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Microsoft Reportedly Scheduled to Introduce Tablet Today

Courier's gutter = FAIL

Friscohoya said:
The screens need to be contiguous or else it falls short of its full functionality in landscape/canvas mode and that is where tablets really shine in my opinion.
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I agree. The gutter in between screens means that you can't watch a movie across both screens. And it means that apps are artificially limited to working in only half of the available real estate.

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My guess on the Apple tablet is that there's a new UI that allows the vast majority of activity to happen without even a virtual keyboard. Touch & drag, with a small row of soft "buttons" along one edge. (And I may give up on those buttons if I think through all the possible gestures.)

Then you get a virtual keyboard that drags up from the bottom of the screen for those times when you have to type.

Maybe another keyboard layout that puts the letter buttons along both edges so that they land underneath your thumbs when you hold the device in your hands.
 
Hmm this could be interesting.

Of course, Microsoft have tried and failed many times with the tablet concept (like they did with the smartphone).

However Windows 7 is undoubtedly an improved product over XP and Vista. Maybe, just maybe they can learn from their mistakes.

Either way with Microsoft showing their hand, the game has been stepped up.
 
cjmillsnun said:
Hmm this could be interesting.

Of course, Microsoft have tried and failed many times with the tablet concept (like they did with the smartphone).

However Windows 7 is undoubtedly an improved product over XP and Vista. Maybe, just maybe they can learn from their mistakes.

Either way with Microsoft showing their hand, the game has been stepped up.
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Windows 7 is undoubtedly an improved mouse and keyboard OS. It might be an improved stylus OS. But it's still not a very good touch OS.
 
cjmillsnun said:
However Windows 7 is undoubtedly an improved product over XP and Vista. Maybe, just maybe they can learn from their mistakes.
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Everytime I read something like that it proves yet again Microsoft marketing for windows 7 worked like a charm and proves that Vista was nothing more than the tool to take all the heat for the changed from XP.

After all the service packs were out for Vista and the software makers adjusted to it it works great. Vista problem was it was a big change from XP so there were bound to be a lot of problems. Microsoft releases Vista to take the heat for the change. After all the bugs get worked out from all the software devs on the change they release Windows 7 with some under the hood changes for the most part. People love windows 7 but I am willing to bet if I put a windows 7 and a current windows Vista computer right next to each other most people would not be able to tell the difference in using them.

Hell I would not be surprised if Microsoft learned something from the Mohnivo or what ever experiment they did (and ran ads for) to figure out that Vista just had a bad rap but really was good and people liked it when they though it was something new.
 
cmaier said:
Windows 7 is undoubtedly an improved mouse and keyboard OS. It might be an improved stylus OS. But it's still not a very good touch OS.
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Ironically, the touch feature was touted as the 'killer feature' during W7's announcement.

Rodimus Prime said:
Everytime I read something like that it proves yet again Microsoft marketing for windows 7 worked like a charm and proves that Vista was nothing more than the tool to take all the heat for the changed from XP.

After all the service packs were out for Vista and the software makers adjusted to it it works great. Vista problem was it was a big change from XP so there were bound to be a lot of problems. Microsoft releases Vista to take the heat for the change. After all the bugs get worked out from all the software devs on the change they release Windows 7 with some under the hood changes for the most part. People love windows 7 but I am willing to bet if I put a windows 7 and a current windows Vista computer right next to each other most people would not be able to tell the difference in using them.

Hell I would not be surprised if Microsoft learned something from the Mohnivo or what ever experiment they did (and ran ads for) to figure out that Vista just had a bad rap but really was good and people liked it when they though it was something new.
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This actually is not a bad theory.

Vista did have major problems, namely: memory management, audio management, file browsing interface, networking, search, copying and moving files, UAC, DRM, to name some few.

Whether Vista was an intentional buffer, or not, MS would have been better off releasing something of the likes of W7 first, and then follow that with an improved version.

Vista was not ready for prime time, and its premature release did nothing more than to reinforce the shoddy reputation of Microsoft.

In hindsight, riding out XP while the development of compatible drivers neared an acceptable level of completion would have been the better option.
 
cmaier said:
Windows 7 is undoubtedly an improved mouse and keyboard OS. It might be an improved stylus OS. But it's still not a very good touch OS.
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Well, Windows 7 already has the technology to allow it to be a good touch OS. With multi touch, all we need now is a different shell with a finger/touch friendly paradigm. Tablets are not a failure, they are just a very niche market.

Apple is known for changing paradigms, they took a business approach and made them into a consumer phone with the iPhone. Perhaps this can happen again with the tablet, although a LOT of companies are bringing their own tablet devices already.

We'll see.
 
cumanzor said:
Well, Windows 7 already has the technology to allow it to be a good touch OS. With multi touch, all we need now is a different shell with a finger/touch friendly paradigm. Tablets are not a failure, they are just a very niche market.

Apple is known for changing paradigms, they took a business approach and made them into a consumer phone with the iPhone. Perhaps this can happen again with the tablet, although a LOT of companies are bringing their own tablet devices already.

We'll see.
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The "all we need now" part has proven to be the hard part for MS. Look how many years they've been pushing crappy, inappropriate interfaces on tablet PC users and windows mobile users.
 
cmaier said:
The "all we need now" part has proven to be the hard part for MS. Look how many years they've been pushing crappy, inappropriate interfaces on tablet PC users and windows mobile users.
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Why should this matter?

