Falling Windows RT Tablet Prices Signify Slow Adoption

angry tapir writes "Prices of Windows RT devices have started falling, signaling an attempt by PC makers to quickly clear out stock after poor adoption of tablets and convertibles with the operating system. Microsoft released Windows RT for ARM-based devices and Windows 8 for Intel-based devices in October last year. The price drop is an acknowledgment that Windows RT has failed, analysts claim. Though Microsoft has not publicly acknowledged the failure of Windows RT, there is already growing concern about the fate of the OS. IDC earlier this month said that Windows RT tablet shipments have been poor, and that consumers have not bought into 'Windows RT's value proposition.' PC and chip makers have acknowledged poor adoption of the operating system. Nvidia's CEO, Jen-Hsun Huang, last month said he was disappointed with the poor response to Windows RT, and Acer executives have said that Microsoft needs to improve the usability of RT."

Comments

Would I buy one?

[Freshly Exhumed]

Not even if it was free as in beer.

Re:Would I buy one?

[nametaken]

I don't get it. I played with the RT ones, and they're ok... but I kinda want one of the Pro's. They're certainly more appealing to me than an iPad.

Re:Would I buy one?

[cheater512]

They are ok for what exactly? You can't do too much with them.

Kinda expensive for a portable web browser.

Re:Would I buy one?

[cbhacking]

Erm what? Did you mis-read the parent post?

The Surface Pro is a full Win8 x64 machine. It's usable for everything from running Android apps (BlueStacks works pretty well, I'm told) to playing AAA PC games (at lowered settings due to the Intel graphics, but it can run the games). Along the way, there's a few things it's great at; it makes an excellent artistic platform, for example (Wacom digitizer with pressure sensitivity and all that). It's also an acceptable tablet (heavier and thicker and lower battery life than a modern iPad, but still usable - and there are people who used old-school Windows tablets that make Surface Pro look absurdly portable), and an acceptable laptop (assuming you have one of the keyboard covers, which also provides a touchpad) and, while not excelling in either role, it's lightweight and fast and compact and gets good-enough battery life for most use cases.

Surface RT, on the other hand, is definitely more gimped. Even if you use the various unlock/"jailbreak" hacks that are available, there's still only a limited amount of software available for it right now.

Re:Would I buy one?

[cheater512]

I played with the RT ones, and they're ok

You might wan't to read it yourself. I was referring to that.

I know what the Surface Pro's are.

Re:Would I buy one?

[cbhacking]

Your $300 netbook uses solid-state storage, has a Wacom digitizer, weighs 2lbs (under one kilo), has 4GB of RAM and runs a 64-bit OS to be able to use it all, sports a quad-core CPU (not "four hardware threads" dual-core-with-hyperthreading, but actual quad-core i5), has USB3, supports hardware virtualization, supports full-disk encryption using a TPM, has a multi-touch screen, and a 1920x1080 ("1080p" in merketing-speak) resolution, Gorilla Glass, and is durable enough it can be dropped from shoulder hight onto cement with no appreciable damage?

Yeah, didn't think so.

Re:Would I buy one?

[gagol]

Point was, my 2 years old netbook runs quite adequatly, have more than I need battery life, no smuge on the screen, enable me to set the screen angle to ANY angle, can be used on my chest if I feel like watching a movie in bed, can run multiple virtual machines without a hitch, enabled me to create content in HD and fiddle with blender quite well, can play 3D games, and since I do not look at my screen with a microscope, I DONT CARE it is not 1080p or whatever... It does the job quite well thank you. What should I trash it and replace it with something 4 times more expensive?

Re:Would I buy one?

[gagol]

I dont see Surface RT as progress... obviously I am not alone. Also, the power in computers has been more than adequate for many years now, it is well known. Also, I will buy unlocked obsolete hardware before I enter the garden anytime. Now this is my opinion, and represents my needs. Nowhere I pretended my opinion represented a comprehensive industry-wide survey. But again, many people seems to agree with my by voting with their wallet.

Re:Would I buy one?

[mwvdlee]

How is it advancement if the new thing fullfills no more wants or needs than the old thing but costs 4 times as much? Job's done indeed.
I'm sure there are a few people out there for whom the Surface is actually useful. Fact is that these are only few or it would've been more succesfull.

Re:Would I buy one?

