The shocking results of our Microsoft Surface Pro Poll

Dec 03,2012 - by Onuora Amobi 42

The Survey Says

So last Friday, I asked you guys to tell me whether you would buy a Microsoft Surface Pro and opened up a poll last week.

The results were VERY interesting.

As of this morning, almost 1200 of you had responded – Thank You Very Much.

To set the context again, the Microsoft Surface Pro with Windows 8 will be out in a month or two and will start at $899 with no keyboard and around $1050 with a keyboard.

When asked if you would buy it, you guys responded this way:

20% of you said you would buy it and thought it was great value
20% said maybe and you needed to see it first.
60% of you said it was too expensive.

Microsoft Surface Pro Poll Results

So there we have it. The Surface Pro is too expensive.

I thought this might be the case.

The Surface RT is beautiful and is very well constructed but when you factor in the following:

It’s new
It has few apps in the Windows Store
It doesn’t run legacy desktop apps (Windows 7, XP etc)
It runs a new OS (Windows RT)

, selling at a premium doesn’t make a lot of sense.

The Surface Pro is also very beautiful and well made but when you factor in the following

It’s new
It has a smaller screen than competitors (laptops, Ultrabooks)
$1000 can get you an AMAZING deal on competitors
It runs a new OS (Windows 8)

, selling at a premium here (at least initially) doesn’t make much sense either.

What would I sell the Microsoft Surface for?

Well thanks for asking.

I have always thought that Microsoft should have sold both the Surface RT and Surface Pro at VERY competitive prices.

I thought the Surface RT should have started at $399 with a Touch Cover thrown in. I would have priced the Surface Pro at $699 with a Type Cover thrown in.

In a very crowded tablet market, I think the best way to compete with the iPad and others would be to offer a very beautiful alternative (Surface) at a very affordable price.

Microsoft should make purchasing these tablets a no brainer.

Consumers have to think a long time before they spend $1000 on anything, especially in more challenging economic times.

What about at the Enterprise Level?

I do think that the Surface Pro might do very well at the business or enterprise level.

If Microsoft is able to offer companies a really good deal on these tablets, they will do very well.

With the exception of the 4 hour battery life issue, these are the tablets that businesses have been waiting for.

I can see executives taking these on the road instead of iPads. I think for a plethora of reasons (compatibility, form factor, Windows Store, Modern UI, Security etc) it just becomes a no brainer to use these in businesses.

I think some Microsoft Enterprise sales people are going to make a LOT of money over the next calendar year.

That’s my take.

What do you guys and girls think?

Use the comments below…

Join the forum discussion on this post

Tags: Microsoft surface, POLL, Tablet, Windows 8

http://www.skyledavis.com/ S. Kyle Davis

To me, I can’t justify a Surface Pro when there are atom processor tablets like the Acer Iconia W510 for $499. It still gets me Windows 8 and is plenty powerful for my needs. And it has 9 hours of continual battery life. And even if you argue build quality, you can bump up another $100 and get in the range of Atom tablets from Samsung, Lenovo, Dell, HP…

It’s hard for me to justify the cost-value of iCore tablets. Windows should have made a “Surface 8″ or something that runs an Atom processor. I think a tablet like that in the $650-$700 range would sell a lot better than the Surface Pro will.
- voleheart
  
  ativ smart pc is perfect
  - http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
    
    Look for my Ativ review soon…
    - voleheart
      
      YEAH!!!!
    - http://www.facebook.com/darrenkgeorge Darren Kavin George
      
      hey! Christmas soon come! Lets hear it! Lol
- http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
  
  Good feedback.
  
  Thanks!
http://www.facebook.com/brenton.klassen Brenton Klassen

I rarely use the desktop on my Windows 8 PC, so I want to get RT.
- WillyThePooh
  
  Me too. I found I seldom go to desktop to start anything. My launch pad right now is through the start screen most of the time.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Robert-W-Burnham/714907265 Robert W. Burnham

When I compare the new Windows 8 tablets to all the Android tablets, I see Windows RT having more or less the same functionality as a 400 dollar Android tablet. The only benefit of a Windows RT tablet is easier integrating into my Windows-based network.

