The last company to announce a tablet with so few details was…

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RIM when it announced the PlayBook. They wouldn’t let anyone even touch it. That worked so well, Microsoft decided to try the same strategy with the Surface.



  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000688001785 Hui Luo

    bingo!

  • DMX

    however, as the late SJ mentioned during his Allthings D interview, the enterprise market is different since the decision is made by a bunch of people that don’t care about their customers. the Surface would definitely get a big shot in the enterprise market as long as the desktop pcs stay with Microsoft

  • James Thiele

    This interesting but lacking in details. Is it a Macbook Air or iPad competitor? Price? Release date?

    • chrislynch

      It’s both a MacBook and iPad competitor. Heck, Windows 8 in general is a competitor to both. Price and Release Date will come, as Windows 8 hasn’t been released yet.

      • James Thiele

        Not sure how you compete against both the iPad and the Macbook Air since they barely compete against each other.

        • chrislynch

          You made my point for me. While Apple’s products don’t compete against each other – one can make the arguement the iPhone and iPad do – the Microsoft Surface can compete against both the iPad and MBP because of it’s dual interface (Metro Home Screen and Full Desktop) in the Surface Pro (or the x86 version of Windows 8 you can install on your Intel or AMD x86-based PC/laptop.)

  • Bror Jönsson

    One major problem for Microsoft is that they have zero presence in enterprise when it comes to hardware. Every single person that sells PC’s on corporate accounts are employed by Dell, HP, Lenovo, etc, and they will most likely not be too happy about this development. I just don’t see how Microsoft can build up a complete distribution channel from scratch without pissing off their closest allies even more. How is Microsoft going to get the surfaces to their corporate customers?

    • chrislynch

      As more and more companies go to a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policy, it makes perfect sense.

    • http://twitter.com/Moeskido Moeskido

      They do have a presence in the enterprise. They have sales reps who can push integrated hardware with CTOs who already have relationships with them.

  • stephen_victor

    Who cares…it’s ugly. Comes with two OS options the avg. Joe doesn’t understand, will be overpriced, no one knows if RT or Win8 Pro is better or worse for their lifestyle…it’s just too much techy details for the consumer MS wants: Apple’s.

    • Ironnmetal

      You can see the future to know it’s overpriced? Compared to what? the iPad? It will be similarly priced. Ugly? By what standard? With the human eyes I was given it looks sexy as hell, and I think anyone that isn’t an Apple fanboy would agree.

      Too many techy details? The entire presentation lacked techy details, which is the one legit complaint that people have so far. If you’re trying to troll the comments you succeeded.

  • chrislynch

    Really? Microsoft wouldn’t allow anyone to touch the devices yesterday? Uh, get real. The Tech Press were at the announcement, and were able to touch it. If you mean consumers, yeah, I agree. But to say MS took the same strategy as RIM is completely idiotic.

    Yesterday was all about the hardware. MS has already talked, in depth mind you, about Windows 8, Windows 8RT, Metro, etc. I watched the video MS published today, and I didn’t see it as a failure, nor the same as when RIM announced the Playbook 2.

    • http://twitter.com/Moeskido Moeskido

      Yesterday was all about the talk. Nobody knows how well the devices work, or even if they do. Far as I’m concerned, until they seed review units to journalists, it’s Courier with a few physical prototypes.

    • http://www.jonathanguenther.com/blog Jonathan Guenther

      They didn’t let anyone touch them because they didn’t want to scratch the Surface. (Ba dum ching!)

  • chinch987

    $3 a month doesn’t get you much these days.