Topic: Microsoft takes on iPad, Surface pricing unvieled

[shingi_70]

Oh snap.didnt even know that existed. I thought that asus came up with the idea.

Played with a few windows 8 laptops yesterday for about an hour or two at bestbuy. I picked up everything pretty quickly and the only thing i had to get used to was the setting menu in the charms bar.



The multi-tasking is crazy useful. Love the idea of always having something like my Google+ or Twitter to the side.

The livetiles are pretty cool as well. THe gaming ones usually scroll through your high scores and others may scroll on tweets or how many emails you have or your lastest appointment. 

[tendoboy1984]

Pretty sure sure google takes a loss on the nexus S. Also tablets are better desgined than most similar priced laptops. Having better design is a good portion of the battle.

Your forgetting Hybrids my good fellow. The best of both worlds.






Also why do besbuy guys suck so much at selling products?

I would definitely go for a Samsung or ASUS tablet, but Acer? No thanks. Acer's old Android tablets were terribly clunky and ugly. HP is making tablets again? I guess since they're running Windows they felt obligated to re-enter the tablet market.

[shingi_70]

The Acer tablet has been getting nothing but rave previews. Only problem seems to be ththe build quality dock.

 http://mobile.theverge.com/2012/10/9/3475334/acer-iconia-w510-preview-windows-8
 http://m.engadget.com/2012/10/09/acer-iconia-w510-review/

Also HP had a bussiness oriented tablet out last year. Also the Envy is shaping up to a pretty good contender. That and the Asus will probably most people's front runners.

[shingi_70]

So on windows Weekly and on twiiter its been hinted that review embargo for windows 8 and surface is the 23rd.

pretty sure Niley patel at the verge will be reviewing the asus tablet and probably topolsky reviewing the surface.

[shingi_70]

Reviews are in and most seem tobe postive with the expect of Gizmodo. The thing seems to be its a good device but lack of apps and ecosystem hurt it. (though most are ignoring the fact that it has a better application support and ecosystem than android tablet) its totally a gen 1 product and it shows.

The Verge
Engadget
Anandtech
Gizmodo
ABC News

 

[BranDonk Kong]

Better application and ecosystem than Android tablet? Since when has Windows had an actual ecosystem?

[Ceric]

Better application and ecosystem than Android tablet? Since when has Windows had an actual ecosystem?

Business wise it always has.  Home they tried Home Server but they sort of missed the boat for the non-niche.

[shingi_70]

More reviews

arstechina
Bgr
AllthingsD
 Slashgear

As far as tablet applications and ecosystem I would say microsoft does a better job. Android as far as applications made for the tablet is abysmal and is rumored to have less than the windows store.  You can use phone apps but not only are they still mostly going to be gingerbread applications but having a strechted app isn't a good experience.  As far as ecosystem I would say that microsoft has a more fleshed out one compared to google.

Windows Phone, Windows 8, and Xbox. All of microsofts services work seemlessly between all three of these products. Not only that but Outlook, skydrive, and Microsoft Office synch up and you have the office web apps for online use as well.   

The biggest flaw in the Google Eco system is that it doesn't have a successful TV componet. Instead Google has shown three seperate tv products that compete with each other in a small time (Google TV, Nexus Q, and Google Fiber box). Not really having anything to compete with the xbox or apple TV makes buying from google TV and movies

The biggest flaw I see in the microsoft eco system is lack of a books offering. But the new company they just formed with B&N should change that.

[tendoboy1984]

More reviews

arstechina
Bgr
AllthingsD
 Slashgear

As far as tablet applications and ecosystem I would say microsoft does a better job. Android as far as applications made for the tablet is abysmal and is rumored to have less than the windows store.  You can use phone apps but not only are they still mostly going to be gingerbread applications but having a strechted app isn't a good experience.  As far as ecosystem I would say that microsoft has a more fleshed out one compared to google.

Windows Phone, Windows 8, and Xbox. All of microsofts services work seemlessly between all three of these products. Not only that but Outlook, skydrive, and Microsoft Office synch up and you have the office web apps for online use as well.   

The biggest flaw in the Google Eco system is that it doesn't have a successful TV componet. Instead Google has shown three seperate tv products that compete with each other in a small time (Google TV, Nexus Q, and Google Fiber box). Not really having anything to compete with the xbox or apple TV makes buying from google TV and movies

The biggest flaw I see in the microsoft eco system is lack of a books offering. But the new company they just formed with B&N should change that.

