Apple under threat from ... Windows tablets
Eh?
It's not just Android-based alternatives that will threaten the iPad's dominance of the new tablet market - so too will Windows machines.
The battle will commence in 2013, says market watcher IHS iSuppli, which reckons that is when Microsoft will introduce a new version of Windows for tablets.
Assuming it's rather better than preview Tablet PC editions of Windows, the release - whether it comes in late 2012 or early 2013 - will stir up the business in 2013, pushing the iPad's share of the market to below 50 per cent.
Apple, we feel sure, will not feel too hard done by if it still has the best part of half of the market after this year's flood of Android-based tablets and Windows ones a year or two down the line.
Crucially, it's a booming market. IHS iSuppli reckons tablet shipments will top 242.3m in 2015, 202m of them iPads and other media tablets, the remaining 39.3m being laptops without keyboards running PC operating systems.
Compare that to the 2.3m tablet PCs shipped in 2010, and you're looking at some impressive growth. Some 17.4 media tablets shipped last year. ®
COMMENTS
Journalist?
You really are in danger of turning into The Inquirer.... (which I gave up reading a good while ago)
Is this a speech to text fail or what?
"Assuming it's rather better than previews Tablet PC editions of Windows"
Eh?
"Apple, we feel sure, will not feel to hard done by"
too maybe?
How about sorting out the slack in your journos, it just makes the site look like an amateur blog.
We all have jobs to do, and you are failing.....
Netbooks ?
Quote:
On netbooks meanwhile, Windows is dominating.
Yeah right. What other choice do I have as an O/S when I buy a Netbook?
Answers on a Postcard to
S Balmer
Microsoft
Redmond
Washington
USA.
By all recent reports, the netbook market is shrinking rapidly thanks to ... Tablets.
Sure there will be a market for small screen laptops. 12in is about the smallest I want to use for long periods. But in the very near future tablet will rule this segment of the market.
How soon?
When decently priced Android ones start to appear in any number.
The Galaxy Tab is (from my quick search) is in places even more expensive than an equivalent iPad. WTF!
... but I do, in practice.
Windows has been around in tablet form for years now. Absolutely no one wants them, except for when the usage case dictates a tablet form with some custom software. Your argument that people 'will be familiar with' Windows is therefore fallacious; if Microsoft wants a chance to enter the tablet market they will need to come up with a new interface a la the Zune.
As for Microsoft 'dusting' Apple, if you care to look at the only important metric, profits, you'll see that Apple is handily beating every other pc maker out there and is, in fact, woth more now than Microsoft.
Apple does not charge for iOS, but Microsoft will for its Windows for Tablets Ultimate Edition, and not just a little bit. Even now, with Android tablets cropping up, having a FREE OS still doesn't make those smaller tablets cheaper than an iPad. And you expect that, somehow, magically, Microsoft will come up with a way to undercut Apple on price.
A pc is not a tablet, the components are not yet commoditised. Apple has been clever to make good deals on memory and displays.
The only way Microsoft could make a dollar in the tablet market is if they build one themselves. That would do nothing for their partners, but as they are all fleeing the ship (HP) anyway...
You're forgetting...
You also need to factor in the 'droid equation. By the time these (currently vapourware) Windows-based tablets appear in 2 years time, anyone hankering for instant fondle-goodness will have had a large selection of devices running Android available for a year or more, so the idea that a Windows version could win purely on price isn't necessarily as cut and dry as you think. Neither, come to think of it, is the idea that people would go with a WinTablet because they're familiar with it - by then there's a good chance they'll be very familiar with Android, particularly because their choice of mobile phone may already be running it alongside their tablet.
(Sorry, but can't ignore the 'price difference' FUD! Haha! MS don't build PCs so you can't compare the price of Apple's hardware to Microsoft's unless you're talking mice and keyboards. Also, if I run Windows on a Mac the hardware cost is identical. ;p )
Title.
Not a c*ck in hells chance can MS compete for tablets. Without some massive overhaul of their OS and policy.
Seriously, hands up who wants a tablet that runs anti virus? Anyone? ANYONE?
Don't worry about the excess heat, it is just running anti virus while it spins the hard drive like crazy because windows can't run on an SSD and needs a spinny old tech HDD.
Oh and you like the MS price hike? Yeah that is called windows tax.
Market share is very heavily dependent on them organising their OS to suit hardware and nothing so far can shape up to the form factor of a small, light weight touch screen, fast and responsive (one that doesn't need quad core) without generating the heat in basic menial tasks. MS can't do that with windows 7.
