Microsoft's ARM blunder: 7 reasons why Windows RT was DOA Industry doomsayers were circling Windows 8 like buzzards before it even launched, but they picked the wrong carcass. Microsoft's real 2012 roadkill was Win8's ARM-powered cousin, Windows RT. The chattering class's comparisons of Windows 8 and Windows Vista are premature – it will take several more quarters before we can gauge …
There's no reason at all to buy it over buying an Ultrabook which it costs about the same, performs about the same, and weighs about the same as Surface Pro including the keyboard cover. The only difference is Ultrabooks will have a better keyboard and be available with better CPUs, neither of which is in favor of Surface Pro.
On their fourth attempt to enter the tablet market since the mid 90s, Microsoft still doesn't understand it, even after Apple showed them what people want! They still try to make something that does everything a PC does, when the Apple and Android tablet sales demonstrate people aren't asking for that. If they were, the iPad would have flopped and there would still be no tablet market.
When vendors release tablets that run full desktop Windows, then people complain (as you do) that tablets aren't PCs (they're not), that desktop Windows doesn't work with a touch-oriented device (it doesn't), and therefore the tablets are useless. But when Microsoft releases a tablet that runs a slimmed-down, touch-oriented version of Windows, people complain that it doesn't run full desktop Windows and therefore it's useless.
I have no idea how Microsoft can get itself out of this trap. Apparently, neither does Microsoft...
I think if it had outlook and AD integration it could have at least had a role in business...
As it is, it can't survive in the low cost market where The Rest Of Android dominates, and it can't survive in the high cost market occupied by Samsung and Apple.
I expect the full fat 8 tablets will have a similar issue except they'll be more use for work, but then people will wonder "but this tablet doesn't have that much more battery then that laptop and the laptop has an okay keyboard and is a single unit... also it has windows 7 which is what all the other PCs I use have on them"
Yeah, the lack of AD and Outlook is killing it. The one thing everyone, even the staunchest fanperson, has to give them is that they have, rightly or wrongly, got business and the enterprise sewn up, and a key part of that is AD. Not having AD integration is throwing away their key advantage, allowing iOS and Android to entrench themselves further in the market.
It was Microsoft that chose to create confusion over the relationship between Win8 RT and Win8 and it's Microsoft that continues to do nothing to remedy the situation. Can't blame users for not knowing what to expect.
The bigger issue is this policy leaves buyers wondering why they should spend so much on what is apparently just a low end laptop/netbook. I'm not claiming being much more explicit about RTs nature and tablet focus would do them much good though, the supposed Windows compatibility is so shallow (only new Metro style apps) jumping OS to IOS or Android would be no harder and that's the only sales point in its favour.
I agree with you, there seems no way out for Microsoft. They foolishly thought they could ship premium price devices based on a 'it runs Windows' slogan instead of competing on what and how well it works as a tablet. There's no reality where the name "Windows" is worth $200 on the price tag unless it really runs full blown Windows and runs it bloody well.
Bought some more NET BOOKS.....
10 minutes into a 30 minute boot up, set up and registering process - Xubuntu 12.04, UNetBootin - Linux installer on a USB drive, FULL install = wiping out Microsoft Windows, and their half baked trial version crapware....
Muuuuuuuuch Happier.
I just think back to all the days, weeks, months and perhaps even years, that this company and it's shitware have cost me, and the enormous amounts of my money and misspent opportunities as well...
"Harrrr Harrrrr - Walk the Plank Ye scurvy dogs!" - loosely translated that means, "Microsoft is having another Epic Fail - Ha Ha Ha..."
Satan - "I welcome them"
Microsoft's bread and butter is people that think they "need to be DOS compatible".
Without that, Microsoft is nothing and Windows is nothing. Microsoft has no competitive advantage in non-PC devices and everyone else has already established "ecosystems".
People were saying this about Windows-on-ARM before these devices came out and people are still saying this about Windows-on-ARM now. There's nothing mysterious or magical or hard to grasp here.
Open source, Open O/S, Open HW it's all BS
Why is everyone buying Apple? Because it is the best overall device, HW/SW/Apps/accessories
Integration value trumpts best of breed component and that is the future.
