Reviews on Microsoft’s Surface

Tuesday, July 17th, 2012 Annie Livingston, Marketing

Microsoft recently announced the upcoming release of a new tablet, Microsoft Surface. Businessweek’s Ashlee Vance stated that the tablet is going to be big competition for not only Apple’s iPad, but for PC companies as well, including HP, Dell, and Acer.  The new tablet comes with a kickstand and cover, that is also a keyboard when opened. The tablet will be the first to have Microsoft Office running—and all of its software and hardware are Microsoft-made.

John P. Mello Jr. from PC World states that the Surface may cause confusion.  While the iPad only has one operating system, the two Surface tablet versions have two operating systems designed for different processors (and use cases).  Microsoft is setting the bar high for other companies to try and compete with in terms of design sensibility and the vision of hardware and software working together.

While the end user point of view is important, we also what to know how enterprise-ready the Surface is.

According to ZDNet, CIO’s predict it’s going to do well.  While some CIO’s admitted Microsoft still has some work to do, overall the predictions are positive.  Because the iPad has yet to have a true competitor, ZDNet claims that the buzz around the Surface is true competition.  One of the CIO’s interviewed by ZDNet’s Steve Ranger claimed that the tablet has such a large chance of success because of its integration with other Microsoft products.

However, Randall Kennedy from betanews disagrees with ZDNet’s claims and thinks that IT will completely disregard the new tablet.  While Kennedy thinks the Surface has a lot to offer, Microsoft has yet to prove itself in the world of tablets, and therefore will not perform well among enterprises.  People are so used to the iPad that they will be unwilling to switch and try something new that hasn’t already be tested by other enterprises or end users.  It doesn’t have the same track record.

A recent article by Tim Greene lists the ups and downs of the new tablet, listing significantly more downs than ups.  He claims that the apps are both a positive and negative feature for the tablet as some of the apps only run on the tablet, and other apps for a laptop are not available on the Surface.  While it is untested in the corporate world, the tablet does have four Office applications making them much more user friendly in the office.

Rob Enderle at CIO.com, thinks that IT might nudge users towards the Nvidia version as the future of BYOD, although the Intel version is more compatible with legacy systems.

We will have a more in-depth, critical look at Microsoft Surface later today. Check back!

Check out the cool features on the new Surface here, they’re pretty incredible!

Tags: Microsoft, tablet