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topmounter

macrumors 68030
Jun 18, 2009
2,606
973
FEMA Region VIII
$349 is still way too much for a boat anchor. I'd rather buy a Nexus7, get a better device with a better ecosystem and pocket a c-note (and then some).
 

JAT

macrumors 603
Dec 31, 2001
6,473
124
Mpls, MN
It is for the iPad...
Why bring up a "phone" when the topic is about the surface which is a "tablet"?
The funny part is that command isn't available on the iPhone.

----------

Eh, swiping between apps is a clunky, inelegant solution to multitasking on iOS. It works, but it's not really smooth or quick.
If you say so. I find it ridiculously convenient. Far more than the **** I've been going through attempting to learn Win7.
 

donutbagel

macrumors 6502a
Jun 9, 2013
932
1
$349 is still way too much for a boat anchor. I'd rather buy a Nexus7, get a better device with a better ecosystem and pocket a c-note (and then some).

Same here. According to MS's stock performance up until recently, a lot of people somehow did not expect this to fail.
 

Tysknaden

macrumors regular
Jun 19, 2013
198
0
No brown plastic!

This is what finally destroyed Microsoft. Brown plastic would bring an incredible amount of strength to MS' corporate identity.
 

LongSticks

macrumors 6502
Jul 22, 2012
301
0
Kent, UK
Have you tried the 5 finger swipe?

While I would still buy an iOS device, I think they make some valid points. I would like to be able to switch to having two apps run side by side at times. Hell, even if it was just two phone apps, that are intended for the small size, running side by side on the tablet. I can't count the number of times I have to switch back and forth between two apps to accomplish a single task. And to make matters worse, the double button click, then find the app and click method is annoyingly time consuming when you just want to go back to the previous app.

Try this it speeds things no end!

Four- or Five-Finger Vertical Swipe Like a double-press on the Home button, a four- or five-finger upward swipe will pull up the multitasking bar along the bottom of the screen. To return it, swipe downward to hide the bar (or single-tap anywhere above it).

Four- or five-finger horizontal swipe
Four- or Five-Finger Horizontal Swipe With a four- or five-finger horizontal swipe, you can quickly move between your most recently used apps. For example, if you’re in Safari and want to switch to another open app, you can perform a four- or five-finger horizontal swipe left or right to move from one app to another; it’s similar to the one-finger swipe you use to move between home screens. You can swipe only between apps that have recently been used; to see those (and which order they’ve been used in), pull up the multitasking bar by double-pressing the Home button or by performing the four- or five-finger vertical swipe mentioned earlier.
 

clukas

macrumors 6502a
May 3, 2010
990
401
I think the entire failure of the RT is its pricing. People don't view the windows rt platform as a premium one as they do the iOS ecosystem. They need to aggressively reduce the price, get them in the google nexus 7 range. $150 - 199 range including the cover and I guarantee they will fly off the shelf. They are not making much of a profit now so Microsoft should bite the bullet and get the device in as many hands as possible, get the price in the impulse but range. Once they establish themselves as a credible competitor to iOS the they can think of charging iPad prices, but its too early or even late for that. Come on Microsoft, get your act together.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 2
 

osofast240sx

macrumors 68030
Mar 25, 2011
2,539
16
I think the entire failure of the RT is its pricing. People don't view the windows rt platform as a premium one as they do the iOS ecosystem. They need to aggressively reduce the price, get them in the google nexus 7 range. $150 - 199 range including the cover and I guarantee they will fly off the shelf. They are not making much of a profit now so Microsoft should bite the bullet and get the device in as many hands as possible, get the price in the impulse but range. Once they establish themselves as a credible competitor to iOS the they can think of charging iPad prices, but its too early or even late for that. Come on Microsoft, get your act together.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 2

That's a horrible idea to get a product that has a very high return rate/buyers remorse into as many hands as possible. No matter what the price MS is in a pickle.
 

sexiewasd

macrumors regular
Mar 14, 2012
211
6
Back in Your Head
I've found that people use windows because to most, a PC is windows. It's compatible, it's familiar, and it's frustrating, complicated, obfuscated, and they don't trust it. Tablets are an escape from that. They will probably keep a "PC" around, but the tablet ( android or iOS) is an escape from that frustration.