From SB's POV: Consumers will use whatever's out there. We've gotta get it out there - if it's good enough, then it's good enough, they'll buy it. That's the way it works - I oughta know.
 
cmaier said:
The "all we need now" part has proven to be the hard part for MS. Look how many years they've been pushing crappy, inappropriate interfaces on tablet PC users and windows mobile users.
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Regarding Tablet PCs.... I wouldn't call them crappy, just not touch friendly. I had no problem whatsoever playing around with a tx2something some time ago. I just did some web browsing and tried OneNote to test the writing recognition. It was pretty impressive and this happened some time ago. I guess the current line of tx2s must be better.

Regarding WM, I cannot argue with that. It plain sucks. It took a long time of tweaking and testing roms, and install apps, to make me love my old Treo 750. I loved the level of customization you had though and my nature is to tinker around with every device I have and I love that. Vanilla WM is ****, plain and simple. WM 6.5 is the same ****, more touch friendly, but still ****.

My believe is that WM is just too stylus dependent. Ignore any other 3rd party app or OEM app, the default WM touch keyboard is simply impossible to use without stylus. HTC has made A HELL of a job making WM user friendly. HD2s are sexy mother****ers. Palm also did a good job with the hardware button and keyboard integration with the Treos too.
 
cumanzor said:
Regarding Tablet PCs.... I wouldn't call them crappy, just not touch friendly. I had no problem whatsoever playing around with a tx2something some time ago. I just did some web browsing and tried OneNote to test the writing recognition. It was pretty impressive and this happened some time ago. I guess the current line of tx2s must be better.
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I've owned two, primarily used by my wife. I've been unimpressed with both. OneNote was fairly nice, but the pen features were not well integrated throughout the OS, and it felt awkward and weird having to use a pen to cllck window-maximize buttons, etc. Sort of like having to operate a calculator by clicking the buttons with a pencil.
 
cumanzor said:
Well, Windows 7 already has the technology to allow it to be a good touch OS. With multi touch, all we need now is a different shell with a finger/touch friendly paradigm.
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I don't think you know how major is the difference between an OS that runs on a touch device and a normal desktop OS.
 
fat phil said:
It is fairly amusing that they've started replacing the word tablet with "slate" now.
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The terminology's been around forever

Tablet PCs (historically) fall into two categories, slate and convertible

A slate doesn't have a keyboard
A convertible does have a keyboard (e.g. it's a laptop with a digitizer-capable screen that turns and folds, optionally with touchscreen)
 
Rodimus Prime said:
People love windows 7 but I am willing to bet if I put a windows 7 and a current windows Vista computer right next to each other most people would not be able to tell the difference in using them.
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A Windows 7 user would notice within seconds. It might take a Vista user much longer.

(Reason: No Aero Peek or Jump Lists on Vista - two huge timesavers.)
 
google phone release was very meh, i'm really excited about this. if it's anything like the concept videos then it will be huge
 
HyperX13 said:
If Microsoft came out with this after iSlate, ok, maybe. But since they are coming with it before iSlate, there is not much to copy.
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the catch is, when will the Microsoft device go on sale. cause it sounds like this is just a prototype announcement not a ready for sale one.

so they announce with an expected date sometime later in the year. Then Apple announces and puts their device on sale. Microsoft starts off losing ground and perhaps rethinking their design (depending on what Apple does)
 
Compile 'em all said:
I don't think you know how major is the difference between an OS that runs on a touch device and a normal desktop OS.
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he he he he.... care to en-light me?

I'm talking about a PC touch device such as an HP's or Lenovo's current tablet PCs. I said that all it needs now that W7 has multi touch support, it only needs a shell that is more touch friendly than Windows.

If you are talking about embedded devices, PDAs or phones, then of course there is a fundamental difference between those and a desktop OS, starting by the architecture.
 
has the stream for this started yet?

I'm checking on http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/ces/ but I don't get anything other than a splash screen. I'm assuming the site hates OS X even with Silverlight installed so I can't be certain that I'm not meant to be seeing anything yet.

Edit: seems like it's off to a swimming start. This is probably why the stream isn't on yet

6:36PM This is not a good way to kick off 2010 guys. Steve is probably bashing someone's face in right now.

6:36PM Half of the computers up on stage have died. They're now manually restarting them, but they've missed a few.

6:35PM This would explain the completely dead screens.



6:35PM "Good evening ladies and gentlemen... if anyone would remain in your seats... we're having a small power problem." What!?

6:33PM The lights are down! Sort of... they seem undecided right now. But the main screens are off.
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http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/06/live-from-steve-ballmers-ces-2010-keynote/?sort=newest&refresh=15
 
Anaemik said:
has the stream for this started yet?

I'm checking on http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/ces/ but I don't get anything other than a splash screen. I'm assuming the site hates OS X even with Silverlight installed so I can't be certain that I'm not meant to be seeing anything yet.
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Some sort of power problem, apparently. But doesn't it start late every year?

EDIT:

Engadget is saying they have to restart some of the onstage computers becuase of power issue.
 
there are a lot of engineers on stage trying to fix the demo pc's that went down with the power issue.

Great start.
 
Please hurry up and fix it so I don't have to listen to this godawful "please hold" muzak any more.
 
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