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Nokia Introduces Windows Tablet

jones_supa sends this news from The Verge: "Rumored for a long time, Nokia's Windows tablet has finally been released. Microsoft might be buying Nokia's device business, but for the next few months they're going to be battling it out as competitors for Windows-based tablet market share. The new Lumia 2520 tablet is everything you'd expect from Nokia; it comes with a very bright and colorful full HD 10.1" display and it looks just like a supersized version of a Lumia series Windows Phone. Other Nokia signatures are a high-quality camera and maps which work reliably offline too. Inside there's a 2.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, and the word is that Windows RT 8.1 runs great. It's responsive and multitasking apps seems just as good as the Surface 2. Because this is Windows RT you also get access to the desktop Office apps as part of this device. At that point the real Surface-like keyboard and trackpad become useful, alongside two USB ports. Estimated battery life is of 11 hours, which is increased when the cover is attached."

22 of 112 comments (clear)

  1. Price? by erac3rx · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Sounds great, looks great, but the price is the most important piece of information here and I don't see it. If it's as affordable as a Nexus 7, it's quite interesting. Priced at parity with ipad like Surface? Not nearly as interesting. Anyone know what the price is?

    1. Re:Price? by icebike · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Even if it looks great, its still Windows RT.
      So they have written off the business market, leaving only the home user market, but anyone who wants a tablet that is incompatible with everything else has already bought an ipad. If the same hardware could dualboot Android, they might have something, but RT destines it for the dustbin of history.

      --
      Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
    2. Re:Price? by mythosaz · · Score: 2

      MY EYES!

    3. Re:Price? by isdnip · · Score: 2

      True. Microsoft botched RT by getting greedy. Like iOS, it is locked down tight, so you can only install "apps" from their store. Sure, that gives MS a cut of the action, Xbox-style, but it's hostile to users and real Windows doesn't have that restriction. Plus it doesn't run real Windows applications. So its ecosystem is pretty narrow and not likely to become very good.

  2. iPad already beaten by tuppe666 · · Score: 2

    iPad is the one to beat, this does not do it.

    Do you not keep up with current events. the iPad is the looser tablet. Its market share has plummeted from 60% of sales last year to 32% http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS24253413 . Ironically Microsoft could have been in this position if...well lots of ifs really... not trying to be Apple would have been one of them. Perhaps you should Google sometime...you can get it even on the iPad ;)

    1. Re: iPad already beaten by grub · · Score: 2

      I want a tighter tablet, not a looser one. Perhaps I should reconsider.

      --
      Trolling is a art,
    2. Re: iPad already beaten by JohnNemesh · · Score: 2

      Ahem...it should read "Trolling is AN art"!

    3. Re:iPad already beaten by mcl630 · · Score: 2

      Because ipad dominated the market for a couple years, Apple likely still has a very large share of total tablets still in use.

      But they aren't dominating sales anymore, which was tuppe's point. This Nokia tablet has to compete with Android tablets, other Windows RT tablets, as well as iPad. There really isn't "the one to beat" (using OP's words) anymore.

    4. Re: iPad already beaten by mcgrew · · Score: 2

      That may be a troll at reddit, but this is slashdot. We laugh at ignorance. He'll be +5 in no time, and if I were moderating he'd get a + from me. I'd have posted the same comment if he hadn't.

      I did stumble when reading the OP. "Looser? Huh?" until I remembered how many aliterates spell "lose" with two Os. It's annoying. And no, that isn't a misspelling of "illiterate".

  3. Re:Irony. by 0123456 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Can programmers really not manage to present two different ways of presenting information.

    They could, if the web had been designed to separate content from presentation. Then different devices could display the same information in whatever form they thought best.

    Oh, hang on, that's what HTML was supposed to do in the first place, until 'web designers' decided they needed the page to look exactly the way they wanted it to look.

  4. Price with Windows RT and LTE is $499(+149)... by tuppe666 · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's packing LTE, and a 2.2GHz Snapdragon 800 CPU inside, with a bright 650nit screen made out of Gorilla Glass 2. A 6.7MP rear camera featuring Zeiss optics and a 2MP front facing camera. 800mAh battery go from drained to 50 percent charge in just 40 minutes. The Nokia Power Keyboard accessory extra $149, and promises an extra five hours of battery life plus two extra USB ports.

    Its not really the best article when it cuts out all the information!!!!!! The fact is is 3 times as expensive as new Nexus 7 with a less desirable OS. Other than it being fun(or depressing) to kick what is left of Nokia. I am not sure of the relevance. I cant help finding it extra ironic(or again depressing) that Windows Phone limited success has been at undercutting Android in its traditional counties.

    1. Re:Price with Windows RT and LTE is $499(+149)... by chuckugly · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The fact is is 3 times as expensive as new Nexus 7 ....

      Wouldn't it be more appropriate to compare it with a Nexus 10 at $499 than with a 7" tablet? I have a Nexus 7 and I like it fine but it's not a 10" tablet (Also have a Xoom) by any stretch.