Why, when that customer walls into bestbuy, would they choose Windows, if that is the experience that they are actively trying to avoid?

The only thing that a salesman could say to sell one is "well since its Windows it will run all the software that you spent so many years learning and let's face it, you've become dependent on that , so what size do you want?"

Instead they have to say "well, no it doesn't run anything, at all really, have you checked out Android yet?"

This can't be a surprise to anyone.
 

APlotdevice

macrumors 68040
Sep 3, 2011
3,145
3,861
In 8.1, on the desktop, Metro can basically be used like OS X Launchpad.

Yeah, but imagine if Apple had removed Dock folders at the same time said Launchpad was introduced. This is basically the situation that fans of the traditional Windows interface are in now.
 

szw-mapple fan

macrumors 68040
Jul 28, 2012
3,481
4,342
While I would still buy an iOS device, I think they make some valid points. I would like to be able to switch to having two apps run side by side at times. Hell, even if it was just two phone apps, that are intended for the small size, running side by side on the tablet. I can't count the number of times I have to switch back and forth between two apps to accomplish a single task. And to make matters worse, the double button click, then find the app and click method is annoyingly time consuming when you just want to go back to the previous app.

There is a great feature on the iPad that allows you to four-finger swipe between apps. This has made my life so much easier.

----------

I think the entire failure of the RT is its pricing. People don't view the windows rt platform as a premium one as they do the iOS ecosystem. They need to aggressively reduce the price, get them in the google nexus 7 range. $150 - 199 range including the cover and I guarantee they will fly off the shelf. They are not making much of a profit now so Microsoft should bite the bullet and get the device in as many hands as possible, get the price in the impulse but range. Once they establish themselves as a credible competitor to iOS the they can think of charging iPad prices, but its too early or even late for that. Come on Microsoft, get your act together.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 2

If you price it really low from the start like the Nexus people will think it's not a premium product. That's really bad for the brand image. What Mirosoft lacks is emotional appeal from consumers.
 

Ronlap

macrumors 6502
Sep 7, 2007
269
202
San Francisco Bay Area
I can't count the number of times I have to switch back and forth between two apps to accomplish a single task. And to make matters worse, the double button click, then find the app and click method is annoyingly time consuming when you just want to go back to the previous app.

Until I can have 2-3 emails, text editor, spreadsheet, and browser windows open at the same time so that I can copy and paste between them, I cannot do "useful" work on a tablet - but then again, that's why I have a laptop.
 

tpho

macrumors newbie
Aug 6, 2012
20
0
When MS first dropped the price on the Surface RT, I thought they dropped it TO $150 not BY $150. Even then, I was like, no one will buy a Surface RT for $150. :D
 

z2daj

macrumors member
Jul 27, 2011
30
0
Worcester, MA
To be fair, the Surface Pro is a great machine. It may be a little pricey, but it does address some shortfalls of the iPad very well (think note taking for class) while running a full Windows OS. If the price was lower initially, it probably would have sold better.

I'm looking forward to the Haswell update to the Surface Pro, and may have to pick one up if the price is right.
 

baryon

macrumors 68040
Oct 3, 2009
3,878
2,929
Despite being that much cheaper than the iPad… Looks like people would rather save up and buy something of quality.
 

wizard

macrumors 68040
May 29, 2003
3,854
571
Eh, swiping between apps is a clunky, inelegant solution to multitasking on iOS. It works, but it's not really smooth or quick.

iOS7 is taking steps to fix this, but it's still not as good as it could be.

It is the best solution for the amount of RAM contained in current iOS devices.

As for smooth it works well enough on my iPad 3. The key is to close out unused but frozen apps. Again it comes back to memory, 1GB isn't really a lot and each frozen app apparently eats into that a little bit.

By the way I know the app when frozen is sent to flash but apparently some state information is maintained in RAM often leading to lose of RAM for the primary app.

