Little Demand for Microsoft's Surface RT Tablet

[CommanderFrank]

We ran an article several days ago where Microsoft announced the price of its new Surface Pro RT starting at $899. If interest is any indication of a price drop, the price is sure to come down. Microsoft has cut the initial order for the Surface from four million units to just two due to ‘weak’ consumer demand.

"Pricing the Surface Pro higher than practically any other equivalent product out there was a puzzling move. Microsoft needs to be doing everything they can to project an image of success for Surface and Windows 8”.

 

[SunnyD]

I dunno... Maybe if it wasn't ridiculously priced (aka: about $400 more than a competing Android tablet)...

 

[Trimlock]

I dunno... Maybe if it wasn't ridiculously priced (aka: about $400 more than a competing Android tablet)...

Why would they price this to compete against a shitty ARM tablet that can't do 10% of what this is capable of doing?

 

[kllrnohj]

Yeah, very expensive, low specs, sluggish, and a confusing interface. Color me shocked that it didn't sell well.

 

[kllrnohj]

Why would they price this to compete against a shitty ARM tablet that can't do 10% of what this is capable of doing?

You seem to be confused. Surface RT *is* a shitty ARM tablet - specifically it's a Tegra 3. It's the Surface Pro that has x86 and "real" Windows 8.

 

[heatlesssun]

I dunno... Maybe if it wasn't ridiculously priced (aka: about $400 more than a competing Android tablet)...

This is part of the problem with devices like this, they get compared to devices that they are nothing like. There is no competing Android device to something like the Surface Pro at any price. That's not to say that a Core i5 tablet like the Surface Pro doesn't have its issues like much lower battery life when compared to mobile OS tablets but then you can plug an external monitor into a mobile OS tablet and run two HD screens while running a native Windows desktop.

 

[kahm]

You seem to be confused. Surface RT *is* a shitty ARM tablet - specifically it's a Tegra 3. It's the Surface Pro that has x86 and "real" Windows 8.

From TFA:

"Lackluster demand has reportedly prompted Microsoft to slash orders of its Surface RT tablet from 4 million to 2 million units.

According to DigiTimes, the slow start for Redmond's ARM-based tablet could ultimately persuade Microsoft to lower the price of its upcoming Intel x86-powered Surface Pro ($899 for 64GB and 128GB for $999) which is slated to ship in January."

The article summary is confusing, due in no small part to Microsoft's idiotic marketing that seems *designed* to induce market confusion. The Surface RT isn't selling, so the article speculates that MS should drop the price on the Surface Pro.

 

[hesho]

but but but....

they sold 40million windows 8 licenses!!! *cough..

 

[Ehren8879]

Even if it's really good, don't be surprised if you show up after everyone's had dessert and no one wants to eat the cake you brought. Maybe it'll sit on the counter and get eaten eventually.

 

[Obi_Kwiet]

I don't see any reason to buy a Regular RT. Too expensive, not enough to offer. The RT pro though, should be amazing. Replaces both your tablet and your PC, and is better at both. Not to mention MS's excellent reputation for hardware design. (360 aside, of course.)

 

[Disco_Stu_04]

Who is the target consumer? What is the use of a 4 hour battery life tablet?

 

[Trimlock]

You seem to be confused. Surface RT *is* a shitty ARM tablet - specifically it's a Tegra 3. It's the Surface Pro that has x86 and "real" Windows 8.

They are cutting the orders of the RT version but the article states they could slash the price of the Pro version. I wasn't not confused.

If you are correct about SunnyD thinking the RT is priced $400 over a competing ARM varient then show me what that $100, Tegra3 device is that is competing with the WinRT tablet.

 

[heatlesssun]

The article summary is confusing, due in no small part to Microsoft's idiotic marketing that seems *designed* to induce market confusion. The Surface RT isn't selling, so the article speculates that MS should drop the price on the Surface Pro.

Part of the problem is that Windows tablets are just complex products compared to mobile OS devices. Just with the hardware there are three distinct platforms for Windows 8/RT, ARM for Windows RT and Clover Trail x86 and Core x64 designs for Windows 8. Then you have the form factors, pure slate, hybrid detachable keyboards and twist and swivel screen convertibles. And on top of that there are digital pen options and there are three distinct technologies there (n-Trig, Wacom and now Microsoft's pen technology in the Surface Pro) that have different performance and behavior characteristics.

So there's a lot to consider with Windows 8/RT tablets and no simple way to market them because of their complexity. Microsoft could do a better job of course, but I'm kind of at a loss as to how they would even go about it and indeed they aren't really trying to corner the market because of their OEM relationships.

