Awesome.

Here We Go Again

You remember when the Zune came out in 2006? It was heralded by many as the most viable option to be an “iPod Killer”, what could be a death-blow to Apple’s dominance in the portable music player field. As you may have noticed, that didn’t exactly happen. In 2009, Microsoft released the Zune HD to combat the iPod Touch, and that was also made out to be the harbinger of doom for the iPod line. Again, didn’t happen.

Guess what? It’s happening again, except this time it’s with the iPad.

"Hello, Windows 8? This is iPad. You win."

September 13, 2011 1:21 pm via MetroTwitReplyRetweetFavorite

@thurrott

Paul Thurrott

That’s a tweet from Paul Thurrott after yesterday’s demonstration of Windows 8 running on a Samsung tablet at Microsoft BUILD. Now, I will admit that I do like what I’ve seen of Windows 8 so far (except for that hideous Explorer menu), and I look forward to playing with the developer build on whatever hardware I can muster together over the weekend. That said, I think Thurrott’s snark about Windows 8 “beating” the iPad, or Boy Genius Report’s screed on why Microsoft beat Apple to the Post-PC era punch are a bit premature, considering that the OS is still a year away from reaching consumers, and who knows what the technological landscape will look like by then?

There’s two things I’ve found that bother me about the coverage Windows 8 is getting. For those of you who know me as an Apple Slut, no, it’s not the fact that Windows 8 is getting any coverage at all. I will say this again: I think Windows 8 looks awesome, and I look forward to playing with it. So I won’t have any of that nonsense, thank you very much.

1. The One OS To Rule Them All

One of the things that a lot of the reporting I’ve read has focused on is how novel the idea is that Windows 8 will run your tablet and XBOX with its slick MetroUI interface and your computer with a standard-looking Windows interface. While I suppose it’s novel that it’s all packaged together in the code, they seem to skip over the idea that iOS (which is OS X with a touch interface) runs iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch and AppleTV, while the standard-looking OS X interface runs Apple’s laptops. This isn’t new ground, really, just a different distribution methodology, which makes sense: Microsoft needs to easily send out its wares to the companies that make the hardware that runs their software, while Apple controls the process from start-to-finish, so there’s no need for both OS situations in one build.

2. A “Real” OS On A Tablet! Oh, Happy Day!

The theme I keep running into that really annoys me is how happy the Technorati are about being able to run full desktop-class software on a touchscreen. “Imagine it,” they say, “working in Photoshop using nothing more than your fingers!” How magical! How wonderful! How inefficient and tedious!

Let’s look at this from a design perspective: desktop apps were not made with someone’s chubby sausage fingers in mind. When I’m working in Photoshop, I’m looking for precision, not the wonder of manipulating my photos with my hands. And if I need to use a stylus, that just means I have some other little piece I’m likely to lose, so that doesn’t work very well for me.

“Hey, eD!,” you respond in my head, “that’s no big deal! You can develop apps to be used for a touchscreen interface! You’re such a moron!” And you’re right, that could be done. But let’s dig deeper into the tablet situation.

At BUILD, Microsoft showed off Windows 8 running on a Samsung tablet with a Core i5 processor, hardware that is usually reserved for a laptop. In fact, the tablet had a cooling fan on the top of it, which This Is My Next mentioned didn’t ever seem to stop running. This sort of tablet is a machine that I don’t really see catching on with anyone who isn’t a total nerd, and that’s the sort of machine you’d need to run Photoshop.

Why would this sort of hardware build stay in the hands of nerds? Because “normal” people don’t do their day-to-day computing on their tablets, they use tablets to check their Twitter feed, browse the web on the toilet, or go on Facebook from the couch. For these people, a machine that could go from tablet to laptop-esque device, while convenient, will either be too expensive, too cumbersome, or run too hot to use for the rest of their needs, like poop-surfing.

The logic of tablets is not to use them as your primary machine, but to use them as a secondary, “fun” device. Are more and more people using iPads as their only machine? Sure. Are these people that follow tech news religiously or do intense work from home? Probably not. For a great deal of the population, checking email and looking at recently leaked photos of Scarlett Johansson’s boobs are the extent of what they do on their computer at home, and that can be done just as easily on a $500 iPad as it can be done on a $500 laptop, and there is less of a concern about viruses, crashing, and lack of Angry Birds on the iPad.

Will there be a market for high-powered tablets? Of course. Do I think it will be as vast as the market for iPads is at the current time? Probably not, but I’m willing to admit I could be wrong.