Microsoft reportedly planning 7" tablet as part of new Surface lineup
Microsoft is again said to be working on a 7-inch Surface to add to the company's next-generation tablet lineup, with the smaller form factor device reportedly set for mass manufacture by year's end.
Citing people familiar with Microsoft's hardware plans, The Wall Street Journal reported late Wednesday that the company is readying a new line of Surface tablets to follow up on the Surface RT and Surface Pro released earlier this year. One of the new units will supposedly be a 7-inch model, which would put it in direct competition with Apple's iPad mini.
Sources say Microsoft did not originally plan on adding a 7-inch Surface to its lineup, but growing demand for small form factor tablets prompted the Redmond, Washington-based company to reconsider.
With PC shipments taking a nosedive over the past three months, Microsoft may be looking to bolster its financial position by entering new markets. Research firms IDC and Gartner released their quarterly vendor estimates on Wednesday, noting the first quarter saw one of the steepest declines in PC shipments ever recorded.
This is not the first time Microsoft has been rumored to be developing a 7-inch tablet, as reports in November 2012 claimed the company was planning a gaming-centric device to be sold under the Xbox brand.
Microsoft's current Surface lineup has seen mediocre sales thus far, with one report from March estimating only 1.5 million units were sold since the Surface RT launched in October 2012. The Surface Pro, which hit store shelves in February and runs a full version of Windows 8, accounted for less than 500,000 of those sales.
By comparison, Apple sold 23 million iPads over the holiday quarter alone.
Citing people familiar with Microsoft's hardware plans, The Wall Street Journal reported late Wednesday that the company is readying a new line of Surface tablets to follow up on the Surface RT and Surface Pro released earlier this year. One of the new units will supposedly be a 7-inch model, which would put it in direct competition with Apple's iPad mini.
Sources say Microsoft did not originally plan on adding a 7-inch Surface to its lineup, but growing demand for small form factor tablets prompted the Redmond, Washington-based company to reconsider.
With PC shipments taking a nosedive over the past three months, Microsoft may be looking to bolster its financial position by entering new markets. Research firms IDC and Gartner released their quarterly vendor estimates on Wednesday, noting the first quarter saw one of the steepest declines in PC shipments ever recorded.
This is not the first time Microsoft has been rumored to be developing a 7-inch tablet, as reports in November 2012 claimed the company was planning a gaming-centric device to be sold under the Xbox brand.
Microsoft's current Surface lineup has seen mediocre sales thus far, with one report from March estimating only 1.5 million units were sold since the Surface RT launched in October 2012. The Surface Pro, which hit store shelves in February and runs a full version of Windows 8, accounted for less than 500,000 of those sales.
By comparison, Apple sold 23 million iPads over the holiday quarter alone.
Comments
Yawn.
As opposed to Windows 8 and all of these Microsoft tablets that are failures, there is one Microsoft product which interests me, and I hope that they release it for Mac. That I would definitely buy.
AOE II HD, one of the best games ever!
I already have AOE II for Mac, but I would pay full price for it again, just to get the updated HD version.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jd_in_sb
Another product that nobody will buy. Ballmer is on a roll.
Ballmer is attracted to a bad idea like a fly to a fresh cowpie. I can not see these things flying off the shelves, but I can see them thrown around in Microsoft commercials.
Console gaming computers are a small niche market and Ballmer is has to duke it out with a couple other has-been companies just to stay in the business, and Ballmer wants to throw more money into gaming with these devices...?
I want some of what he's smoking!
Haha, $500? Fully subsidized with a plan? I said that is the most expensive phone in the world, and it doesn't appeal to business customers because it doesn't have a keyboard, which makes it not a very good email machine.
Right now we're selling millions and millions and millions of phones a year, Apple is selling zero phones a year.
One of the reasons for Surface Pro's poor battery life is because they had to make the form factor so small and light. They sacrificed the battery to make it svelte. What do you think is going to happen when you shrink the battery down even more (for a 7" device) and you're still trying to run a Core i5?
MSFT needs to make a bigger "tablet". If they were smart they would make a 11" or even 13" model for the professionals. Surface Pro is already too big and unwieldy to keep on the lap or hold in the hands anyways. Everyone pretty much uses it on the desktop just like a laptop.
I like stories like this one better:
Samsung Office Searched by Police in OLED Technology Leak Probe [URL=http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-10/samsung-office-searched-by-police-in-oled-technology-leak-probe.html]>[/URL]
edit 2: Microsoft Surface Phone rumor resurfaces, to hit the shelves by next summer [URL=http://www.phonearena.com/news/Microsoft-Surface-Phone-rumor-resurfaces-to-hit-the-shelves-by-next-summer_id35049]>[/URL]
Will the 7" Surface come with a free finger file?
They should just skip tablets and go back to being a pure software company for a while, and try to be ready for the next big platform, e.g. wearable devices. If they keep trying to do everything Apple is doing they will permanently be in catch-up mode, they need to skip a generation to get back in the game.
This is so Ballmer...doubling down on failure. Ron Johnson was given less than 2 years to wreck JCP. How many decades will Microsoft give Steve Ballmer?
OMG. so funny. Thanks for posting youtube video.
Oh, it's much worse than that.
Imagine 100 people dancing around and doing gymnastics moves clicking a 7" tablet. The tablet will be too small to make a good 'dance around like idiots clicking your tablet' commercial.
Flamenco dancers clicking their Ventanas Ocho Casteñets.
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
Somewhere, Samsung is working on a new Galaxy phone that is larger than this
I can't wait for Samsung to rebrand their laptop line as "Galaxy" products thanks to the inclusion of a telephony chip.
Cue the commercials where you see people holding their 17" laptops to their heads.
"Now with a new hinge that lays flat to facilitate closer holding!" Of course, that shows up on the SECOND generation model…
For colder climates they would offer the Astrakhan model:
And, for the ladies... a nice warm muff: