A Radical Plan For Saving Microsoft's Surface RT 391
Nerval's Lobster writes "Last week, Microsoft announced that it would take a $900 million write-off on its Surface RT tablets. Although launched with high hopes in the fall of 2012, the sleek devices—which run Windows RT, a version of Windows 8 designed for hardware powered by the mobile-friendly ARM architecture—have suffered from middling sales and fading buzz. But if Microsoft decides to continue with Surface, there's one surefire way to restart its (metaphorical) heart: make it the ultimate bargain. The company's already halfway there, having knocked $150 off the sticker price, but that's not enough. Imagine Microsoft pricing the Surface at a mere pittance, say $50 or $75 — even in this era of cheaper tablets, the devices would fly off the shelves so fast, the sales rate would make the iPad look like the Zune. There's a historical precedent for such a maneuver. In 2011, Hewlett-Packard decided to terminate its TouchPad tablet after a few weeks of poor sales. In a bid to clear its inventory, the company dropped the TouchPad's starting price to $99, which sent people rushing into stores in a way they hadn't when the device was priced at $499. Demand for the suddenly ultra-cheap tablet reached the point that HP needed weeks to fulfill backorders. (Despite that sales spike, HP decided to kill the TouchPad; the margins on $99 obviously didn't work out to everyone's satisfaction.) In the wake of Microsoft announcing that it would take that $900 million write-down on Surface RT, reports surfaced that the company could have as many as six million units sitting around, gathering dust. Whether that figure is accurate—it seems more based on back-of-napkin calculations than anything else—it's almost certainly the case that Microsoft has a lot of unsold Surface RTs in a bunch of warehouses all around the world. Why not clear them out by knocking a couple hundred dollars off the price? It's not as if they're going anywhere, anyway."
Dumping? (Score:2, Insightful)
Illegal, no?
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Interesting)
Illegal, no?
well, dumping what you have is not illegal.
the 900 mil writeoff may well be taking it into account that they would get rid of the stock at price of 150... or whatever.
however here is the point..
"(Despite that sales spike, HP decided to kill the TouchPad; the margins on $99 obviously didn't work out to everyone's satisfaction.)" who the fuck cares if it flies off the shelf for a very limited amount of time? stupid article is stupid and even knows it. make a buttload of loss on every device and make up for it in scale of your inventory..
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Dumping? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nerval's submissions have really gotten silly lately.
Re: (Score:3)
You must be new here!
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to make a product that sells in high volume, then you need to make sure that the product is something that the market wants. This is the thing I can't really get my head around with MS at the moment. It's almost like they've replaced market-research with pure-fantasy. Did they not show anyone the metro interface? Didn't anyone mention that it looks like it was designed by a colour blind child with no drawing ability or understanding of aesthetics? Or did they just assume that they could steam roller the world into liking a product that no one wants?
Re:Dumping? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's almost like they've replaced market-research with pure-fantasy.
Asked and answered: the new paradigm at MS is design-by-focusgroup and design-by-the-windows-feedback-program. Both activities that only people who are semi-retarded visavi computers participate in. Ergo, everything is now shiny, clumsy, basic, in-your-face and nagging you.
Re: (Score:3)
Dumping Surface RT could attract enough users that developers would start to take the Windows platform seriously. Then, since MS makes a $50/year per developer account, and 30% from every app sale, they may use the discounted RTs to jumpstart the Windows Store and recover at least some money (maybe unbundle Office and sell it as an addon?).
And hardware cannot sit on shelves forever. Storage space costs money, components get obsolete over time and in 2 years 50 bucks would be the right price. However this ma
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Insightful)
They just assume that they could steam roller the world into liking a product that no one wants. They were told repeatedly during the beta cycle that metro was problematic at best. MS refused to listen because they to have the damn tiles. MS forget that they are no longer in the same space as apple and Google. Not only was it totally unacceptable to Businesses who are their primary clients and purchasers but to the general public. the people who like it are those who would have liked it regardless and are so small in number that its not economically feasable to do so as we all saw.