With the cheapest RT tablet being 500 dollars, is that extra benefit worth 100 dollars to me? Yes, but barely. Once we get much past 500 dollars, the benefit of an RT tablet is not worth the extra cost.

Throw in a full x86 OS and the value does go up. I am willing to pay 600-700 dollars for an x86 Windows 8 tablet. It would not be fast enough to replace my desktop, or even be much of a gaming machine, but the extra functionality of an x86 tablet would be worth the extra money.

However, even then I have my limits. 1000 dollars for a tablet? No.
- http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
  
  Unfortunately I have to agree.
  
  The $1000 number is pretty steep…
  - WillyThePooh
    
    me too. I am not using a tablet on the road and so battery life is not my deal breaker. Price is.
http://www.facebook.com/maurice.green.14855 Maurice Green

The price is competitive compared to other touch screen
slates with an i5 processor and 4 gigs of ram.
- http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
  
  That’s good feedback too.
  
  Thanks..
- http://www.facebook.com/darrenkgeorge Darren Kavin George
  
  Competitive? Its not beating the competition, it is in line with the competition.
  A 100m race isnt fun when everyone runs at the same speed!
  - Robert Kegel
    
    What tablet is the competition of the Surface Pro? Not the iphone. Not an Android device. They both use ARM processors. The RT tablet is more of competition to those. The Surface Pro will only be in competition with other tablets with similar specs and that also come with a keyboard dock and all those will be running Windows 8 so the Surface Pro is in competition with other Windows 8 tablets, so basically Microsoft is in competition with itself. They win no matter what Windows 8 tablet people buy.
Pingback: Are Microsoft Tablets the Only Option in the Enterprise? Hint: No | windows8enterprise.com
http://www.facebook.com/people/Thomas-Mehaffey/1798896724 Thomas Mehaffey

I’ll stick with the enterprise side on this one and leave the entitlement class to their $200.00 toys.

I respect your point on pricing, but the drones would be screaming that the RT is more than the ipad mini or kindle fire and the pro is the same price as the ipad. No matter what Microsoft does, the sheeple wouldn’t be happy. Cost too much, hard to learn (not surprising considering the state of stupidity in the world today), doesn’t come in a shiny box that makes me food.

They are just getting started with the tablet field, it’s like nothing else will ever come out again or at a lesser cost and they are stuck with this. I see many options for many people, with the surface and all the OEM’s coming out.

My whole look at this is, if these appletini people are so happy with their products, why are they even bothering posting on sites like this in the first place. I am perfectly happy with my technology and have never once posted on an apple forum or a android one for that matter.
- http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
  
  Yeah but it wouldn’t be credible to compare to a mini or fire.
  
  The iPad comparisons are credible and natural at those prices…
tom L.

Desktops forever / and boo to w8
- WillyThePooh
  
  win8 doesn’t equal to tablet. It could also be on a desktop.
Bender

Why did you think the results were shocking, or was that just a headline. I think the results of the poll is that common sense prevails.
- http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
  
  LOL
  
  You have a good point…
DCJason

The 4 hour battery is a deal breaker. While on the road, I’ll have to find a place to juice up my battery during my lunch break. Yeah, right. I’m not going to spend $1000+ on a Surface PRO that will make me go through that every day! As nice as the design is, I’ll be looking for an alternative….
Charles

Isn’t the Surface Pro tablet designed to be a high-end, designer product (an Apple-like, Flagship product for Windows 8 Pro) … as such, $1000 is not unreasonable or too expensive. It is also designed to not challenge too agressively (piss-off) Microsoft’s hardware partners (Asus, Acer, Dell, HP, etc, etc, etc).

I think Microsoft has the right idea with the Surface Pro tablet!

Charles
- WillyThePooh
  
  So you mean Surface Pro is not designed for our poor mass.
Tom

Any company that doesn’t
listen to their customers is bound to fail.

