Surface left on shelves as world+dog slurps up small slate

Interesting story today on The Register about Surface RT issues;

Half a million Microsoft Surface tablets may be gathering dust on shop shelves, it has been claimed.
Market watcher IHS iSuppli reckons Microsoft shipped 1.25 million Surface tablets into the resale channel during Q4 2012. However, only 55 to 60 per cent of those Windows RT-based devices were purchased by punters.

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That means there were 500,000 to 562,500 Surface tablets awaiting sale to consumers at the end of the quarter.

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Read the rest of the story here:

I just don't get it, when did the Surface tablets become this big thing in the media where it's become the primary Windows 8 or Windows RT tablet PC?

Nonetheless, let's break this down like a logical, economics person would.

The Surface tablets were sold physically within stores, specifically Microsoft Stores in the US. There are about 60 or so of them in total. This didn't change until about December. So the only way to buy it if you didn't have a Microsoft Store around was online. But seeing as places like best buy are the main retailer of PCs sold, people going into best buy and not seeing a Surface tablet to play around with before purchasing it or purchasing it right away would be turned off a bit and probably just buy the next best tablet in stock, if there were any in stock. Maybe if certain people had that much motivation to buy it, they'd probably come across it online. But most people probably don't know that. They see commercials for it and go to a large PC retailer and not see them or find that the store doesn't stock them. Then there is the fact that there were supply issues a couple weeks into the launch.

Point 1: Insufferable deployment and shipments constricted the sales of the tablets until December 2012, pretty much the end of Q4 '12.

Point 2: Many people didn't know that they had to buy it online, which again goes back to point 1.

Point 3: The tablets weren't available elsewhere such as retailers like best buy or Staples until December, so theoretically shipments of said tablets, both Pro and RT, might be much higher after Q1 2013.

Point 4: Microsoft didn't really plan on originally to ship the tablets to third party retailers in an effort to not compete, impede or hinder their OEM partners. They did a couple months later to boost sales some, which might be because their OEM partners weren't delivering what they wanted to see, like 10 hero models and 20 feature models.

Point 5: Most are still waiting for the Surface Pro over the RT as a secondary PC, their first tablet PC, or first tablet in general as many feel the Pro has MUCH more to offer than the RT; which is true.

Well there, we have the glass is half empty and the glass is half full argument.

At work, we bought 3 ipads, and 7 androids. I requested a surface and it wasn't even discussed. The faith in success is really lacking here.

I've started lobbying for a surface pro, but not having any luck thus far.

I still have a hard time imagining why I would want or need a Surface RT or Surface Pro.

RT does not run (most) traditional Windows apps. Software I might run elsewhere would not run on RT unless I buy an RT version. Sure, it comes with Office but that's not sufficient reason to buy an RT tablet.

Surface Pro pricing is apparently around $899 US, a rather steep price considering that I can buy a nice full-featured laptop for less. Sure, an RT tablet would be smaller and lighter than most laptops, but that's not enough to justify it for me. There are also good Android and fruit company tablets running half that price, so why do I want to consider Surface?

You would consider the Surface if you need more portability than your laptop, desire a touch screen interface and demand app support and functionality that you cannot get from Android or Apple.

Sounds like you don't have these needs or concerns. Neither do I.

Personally I would love to buy a Surface Pro for the learning experience...but I just cannot justify the ~$1,000 for the experience.

pparks1 said:

You would consider the Surface if you need more portability than your laptop, desire a touch screen interface and demand app support and functionality that you cannot get from Android or Apple.

Sounds like you don't have these needs or concerns. Neither do I.

Personally I would love to buy a Surface Pro for the learning experience...but I just cannot justify the ~$1,000 for the experience.

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There are like, different OEMs to choose from for a tablet PC.

Although I think this is why the price is kind of steep for the Surface tablets, there are still OEMs out there that have some product offerings for Windows 8.

Coke Robot said:

There are like, different OEMs to choose from for a tablet PC.

Although I think this is why the price is kind of steep for the Surface tablets, there are still OEMs out there that have some product offerings for Windows 8.

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I agree: there are a number of Windows 8 machines out there, both RT tablets and full-version Windows 8 and Windows 8 Pro machines. I'd seriously consider one of those before I considered a Surface or Surface Pro.

At the moment, I have no need for anything like that. I am considering buying a tablet but it likely won't be one that runs Windows.

It isn't just the surface RT product offering that didn't go well.

Win 8 itself has failed to inspire - in spite of the enormous ad spend.

Three months after its official launch, Windows 8 has 2.3% market share, Net Applications reported...

Its predecessor, Windows 7, had 7.7% market share in January 2010, three months after its launch

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Microsoft Windows 8 Uptake Badly Lags Predecessor Windows 7 MSFT - Investors.com

I believe it is doing worse than Vista at this stage - and Vista didn't have that give away price.


The surface pro release will be like an attempt to relaunch Win8. Oh dear.

It is not as if we didn't warn them . They had enough feedback before releasing the thing.