[smash]

Microsoft killed RT in an epic case of one hand not talking to the other, and corporate greed (to force people to go for Pro - which also falls through the cracks as a device without a real market - it's too big and heavy - essentially its a laptop with a shitty keyboard that you can't use without a desk). Enable RT to be domain joined/managed, give it a half decent screen and you'd see corporate sales pick up.

As it is, they disabled all that and gave it a shitty screen compared to the iPad - so no consumer in their right mind will want it. Corporates won't want it either as it is not managable via active directory.

So.... it managed to hit that segment of the market that doesn't exist. Way to go Microsoft!

Re:Would I buy one?

[smash]

Yup, and unfortunately it would appear that the 3 of you in that market are not enough to sustain it.

Re:Would I buy one?

[jonnyj]

No, I wouldn't buy one either. But the inconsistency of the technical press is quite entertaining.

Apple strips most of the functionality out of OS X, erects a walled garden around the system, dumps it onto an ARM-based tablet and, voila, a cool, hip, trendy iPad that the critics adore.

Microsoft strips a small part of the functionality out of Windows, erects a walled garden around the system, dumps it onto an ARM-based tablet and, voila, a vile, loathed RT device that the critics lambast for being dumbed down and failing to run Excel macros.

I don't want either device, but it's clear which one has been dumbed down the most. Microsoft needs a new PR department.

Re:Would I buy one?

[Joce640k]

i love it how the 'geeks' belittle the windows 64 gb tablet's space, while all I've heard is rave reviews about google's 32 gb laptop.

You won't be so happy when you find out how much space is left over after you install the OS.

Re:Would I buy one?

[peragrin]

Well google came out with android and that is eating windows RT's breakfast lunch and dinner.

Tablets have a place between laptops and phones. Windows RT was MSFT's answer to the high power high battery drain of intel chips. It is failing because it has all the headaches of windows and none of the usefulness(Windows RT can't run standard windows applications.)

As for chasing the masses, it is exactly that allows companies to do things like sell it for less.

Take an android tablet or an ipad and compare it in price to Windows RT machines. The difference is mass market. One has it and one really doesn't.

I don't blame MSFT for trying. I blame MSFT for failing to change enough to actually be able to compete.

Re:Would I buy one?

[frdmfghtr]

Microsoft strips a small part of the functionality out of Windows, erects a walled garden around the system, dumps it onto an ARM-based tablet and, voila, a vile, loathed RT device that the critics lambast for being dumbed down and failing to run Excel macros.

A small part? I'd say the lack of ability to run anything except RT-specific software is much more than stripping a "small part of the functionality."

Re:Would I buy one?

[thoth]

Apple strips most of the functionality out of OS X, erects a walled garden around the system, dumps it onto an ARM-based tablet and, voila, a cool, hip, trendy iPad that the critics adore.

You left out the part where Apple spent 4 years building a software infrastructure including apps for handheld devices (phones), and then rolled out the iPad.

Microsoft attempted to birth both (phone, tablet) into a hostile environment (solid competition), at the same time. They may as well have chucked a baby into the deep end of a swimming pool and expected it to survive. After draining the water from the pool first.

Re:Would I buy one?

[Kielistic]

they keep trying to shoehorn Windows into a tablet.

Well to be fair this time they shoehorned some tablet into Windows first...

Re:Would I buy one?

[FireFury03]

Stuff that's more expensive but less useful? I can't believe they are scratching their head wondering why uptake sucked.

I think MS still can't understand why they aren't Apple... Apple regularly pull that kind of crap - produce a product that's very expensive but less useful than the competition, and the consumers just lap it up. From MS's pricing it seems that they think they have the same influence, and now they've fallen on their faces they probably can't understand why they don't.

Re:Would I buy one?

[yoshi_mon]

Surface Pro can do all that faster and better...

Faster, sure, better? Purely your subjective viewpoint.

If, for example, there is a device that can fill the needs of a user that has longer battery life that would be a "better" device for that user.

Admit that you are 100% wrong on the idea that it is better and I won't write you off as the MS shill that you appear to be. (No buts, full "I was wrong, end.")

Re:Would I buy one?

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/01/surface-pro-disk-space-to-fall-a-long-way-short-of-what-youd-expect/

A stock surface 64 pro should only have ~ 23 Gb left

What did they think was going to happen?

[DigitAl56K]

Even forgoing "backwards compatibility" with x86 apps, maybe, maybe if you could actually compile desktop applications for it it would be a slightly more attractive platform, but being stuck with nothing but Office and what's available in Metro? It just isn't going to live up to many buyers desires or expectations.

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[DigitAl56K]

If you wanted to run Desktop apps, and wanted x86 compatibility, Surface RT is not the device for you. You need a Surface Pro.

Summary suggests Windows RT is not the device for a lot of folks ;)

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[Bert64]

Which is the whole reason it failed...
By marketing it as "windows", buyers expected some level of compatibility. The compatibility isn't there, which left buyers feeling misled.

And being able to compile desktop apps wouldn't be much use, 99% of windows desktop apps don't come with source code so most of the apps you could recompile for it would be cross platform open source apps. And if you want to compile cross platform open source apps for ARM you have been able to do that in Linux for many years already.

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[purpledinoz]

It's also a marketing problem. What the hell is the difference between Windows RT, Windows RT Pro, Windows 8, Windows 7? Wait, there's no Windows RT Pro, but there's a Surface RT and Surface Pro, right? What's the difference again? One is thicker than the other, and the cheaper one runs ARM. I would do more research, but I just don't care enough. I'm sure I'm not the only one. People just want shit that works, they don't care if runs on ARM or x86.

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[Dorianny]

The real problem is not the new APIs but rather the sandbox which makes it impossible to write any useful productivity application targeting these new APIs. Not even MS Office apps on RT use the new API's as doing so would cripple them behind any usability. Sand-boxing makes sense on phones as being primarily a communication device precautions must be taken so that buggy, malicious apps cant render it non-functional, or spy on you. Tablets are not primarily a communication device, treating them as over-sized phones is whats holding them back from being really useful tools.

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[Hal_Porter]

The whole thing is insane really. At the start MS had 90% of the desktop market. Windows Mobile had about 10-20% of the mobile market. Most importantly they had a load of ISVs producing software, the old stuff run on Win32 and the new stuff on .Net.

MS introduce the Kin and Zune. These were spectacular failures - based on .Net and C#

Then MS decide to replace Windows Mobile with Windows Phone 7. It is based on C#/.Net and is locked to prevent Win32 code. It share a lot with Kin and Zune. It is a failure. They replace it with WP8. WP8 is locked to prevent Win32 code except for Microsoft's code - IE and Office are still Win32. Everyone else is supposed to use the WinRT API in C++. Then they move the WP8 API to Windows 8 and release an ARM version which is locked to prevent Win32 code. Windows Phone is now down to a few percent market share. Most of the ISVs defected to Android and iOS and show no sign of coming back.

So you've got a UI which they used on their phone project which is not selling on their desktop OS which is. At that point it seems like people stopped buying machines with Windows 8 - if you look at what happened Windows 7 is still outselling it.

Now if you look at Vista it sold poorly and they rushed out Windows 7. So you'd expect them to rush out a Windows 9 which had the start menu restored. But if you look at Windows Blue the biggest change is apparently "an improved charms menu".

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[RotateLeftByte]

Heretic!

~But you aren't far from the truth :)

Re:What did they think was going to happen?

[BonThomme]

"an improved charms menu"

They added blue diamonds?

Re: hi

[Anonymous Coward]

What - to buy a Windows RT tablet? ;)

Let me guess...

[elashish14]

Redmond is gonna blame OEMs for this one too eh?

(Reference: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/01/24/windows_8_blame_game/)

Who is the core audience for Windows?

[TheGeneration]

I just don't understand who the core audience for windows is any more. Who are they trying to sell to?

Office workers? Great, Windows is a pretty good system for that usage since office workers have admins that can unf*ck their system when they pick up a virus off browser exploits.

What about the 90% of home users who aren't computer professionals? Are they better off with a Windows operating system that comes preloaded with so much bloatware it can make in Intel i7 chip work hard just to boot? What about when good old Mom or Dad accidentally downloads that trojan horse "anti-virus" that takes over her system to the point where it is unusable? Is Windows still a good value for them then? Wouldn't they have been better off buying a mac with it's easier to use interface, bloatware free on day 1, and far fewer viruses circulating?

Gamers of course are stuck with windows since so many games use Direct X instead of OpenGL.