As for dumping a built unsold product that they have already taken a write off for, any more is better than no money. Sell for $99 would hurt but people would buy them. Unfortunate RTs are a locked ecosystem so they would be still half useless.
Microsoft needs to accept the fact that their code is way to large now but they can't change it either. The windows 7 style is the only way it will sell. (actually had they flips it. Had default to the desktop, turned Metro into a new start bar and allowed the live tiles to be a choice, it would have flown off the shelf. IT is very stavble and has a host of good updates. Its just Metro is in the way. Since surface RT is all metro, that is the cheif problem.
Re: (Score:3)
The ancient Greeks knew that men often find that their greatest strength becomes their greatest weakness. A man who has arete ("excellence") such as great power, great beauty or great prowess may develop hubris ("arrogant pride"), which in turn leads to ate ("blind recklessness" the final letter is pronounced), when he loses his sense of humility and becomes rash or imprudent. Ate, in turn, leads to nemesis ("retributive justice").
Metro? Vista? .docx? What else could have lead to these products, other than
Re: (Score:3)
I don't know that I'd lump Vista in there. Yes it was a disaster at release but it was also a good faith (or as close to it as a company like Microsoft gets) attempt at solving many of the problems that people had been bitching about for years -- primarily security concerns. Most of the biggest complaints relating to Vista stemmed in some way or another from a program/driver/etc that worked under XP but blew up under Vista (often silently) due to UAC. Could they have done something better and more backwa
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Insightful)
The point is to monetize it though. As others have pointed out its not like game consoles. Where you can sell the box cheap, even at loss, because you know you will make money selling titles, and licenses to others to make titles.
The tablet ecosystem isn't like that. Most of the software is third party. Apples App-store has defined the model. Titles sell for a few bucks, mostly and Apple rakes 30% of the top; (playing fast and loose with the details here).
Getting 30% margin on something that has practically no activity cost (Microsoft already does web hosting, so I doubt their store infrastructure costs them much) is nice but you'd need to push a lot app sales getting 30% * $3 to make up for what maybe -$150 margin on the hardware sales. Just to break even you need to sell around 170 apps on average to each user.
Now is the sort of user who chooses an also ran tablet for reasons primarily having to do with price, likey to go out and buy all that many apps? No probably not..
Nor can you try and get developers to charge more. The market has already set the price points for this stuff; the developers know this, they are not going to waste their time writing for or porting to your platform that already is niche compared to the other players when you then insist they charge a price that will make their product unattractive to the few people who actually have your hardware. Not that developers don't want to be able to charge more, but copies sold for $3 is better than no copies sold priced at $15.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Thats the problem - you can't. (Score:5, Interesting)
MS didn't use the same signing key as they used for the Linux loaders... so the verification always fails.
Now if you find a way to hack the UEFI secure boot loader....
Either Microsoft have done security right for the first time in their very long history of bad security, or it's hackable. I'm guessing the last option is more likely.
Some Linux varient on that hardware might be pretty nice.
Re: (Score:3)
Now if you find a way to hack the UEFI secure boot loader....
Not quite. If you can find a security hole in the Windows kernel that allows arbitrary code execution in privileged mode (not as easy as some Slashdot readers like to believe) then it's possible to bypass UEFI secure boot by making the Windows kernel into a chain bootloader.
Re:Thats the problem - you can't. (Score:5, Funny)
Oh get real. What are the odds of finding a security exploit in the Windows kernel?
Re:Thats the problem - you can't. (Score:5, Funny)
Oh get real. What are the odds of finding a security exploit in the Windows kernel?
Yea, it would probably be a lot easier to just buy a couple off a rogue NSA agent.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Informative)
'In economics, "dumping" is a kind of predatory pricing, especially in the context of international trade.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy) [wikipedia.org]
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
When the fark did Amazon ever underprice ebooks? When the kindle launched, the ebook price point was around $10. More than a brand new paperback. New titles got hardcover prices.
