I've seen say the OS is fine and Metro/Modern works okay for a tablet, it can be frustrating to use without a touchscreen on a desktop. So while Win 8 will probably work on older hardware, it might be best to wait to get it when consumers can get hardware with touch.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
You can get a Nobel Peace prize for "not being George W Bush", but apparently people aren't standing in line to buy "not an iPad".
Surface has very limited geographic and retail distribution. It seems to me this is Microsoft's effort not to step on OEM partner shoes, who will be selling in Walmart, Best Buy, etc.
It doesn't help that they confused everybody with Win RT vs Win 8 as well as the fact that they told everybody that a better Surface (Pro) was coming a few months later.
firestream.net
Who cares?
The only review that matters in the end is what the market thinks. The market doesn't seem to be buying. Saying "the professional reviewers liked it!" is loser talk.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
Whatever dimwit argued that the Surface needed that "perception of value" should be fired, after being publicly humiliated and dressed like a duck while giving an apologetic speech on national TV. As a $249 loss leader distributed through Wal-Mart, it would have succeeded and at least gotten significant share while more expensive, un-lame versions with better displays, 4G, and so on. Microsoft can't compete on quality with Apple. What's left is either price, or a significant value add (e.g. free Verizon phone service for a year or free unlimited internet via some national hotspot company). Instead, they want.... more money. It's as if the effort was *intended* to fail.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Anyone looking at Microsoft mobile solutions as a consumer product is looking at them wrong. These toys are meant to keep Microsoft relevant in the mobile business space. Write once, run Microsoft. Businesses don't need to hire ancillary dev teams to write their ancillary mobile apps they can utilize in-house talent and existing code bases. Even LOBs are going to be able to spill over into the mobile space since they won't be shackled to orange shield implementations that scare the CSOs. If businesses adopt Microsoft mobiles the hope is that consumers--used to their work devices--will find the familiarity attractive enough to stick with the brand.
Time will tell if the strategy pays off. The ability to use C#/XAML and avoid the costs and penalties of HTML5/JavaScript is a very attractive proposition for businesses.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
for a site with highly libertarian users who are all about personal privacy and internet freedom, it's weird how often you see slashdotters ripping on anonymous users *only* because they're posting anonymously.
- ac, lol
I've yet to see a complaint about the slate tablets, other than the app store for it not being matured.
While that may be true, I have also not seen any review that said the Microsoft tablet is superior to the iPad or Android offerings. The reviews usually sound like "the Surface is OK, but since there is no cost benefit, I'd get an iPad".
That is Microsoft's problem -- a me too product with no compelling advantage.
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You act like people gravitate toward superior products, as opposed to the product with superior marketing.
You seem to think there is a differentiation between the two. If an inferior product reaches critical market mass through superior marketing, that mass often makes it the superior choice.
Betamax was superior to VHS, but the players were multiples of cost and the content was lacking. Although Betamax was superior for the engineer, VHS was superior for the consumer.
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Surfance specifically though is expensive, and there's no obvious reason why you'd want it. Windows 8 is horrid. Everyone I know who has installed it has been desperate to get rid of it, 16 year old tech savvy kids, 16 year old technically inept kids, their 40 year old parents, computer scientists, IT people, physicists, fine arts grad, game, developers and designers.
Surface itself, the hardware, is probably OK, but it's worthless without a slate suited OS, and that isn't windows 7. So you have to spend a lot of money on hardware, with software that you won't really like, and importantly, given the negative reception, I would presume windows 9 will behave very differently from 8, but I have no idea how differently, and that's the problem. What would you be buying into with Surface? Is this a dead product before it goes anywhere? Will it support windows 9? You'd hope, but then after the WP7, WP8 thing I'd be skeptical.
Until the 3rd party guys really get into the game it's hard to see where this is going, and I wouldn't be surprised if they're holding onto what they have until MS has to admit Surface as a failure before they do their thing. Corporate politics and all that.
That's not a bad idea - I think I like it!
Of course, Microsoft would probably do all they could to hinder the release of drivers to make full use of the hardware on Linux, or Android.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
I doubt they do it, for a few reasons:
* They're allegedly "all in" with the thing. They know that the Surface Pro (the one which can run 'actual' windows programs) won't sell much more than any other Windows tablet has since 2001, so if they're going to do tablets, the RT is pretty much it.
* They went out of their way to totally screw up the UI in Windows 8 just to accommodate tablets. They risked enterprise acceptance, long-time customer expectations, and more... just for tablets. This reinforces the first point, but also means that if they fail, it'll be a damned hard time explaining why they would eventually put the UI back (not marketing mind, but Ballmer's own political reasons, since he and the recently-departed Sinofsky put so much of their reputations into the damned thing.)
* They didn't sell the remaining Kin or Zune units at fire-sale prices, did they? (I'm honestly not 100% certain, but I believe they did not).
