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The Windows RT Surface will probably be less than the iPad, but the Windows 8 Pro tablet will probably be more than the iPad (maybe $600+).

Kindle Fire 2. 'Nuff said.

It would be great if it had Kinect built in and it understood swiping gestures so that content could be sent to a surface next to you. It would also be cool if it had the old surfaces ability to place a digital device on it and have the content "spill" out to the screen, like pictures, songs, movies, apps, etc. With a Java system built in, it could run all Android apps. Mac users would be so envious of kinect based gesturing! Imagine a kinect game of finger karate where your fingers control the screen character

Microsoft should treat this like the Xbox.They should sell the Windows RT tablet below cost and make their revenue on the market place. When the HP slate went on sell below cost, sells sky rocketed because it was the cheapest pad on the market. They should set the price below the iPad. The Windows Surface pro should be sold at full price because its target audience is not your casual pad user. Its target is for professionals and enterprise, which those people tend to pay more because they need these features.

I don't give a rats ass what they cost. I'll be buying one.

I'm not sure how these experts came up with $700 for the Pro. The mean Ultrabook price is more like $1000 so to be competitive to THAT price, the pro only has to come in at $900. Considering it comes with a digital pen, you're looking at the high end, not the low end of that range.

The Pro is very similar to the Samsung Series 7 slate and that's $1100 to $1350.

The RT model is a very high end ARM tablet, so I'd be surprised it if comes in below $500... and as we saw with the Transformer Prime, being the *same* price as the lowest end iPad even with twice the memory means people (and bloggers) will miscompare them.

I love how this hype article just assumes that it will work, and performance isn't even a factor.

It seems to me that Jack Gold is not the go to guy for understanding emerging technological markets and trends. He seems to be a commodity guy, not an idea guy.

In my opinion, if MS are to succeed, they need to ignore the pundits and not worry about pricing as much as establishing their own niche in the mobile space.

If MS follows the commodity marketing scheme of Samsung, Lenovo, and others in the tablet space they are doomed to failure.

From what little I've seen of the Surface, it appears that MS might finally understand this. I think it has real potential to do very well. Not because of specs but because of function and interoperability with Windows in the enterprise.

This post has been edited by nonseq: 20 June 2012 - 07:24 AM

IMHO... I think the price will need to be $100 less than the equivalent next generation ipad or it will fail. I base this on the following. Unless this product can "walk on water" You will not pull the Crapple fanboys away from their i-products. Microsoft fanboys will buy this anyway. The goal will be to get the people that are on the fence to purchase the Surface. The only way to do that is to have a lower price. Otherwise they will say I might as well get the ipad.
I see this pulling more business from the Android market than Apple.

People keep comparing this to the ipad. The Surface against the iPad only shows how limited and a toy the ipad is when it comes to work... Even the Surface RT out works the ipad... I will be happy to pay more for the surface than I paid for my iPad2

I will be keeping my iPad2, but I will by getting a surface on Launch. My only problem is that I want the pro, but the RT comes first... I may end up with both.

I look forward to swiping and doing general work with the tablet and then getting home or the office and docking it to do my real work. I will not need my laptop any more.

With my ipad, I dont play games much or use the multimedia features. I bought for work. The limited apps, hardware limitations all have me pulling my hair. I had to get a keyboard, camera kit, etc. My ipad will be around for fun, others to use, and helping people when they have questions, but the surface will be my new mobile king.

The so-called analysts, as usual, have no clue. The iPad was a stop-gap because there was no reasonable Windows-based tablet for business users. Instead of a device that met business users needs, business users adapted how they worked to the various limitations of the iPads. With these new tablets, businesses will be buying them up by the thousands as they will make life easier for corporate IT who will no longer have to shoe-horn Apple devices into their networks. Will it be a consumer success though? That is the big question mark and it totally depends on how Microsoft promotes these devices and how much buy-in they get from application developers.

We Yes and No.

Windows RT is a limited option much ike Android and iOS. Since those components have been in product for several years now, MS certainly can get a good pricing deal on millions of parts produced.

So at the leats the RT version can certainly be as cheap an an iPad. And even if its more, MS can certainly sell the item at a lose as they did with Xbox to get the product out on the market. They have well over 55B in cash in the bank, plus I am sure Bill Gates would see to it that he woudl use his own cash to make sure MS has the money to cover the loses. He is still Chairman of the Board.

The Xbox is the number one console on the planet. Why? Bec MS support it when it has problems, they took a lose in cost and sold the box at $100 lower than the PS, forsing Spny to also drop it cost to compete. MS invested into getting devs to make the best gams for Xbox FIRSt and then porting them to other cosoles. This made Xboax sales increase knwoing first runs game would get here first, Xbox Live service tho it costs, offers way more than PS Network did for FREE. And it still offers more. 60bucks a year is CHEAP to get the extra MS offers. The box is so goo, that in 5+ years it has stood up against not one but 2 PlayStations and 2 consoles from Nintemndo with just one model.