Re: (Score:2)
Illegal, no?
Not if it's in a proper landfill capped with concrete.
Surface RT: Apple /// Electric Boogaloo.
--
BMO
Re:Dumping? NO! (Score:3)
They already took the loss.
So? This wouldn't be to fix an inventory accounting problem. It wouldn't be to "stuff" a channel. It wouldn't be to sell below cost for illegal competitive advantage - or barely.
These tablets are now fiscal landfill. Selling at a price to recover distribution and delivery costs (so they don't bleed more) is a better plan than many.
And give us opportunity to HACK THE LOADER!
I wouldn't try cracking firmware on a device of questionable value, that cost me several hundred. But a
Re: Dumping? (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
I'd buy a few for under $100. At the worst, they'd make nice video players for long car/plane rides with the kids. I'm sure they are adequate for couch internet surfing. If they can do anything else at all, that's pure gravy. Hardware-wise, these aren't crap tablets - they are reasonably nice machines (spec-wise... never seen one myself).
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Informative)
That's not the definition of a Loss Leader.
Re: (Score:2)
Then the RT Pro looks tempting as an upgrade (assuming the price differential isn't too steep).
What the hell is an RT Pro?
Feh. One goof while typing in a hurry and hoisted by my own petard. Such is the /. way. You know what I'm talking about: The Surface Pro.
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Insightful)
HACK THE LOADER.
Ubuntu tablet for $75 USD.
So?
HACK THE LOADER!
Exactly (Score:2)
Re:Exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
The obstacle is getting an unsigned ARM image to load. Surface has been unworthy of the challenge at its original price. Android pads are like a date in the Tenderloin: cheap and easy (and likely male :-) ).
But a near-free WART from MS? That changes things.
Re: (Score:3)
Links?
Re: (Score:3)
Problem is you may not be able to bypass the secure loader. Look at the tear downs for the normal RT and it looks like you're not really going to get easy access to the roms. None of these tablets are designed to be repaired or modified, ever.
Re:Dumping? (Score:4, Insightful)
Problem with Surface RT is the same problem the HP Touchpad had: few developers. Apple sells well because they're Apple, Android sells well because it's the phones are free and the tablets are cheap. Microsoft can't even get people to buy Windows 8 tablets much less Surface RT tablets. So, you want to sell them, do what you did with the Xbox for several years: sell the Surface RT at a colossal loss like the Xbox was sold at a huge loss. [dailyfinance.com]
Why sell at a loss? Windows RT has a Microsoft store built into the OS, so Microsoft will make their money back on the store just like Google makes up for giving way Android from Google Play. And since the Surface RT doesn't run windows software good luck to anyone trying to install software from anywhere but inside the Microsoft store.
Re:Dumping? (Score:5, Interesting)
That will only dignify ARM Restricted Boot. There's no reason to let Microsoft (or Apple and friends) allow some architectures to be useful and others to be outright sealed to their hardware; this will just embolden them to make all PCs jailbreak-required. Best to just not purchase RT, and wait for a real ARM alternative.
Also, Ubuntu. So there's 2 reasons I can't support. Sorry.
Can we get off the dead horse already? (Score:2)
Seriously, no matter how you beat it, it won't gallop anymore.
A Better Option (Score:5, Funny)
Re:A Better Option (Score:5, Informative)
You mean reprogram them with something better and slap a different label on them? Cause thats what actually happened with ET according to people who worked at atari.
Re:A Better Option (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm pretty sure he means dump into landfil [wikipedia.org] and walk away.
Now, as to if that ever actually happened, I couldn't say.
Re: (Score:3)
You mean reprogram them with something better and slap a different label on them? Cause thats what actually happened with ET according to people who worked at atari.