Let’s look at a few.

Ericsson mobile phones, ones one of
the largest mobile phone developers, didn’t saw that the market changed, and
ignored the customers wishes. They stuck with their notion that mobile phones
was for the enterprises and missed all the young people that wanted a NICE
looking phone and when they finally woke up it was to late. People had gone
elsewhere.

And now they are gone.

Nokia recognized the market change
and grew to be one of the largest phone developers. But then totally missed the
customer demand for smartphones. They are still here, but for how long?

RIM Blackberry, well what can one
say, they make absolutely superb phones, with a great design. But they don’t
seem to want to sell any phones. They totally disregard the biggest consumer
group out there. The 15 – 40 years, demographic group. People who want to be
able to buy a phone in any store just like all the other brands are selling
theirs. Without being forced to use a BB plan of any sort. Just be able to
purchase a phone and a prepaid SIM or any other SIM and carrier of their own
choice. But no they refuse. A BB on a BB plan has great security but ordinary
people just don’t care about that, that much. They want a phone and that’s it.

Well they are still here, but for how long, the end is approaching very, very
quickly. I they don’t change their policy…….well,

They will be greatly missed.

Now why am I of topic?

Well I’m not.

These three companies were the leading brand in their time, and grew to big and
disregarded the change in the consumer demographic. All three of them, focused
on the enterprise market. And even if it is very profitable in the short run.
In the long run you NEED to attract the masses, the ordinary people who buy
phones, software or hardware every year.

Microsoft is doing exactly the same thing right now. They don’t listen to their
customers.

They are slowly changing the interface in the software to look as they want it
to look and totally disregarding the user’s wishes.

The users want to be able to customize their software to their liking and not
to be stuck with what MS thinks is best for you.

A couple of examples.

- Start-button -

well everything has already been said about that, but it should have been made
optional.

Since that’s
what the users want.

- Customization –

It’s no longer possible to change windows system fonts, many, many people with
poor eyesight wants this option and they will not migrate to win8.

And many more customization options are also removed.

- Media-center -

If you buy Win8 Enterprise then you will not be able to install Windows Media
Center.

There are many, many people out there that uses WMC for presentations and are
stuck without it, and they can’t use win8Pro since there are some features in
win8enterprise, that are missing in win8pro that they in an enterprise
environment need.

And those people won’/ can’t migrate

Again, should be made optional.

Finally the surface pro

I have seen it and I really love it and I will probably buy it when it comes
out even though i don’t think that the masses will come running to buy it at
that price.

And that’s the thing even though the sales to enterprises may very well be
really profitable, it is only in the short run.

The ONLY way to make profit in the long run is to attract the masses.

Which MS has been very good at in the past, at least with their software.

Since they practically giving away win8 at the moment and the sales for the
first month, are in the vicinity of the sales of Vista. Well then I guess they
must be doing something wrong….

But don’t get me wrong I like MS, and I like win8 since most things are
customizable if you know how,

but it slowly is going in the wrong direction.

So what is the lesson here?

When a company gets to big and think that they can get away with anything such
as pricing and stop listening to their customers, well then they are on a
slippery slope.

The trust of a loyal customer is not something you get, it’s something you
earn. And to earn back a lost trust, in this business is really, really hard.

It’s actually
really easy, if the company’s gave people what they want and not what they want
them to have. Then they might stay with the brand, if they don’t get what they
want they will go elsewhere.

Any of the company’s at the top might not have ended up where they are, if only
they would have listened……to their customers

IMHO

Tom
- WillyThePooh
  
  While you may not able to change system font, but you do can change the size and bold the font. Search for “Display” in charm. You can change everything larger or a particular part such as “Title” larger.
  Search “Magnify” in charm should able to bring you the one to magnify your windows for people with poor eyesight.
  