As if anyone cares about the Nook anymore. Kindle Fire is one of the more popular tablets (along with the Nexus 7), and it's the most popular e-reader. The Nook can't touch it.

[shingi_70]

Wut the nook as a device and service is still insanly popular and is bolstered by barnes and noble retail stores

The windows 8 launch event is today. Pretty sure it can be viewed here.

 http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/presskits/windows/

[ShyGuy]

You gonna get one Shingi?

[shingi_70]

Nah. Going to go for the Envy X2 myself.

I do however have windows 8 installed on a laptop going to post screenshots tomorrow.

[BranDonk Kong]

Dude in my Java class has Windows 8...I can't stand looking at his monitor because of how ugly Windows 8 is.

[Plugabugz]

Dude in my Java class has Windows 8...I can't stand looking at his monitor because of how ugly Windows 8 is.

Someone actually installed Windows 8 on his laptop then wanted us to help because his outlook doesn't work anymore. Nobody told you to do it, did they?

[Do_What]

What's wrong with his outlook? It works on my laptop with windows 8.

[shingi_70]

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

[Fatty The Hutt]

That's purty.
Do want.

[nickmitch]

Looks like now is the time to be in the market for a tablet. Almost certain my next one will be a Windows one. Though, I can't see myself letting go of my iPad anytime soon.

[NWR_insanolord]

Even I'm thinking about grabbing one of the full-fledged Surfaces with the real Windows.

[shingi_70]

Even I'm thinking about grabbing one of the full-fledged Surfaces with the real Windows.

Eh I used to be high on the surface pro until I realized it won"t be running Haswell until the next generation. So the surface pro coming out early next year will probably have bad battery life compared to the arm (RT) and atom tablets.


Beyond a few applications (Office, Lightroom, and Visual Studio) I've been spending most of my time in the metro side of things.

[tendoboy1984]

Well I finally tried Windows 8 at Best Buy. The only tablet they had was an ASUS Transformer Prime Vivo RT. I did find a few all-in-one PC's from HP and Dell. I found the interface to be extremely intuitive and easy-to-use. I can't believe how stupid-simple Windows 8 is. Too bad that ASUS tablet is overpriced, just like the iPad (you do get 32GB with the ASUS tablet for $599, but yeah).


I can't wait until next year when (if?) those tablets drop to under $400. Hopefully we'll see a Microsoft Surface 7-inch (or even a 3rd-party tablet that size).

[toddra]

I wasn't even sure if I wanted a tablet until I tried Windows 8 and now I think Windows 7 is so sluggish it's almost painful. If anything though I would get a hybrid.

[shingi_70]

 Man I hvae windows 8 installed on my grandmas computer and stillhave XP on my mine for the time being. After getting used to windows 8 going back makes everything worse. Gotten so used to the snapped app multitasking.

Also today is microsoft's windows phone 8 event


Its 10:00am pdt and 1:00pm est

It can be watched url

We also have pictures of the windows 8 to windows phone 8 synch software.





Verizon has also offically announced the lumia 822 which has to be the ugliest of the lumia 8 series varients.

Our two carrier upgrades are sometime next month so i'm going to get a lumia 810 and i'm getting an htc 8x.

It seems the surface is selling pretty well for a product that has no real non tech hype to it.

Wpcentral posted this awesome screenshot of the surface with the htc 8x. Means that most outlets already have windows phone 8 headsets and the revivew embargo is over soon.

[Ceric]

I'm hoping to get the Lumia 920 in Yellow I think.  I'm hoping what they come up and say is: "These are the new features in Win Phone 8.  Everything else we left alone because it was good as it is."

I'm finding every single one of the Metro Apps on Windows 8 to be disappointing because the Windows Phone 7 Equivalent ones are just so so much better.

[shingi_70]

I just learned in windows 8 you can pin not only apps to the start screen but differen[youtube][/youtube]t sections of that app. I have a small live tile for news at the bottom of my start screen with my main apps. And on the upper one I have a larger live tile dedicated to local news. I really think microsoft did a good job on all of the default apps.

Not sure how I feel about colored phones. Right now i'm trying to decide between the blue and black 8X.