Surely they wouldn't have used EPROMs for games that were expected to sell millions of copies? The cost difference between those and mass-produced PROMs would presumably have been millions of dollars.
Re: (Score:3)
I don't know the specifics, but in an interview on NPR, the programmer Howard Scott Warshaw said that he thought that's what they did "reprogram" them. I'm not sure exactly what he meant by that, if they just replaced prom on them or reprogramed an eprom that was there. Can't find a link to the interview ...
Re:A Better Option (Score:4, Interesting)
This is the inside of a 2600 cart. [hardwaresecrets.com]
There is no window.
EEPROM didnt exist yet.
To reprogram an ET cart, they would have had to desolder the PROM, and put a new on on. that might actually have saved money, since they could recycle the PCB that way.
Re:A Better Option (Score:5, Funny)
Re:A Better Option (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, if that isn't about the shrillest over-reaction to image linking I have ever seen...
What assholes.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
I heard it through the grapevine (Score:3)
They already have some sort of plan like that, involving dumping them on the educational market. Someone in this country still believes the children are our (/their) future, I suppose.
So no cheap tablet for you!
$100 for useless is still useless (Score:3, Insightful)
Part of the thing that made the TouchPad fire sale successful is the idea that you could do something with it, and that something had nothing to do with the software that HP shipped on it.
The only way they get excitement for the Surface RT tablets is to do away with that SecureBoot horseshit. Then a fire sale might move the hardware.
Re:$100 for useless is still useless (Score:5, Informative)
Excuse me... pay attention.
Windows RT. No UEFI key available to the user. No alternative boot. No way to even develop your own non-Metro application.
It renders the Surface RT table a glorified rock... unless you happen to want to run software from Microsof't's app store. Even then... $100 may be overpriced.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
MS requires on x86 that you can disable secureboot. But, they also require that on ARM that it CANNOT be disabled. Your ability to install OS other than windows on an x86 UEFI machine is both as designed, and also irrelevant when talking about these ARM based tablets.
Re:$100 for useless is still useless (Score:5, Informative)
SecureBoot is no big deal, at least I haven't had too many problems with it. I'm running Linux right now on a 13" Pro Retina, and UEFI wasn't too much of an issue.
Apple laptops don't use secure boot. EFI does not imply secure boot.
Re: (Score:3)
Apple isn't implementing SecureBoot. I run Windows 8 (hacked with a real Start menu) on a MacPro4,1 because Win8 actually does a real EFI boot, unlike the complete hash of it they made with Windows 7.
That 5 year old Mac Pro boots Win8 in under 12 seconds.
Re: (Score:2)
No, the largest market for tablets is people that want to run apps on their tablets. That market coincides almost exactly with the iPad / Android market segment.
Developers target platforms that have users. WinRT has no users, thus no developers, even with Microsoft giving hardware to developers for free.
WinRT is dead - swap it out with something else and you might at least recover *some* lost money.
Yeah give them away! (Score:3)
Because fuck the shareholders, that's why!
Chairs to their faces all of em!
Re: (Score:3)
And keeping them in a warehouse does what good for shareholders, exactly?
Re: (Score:3)
And keeping them in a warehouse does what good for shareholders, exactly?
It gives Microsoft a chance to come back with a better product and crack a market where they could make billions over billions if successful. A firesale destroys that chance forever.
Re: (Score:3)
I don't see how a firesale would harm their chances of that. If anything, it would get products with their brand into people's hands, so that (unless it sucks) they might become known as a brand whose products in that space are worth consideration.
I mean, right now they just look like their standing there with their dicks hanging out. They don't have much to lose here.
Price (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Yeah, they wanted it to sell so they kept the price low, but they didn't want to tick off their OEM's anymore than they already did so they didn't want to sell it any cheaper. In the end, they just screwed themselves.
