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Analyst meets with big computer maker, finds ‘general lack of enthusiasm’ for Windows 8

Friday, June 8, 2012 · 10:15 am · 20 Comments

“Topeka Capital analyst Brian White is traveling around Taipei this week and firing off short notes on what he’s hearing,” Jar Yarow reports for The Business Insider. “The most interesting tid-bit in today’s note is about Windows 8.”

More 3Q12 Uncertainty, Notebook Vendor Not Thrilled with Windows 8… Windows 8 should enter production in July and notebooks with the new operating system could be on the shelves by as early as September (even if not officially yet announced by Microsoft). During our conversation, we noticed a general lack of enthusiasm around Windows 8 for the notebook computer market and uncertainty around the success of the launch this fall. In fact, our contact will monitor the acceptance around Windows 8 before launching a tablet around the new operating system.”

Read more in the full article here.

Categories: News

Tags: Brian White, ios, iPad, iPad wannabes, MacBook Air, MacBook Air wannabes, microsoft, OS X, Topeka Capital, Windows 8

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Comment Feed

20 Comments

Shock Me

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 10:25 am · Reply

Of all the contenders MS has the best shot at creating a touch OS to compete with iOS. That’s why it is so delicious to see them screw up their desktop and notebook computers with a tablet operating system. They should have stopped at Windows RT.
- silverhawk1
  
  Friday, June 8, 2012 - 10:32 am · Reply
  
  Should have stopped at DOS.
  - ajdowntown
    
    Friday, June 8, 2012 - 10:34 am · Reply
    
    Which they didn’t even make in the first place!
    - opsono
      
      Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:18 am · Reply
      
      And they’ve _been_ trying to manage a workable touch interface since XP. It’s all been spectacularly flawed and clumsy. (Anyone here actually tried to use a W7 ‘touch’ system? Yuck.) And they’ve been trying similarly in vain with tablets for years. I’m not at all sure what their horde of programmers and engineers has been doing for the last fifteen years.
      - Really
        
        Friday, June 8, 2012 - 12:26 pm · Reply
        
        Everyone at MS is bogged down with meetings, focus groups, , strategy pow-wows and re-focus groups that they only code about 2 days a week.
        
        imppaul
        
        Friday, June 8, 2012 - 12:48 pm · Reply
        
        I think your estimate is high. From what I hear, less than 1 day of each week is spent on actual coding.
        Poor bastards.
        
        Aaron M.
        
        Friday, June 8, 2012 - 1:15 pm · Reply
        
        At least they still have jobs. For now.
althegeo

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 10:40 am · Reply

Seriously, all Microsoft has going for it is the Kinect.

Everyone already has a fairly adequate and familiar OS. Everyone also has a fairly adequate and familiar Office suite. Everyone also has iTunes and an iPod, iPad, iPhone or all three.

Xbox is free with the purchase of a Kinect.

What else can Microsoft sell to their customers?
- Cubert
  
  Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:42 am · Reply
  
  And they didn’t even make the kinect. They bought that company right as they were about to bring the kinect to market.
  - Really
    
    Friday, June 8, 2012 - 12:47 pm · Reply
    
    Kinect was developed in-house using multiple vendors and pieces of technology they bought or licensed.
    
    Microsoft bought 3DV Systems for their motion based patents and technology expertise. PrimeSense provided the camera technology and a company called GestureTEK provided a software layer for gesture detection. An in-house game studio called Rare provided much of the game interface software layer.
    
    MS built an internal team and it was originally called Project Natal.
    
    There were multiple companies with pieces of the technology but there was never one company that had the hardware we now know as kinect just sitting there waiting for MS to slap a sticker on it.
    - twilightmoon
      
      Friday, January 25, 2013 - 6:25 am · Reply
      
      Wow interesting info thank you.
Grifterus

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 10:54 am · Reply

I just tried Win8 Release Preview (in a virtual machine, of course, I’m not planning to taint my Mac, hehe!)

On the plus side, the new IE is a huge improvement over the previous crappy versions.

On the cons, it not intuitive at all. It’s a perfect example of design gone wrong. It’s visually nice. It really catches your eye. But it’s a usability nightmare. It took me like 15 minutes to figure out how to switch applications, how to shut down, how to switch from Metro to the new Desktop (which is awful), and all of my discoveries were by mistake and by trial and error.

Shutting down takes like 3 steps: Going to Metro, logging off, going back to the Log On screen and clicking os shut down. Horrible.

The Windows Store is a blatant copy of the Mac App Store operation wise. It has a different front, but does the same.

If they made life harder for XP users moving to Vista/Win7, this change will be a nightmare for people moving to Win8. All I can see is XP living longer after this release.

At this point, for those who can not afford a Mac, I see, for the first time, Linux being a suitable replacement. It will be easier for a legacy user to go from XP to Ubuntu than moving to Windows 8.
Peter Blood

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:02 am · Reply

Windows H8 = Vista 2 with a side of extra bitter sauce

Even diehard PC lovers will have a hard time trying to justify their like of this one. Peter Principle is in full force here.
Dogadoga

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:10 am · Reply

What… no MDN Take? I was getting ready to read a funny comment about Windoxe 8.
- hannahjs
  
  Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:56 am · Reply
  
  “Notebook Vendor Not Thrilled with Windows 8.”
  
  Bad consumer reviews are one thing, but when the OEMs stiff-arm a Windows OS release, you sense that Microsoft’s days are numbered.
  
  And that’s funny.
- silverhawk1
  
  Friday, June 8, 2012 - 12:17 pm · Reply
  
  Read the headline, that’s from MDN.
moremac

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:27 am · Reply

pig + lipstick = REAL INNOVATION (or Ballmer in a dress)
BoC

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 11:52 am · Reply

You either have easy to use intuitive operations…or you don’t.
Chas

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 12:24 pm · Reply

I think they should release Windows RG:

http://www.deanliou.com/WinRG/

Best version ever

=:~)
Apple is Always Right

Friday, June 8, 2012 - 4:46 pm · Reply

MS = RIP 2012