Finally, HP did it because they really weren't all that invested in the things - that is, HP didn't bet the company on a tablet paradigm. Microsoft however appears to be doing just that.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Microsoft dealt netbooks the death blow with their "reference platform" for Windows Starter Edition. You couldn't have more than 2GB of memory with only 1GB installed and still get the super duper netbook discount for Windows. You couldn't have a screen larger than 10.2". Only single core CPUs were allowed. This stagnated the netbook market at the same time when full sized laptop prices were dropping and hardware was improving while people shifted away from desktops.
Why would anyone buy a crippled netbook for $250-$300 over a cheap laptop with a real version of Windows, optical drive, multicore processor for $300 - $350? The weight and battery life weren't worth the drawbacks for $50. I was shopping for a netbook for my daughter to take to school during this time and opted to get a laptop instead.
Microsoft disrupted the natural market with their license demands in an attempt to kill Linux on netbooks. Unfortunately for them, the iPad shifted the market for low power computing out of their sphere of influence.
You have obviously not used Windows lately, or any other Microsoft product if you say such abjectly ignorant things. You may laugh, but those of us who have to support Microsoft products know the truth, and how wrong you are. Microsoft-level quality products are indeed expensive, and for good reason too, do you have any idea how much it costs to support this crap? How hard it is to keep up and running? Clean it up after the latest security breach? Preventing breaches is a fools errand, give it up.
All this costs money, lots and lots of money. Initial purchase price may be low compared to everything but FOSS, but that is only the beginning. If you calculate TCO, you will see exactly how expensive this poorly coded pile of outdated security holes really is. It ain't cheap.
-Charlie
[Yes, this may look like sarcasm, but sadly it is not]
Thankfully we're not all the same, and the "highly libertarian" types are a vocal extremist minority.
All AC means is that readers can't match up one statement from an AC from another. People never know if they are discussing with the same person, of different people. And that can be annoying.
It has nothing to do with keeping their personal privacy, because of course the majority of the people that post using an account use a pseudonym.
That's not the party line, citizen.
Actually; it seems to be pretty much the party line. Every time we get any discussion of the various Windows 8 components someone pipes up and says "have you tried it", "if you saw the real thing" etc. etc. Every analyst house has completely overestimated the success of Windows phone 7 and Windows 8 in every way. In the same time when Tommi Ahonen was able to give accurate Windows Phone market share forecasts. Have a look at a almost any review; They say "it's great but the price is too high"
Look at the difference between an Android tablet priced for $300 and an Android for $600. One of them is a great value device with real compromises to bring it down to price and the other is a really great no questions device. You can't write a review which says "it's great but it's only worth half it's price". What you mean is "it's crap for the price and they should cut the price to a level where it's worth the money". The entire media is running scared of naming the pile of garbage that is Surface. Have a look at how carefully they never criticize the low resolution of surface; They always prefix with some Microsoft marketing statement; for example extreme tech writes:
etc. etc.
Try to find one of the mainstream reviews which mentions that the surfaces resolution, at 148 PPI, is worse than almost any modern tablet. As a point of reference; the iPad has 264 PPI, the Nexus 7 has 216 PPI and the iPad mini has 163 PPI. The Google Nexus 10 with a 300 PPI screen is a completely different league. With a screen like that the correct price for a Surface is in fact around $250. You would have to go back to the very original iPad screen to find an Apple product with a lower resolution screen. The same thing repeats with mention of the terrible user interface experience - always gently skipped over or we are told "you can get used to it fast". Again with the app store, almost every review completely ignores the quality of the apps ported from iOS.
Have a look on any site with "consumer reviews". You will probably find more positive reviews than there are people outside Microsoft with tablets, and any review which reads as if someone actually used the product will be voted down out of visibility.
I think that the great thing is that consumers have finally realised that there is a Microsoft party line; have realised that that line is everywhere and that they are choosing to ignore it.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
Apparently they have the monopoly on stuff we don't want any more.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
You seem to think there is a differentiation between the two.
This. A *product* - something made to sell - cannot be separated from its marketing. A widget may be technically extremely good at many things and yet fail as a product because its good qualities are not relevant enough to the consumers or poorly communicated to them, or the process of buying is inconvenient - or for myriad other reasons related to marketing.
Actually there was a bit of a fire sale on the Kin.
The Kin ONE went from $50 to $30 after a month. The Kin TWO went from $100 to $50 at the same time. The devices where then discontinued shortly after.
Verizon then sent the remaining unsold units back to Microsoft. After a year, that same inventory of unsold devices emerged with a firmware update that turned them into feature phones, named the Kin ONEm and the Kin TWOm.
Someone was complaining the other day about some of us pointing out the very obvious Microsoft shills, but there is quite obviously a very concerted effort by Microsoft to pump up their credibility and to diminish that of their competitors. It would be quite entertaining if someone were to expose it as they did with the FaceBook attempts.
You can only buy the device in about 80 stores NATIONWIDE or on Microsoft Store's website, no shit it's sales are low. Put it in Wal-Mart, Best Buy, etc and it would probably triple sales. That's not say 3 Million is an impressive number, but it's just common sense that most people just don't know it exists.