It only works if there is a back end (Score:3)
If getting these things into people's laps gets them to buy a buttload of MS software or makes them so attractive to developers that everybody shifts over to RT, it could work. But I would call that highly unlikely. Otherwise, they're just taking an even bigger loss than before. It certainly didn't work for HP.
Lemons into Kool aid? (Score:2)
Can you stomach it?
dump them at $79 so they end up (Score:5, Interesting)
isn't that what happened with the majority of the TouchPads that went for $99?
Re: (Score:3)
Which is why you don't do what HP did (just more incompetence, what did you expect?).
Instead lowering the price gradually until the devices start to move at a target pace. That way MS both makes the maximum from each one as well as moves them at the rate they wish. This isn't even that hard when compared with something like concert/airline tickets because the people coming into the pool late aren't the ones willing to pay more than the average.
But, it seems some manager somewhere got a bonus by claiming the
Re: (Score:2)
yes although I don't think they sold so easily for that price
Still a lot (Score:5, Interesting)
No matter what the materials and other costs per unit, $900M still means a large number of units. There's ways they could use that stock to help keep up their fight for real estate in minds and hearts of users who still consider Microsoft and Windows and Office to be relevant, many of whom probably think the iPad was made by the "Windows people" since they've never seen anything by anyone else. Just imagine if they made a deal to start giving these away with Time-warner or Verizon service. As many home users consider the device and the network to be one thing anyway, they could gain a lot of mindshare that would be lost simply by doing so. Even $200 or more in rental fees from users adding a $10 line item to their bill for it would drop that $900M almost by an order of magnitude. App store purchases would increase overnight, and the remainder of the loss would disappear within a year. There's a lot of creative ways Microsoft could come out of this smelling roses, without "dumping" the stock, and end up better off. Just looking at the numbers you can tell they might be down, but they're not out.
Yeah, and they'd go broke (Score:3, Insightful)
"Imagine Microsoft pricing the Surface at a mere pittance, say $50 or $75 — even in this era of cheaper tablets, the devices would fly off the shelves so fast, the sales rate would make the iPad look like the Zune."
What?
Microsoft would be put in a very strange position of NOT wanting to sell Surfaces. The more they sell, the more money they lose.
Maybe the OP thinks that this will help them build up market share. I think that by the time Microsoft built up enough marketshare they'd be bankrupt, but on top of that, are consumers going to stick around when the prices are raised again? They're not stupid. Once the prices reset to something more realistic they'll go look at other platforms again.
Is this a joke?
Re:Yeah, and they'd go broke (Score:4, Interesting)
The more they sell, the more money they lose.
When you (i.e. Microsoft) have already bought large quantities of a product that are sitting in your warehouse, that's called a "sunk cost". There is no way to "save" that money you've already spent; the only question is how best to use the warehoused inventory to make new income. In terms of business strategy, you actually pretty much ignore sunk costs when deciding what to do next.
Re: (Score:2)
I think this happened with the Nokia N8x0 series. I tried buying one, and the guy tried so hard not to sell it to me that I literally had to tell him to shut up and take my money.
Re: (Score:3)
I don't think you get it. If they have the stock on hand and write it off, that means they're earning $ 0 on each unit. If they sell one for $75, they're making $ 75 on it.
Right now they don't have the option of selling them for $ 499, so they have a warehouse full of objects that cost them money. They need to figure out what price point will sell, and what kind of strategy is best for future growth of Windows RT.
Sure, but that doesn't make it a viable long term strategy. Even if they sold every one they already have in stock (estimated at 4 million units), it wouldn't make a dent in the tablet market.
I know what a fire sale is, but a fire sale isn't going to capture the market like OP is suggesting.
Re: (Score:3)
A better way: (Score:2, Insightful)
Why not just unlock (via patch or something) the boot loader, so that you can load Android/Linux or GNU/Linux?
Re: (Score:2)
That would be the worst outcome from Microsoft's perspective.