What about programmers? Windows is SH!T for programming (unless of course you are developing windows applications.) Mac OSX and Linux are both far superior for programming. (OSX after all is a posix compliant Unix Operating System under the hood.) Considering how limited DOS was (and, apparently no longer even present in the current windows) programming from the command line in a Unix/Linux machine is a far far superior option.

So if you're an office drone, or a gamer you're really the only two people who still have a reason to have Windows.

Re:Who is the core audience for Windows?

[DigitAl56K]

Nevermind who Windows is "good for", let's look at what Windows has going for it:

1 - A ton of users familiar with its desktop UI
2 - The mother-load of desktop software
3 - A ton of games compiled for native x86/x64
4 - Office

With Windows RT Microsoft basically said "Screw #1. Screw #2. Screw #3." That leaves a tablet for .. people who want to use Office on.. a tablet? Oh and they also added Metro. Except that the market for portable devices is already full of app platforms that are far more established.

Why would you buy a Windows RT tablet? Beats me. Clearly someone thought they could toss their core value propositions but win in the app space because... because something?

Re:Who is the core audience for Windows?

[DigiShaman]

Windows 8 is a massive paradigm change. The only people using Windows 8 are those forced to replace their computers. Microsoft's whole point around Windows 8 is that it's a thin-client. All future applications and data will be stored in the "cloud". See Office 365 and SkyDrive for example. The idea of CPU architecture should only be important to the software developers, not the end user. Again, the idea being your data in the "cloud" is architecturally agnostic. Never mind the fact that the Windows 8 UI is an anathema to end user multitasking. They still haven't figure that out after the preview of Windows 9. In fact, they actively do not want too. The corporate world reality is an inconvenient truth. The disconnect will always be there from the start of Windows 8.

Re:Who is the core audience for Windows?

[evilviper]

1. Users are NOT familiar with the Windows UI. The UI changes every damn release, in substantial ways, requiring retraining or lots of trial and error. Ironically, Windows 7 with its new large task bar and large icons, looks almost exactly like my GNOME 0.9x desktop on Slackware Linux 3.x, circa 1996.

2. Windows has a lot of software to fill in missing pieces and fix broken-ness of the OS, which are entirely unnecessary in other OSes. You bet, Windows has a lot of disk defragmenter programs, and Linux has practically none, but that's not a bad thing. FOSS software has reached a point that damn near anything you could want on Windows, can be done on any other OS as well, and usually BETTER.

3. I'll concede games, though I, and I believe most people, prefer bypassing the topic, and using a game console instead. PC gaming was a big deal back in the 90s, but these days consoles are just as capable, games are as good if not better and cheaper all-around.

4. OpenOffice and LibreOffice are superb. With Microsoft's absolutely moronic switch to the "ribbon" interface, I find MS Office to be the second-class citizen... the also-ran that I avoid if humanly possible. MS Office is now the crippled knock-off version, where there are tons of things users want to do, but can't figure out how to do, to save their life.

Re:Who is the core audience for Windows?

[flimflammer]

1. Users are NOT familiar with the Windows UI. The UI changes every damn release, in substantial ways, requiring retraining or lots of trial and error. Ironically, Windows 7 with its new large task bar and large icons, looks almost exactly like my GNOME 0.9x desktop on Slackware Linux 3.x, circa 1996.

No, the theme changes. The UI design itself has stood relatively untouched since its inception. Most major UI changes up until Windows 8 were purely cosmetic and almost universally had a means to revert to older forms.

It wasn't until Windows 8 when achieving any of the older functionality was pretty much universally removed.

Re:Who is the core audience for Windows?

[smash]

There's a lot of broken shit in Windows 8 and i'm not just talking about the start menu - that's actually the least of the problems (even if it is a step backwards). Try to actually install/configure a printer, customize the non-luser wifi settings, etc. You're constantly switching between Metro and classic, as teh settings aren't even all reachable from within a single UI.

It's a clusterfuck.

Fire sale?

[longbot]

I, for one, cannot wait for the clearance fire sale as MS dumps and runs from the tablet market. I love my $150 32GB HP Touchpad!

Re:Fire sale?

[ocratato]

Since its locked down so it can only run Windows RT, and the App Store would probably be shut down, what are you going to do with it?

Re:Fire sale?

[ocratato]

To quote from the referenced article:

"The specific value can't be permanently altered on devices enabled with Secure Boot"

So not much use really.

