| HappySqurriel said: This will play out exactly like the Surface RT ... Line-ups on launch day followed by disappointing sales because few people are interested in a non-Android/non-ios tablet. |
For Surface RT the launch day line-ups were created by Microsoft giving away $100 of Xbox Music credit to the first 100 customers. I haven't heard about a similar promotion here yet; probably there is enough "sight unseen" demand that such pandering isn't needed. My impression is that a lot of people have convinced themselves that Surface Pro is the tablet they've always wanted, and they will get decent initial sales.
But Microsoft's products have tended to be better at satisfying feature checklists than satisfying actual users. Not every good idea on paper translates into a good experience (conversely, everyone in 2007 thought it was stupid not to have a keyboard on the iPhone, until they tried one in person). From the reviews it appears that to achieve their "no compromise" tablet/computer hybrid, Microsoft had to compromise on battery life, CPU, weight, price, storage capacity. The real question is what aspects do consumers value most in a tablet? Will people be happy with the actual product rather than just the hope of one?
I'm no fan of Microsoft but I'd be happy to see at least modest success for the Surface; it isn't just a brainless imitation of the market leader like Galaxy Tab was, and they deserve a lot of credit for that (last I heard, Windows Phones rate very highly in customer satisfaction). However, they have also done some undeserving things like backstabbing their hardware partners only to arrive late to the game. In 2007 when they should have been working on this, Microsoft Surface meant something vastly different.