 

[heatlesssun]

but but but....

they sold 40million windows 8 licenses!!! *cough..

Which has nothing to do with Surface RT sales, totally distinct products and RT devices are counted as Windows 8 licenses I believe.

 

[DeathPrincess]

If you want something to do junk get a cheap tablet. If you need something actually powerful, you wont be getting this. So it's for the people who need slightly more power than casual web browsing/word but don't really need to do anything indepth.

 

[Wumpus]

All the kludge of windows
All the apps of blackberry (RT=ARM Metro apps from the MS store only)
All the price of Apple (maybe a smaller Apple, but who would pay a premium for this???)

I'm sold!

 

[Trimlock]

If you want something to do junk get a cheap tablet. If you need something actually powerful, you wont be getting this. So it's for the people who need slightly more power than casual web browsing/word but don't really need to do anything indepth.

You'd be surprised at the capabilities of these ULV CPU's, these aren't ment to be luxury items, but we will see their demand when they actually release, I'm not expecting a fire sale.

 

[DeathPrincess]

You'd be surprised at the capabilities of these ULV CPU's, these aren't ment to be luxury items, but we will see their demand when they actually release, I'm not expecting a fire sale.

They are luxury items but it's will be down to see if they can convince people to spend 2x over what another luxury item is worth, and if the added capabilities make it worthwhile to customers.

Lots of people typically state that the reason for the current rise of tablets is that they provide "enough" power so people don't "need" laptops. So on the same basis, having more than enough power and charging 2x for it might not be the easiest sale.

The price does seem a little high already, especially as it's more that similar more powerful laptops. Especially those with more than 4 hour battery life. Even my i7/decent power sucking GPU equiped laptop has more than that (and even that can have off days with really big digital paintings, though thats probably not what people will be doing on these [I hope not anyway, for their sake ]).

 

[heatlesssun]

The price does seem a little high already, especially as it's more that similar more powerful laptops. Especially those with more than 4 hour battery life. Even my i7/decent power sucking GPU equiped laptop has more than that (and even that can have off days with really big digital paintings, though thats probably not what people will be doing on these [I hope not anyway, for their sake ]).

But this isn't a laptop, it is significantly more portable than most, even ultrabooks. A lot of people use this class of device for digital artwork like the Series 7 Slate from last year and many have found them to be quite capable of handling large Photoshop projects.

As for the battery life we'll see. The four hour number is getting tossed around like a fact and we really don't know how it's being measured other than half the life of the Surface RT. If that 4 hours is say fours of HD video playback, that's actually pretty good for an ultra portable.

 

[sir-gold]

We ran an article several days ago where Microsoft announced the price of its new Surface Pro RT starting at $899. If interest is any indication of a price drop, the price is sure to come down. Microsoft has cut the initial order for the Surface from four million units to just two due to ‘weak’ consumer demand.

What is a "Surface Pro RT"? (and does it run "Windows Vista 8"?)
If HardOCP is confused by the naming scheme, then the average consumer has no hope of figuring it out.

Also, what do sales predictions of Surface RT (arm based) have to do with the price of the Surface Pro (x86 based?)
That's like saying Apple should change the price of the macbook based of sales of the ipad.

 

[Ducman69]

Its Surface RT or Surface Pro.

This is like saying Camaro SS RS.

 

[bacon]

Even if it's really good, don't be surprised if you show up after everyone's had dessert and no one wants to eat the cake you brought. Maybe it'll sit on the counter and get eaten eventually.

Pretty much. MS is a leviathan and can't make moves as quickly as they need to.

 

[SkribbelKat]

It's not selling well...no surprise there. You can go buy an Android tablet for $100 and get pretty much identical functionality plus a larger number of programs and applications that make the device a lot more flexible. The Surface RT just doesn't do anything that any other cheaper tablet already has been doing for a while.

 

[Super-D]

I've always said tablets in general are a gimmick and a waste of money when you can just get a better laptop for a similar price. Maybe the fad is just beginning to die off. I can't wait until I can go a month without seeing some stupid "death of the desktop" article saying toy tablets are going to take over.

 

[pelo]

It's not selling well...no surprise there. You can go buy an Android tablet for $100 and get pretty much identical functionality plus a larger number of programs and applications that make the device a lot more flexible. The Surface RT just doesn't do anything that any other cheaper tablet already has been doing for a while.