  5. So, what do we have here? by JohnNemesh · · Score: 5, Informative

    We have a USELESS tablet, with locked down hardware. We have a miserable selection of apps, including a YouTube app which is nothing more than an HTML5 webpage. We have a high price, $400-$500 minimum. And we have a company that will not be making any further versions of this machine, also bringing into question their ability to even support the poor fools who buy one! Utterly useless waste of time and money for Nokia!

    1. Re:So, what do we have here? by chuckugly · · Score: 3, Informative

      I have to agree here, RT seems to me to be one of the really remarkably bad ideas in tech recently. We have Windows (fine) and Windows Phone (OK whatever). One (or both) of those should be used for the tablets, but the concept of creating a third platform that's incompatible with the other two is just astonishing to me.

  6. Re:Only one tablet market buddy :) by chuckugly · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Well I can only speak for myself, but for me those sizes solve two very different issues and have very different but slightly overlapping use cases. If I have to choose, I want a 10" because it has (based on the Xoom vs the Nexus 7) vastly better usability and somewhat better battery life (probably bigger battery) but if I can have both (I do) then the 7" will fit in some of my pockets and is nicer to carry day to day. Which looks a lot like different but overlapping markets, buddy. ;) In any case, Google sells a model that more closely approximates the specs of the Nokia, and that model is the $499 Nexus 10. You can argue that all people seem to want is a Ford Focus and there is "one car market", but when Ferrari makes the 458 it's silly to insist on comparing them rather than comparing the Ferrari and maybe an Aston Martin.

  7. Two tablet Markets!? by tuppe666 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Well I can only speak for myself, but for me those sizes solve two very different issues

    Whoa there cowboy, before you launch into another female circumcision analogy, can I say I really don't give a monkeys. The reality is even if you pretend there are two markets...you are only arguing that Microsoft are launching a expensive product in a *smaller* market. I don't think you really understand your own points. The bottom line is screen size is simply another metric in its specification, one ironically you point out can be a disadvantage.

    Although as I said overpriced in the larger tablet market, or overpriced in the smaller *cough* larger tablet market (Jesus). The results are the same.

  8. Good for Nokia I guess? by WaffleMonster · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think *ALL* computers running walled garden OSs where execution must be approved by a single entity are offensively stupid.

    Neither would I consider purchasing such an expensive device without a user replaceable battery. Batteries still suck and there is still enough variance during manufacturing and use it is still very much luck of the draw what you'll get.

    There is no useful technical reason for locking down execution and planned obsolescence (dead battery = dead device) other than screwing over customers.

    In this way I hate the new Nokia and Windows RT bullshit as much as I hate Apples ipad bullshit.

    It really is quite a depressing situation... the hardware guys continue to kick ass while software guys seem to be spending all their time picking their noses, fiddling with UX and carefully apportioning value such that none dare be left on the table.

  9. Re:Irony. by steelfood · · Score: 2

    'web designers' decided they needed the page to look exactly the way they wanted it to look.

    These people need to be marginalized in any discussions regarding web technology. They're as bad as the people trying to fit everything into the browser *ahem* Google *ahem*. There's no way something designed for 1600x900 will look exactly the same as something designed for 1280x1024. Hell, you can resize your browser window to half your 1980x1200 screen, and it won't look the same. And I haven't even gotten to phone sizes.

    The worst part is, nobody has it right. HTML(2) started off with not even the slightest concept of this, and then tried to tack on some extensions that somewhat made it possible, but was really just a bunch of hacks. HTML5 started off with it as the basic premise, then went off the deep end as more and more vested, moneyed interests had something to add. Now it's everything, and nothing all at the same time.

    I'm waiting for HTML4.5, that happy medium between 4 and 5. Preferably, it won't be based on SGML, but that might be asking for too much (and it wouldn't be a *ML anymore).

    --
    "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
  10. 6 devices by Frankie70 · · Score: 2

    Nokia has actually released 6 new devices. Some phablets and some tablets.

    http://bgr.com/2013/10/22/nokia-lumia-1520-lumia-2520-release-date/

  11. Re:Anti-Windows posts by wmac1 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Vote positive (to even slightly pro-MS posts) and you will no more receive voting points. I have huge amount of positive karma (tens of +5 posts) but after I voted a few of these up, I receive no more voting points.

    Btw. I have never worked for any American company or organization (let alone MS). I have been using Linux since 15 years ago on servers but windows on most workstations. I have developed mostly for *nix, Java and at the same time C++ for Windows.

    So don't assume the votes on /. really show the opinions of all readers. /. gives the up vote points to those it likes.

  12. Was I the only one... by Sfing_ter · · Score: 2

    Was I the only one who read that as "Nokia Introduces Windows Toilet"...
    It's early but... I really wanted to leave a memory dump...

    --
    A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing. Emo Philips
  13. Re:Anti-Windows posts by OakDragon · · Score: 2

    The Start Button is now old enough to vote. It would be ashamed to kill it off before it can buy its own beer!