This is also why linux on x86 is the next downward spiral for Intel. HP was the first to fall, Intel is next then Microsoft.
e99
RT does nothing that and android or is device can't. As has been commented on the office is gimped so polarised office does a decent enough job to mimmick it. At half the price you can get a tab2 or an older ipad. An AC commented above, if it had AD integration with domain toys then it would be useful to businesses. As it is it is a very standalone toy. Waste of money.
The reality is that Windows is now a niche operating system for the decreasing proportion of computers which sit on desktops (or laptops) and have displays, while Linux owns the rest of the market from supercomputers to domestic routers and is rapidly gobbling up the information appliance market as well.
> It's obvious you are not aware that the Mac OS and therefore all mac os software is also based on open source code called Darwin.
People are "not aware" because Apple does it's best to hide it. It's like a Tivo. It's like a tree falling in a forrest. If no one actually hears it, is it really there?
Anything the user sees on an Apple system is strictly proprietary and is for Apple brand hardware only.
Everyone isn't buying Apple. Those days have long gone...
Apple's tablet marketshare is at best 50% (more likely 40% when you add in the uncounted stuff that's not Google Play certified), and Android has already killed the iPhone, in both sales, and desirability. (pick up a Nexus 4 and tell me it's not a better phone than a iPhone5 is every respect, and half to 2/3rds the price - depending where you get it from).
Killed the iPhone? Were you in a coma when the 5 came out? Everybody medium was wall to wall with free advertising for Apple.
Android and the iPhone have different business models. The iPhone is all about profit, otherwise they'd licence iOS to other manufacturers. It's like saying Ford are killing Mercedes after looking at nothing other than the market share figures.
I suppose I'll just note that Apple used a lot of open source material when building Mac OX . The underlying OS (Darwin) is constructed from a Mach kernel with BSD userland software on top. It is only on top of that Apple has placed its Cocoa frameworks.
The combination has worked very well.
Yeah, I can't see spending a thousand bucks for a tablet when you can get a great laptop for that price. It might find a nice niche in places like hospitals and warehouses where high-power in a portable config is a big winner and pockets are deep, but I can't see a single consumer buying one. You can get a kindle fire for every room at that price, or nearly two ipads.
"I can't see spending a thousand bucks for a tablet when you can get a great laptop for that price"
I think you are making much the same mistake that Microsoft is making.
You don't buy a tablet because it is cheaper than a laptop. You buy a tablet because it is easier and quicker to pick it up to check emails and the latest news on El Reg than it is to do it on a laptop.
It doesn't really matter if Surface RT or Surface Pro fail, what matters is if the OS fails. If they'd have knocked out their reference designs later on after the OS's release then perhaps it wouldn't have been a problem, as Google did (one well after launch then after that one reference design with each major revision of the OS released in small numbers). As it is they just annoyed their OEMs from the start which is generally not a very good thing to do if they want their OS to succeed. They tried to be Apple yet carry on with their old OEM relationships at the same time and oddly enough, managed to fail completely.
They also tried to carry on with Windows x86 and launch a touch OS at the same time and also failed. They should have done something like let Windows x86 run TIFKAM apps but not have a TIFKAM mode unless specifically requested by the user or the hardware profile allows it (it detects it's running on a fondleslap or on a combined device in fondleslab mode), called Windows RT something completely different (probably Microsoft Touch given how much their like their original names) which only runs TIFKAM apps and only has TIFKAM mode.
Finally make it obvious like the shop bridges both platforms with a name that doesn't link it to one platform or the other (i.e. Microsoft Store instead of Windows Store or Touch Store), encourage their developers to make desktop and TIFKAM versions of their apps, and if you buy one you get the other free if you sign in from a device which allows it (see SteamPlay).
In short, when faced with a decision they should have taken the other choice. But then again hindsight is always 20/20...
I have a Surface tablet and it's great to use and a league ahead of anything from Apple or Android as yet. (Full USB support, proper App multitasking - run one app on the tablet and another on an external screen, best screen display of any tablet for the resolution, better bettery life than any similar Android tablet, best keyboard solution of any tablet etc, etc).
RT App store sucks atm is about the only thing I can agree with from this article, but that will come over time.