Microsoft forgets its own history (Score:5, Interesting)
In the 90s, Windows and MS Office adoption was driven by de-facto discount/piracy (You could buy a cheap upgrade version to legalize your pirated version). It worked. Office and Windows became the standard.
It's probably the only way a technically inferior product can ever get traction.
Support costs (Score:5, Interesting)
So not only would they take a loss on selling the devices at well below cost, but they have ongoing support/warranty costs. Fulfilling an order has some non-zero cost, so that also has to be deducted from the price of the device as well. They could try selling them without warranty or with a very simple 30 day exchange warranty for defective products, but that could leave them with a PR problem when people run into problems with no way to resolve them and the blogs start filling up with complaints about how Microsoft sucks because they won't stand behind their products.
I really wouldn't be surprised if selling the device for $50 costs MS more than destroying the devices.
Only thing they have left to lose is face (Score:3)
They could try selling them without warranty or with a very simple 30 day exchange warranty for defective products, but that could leave them with a PR problem when people run into problems with no way to resolve them and the blogs start filling up with complaints about how Microsoft sucks because they won't stand behind their products.
Then why do you see all this happening on eBay and the like all the time. Hell even Apple was doing it at one point [1]. No one cares about warranty at that price, which is a significant discount. If they do, they get "corrected" and there's fuck all they can say about it (see what happens with other gray-market sales).
The only thing standing between Microsoft and an eBay store auctioning or selling off the remaining stock is their pride and image. And that's a mighty hefty price even for Microsoft to pa
Locked Bootloader (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Which is why you can install several Linux distributions on to platforms with Secure Boot enabled, and why you can freely replace and change the keys on x86 platforms, right?
Microsoft locking down Surface RT via secure boot is no more or less bad than Android vendors locking down their devices via TrustZone, a signed u-boot checking a s
who wants connected insecure platform? (Score:2)
Radical plan to destroy Microsoft tablets forever (Score:4, Insightful)
The submitter went on about HP, and how they couldn't even deliver fast enough. Of course not. But they had contracts in place that forced them to pay for the parts, and to pay for the tablets being built and shipped, so they delivered the last tablets from the assembly line as the arrived, even though they were losing lots of money on each of those. But then the product was dead, with no chance of HP ever getting back into the market. If Microsoft went that way, then for a few hundred million dollars they would forever destroy their chance to ever crack the tablet market.
How about allowing ARM desktop apps beyond Office? (Score:3)
Maybe they're worried that (a) it would be too much work to expose and support the legacy desktop APIs for ARM, or perhaps even more likely, (b) it would cut into their Surface Pro x86 sales. In my opinion, they should frantically be trying to make Windows tablets get every little edge they can over the opposition.
But what do I know? I am not Steve Ballmer, and spend a lot more time sitting on a chair than hurling it.
So retarded, where to begin? (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine Microsoft pricing the Surface at a mere pittance, say $50 or $75 â" even in this era of cheaper tablets, the devices would fly off the shelves so fast, the sales rate would make the iPad look like the Zune.
1) And then Apple could sell theirs for $1! :-|
2) MS would be taking a HUGE loss on them. They make OK money at $500. $400 might be break even. I'm pretty sure they don't want to lose $300 or more on each sale. That would lead to...
- raising the price 5-10x on the next release to return to profitability -- which no one would like if they were used to them being so cheap.
- leave them cheap forever, lose money forever.
There's a historical precedent for such a maneuver.
Yeah, it's called a "fire sale", and it's a final grasp at a few bucks, not part of a long-term strategy.
In 2011, Hewlett-Packard decided to terminate its TouchPad tablet after a few weeks of poor sales. In a bid to clear its inventory, the company dropped the TouchPad's starting price to $99, which sent people rushing into stores in a way they hadn't when the device was priced at $499.
Because they were retarded. They could have dropped to $349 and made a LOT more money and still sold every one, but in a much calmer fashion. Believe it or not, there is a sweet spot between "Sell none at $499" and "Sell thousands in hours at $99." It's called "supply and demand" and it's covered in the first 5 minutes of your first economics class.