In any event I don't know of a better way to do multitasking on an iPad with the current OS. Between the side swips and the up swipe you can get to any app you need pretty quick.
 

wizard

macrumors 68040
May 29, 2003
3,854
571
Until I can have 2-3 emails, text editor, spreadsheet, and browser windows open at the same time so that I can copy and paste between them, I cannot do "useful" work on a tablet - but then again, that's why I have a laptop.

This is bogus, copy and paste between apps isn't anymore difficult on iPad than a desktop machine. In fact in some ways it is easier. For one you don't have to hunt for the Window that you want to past into. In many cases copy and paste is a smoother experience in iPad.
 

Black Magic

macrumors 68030
Sep 30, 2012
2,787
1,499
Microsoft is now the dinosaur in technology. They are slowly dying. Yea, enterprise business and services keep them looking healthy but slowly things are changing. This would be a perfect time for a competitor to come out with enterprise suites and solutions.

RT failed for multiple reasons. Namely it lacks vision and identity. It's not compatible with anything and what developers are going to develop 2 different apps for the Windows store? An RT version then a normal Windows 8 version? It's just plain stupid and anyone with half a brain could have saw this train wreck before it happened.

Microsoft is showing that it has no innovation or vision and it's best days of copying folks are behind them. While they are trying to get into the regular size tablet space, Apple and Google have moved on to the 7in tablets. MS is late to the show again! Yea, we all heard the rumor Apple is looking at watches and TVs but you can bet your ass MS is working on it too (they are classic "me too"ers) and their products will be half-ass as usual. Microsoft products try to do everything for everyone and isn't particularly great at anything. Just average products and services for most of their lineup.

Bottom line: MS is the Wal-Mart of technology.
 

Mainsail

macrumors 68020
Sep 19, 2010
2,346
3,112
A tablet should have a buttery smooth touch interface. A Laptop should work effectively with keyboard and mouse (or trackpad). It is very hard to imagine an operating system that is both optimized for touch and keyboard. The windows tablets have proven this is extremely difficult to do without seriously compromising the user experience.

By the way, I see many professionals using iPads whist on travel and in meetings to effectively do work. I use mine everyday. I am not saying the iPad is as fully featured as a laptop.....but, it is still a very useful tool for many users.
 

blitzer09x87

macrumors 6502
May 19, 2013
408
0
whatever! i m completely happy with my surface pro and plan to buy the next version of it. it's way better than the macbook.
 

WilliamLondon

macrumors 68000
Dec 8, 2006
1,699
13
What this doesn't say, but what I would assume is that this was their *initial* production run, which means they expected to sell many, many more of these than they did in the product's first year.

I would assume they didn't expect to produce only enough for only the first days from one production run and not produce any more until year 2 or an upgrade to the product warranted more production, I'm sure they expected several runs or an ongoing production run, either of which would indicate they seriously overestimated sales of this product and the $900M writedown doesn't represent at all what they were expecting this product to contribute to their overall revenue.

I think maybe they ought to think about getting out of the hardware game altogether (save the XBOX of course), perhaps just something worthy of their consideration??
 

throAU

macrumors G3
Feb 13, 2012
8,819
6,986
Perth, Western Australia
Microsoft should just go back to writing applications. They're actually half decent at that. Leave the operating system stuff (which is commodity these days anyhow) to others who know what they're doing.


edit:
RT could have taken off, but MS got greedy. It has benefits: no x86 viruses, battery life, etc.

However, they screwed up in several major ways:

- no domain join on RT. sorry but what? are you serious? why would i consider windows if not to integrate into my AD environment?
- no metro version of office. Office is their killer app. I defy anyone to try and actually use the regular version of office with touch.

Get metro office done, Pronto. Its the only reason anyone REALLY wants a Windows tablet. Other than the admin nerds like me who want it on the domain to simplify asset management.

----------

In 8.1, on the desktop, Metro can basically be used like OS X Launchpad.

Because launchpad was such a hit...


I mean i use it occasionally when i am running something full screen. But if it was the ONLY way to launch apps.... screw that.
 
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