The user reviews are slowly coming out on the Intel Atom Z2760 (Clover Trail) CPU which can be found in Acer, ASUS, Lenovo, Samsung and Dell Windows 8 tablets launching this month.

Apparently battery life is quite remarkable with minimum 8 - 10 hours of battery life with moderate to heavy usage. I guess the 32 nm cpu with TDP of 1.7W will do that. One has to wonder how good this will be at 22 nm that Ivy Bridge currently uses.

Performance also appears to be very good which is not something that could be said about Atom CPUs few years ago.

The only drawback appears to be the SGX545 integrated graphics only supports DX9 on these launch tablets. Its DX10 enabled on other devices that use it, but it apparently failed the Microsoft certification for DX10 in intel's hands, which is not surprising considering how bad Intel is at making integrated graphics drivers. All in all, don't expect to play modern games on these tablets. Productivity, light gaming and web surfing is what these tablets do best.

With this said, one has to wonder what the future of Windows RT is that is currently used in Surface and other OEM tablets.

Here is one of the tablets using this Intel Atom platform.

Very cool. This is going to be a big help for full featured Windows 8 tablets. What's the point of Windows RT if x86 can run Windows 8? Glad I didn't throw my money away on a Surface this year. Next year will probably have a kick ass Windows 8 Surface with this processor.

I honestly wish Microsoft never bothered with Windows RT and that the Surface available for sale now had full Windows 8 and this Atom CPU running it.

The Surface Pro thats already announced is coming in January and comes with an intel i5 processor and HD4000 graphics. This is a big performance leap over this Atom platform. That device will be able to run modern warfare 2 for example at 720p at well over 30 fps without issues.

However the price will be higher...800 minimum IMO. And as far as battery life, it will be significantly lower. 6 hours maximum IMO. For me who needs productivity and some legacy PC software + regular tablet stuff, this is a little too expensive with too short of a battery life.

All in all, there will be plenty of tablets to choose from in the coming months. Lenovo ones specifically are looking really awesome. So I may skip surface all together and go with another Win 8 tablet.

I've never been an early adopter. I like to wait for the bugs to get ironed out and the price to drop. But one of the things that I've always liked about Microsoft is they don't wait, they push forward with a no matter what attitude. The RT is for casuals and the Pro is for heavy users. That's what MS could produce right now. When the Atom is ready and cost effective it will most likely be the basis for the Surface 2. I'll probably get that one.

@kain_kusanagi

Gotcha. Yeah if you're willing to wait, by next year intel will shrink their Atom CPU's down to 22 nm from 32 nm its currently using, which immediatly means better performance with same battery life or better battery life with same performance.

I probably will buy something this year and I'm totally leaning towards lenovo thinkpad tablet 2. The fact its the only accounced Windows 8 Atom based tablet with a stylus and active digitizer screen, makes it stand out for my needs. It looks sturdy and solid to boot...

Good choice! I'm going to wait. I don't yet feel the need to replace my notebook and my Samsung Galaxy Note is a great inbetweener. By next year I'll probably be shopping for something to replace my notebook. That something will be a Windows 8 tablet with some kind of physicle keyboard. It may be a MS Surface x86 or it may be something like your Lenovo.

I'd really like to play with a Surface RT. I was playing with a Vivo RT at the store and I thought Windows 8 was a nice fit for a tablet.

Not a fan of the whole RT thing though in respect to requiring the windows 8 application store. I'd really like to have a tablet that can be used as a tablet for fun and can actually do some work yet have a nice battery life. I'm really interested in the new tablets with this processor in it.

I was really thinking about perhaps a Nexus 7 or 10, but I'm starting to lean towards a Windows 8 tablet.