You think MS can't handle Apple? The have beaten them before with one simple rule, market your product in a market where your nearest competor has a bad option or NO OPTION. An in the Enterpirse where bsuiness use Windows and Office, Apple and Google and even RIM simply can't compete. The market is big enough for 3 major players and only Google, Microsoft and Apple have the money and partners to cover such a vast amount of companies. However the Iapd is not compatible with Enterprise software. Yes you can buy VM software and remotely use your dekstop. This option is SLOW, it is not Dependable and is not as SECURE, as having a device that can natively reach these services. Try uing a remote connect on some insecure WiFi at an Airport or Bus Termainal or Hotel and see what could happen.

this is what the naysaysers all failed to consider. They rather just bash MS and not consider that NO ONE on thsi planet can support their software better than they can. For that reason this item should succeed. Yes other PC maketrs alo have Windows 7 tabets that had slow sales. Windows 7 wasn't designed with a UI that takes advantage of TOuch platforms and thus is no better than Windows XP Tablet Edition.

Tommy7q6z, on 20 June 2012 - 05:09 AM, said:

You are aware there are multiple models of iPad with the most expensive costing $850 from Apple and $899.99 on retail?

Also this is a PC using an Intel i% processor in the Pro model, and I think it will likely cost $799 and would be well worth it as it wont be a crippled tablet like the RT version will be on seom front.

CyScott, on 20 June 2012 - 06:01 AM, said:

The reason the HP Slate did sell is because it was running WebOS and no one wanted it. Then it went on sale and ppl bought it knowing that the support was not comign with it for long. Also Android can be installed on it too. So for a couple hundred for an unsupported tablet, it was a deal. This one is going to be supported at least 5 years for the software and likely 1 year as any other device. No MS-Care required.

BigBanks, on 20 June 2012 - 07:02 AM, said:

Because the RT version will work very much like an Android tablet or iPad. From what we already know of Windows 8 RT, its biggest plus runnign on ARM that the others dont have is, The device will be rnning a full desktop version f Internet Explorer, the device will support Flash, without using a plugin and the RT model will come with Office which has been redesigned to use the Metro UI and take advantage of some of the touch benefits.
If th RT model is WiFi only, then MS shouldn't have a problem reaching thr $499 price point.

The Pro model running i5? $800 is what I expect as many untrabook will be at that price point by this fall. They are already less than $1000.

This Acer with an i5 and these specs retails for $999, yet it can be found for $799 on Amazon. Since the Pro model has similar specs, I would thing $800 is the right spot. At that cost, MS would only be taking a small hit that will easily be made up on software sales.


http://us.acer.com/a...el/LX.RSE02.145

The RT will probably do just fine wherever (within reason) they pitch it. There are plenty people who will take it as an iPad-competitor that's not Apple.

The Pro will be much edgier, IMO. I don't see them being able to carve too much off the price, and the real question people will be asking is whether the advantage of running arbitrary Windows apps locally will be more or less cost-effective than achieving the same remotely through an ARM-based tablet unless the price is right.

One problem they may well face is that the very reason that the Pro will be attractive to some—the ability to run arbitrary Windows applications—will undermine the level of lock-in that they could use to justify a loss-leading subsidy.

This post has been edited by crosswordbob: 20 June 2012 - 09:34 AM

Not rocket science, here. They will, no doubt, be priced where they should.

Best guess for a competitive placement must be sub-$500 for the RT, and sub-$900 for the Pro. If you add up the accessories for an iPad that come with the Surface Pro - WHICH IT WILL COMPETE DIRECTLY WITH (SHEESH!) - the Pro will be dead-on competitive at that level.

LinuxGuyFromRI, on 20 June 2012 - 07:19 AM, said:

Agreed, but I'd add that, yes, consumers will buy them. Every person in IT or enterprise is - surprise! - a consumer. Dell used this at one point in their history to rise to the top of the market. If it works at work, it'll work at home, but not the other way around.

QUADICON, on 20 June 2012 - 08:07 AM, said:

Actually I don't think you understand the history involved. For the most part you are right about the XBox. It really ascended to dominance though when MS developed the killer device a kinect. Most of the life of the XBox it has lost money. The entertainment division hemorrhaged it for an eternity. I doubt that they have even remotely made those loses up yet. As far as Gates having the money to support it. Gates didn't get to where he is in life by being stupid. He didn't do that while he was CEO anymore than any other shareholder. Why would he do it now? I will add that having success in mobile is critical for Microsoft's future. Without it they have none.

The article isn't bashing the Surface. (That is an even more odd name than iPad.) I think they are being realistic in saying cost in important. Trying to unseat the 800 lb gorilla (iPad) won't be easy. The surface needs to offer a compelling difference for it's adoption. Currently most have the perception that the iPad has the advantages of...

Apps availability
Ecosystem
Cost
Quality
Availability of accessories
Support
At this point tried and true technology

Right now the only advantage of the Surface would be...
It will offer Office. (I am not sure how important this will be. Will the number of people that both want a tablet and have to have Office be enough to keep it alive as a product?)

We'll pretty much have to wait and see how it does. MS has been down this exact hardware path before and has been on the loosing end with Zune, phones and tablets. As I said they have also been on the winning side with XBox.

By the way I think you completely missed the purpose of tablets now. They are great media consumption devices. They are great for point-of-sale. They are great for medical. Most any purpose where you need portability, information but have limited need for input. Right now they really aren't replacements for laptops or desktops. Microsoft is trying to make it closer to that. What I question is whether there is enough of a market for just that. I don't think there is and the Surface will have to appeal to the larger audience also.