Surface Pro Set For January 26 Launch, Says Microsoft Store

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Here comes the real surface... I have really mixed feelings about how it'll do.

Regardless, it would drive tablet/ultrabook development in a great new direction
 

ojas

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[citation][nom]tuffjuff[/nom]If only that keyboard came with it, then the price would be a little more palatable.[/citation]
True, i doubt that keyboard is worth more than $25 anyway.
 

Daedalus12

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I'm really hoping this does well. It's still priced a bit too much for me, but a strong showing with the surface pro should help drive competition and innovation. A true "laptop replacement" tablet at $699-799 would be great.
 

BringMeAnother

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I'm setting up a count down timer for this. Been waiting for a full OS tablet for ages. Still, I'd buy this only if the reviews are great. Otherwise I'd probably wait for the next generation.

For those interested in Windows 8 (not RT) tablets (slates only) here are some names from my research:

Intel Core i7/i5/i3

Microsoft Surface Pro
Kupa X15
Acer Iconia Tab W700
Samsung ATIV Smart PC Pro 700T

Intel Atom

Samsung ATIV Smart PC 500T
Asus ViVo Tab
HP Envy X2
HP ElitePad
Lenovo IdeaTab Lynx
Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet 2
Acer Iconia Tab W510
Dell Latitude 10
ZTE V98
 

wemakeourfuture

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[citation][nom]Daedalus12[/nom]I'm really hoping this does well. It's still priced a bit too much for me, but a strong showing with the surface pro should help drive competition and innovation. A true "laptop replacement" tablet at $699-799 would be great.[/citation]

It won't do well. Myriad of reasons but price is a huge one.
 
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Everyone complains about price. Take a minute to think. ALL OUR LIVES, how much have tablet computers cost? WEEEELL over 1,300 sometimes. 999 is AWESOME for 120GB SSD and 1080 resolution?! PFFFFT, I know I'll be buying one if I want another tablet!
 

ikefu

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I've been contemplating getting an ultrabook for the portability factor and the Surface Pro will actually be cheaper than most Ultrabooks. Convenience of an iPad with the ability to run all my work programs and older PC games (woot Age of Empires 2 to go!)

The only thing holding me back the coming release of Haswell CPUs late this year. The new S0ix active sleep state should help out with the poor battery life that comes with full Core CPU tablets.
 

sun-devil99

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[citation][nom]therogerwilco[/nom]I don't recall people being this negative when the ipad came out at such a high price[/citation]
I don't know, may be people expect 'such a high price' from Apple and wasn't the iPad the first into the Tablet Market? Microsoft is trying to play catch-up and may be they need to market the Surface better.
 

robochump

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MS Store sales person stated that he expects the MS Surface Pro to have much less battery life due to the added performance. Its tough to balance perf and usable battery life as well as Apple has (not that iPads are high end but works very well) but Surface appears to be a solid contender, eventually.
 

ikefu

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I think the price issue is this: The surface has all the guts of an Ultrabook and priced it to match but it looks like a normal tablet so people expect it price like an iPad.

I think its a perception issue. I would love to see it priced as a tablet, but ultimately what you have is an ultrabook in tablet form factor.
 

soo-nah-mee

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I've been an early adopter many times, but I have a strange feeling about the first generation of these guys (Surface PRO and it's brothers from different mothers). I guess it's because these are pretty much the VERY first examples in a entirely new genre of devices. This may very well be a glimpse of what the next 5-10 years of mainstream personal computing will look like; the perfect combination of tablet and laptop. I think I'll just let others work the bugs out and hop on when the next round comes out.
 
[citation][nom]thecolorblue[/nom]ridiculously overpriced[/citation]
What do you think the price should be?

Generally speaking, except for Apple stuff, they make VERY little profit on these devices. The parts and designs do cost money. For non Apple products, you can expect the most a company could discount their computers is maybe 10% before they start to threaten their ability to stay in business.

This has far more power than anything else on the market in tablet form.
 

w8gaming

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It is interesting to see almost all the negative comments here are about price, instead of concerns like much shorter battery life, limited storage in relation to the average software size in Windows world, weight and such. That actually implies that many of you are actually VERY INTERESTED in such a product, only the price is holding you back. And if you look at the components went into making Surface Pro, it is obvious why it is being priced at this level. Hint Intel CPU. And in 2013, vendor might try to make tablets with AMD APU and that will brings the price down.

Atom based Windows tablet is already available in the market and is priced only slightly above Surface RT. Current generation of Atom Z2760 has similar performance of a Pentium 4 and so running older game such as Age of Empire 2, Baldur's Gate 2 etc should not be an issue. Atom based tablet is also much lighter than the x86 based tablets, some models are even lighter than iPad2. They also have long battery life that can rival iPads. In term of raw CPU performance, Atom CPU is still ahead of the ARM based tablets in the market as well. If there is any shortcoming compared to the ARM based tablet, Intel has paired Z2760 with a weak GPU. Maybe other vendor might try AMD C-60 in such category in the future for better graphics performance.

I think there will be a lot of different CPU+GPU variants in the 2nd generations of W8 tablets. Not sure why there is no vendor offering anything based on AMD APU at the moment. Maybe no one dare to take the risk to offer a less popular brand while their competitors are all putting Intel CPU in their tablets.
 

therogerwilco

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One other thing nobody is taking into consideration is this:
Intel recently announced a few weeks/a month ago, that they're producing a low wattage cpu coming out 1Q 2013. Furthermore today I saw an article about 'limited edition' cpu's (I think the first was cloverfield, this is haswell iirc) and they'll be sub-10w power requirements. In either case, the runtime of these will be dramatically different than previous wattage cloverfields (if that is still what's going in the Surface Pro vs the limited edition haswell) so all the speculation of "omg the battery life will suck!" is completely unnecessary and most likely the negative point apple fans are trying to push.

I think ultimately w8gaming and several others have the right idea, this is the FIRST generation of the devices. Bottom line. Also, their current specs are superior to the first several generations of the Ipad and of course the android tablets. Furthermore, I believe the Surface RT and Pro beat all other Ipads hands down for the simple fact of including a USB port. I consider this a common sense feature, Apple (even under Jobs) made the mistake of trying to change the users habits instead of tailoring the product FOR the users. I'm sure Steve Jobs would have loved to see it, merely because even though I'm not an Apple fan, I always had the feeling he appreciated fine pieces of technology, a piece of art if you will, that many products have come to be.
 
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