Big journalistic error in the article too - Nokia's sales of the Lumia actually far exceeded market expectations - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20978136
Hmm, shill alert, this post sounds suspiciously like other posts, ignoring the critical errors with Surface (like the inability of Word to keep up with even slow typing speeds), and shouting about some lame background app screen "feature" that nobody cares about...
PS. Android does proper multitasking just fine, I think you are confusing Android and iOS (which doesn't do multitasking, unless Apple allow it).
"Full USB support" is no selling point for any Microsoft device. My PHONE has "full USB support". The rest of your post is similar marketing nonsense that's simply out of touch with reality. You need to step outside of the Redmond echo chamber and so does the upper management at Microsoft.
To be honest there is no reason at all to buy either of them.
I have an iPad, a MacBook Pro (and a Galaxy Note, Windows 7 desktop, Windows server and SuSE Linux server). I use the correct tool for the job I want to do, and what Microsoft still don't get is that laptops and fondleslabs are used for different things, and therefore require different user interfaces.
I thought a comment on slashdot recently specifically on the topic of the dual UIs was excellent.
they cited this microsoft paper
http://www.sigchi.org/chi96/proceedings/desbrief/Sullivan/kds_txt.htm
"The Windows® 95 User Interface: A Case Study in Usability Engineering"
"Separate UI for Beginners
The first major design direction we investigated was a separate UI ("shell") for beginning users. The design was quickly mocked up in Visual Basic and tested in the usability lab. (See Figure 4.) While the design tested well, because it successfully constrained user actions to a very small set, we quickly began to see the limitations as more users were tested:
If just one function a user needed was not supported in the beginner shell, s/he would have to abandon it (at least temporarily).
Assuming that most users would gain experience and want to leave the beginner shell eventually, the learning they had done would not necessarily transfer well to the standard shell.
The beginner shell was not at all like the programs users would run (word processors, spreadsheets, etc.). As a result, users had to learn two ways of interacting with the computer, which was confusing. "
"For these reasons and others, we abandoned the idea. Importantly, because we used a prototyping tool and tested immediately in the usability lab, we still had plenty of time to investigate other directions. "
---
Those same conclusions should of been drawn with the new Metro/Modern/whatever UI. MS was too impatient, they should of taken the time to do it right, don't give two different UIs that you have to switch between. Especially if they are not compatible with each other (e.g. doing certain things can only be accomplished in one or the other, and I have read things like IE is separate in each, not having any knowledge of the other as well).
For that reason alone Windows 8 should of never had been allowed out of the gate. Forcing the same metro UI on windows server 2012 (which they do if I recall right - one of my friends who is a MS employee was complaining about it recently) is even more absurd.
Also it appears that the low end Win8 laptops are getting terrible reviews and high return rates (too slow, bad quality, etc). I imagine the cost of the touch technology just compromises the rest of the system too much for a low end box.
" "Should of" used to be wrong. But now it is used so often that it has become the correct form. "
No it hasn't!! It makes no bloody sense at all! For example, compare the following statements:
- I should have gone to the shop.
- I should of gone to the shop.
This only *sounds* ok because of the homophone with the correct abbreviation 'should've'.
Now compare that with how blatantly stupid this sounds:
- I have gone to the shop.
- I of gone to the shop.
And THAT is why "should of" is, has always been, and will always be WRONG.
With the Microsoft remote control, the desktop running Windows 8 behaves as if it's running locally on the tablet (swipe from right edge for charms, swipe from left to change apps, sound plays via local speakers). Which app do you use in the Android marketplace to do it? I haven't seen the same functionality with my Android tablets, but I may need to try a different app.
I was playing Borderlands 2 today on my Nexus 7, running on my PC but streaming to the tablet over WiFi with SplashTop (Google Play free or paid). It's not perfect (have to muck with the aspect ratio some) but by god is it fun! Incidentally my XBox 360 controller was plugged into the usb port of the tablet, btw, not into the PC.
I'm not sure if you were trying to be sarcastic or not, so I'm hoping you were simply unaware of solutions such as this.
"For a VDI solution where users need Direct3D whizzyness (and in the real non-linux world they do) it is hard to beat"
Direct3D for work? Where do you work, id Software? If anything, *disabling* whizzyness is probably an intended course of action in enterprise PCs/clients as to avoid employees doing LAN parties on company hardware.
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