Can you imagine what would happen to the sales of these if Google decides to slap Android on their Samsung Chromebooks with the A15s and a decent display? It'd be like the HP Touchpad all over again, except with a Microsoft product.

The Surface RT is a weird thing, but weirdest of all is the price. Microsoft is making some big money off of these, and even if they did price it lower it would mean the OEMs would revolt. They were stuck between a rock and a hard place from the beginning. That said, at least the RT makes more sense as a tablet than the Pro. Who the hell is okay with 4 hours of battery life from a tablet?

Of all the Win8 devices sold, tablets/hybrids make up less than 1% of the sales. Less than 1%!!

 

[DeathPrincess]

But this isn't a laptop, it is significantly more portable than most, even ultrabooks. A lot of people use this class of device for digital artwork like the Series 7 Slate from last year and many have found them to be quite capable of handling large Photoshop projects.

As for the battery life we'll see. The four hour number is getting tossed around like a fact and we really don't know how it's being measured other than half the life of the Surface RT. If that 4 hours is say fours of HD video playback, that's actually pretty good for an ultra portable.

But, i'm not sure how that can be true, unless they weren't doing things on the same (this is kind of mid resolution, 10kpix x 15xpix, 150mp [actually pretty low large print res]) scale, not the 600mp+ desktop level stuff. According to Microsoft's specifications, it has less disk space (scratch disk for serious prints and chew through 100gb+), the same monitor size, a slower, 1/2 threaded CPU, much less RAM, no real GPU and no real (and much slower) Vram (which photoshop uses lots of, it just reuses system ram). Yet somehow it's capable of doing more?

The greater portability isn't a bonus if it isn't capable of doing the thing it isn't fit for the purpose it's needed for. If I had a surface and my laptop, the best and most portable device in the "able to do this" category would be the laptop, as it can actually do the activity. Stuff like "professional quality" sound production/mixing is also out based on the specs (plus you normally just put it on a desk somewhere ). This doesn't seem like a fully realized professional product, just an updated tablet.

One worrying thing from the specs is the 1 year warranty. Thats pretty junky on a $900 product... Either they are cutting corners, or they don't have faith in their own product. For example, the laptop came with 3.

 

[SkribbelKat]

Can you imagine what would happen to the sales of these if Google decides to slap Android on their Samsung Chromebooks with the A15s and a decent display? It'd be like the HP Touchpad all over again, except with a Microsoft product.

The Surface RT is a weird thing, but weirdest of all is the price. Microsoft is making some big money off of these, and even if they did price it lower it would mean the OEMs would revolt. They were stuck between a rock and a hard place from the beginning. That said, at least the RT makes more sense as a tablet than the Pro. Who the hell is okay with 4 hours of battery life from a tablet?

Of all the Win8 devices sold, tablets/hybrids make up less than 1% of the sales. Less than 1%!!

Wait...the Surface Pro is only going to get 4 hours of battery life? That's really awful...netbooks have been lasting longer on batteries for like six years now. I'm guessing MS sealed the battery inside too so you can't replace it if you're sitting around on a plane and need to use it for longer too, huh?

 

[pelo]

The hardware is pretty expensive on the Pro version, DP. I wouldn't be surprised if the margins were much slimmer on the Pro version than the RT and there were fewer orders placed by MS for the Pro because of that. Ultrabook margins are typically very low, ~5-7%, and this is an Ultrabook with a touch screen.

An Ivy i5 ULV costs ~$200. Then you've got the Samsung PLS 1080p display, it's touch enabled so you've got to add costs there (don't forget the glass!). Their VaporMG thing was suffering from poor-ish yields earlier this year, not sure about now but I know it isn't cheap to manufacture. The battery costs ~$50-$100.

The keyboard really should have had an added battery, but it would have made the device thicker, heavier, and cost even more. That's my biggest grief with the Pro, aside from the price. ~4ish hours isn't just crap, it's abysmal for a tablet/laptop that's supposed to be used for work.

 

[illli]

they priced it too high. if they REALLY wanted to gain a foothold they should have included the keyboard cover at that price, or reduced the price by $100.

scroll down to price and then screen resolution http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/10/nexus-10-vs-apple-ipad-vs-microsoft-surface-rt/

at the same price as the competition, people will just saw 'screw it' and get something 'known' like android or apple.

 

[heatlesssun]

One worrying thing from the specs is the 1 year warranty. Thats pretty junky on a $900 product... Either they are cutting corners, or they don't have faith in their own product. For example, the laptop came with 3.