Re:Fire sale?

[tftp]

What kind of support you expect to have on an opened and hacked WinRT tablet, with some parts missing and other replaced, and with wires soldered to test points? On a product that is officially discontinued?

Once you start soldering, all support and warranties fly out of the window. You are on your own. Those who are not comfortable with that should buy a finished product, or R-Pi - at least that one is *intended* for hacking. Not that you will get far with support if you burn the I/O with 120V AC.

With regard to quality, where do you think those WinRT tablets are made? In Redmond, perhaps, in MS's own basement?

If you are worried about performance of the CPU, or the amount of memory... MS has no exclusive control over that. If the market wants a tablet with this and that hardware, China will put it together, very quickly. If that's only you who wants 16 GB of DDR3 RAM in a tablet... sorry, you'll have to make your own.

Re:Need a common platform

[Anonymous Coward]

Note to Windows RT hardware suppliers: Unlock the boot ROM, so we can run linux on the fire sale devices - I've got several netbooks running linux from Microsoft's last attempt. I'd buy unlocked Windows RT Tablets at the prices that Netbooks got dumped at.

Landfill

[ocratato]

The only way these could have succeeded was to price them below Android and recover the losses from the App Store.

The way these are heading, we will see Microsoft soon abandon them and because of their locked down nature they will be consigned to landfill.

I just checked Amazon -

[pecosdave]

I wouldn't say these things are priced into the dangerously low zone. They're still more expensive than the equivalent Android tablets and right around iProduct pricing. Even if I could put Android on one there wouldn't be a reason to buy one for that reason, a native Android tablet would still be the better dollar based choice.

windows RT experience

[chentiangemalc]

so I've been using Surface RT 64 GB as my primary device now for several weeks. The good * working with office documents clearly superior than existing tablets * jail break to run .NET (non-WPF) and re-compiled native apps to ARM is great. I have SharpDevelop, full C# IDE on tablet and it works great. * remote desktop capabilities works great * can achieve 80wpm+ on the "touch" cover The bad: * The Windows Store Apps/Games suck big time * Windows Store Apps Quality * Windows Store Apps Launch Speed * No official SDK to compile desktop apps to ARM * jailbreak required to run 3rd party desktop apps * Mail app search is totally non functional for me (but works on my Windows 8 x64 dev) * Not sure if Touch Cover will be durable * Screen too reflective * Auto brightness is either lacking totally or works poorly * can't dual boot an alternate OS (yet) * gcc not ported yet to target Windows RT (ARM) desktop apps * WinDbg for ARM not publicly available * citrix Client is TERRIBLE (worse than iPad/Android versions) HTML5 client is slightly better. I find overall I'm happy with it,use it to remotely access full Virtual Desktop with external monitor and keyboard/mouse, and then take it away to cafes &c or crammed public transport for document reviews/editing/creation. In my opinion main thing MS needs to do: unlock desktop apps (at least as system setting) and rapidly get QUALITY in Windows Store, and ensure apps like MAIL search works flawlessly and launch time is super quick. I think the product has potential but if the app quality issue is no rectified fast doubt it can survive.

Re:windows RT experience

[93 Escort Wagon]

When you mentioned "the bad", you forgot to include the apparent inability to format Slashdot posts.

Branding Branding Branding

[ScottCooperDotNet]

Microsoft seems to be tied to the Windows brand when it is not appropriate and even harmful to the prospects of a product. Would you buy a Microsoft Windows Xbox?

Windows RT brought to mind all the negatives of the Windows brand: viruses, instability, insecurity.
Yet the Windows RT name here, as DigitAl56K noted above, did not include the brand positives: Familiar UI, existing software and games.

Coming up with a new product name is difficult, especially for a global company. Using the existing brand plus two random-to-consumers letters was a wimp-out that added nothing to differentiate this radical departure from the rest of the Windows brand.

Re:Branding Branding Branding

[Bert64]

The worst problem is that the brand name *implies* a familiar interface and existing software, leaving users extremely disappointed and frustrated when they find those two factors lacking.

MS seems to have an obsession with putting the windows brand everywhere, they are seemingly too arrogant to realise that their brand is viewed extremely negatively by many and only tolerated because in its core markets users are stuck with it or even completely unaware that alternatives exist.