Despite that sales spike, HP decided to kill the TouchPad...
No, the decision was already made. They decided to leave it dead because a) the CEO that day wanted out of that business and b) there was at least ONE person in the company who realized the million-percent spike in demand was due to the crazy price.
... the margins on $99 obviously didn't work out to everyone's satisfaction.
NO FUCKING SHIT. But that would be totally different with the Surface because... um...
Why not clear them out by knocking a couple hundred dollars off the price? It's not as if they're going anywhere, anyway.
Sure. We might see that. Though MS would want to save more face than HP would -- HP was leaving the business, period, whereas MS still a) sells the OS and b) needs for their to be hardware for that OS to run it on. Whether that hardware is made my MS or someone else, Windows can't be seen as a daed-end brand, like WebOS.
I'm guessing they'll either do incremental lowerings to clear out stock, or one good (but not ridiculous) price drop, like maybe $349. Possible $329 to directly compete on price with the smaller iPad mini. A lot depends on if MS is going to release another Surface RT. If so, it will be a small lowering, a typical "hey, last year's model is cheaper now." If not, it'll drop a bit more to clear them out in a reasonable time, but don't expect HP-like prices.
surface RT (Score:3, Insightful)
And save it...why even? (Score:3)
This is the 3 or 4th /. post worried about the fate of microsoft surface ...as if one should care! Just let it die! It is a bad product, with a bad startegy and bad timing! Why care at all? With either Surface RT or not, or Microsoft itself. Pointing to desparate Microsoft-fans blog posts trying to save it is as little "news for nerds' as I can imagine.
Here's a plan: (Score:2)
For $399, Surface RT + keyboard cover. That's all it takes for me to get a Surface RT. The keyboard is shown in the ads but not included in the package. I think iSuppli estimate the keyboard cover cost $20 to produce. I don't need a million apps, but I do need a keyboard a lot of the times.
They can't - It ruins their plan (Score:5, Interesting)
Steve and company are looking to get the "iPad halo". They priced at $499 for that very reason: pricing themselves above the iPad would lead everyone to say "why not just get an iPad?". Pricing below the iPad would be a de facto admission that the iPad is "worth more". Microsoft is trying to establish themselves as having a premium product.
This is why you will never see a Surface fire sale: It is an admission that the only reason to buy a Surface in the first place is because it's significantly cheaper than any other first party tablet (and most third party tablets that don't come in boxes with Chinese bullet points).
HP did the fire sale because they were looking to shuffle their inventory, and it was cheaper for them to sell them at a price well below manufacturing cost than it was to landfill them, and they did so because they were looking to get out of the tablet market anyway - they didn't care what it did to the Touchpad brand because the brand itself was headed for the dumpster out back.
Microsoft still wants to sell tablets. Microsoft wants to sell tablets to people who have $500 saved up for an iPad. The logic goes that if they have $500 for an iPad, they have $500 for a Surface. If they sell at $300, well then it's easier to upsell them the keyboard case and still get close to the $500. At $99, even with a keyboard, a copy of Office RT, and a service plan, they're still leaving about half the money on the table, and in doing so, reinforcing the mindset that "A Surface is only worth 1/5 of what an iPad is worth". Sure, it will get Surface units in the home, that will be used for Internet Explorer and Netflix and...basically nothing else. This is great for the customer because it doesn't tap too much into the money they had saved up for the iPad...but they'll never get a Surface2 at $499, "because Surface tablets just aren't worth that much money, otherwise Microsoft wouldn't have sold first gen units for $99", the logic goes.
Microsoft could probably make $901 million by selling those tablets for ($901 million / quantity in inventory) and do better fiscally with the first gen units than by just taking the writeoff. The problem is that the marketing division knows that premium brands never dilute their influence by committing acts of desperation. Microsoft doesn't want to simply gets units in hands, they want units in hands that have already parted with enough money to mirror the margins that Apple makes on their hardware. So long as this is the case, you'll never see a fire sale.