  The best of Win8 is it doesn’t need a lot of customization to make it work but you can if you want to. Apple is more restrictive in customization and seems no one ever mention that it is no good. Actually, people like it and say it is easy to use as no customization is needed.
  For Start button, it is not an issue because you have the window button that could bring you back to start screen instantly and you could launch new apps from there. The apps you are running is still running in the background. For iPad, the one in the background actually is halted because it doesn’t support multitasking.
  - Tom
    
    This now tends to get OT, but
    
    I am aware how to enlarge the fonts but that is not the issue. There are fonts that are easier to read than the one MS forces on you. So it should be possible to choose. That is the issue not be allowed to have the option.
    
    It’s not an issue to me but there are loads of people that think it is.
    
    If you don’t want to customize your windows installation, fine, but there are, again, loads of people that want to have that option.
    
    No one forced you to customize earlier versions of windows either, that is your choice, but those who want to have that option should have that.
    
    If the start button isn’t an issue for you that’s also fine, but it is an issue to loads of people. On a tablet with a touchscreen it is not a problem with the Modern UI but on a desktop PC used for work it is a big problem.
    
    If it wasn’t why would there be such a huge demand and downloads of Start8 and other software returning the start button.
    
    Well and as for Apple.
    
    The lack of customization possibilities and compatibility issues could be among the reasons to why Apple only have about 5% of the world PC market the rest is more or less Microsoft.
    
    OK if one counts the iPads then they actually have 25% of the world market. But since the only competitor has been the Android OS and MS hasn’t been on that market it is not that surprising.
    
    But that is most certainly about to change, since win8 actually is a great OS for tablets. And compatible with almost everything out there.
    
    And to clarify, I do like MS and I do like win8 and with a bit of serious hacking you can get you win8 almost the way you want it. But that is not for everyone and I’m for that people should have the possibility making it the way they want. Without having to either buy apps that’ll do the job for them, or hacking the system. Especially not something that could have been easily included.
    
    Removing functionality for no apparent reason is just plain stupid.
    IMHO
    Tom
    - http://www.facebook.com/jpdeveau Jason Deveau
      
      I’m sure they care somewhat but this is a baby step into the multi-platform OS of the future. MS also already is rumored to be putting in the start menu, or at least an option for it in SP1. Stop harping on this stuff people. Windows 9 will see further refinement and again an excellent price point.
http://twitter.com/RexKing13 Rex King

Hi Onuora,

While I think is likely that the majority still think the price is too expensive as your poll says, I do feel like I need to critic your poll just a bit. With the only reason that a person would say no to buying it because of expense, they are left without any other way to express why they may not buy it. For example, I will not buy it, but expense is not the reason, battery is. Yet with out being able to have another outlet, I had to choose between it being too expensive and having to wait and see. I ultimately chose wait and see, when i know full well that I will not buy it. This issue has the chance of you possibly reading too much that the data doesnt truely support. Another think to be careful of in making a pole is leading answers. The choices need to be as free from bias as possible in order not to sway the participants. While this is not a huge problem with this particular poll, I still felt a twinge of it when submitting.

My personal full explanation of why I will not buy it is this. This is an ultrabook with the ability to be used as a tablet. The price of this is well within the price of an ultrabook so I see no problems here. The problem is that 4 hours of battery life makes this in no way passable as a tablet. Therefore I will either wait until a later generation or buy something else. At this point, even the RT is looking like a better option to me. I think I am looking for a balance more on the tablet side. In which an ATOM processor might be best to my task as I will likely use it 90/10 tablet/pc. Any thing that needs more horsepower can be done on my desktop.
- http://www.windows8update.com/ Onuora Amobi
  
  Great point.
  