They are like the east german trabant, a car almost universally derided and yet people still queue up to get one because nothing better is available to them.

In the phone and tablet markets, users are not locked in to windows, non windows systems are well known and widely available.

Re:Improve usability?

[cbhacking]

It actually has the normal desktop mode. Office, the legacy Control Panel, Windows Explorer, all the old admin tools (from Task Manager to Registry Editor and Local Security Policy editor), all the command-line or scripting environments (CMD and PowerShell, plus WSH scripts), the built-in Remote Desktop (there's another one in the store), and one of the two Internet Explorer modes (the one that looks like, and includes all the features of, IE9 on Win7) all must run in the Desktop. It's definitely still there.

However, by default, desktop mode applications must be signed by Microsoft before they can run on RT. This has only limited impact on scripts - there are .CMD and .PS1 scripts to automate a number of things in RT, both written by MS and by independent third parties - but it means that the average independent software vendor can't just distribute an ARM-compiled version of their Win32 app and expect it to work. That said, there's a hack which has been out for months (and multiple Patch Tuesday cycles) which unlocks (some say "jailbreaks") Windows RT to remove this signature restriction. At that point, you actually can just fire up Visual Studio, set the target platform to ARM instead of Win32/x86 or x64, compile your app (VS will complain a little, but it's easily fixed), and run it on RT. In fact, you can even just download a .NET 4.x (4.0 or 4.5, currently) app and run it right on RT with no forther effort at all, assuming it was compiled with the "AnyCPU" target platform.

Link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2092158

Windows advantages

[Enderandrew]

In the enterprise market, iPads and iPhones are everywhere. The reason Microsoft could in theory have won back that enterprise market was providing a device that:

1. Could join a domain and be managed by Microsoft tools
2. Run existing Windows legacy apps

So Microsoft provided

1. An OS/tablet that can't join a domain to be managed by Microsoft tools
2. Can't run Windows legacy apps

So is arguably worse than existing Android/iOS tablets on price and hardware. The software provides less value. And the OS eats up all your storage space.

Honestly, I can't see anyone making an argument for buying a Windows RT tablet.

I'm sure this won't matter to the haters

[Barlo_Mung_42]

but my surface RT is the best travel computer I've ever owned. When I'm on the road I don't need to compile apps or do heavy lifting. I need to check email, use word / excel and browse the web. So why is it better than any regular tablet? It's as light as a tablet when I want tablet mode but has support for a real mouse / keyboard when I don't.

Re:I'm sure this won't matter to the haters

[Therad]

Yes, they all support keyboards trough bt or USB if they have that connectivity (not all tablets have USB, not sure about bt). And let's all forget about asus transformers, which provides a nice keyboard and doubles battery time when using it.

Re:Even though Surface looked great in paper...

[WaffleMonster]

I recently bought a W7 tablet. Jesus fucking christ, what a piece of shit. It's like a Cyrus Cybernetics Corporation product. And I LOATHE apple products, so don't call me a shill. But W7 could never be considered usable by touch by anyone sane who is not a shill.

All tablets are useless pieces of shit.

This is exactly the problem.

[symbolset]

It's the millions of comments and reviews like this that are killing Microsoft's hardware partners on WinRT. "Loved WinRT - intuitive, responsive, loved the hell out of the OS. Returned this (VivoTab RT, Dell XPS 10, Lenovo Yoga 11) to the vendor because I also bought the Surface RT and prefer it because x,y,z. Four stars for this though, as you might like it." And where do these comments and articles come from? Microsoft's own marketing campaigns, fed by the billions in profits their partners funnel them, amplified by their Bing search engine. With friends like this Microsoft's hardware partners don't need enemies.

If you want to survive as a manufacturer never ever ever screw your distributors. Word gets around.

Re:This is exactly the problem.

[smash]

unsafe image/video search

Re:hi

[Dr Max]

Weren't android tablets dropping prices like this a year (and a half maybe) ago. I guess it's a dead platform.

Re:hi

[AlphaWolf_HK]

Well they didn't really drop that much, but what little they did is easily explainable: Inexpensive but good tablets hit the market hard and fast around that time. Namely, the Kindle Fire and the Nexus 7. Naturally the competition needed to do just that - compete.

Re:Two problems.

[BonThomme]

yes, if they had only leveraged their success with Windows Phone...