Lose money on units, make money on volume? (Score:3)
Again?
Why do people keep pushing this bullshit?
I like the RT, but.... (Score:5, Interesting)
idiot (Score:2)
there's one surefire way to
Right, because no one else but you has ever thought about it, done some calculations, asked a few experts or (gasp!) customers, and ran the scenario. Least of all the people who just took one of the largest stock dives in their history and wrote off more money than you will ever see in your entire life.
Why was this piece of crap posted to the frontpage, instead of some unknown blog with 5 readers, where it belongs?
Sell it like a smart phone (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Failing beating them, joining them is on the table? Ah, It's time for another round of the three E's: Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Not so radical. (Score:5, Informative)
There's no "port" involved. Or rather, they already did that. Then they added literally one configuration change to lock out non-MS-signed desktop apps. One change. It's a single flag in the kernel. On x86 and x64 builds of Windows NT, it's not set. On ARM builds of Windows NT (RT and WP8), it is.
Clear that flag (which is what the current "jailbreak" hack for RT does), and you can run any desktop software that will compile for ARM, or any .NET program, or any other language that can be run through one of the others (for example, Java is possible through IKVM, a .NET program implementing a JVM).
Now, as for domain joining, that's actually a simpler problem. All versions of Windows NT have had multiple SKUs (editions) ranging from the do-anything highest-end Server builds to the very crippled Starter builds. It's all the same codebase, just a configuration change. RT falls somewhere between Win8[Home] and Win8Pro SKUs in terms of business-y features; it can use BitLocker encryption (usually not available on Home) but cannot join domains (usually available on anything *except* Home).
Working around that particular restriction is also possible, though it is not easy unless you also remove the signature enforcement ("jailbreak") at which point it becomes nearly trivial.
Oh, and there's already a (very early and still incomplete) x86 emulation layer (actually, dynamic recompilation) for "jailbroken" RT devices. It's slow, as one would expect, but it can run old games and desktop software just fine. It also is the work of a single homebrew developer working from public documentation and reverse engineering for the Windows interoperability (calls to system libraries are thunked to ARM code, which is both faster than using x86 libraries and requires less install space). Microsoft could do a better job easily by putting a few of their people who previously worked in that space (for example, the "Virtual PC for Mac" software worked the same way, some of them are probably still around) on the job.
Re:Not so radical. (Score:4, Interesting)
Sorry to self-reply, but in case it isn't obvious from the previous post: Microsoft could "fix" RT with a single, simple update. Reboot the tablet and the restrictions are gone.
An official x86 compat layer would be a fair bit of work, of course, but it's not really necessary to do that; the simple ability to run .NET apps (and maybe they get a few of their more important partners to flip the Platform option in Visual Studio to "ARM" and hit Build again; often it really is that simple) would make RT a lot more appealing.
Microsoft actually doubled down on RT's lockdown (Score:4, Interesting)
In Windows 8.1, Microsoft actually made significant changes just to lock down Windows RT more strongly. They created a new type of "protected process" that protects csrss.exe from debugging, which is exactly how the RT 8.0 jailbreak worked. They clearly spent a lot of engineering resources to do this.
I have a thread post here [xda-developers.com] describing some of the changes in 8.1 that were clearly designed to target RT's jailbreak, for they have little other practical use.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
It's not called "Dumping" it is called "Liquidating" - There is a difference..
.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Part of that was because you could upgrade the Mac XL to way higher specs than the Mac or Mac 512k. You could jam 2MB of RAM in there, which no Mac was going to get until the Mac II line. Oh, and it had a hard disk.
Re: (Score:3)
RIM was trying to bump start the Playbook. I think that Microsoft is trying to bump off the RT tablet.