  I should have added that reason to the poll…
Pat

Hi Onuora,

No, I bought a new HP while I could still get windows 7. Will be able to update If windows 8 turns out to be any good or thy get the bugs worked out of it.
stephen b

i would have to agree with the comments below entireley and i agree with the fact that as ive said before that microsoft are not listening they didnt listen with vista, they got it right with xp and windows 7 but have lost it with windows 8 from not listeneing the same goes with the surface pro for a lot of the reasons listed below so do we expect the next generation of microsoft tablet, mini computer and windows 9 to be the ones that are as near right as you can get it. probably, but what i would also say is that people like us and Onuora have done all we can to educate all these companies to listen to the users and build something they want not what they want them to have. so im afraid to say im sticking with my own build computer with windows 7 and mini computer and my android phone.
Alexander Rogers

but why in the world would i pay that much for a surface when i can either a) get an ipad for less.. or b) get a macbook pro 13 inch that can run windows and mac and do so much more for only like less than $50 more 0.0
- http://www.facebook.com/jpdeveau Jason Deveau
  
  Alex, I dont think alot of the Windows fans here would even consider a mac. Myself included.
- pryne
  
  ipad doesn’t run full OSX apps and is too expensive for just being a limited tablet. a macbook pro doesn’t have a touchscreen.
tom L.

Desktops forever / like where’s the remote dear? LOL
http://www.facebook.com/darrenkgeorge Darren Kavin George

I teLl you what man. I am sorely disappointed. Amazon sold their Kindle Fire at a loss. Windows overpriced their surfaces. Whats the result? Kindles sold out. Surfaces flopped out. I went black friday shopping, apple store was rammed. I didnt even see a surface anywhere. Lame. lAme. LaMe. lamE. LAME.

The surface pro is 64bit though, and thats the major selling point. However, the Elitepad 900 has a 16:10 screen which makes for a better experience for what I need, and it has great accessories, and is cheaper. So I am having an extremely difficult time justifying a surface pro. Again, Onoura, you are 100% accurate on price. I wpuld easily pay $700-$800 if I got the type cover with it. $900 with a type cover, I woulf even stretch for.
Whats the point of spending 1billion on marketing? Big fail
http://www.facebook.com/jpdeveau Jason Deveau

how can they price surface like this with things like the nexus 10 at half the price? I want an RT or 8 tablet but this is out of my price range for multiple reasons. 1, I could get another better stats tablet for 2/3 the price. 2, its just too expensive. 3, at this price IT SHOULD AT LEAST HAVE AN SD SLOT. oh and it should predict the future or something. cause $1050 is way too much.
- pryne
  
  Both Surface devices have memory expansion slots, or did I misunderstand your statement. I apologize if I did.
http://www.facebook.com/jmveilex Jean Michel Veilex

then again there isn’t a single PC tablet cheaper than that on the market so why should they be cheaper….. they’ll get early adopters and when the cost goes down and the adoption of win 8 on more conventional product will spread the price will go down and more people will buy…..
I love how since apple and smartphones and dumbtablet… everybody thinks a product should sell like hot cake on release date…. that is not true in the real computer world…. new/high tech never sells well at first….. look at LCD monitors, laser mouse, touch screen for real PCs, high end CPU, graphic cards, high end RAM format, wi fi norms, storage technologies…. none of them in the computer world break record sales on day one absolutely NONE ZERO NADA…. so why people try to make it look like it should be different for surface pro…..
this a rather new tech with only 2 other competitors that I know of… Samsung series 7 slate and the asus transformer which both are inferior and in about the same price range which makes surface actually a bargain in comparaison…. people are just getting confused between markets IMO… smartphones and tablet market can’t be compared between each othe and even less with an emerging market such as PC tablets…..
Robert Kegel

I think Microsoft should do what they did with the Xbox 360. Take a loss and make money on store purchases. Other than that Surface Pro is competing with Ultrabooks which are about seem to be between $800 and $1000+ (although most ultrabooks have 13 inch screens are larger, but they also don’t have touch screens).

About RT well I wrote an article what I think they should have done with that and I’m going to stick to it.

The shocking results of our Microsoft Surface Pro Poll

What would I sell the Microsoft Surface for?

What about at the Enterprise Level?

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The shocking results of our Microsoft Surface Pro Poll

What would I sell the Microsoft Surface for?

What about at the Enterprise Level?

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