I'm not a digital artist, you know a lot more about that I do. I'm simply pointing out that if you go look on YouTube and TabletPCReview.com you see a lot of people talk about using tablet PCs with Photoshop and a popular device for the last year for this was the Samsung Series 7 Slate and a number of people have reported that it worked quite well for them with Photoshop and the Surface Pro should be a bit more powerful than the S7S.

 

[Ocellaris]

If HardOCP is confused by the naming scheme, then the average consumer has no hope of figuring it out.

MS has a boner for confusing marketing and trying to push convertibles on people when at no point in history has the market shown convertibles are a path to success.

 

[kllrnohj]

But this isn't a laptop, it is significantly more portable than most, even ultrabooks.

I disagree with that. More portable? Maybe. Significantly so? Not really. It is 2lbs and .5" thick, after all. That's pretty similar to an 11" Air, which is .7" and 2.4lbs. And you're probably going to be adding one of the covers to the Surface, which will increase thickness and weight a bit.

If that 4 hours is say fours of HD video playback, that's actually pretty good for an ultra portable.

Not really. 4 hours of H.264 HD video playback is on the lower end of battery life for ultra portable, some are hitting the ~6 hour mark. That's not including things like the Lenovo X230 which can easily do much, much longer with some of the extended battery options, but obviously aren't as portable as a result.

 

[heatlesssun]

~4ish hours isn't just crap, it's abysmal for a tablet/laptop that's supposed to be used for work.

People keep quoting this 4 hour number based on a single tweet that said half the battery life of the RT and have no idea what is being done in those 4 hours. If it's 4 hours of 1080P playback at 1080P at a medium to high brightness setting, that's actually pretty good for a sub-2 lbs. Core CPU device.

 

[BoogerBomb]

Why would they price this to compete against a shitty ARM tablet that can't do 10% of what this is capable of doing?

Because nobody is willing to pay $900 for this thing regardless of quality.

 

[Trimlock]

They are luxury items but it's will be down to see if they can convince people to spend 2x over what another luxury item is worth, and if the added capabilities make it worthwhile to customers.

Theres a 1080 screen, SSD, ULV, under 2 lbs tablet out there for half the price of the Pro?

 

[pelo]

People keep quoting this 4 hour number based on a single tweet that said half the battery life of the RT and have no idea what is being done in those 4 hours.

Followed by:

If it's 4 hours of 1080P playback at 1080P at a medium to high brightness setting, that's actually pretty good for a sub-2 lbs. Core CPU device.

It's the same way they judged their RT battery life, meaning mixed workloads at probably ~200nits brightness. So, no, it won't get 4 hours of 1080p playback and it'll be even less.

Is that better?

 

[Trimlock]

Because nobody is willing to pay $900 for this thing regardless of quality.

How can you say that prior to its release? The RT is the one with the low demand, while it was 'ok' it wasn't big either. Then again MS is only worried about kick starting the WinRT experience, not necessarily making their own tablet the #1.

 

[SkribbelKat]

People keep quoting this 4 hour number based on a single tweet that said half the battery life of the RT and have no idea what is being done in those 4 hours. If it's 4 hours of 1080P playback at 1080P at a medium to high brightness setting, that's actually pretty good for a sub-2 lbs. Core CPU device.

That's a lot of criteria for that if statement which you have no way of supporting until the hardware is in the wild.

 

[heatlesssun]

I disagree with that. More portable? Maybe. Significantly so? Not really. It is 2lbs and .5" thick, after all. That's pretty similar to an 11" Air, which is .7" and 2.4lbs. And you're probably going to be adding one of the covers to the Surface, which will increase thickness and weight a bit.

Try using that MBA standing or moving around.

Not really. 4 hours of H.264 HD video playback is on the lower end of battery life for ultra portable, some are hitting the ~6 hour mark. That's not including things like the Lenovo X230 which can easily do much, much longer with some of the extended battery options, but obviously aren't as portable as a result.

Yeah, and how many of those ultraportables are running 1080P screens? The x230 is only 1366x768. All I am pointing out is that a number is being thrown around and we have no a clue how it is being derived other than a comment from a single tweet that said half the life of the Surface RT.

 

[Ocellaris]

Yeah, and how many of those ultraportables are running 1080P screens? The x230 is only 1366x768. All I am pointing out is that a number is being thrown around and we have no a clue how it is being derived other than a comment from a single tweet that said half the life of the Surface RT.

1366x768 resolution is pretty damn terrible for a modern product. I wouldn't use that spec as a defense or justification for anything.