Amazon accidentally leaks world's first small-screen Windows 8 tablet

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by frahse

Speaking of Acer. I have long avoided them too, from the days when they were just a cheap product at Circuit City.

But, yesterday, my wife got her Acer C7 (4GB RAM, 320GB HDD) Chromebook from Amazon for $219, and I must say she is impressed. Me too.

Acer -and Asus the same in my opinion- usually is offering a great cost-benefit ratio.
If one wants to stick to a certain budget, they often are the best choice.

I had bought the Asus VivoTab Smart Windows 8 Pro tablet.
Similar specs as my Dell Latitude 10 (with the exception of Latitude 10's security options), but for half the price! And it did perform surprisingly well.
But "the devil's in the detail", as we say in Germany.
I sold it, because some annoying details killed all the fun for me, for example the proprietary update process, which stops working after the very first reset (hundreds of threads about that).

My simple experience: Savings usually come for a price. Even the price reduction for Microsoft Surface RT for example: You get it for a great price. But you get a product, that's almost one year old and simply isn't very successful (and even an uncertain future for the entire OS)...

I've had buyer's remorse way too often with presumed "bargain buys", to actively look for them.
I'd rather have a tablet for € 1.000 (Latitude 10, Surface Pro), that's working great and feels valuable, than a tablet for half the price with some flaws.
When using it, I don't see the savings anymore I've had 6 months before. I just see what annoys me about it.
I stuck with Asus VivoTab Smart for a few months. But eventually, after finding hundreds of reports similar to my problem and no reaction from Asus at all, I sold it. I very rarely do that. But in this case, all the fun was gone for me - bargain price or not...

[Kumabjorn]

That is pretty much what killed Japanese PC makers. They made quality products, but they insisted on all sorts of propriety ports and connectors, after a few months you could no longer get any replacements or parts. In the end there is just too much hassle to deal with.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by wizwor

I'm sure Office is getting touch updates even as we speak.

More of the Office Apps are being ported to RT - eg Windows 8.1 RT includes Outlook.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

That is pretty much what killed Japanese PC makers. They made quality products, but they insisted on all sorts of propriety ports and connectors, after a few months you could no longer get any replacements or parts. In the end there is just too much hassle to deal with.

There are some extremely successful Japanese PC makers: Sony and Fujitsu, to name but two.

[hidari]

Toshiba, NEC....

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by HarryT

There are some extremely successful Japanese PC makers: Sony and Fujitsu, to name but two.

Have to disagree, they've lost market share almost on a yearly basis. Fujitsu hangs on thanks to corporate support, but Sony now holds a sliver of the very high end of the market. Their margins won't be sustainable over the long run.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by hidari

Toshiba, NEC....

In Japan they still have a presence, but even Toshiba is difficult to find once you are outside Honshu. NEC never really recovered from the PC98 propriety problems.

[HarryT]

But the point is that they haven't been "killed", as you stated. That statement is simply wrong. It would be perfectly correct to say that British PC manufacturing is (AFAIK) dead, but Japanese? No.

[Kumabjorn]

I guess our usage of the term "killed" as an idiom differs, but off course you are the native speaker...

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by HarryT

There are some extremely successful Japanese PC makers: Sony and Fujitsu, to name but two.

Fujitsu right now plans downsizing staff by 10% to 20%. Very rare in Japan.

Personally, I don't see a specific "Japanese problem".

Same applies for HP or Dell.

Basically, almost all "box selling" companies have enormous problems for a decade now.
2 main reasons, in my personal opinion:
a.) If Chinese manufacturers can push tablets for € 100 into the market, it doesn't make any sense at all to try to compete over price. Even if you win that price battle, you won't generate any margins.
b.) Consumers have been bombarded with benchmark prices for years. They expect such price levels for everything: I've read reviews in iTunes "for such a high price I would have expected a better game"- The game was € 5! I still remember the good old times of C64 with 100 German Marks = € 50 per game! This permanent "all is too expensive" attitude of consumers has led to a downwards spiral. HOw should a manufacturer nowadays deliver quality products for such low prices? So they deliver mediocre quality. And the spiral continues...

[SeaKing]

The Japanese Electronic manufacturers do seem to be having difficulty, while the Automakers are doing well, except for a slight glitch with the RAV4 on a new front end crash test recently. I am sure the Auto people will figure it out just like Mercedes did a couple of years back.

The Electronics side is more problematic. I would say at least 50% of them will be back. Or maybe that should be there is a 50% chance that they will be back.

[HansTWN]

It is not just electronics. The Japanese model is outdated and they are not really competitive anymore. There are exceptions (like Toyota) but in general they are going downhill.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by HarryT

But the point is that they haven't been "killed", as you stated. That statement is simply wrong. It would be perfectly correct to say that British PC manufacturing is (AFAIK) dead, but Japanese? No.

Raspberry Pi is growing by leaps and bounds.

[HarryT]

This thread is talking about "traditional" PCs, not other forms of computing device such as tablets or the Pi.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by HarryT

This thread is talking about "traditional" PCs, not other forms of computing device such as tablets or the Pi.

How "traditional"? The first PCs were Hewlett Packard handheld programmable calculators.

And in what sense is a "small screen windows 8 tablet" a "traditional PC", or not a tablet?