Today my employer hosted an internal conference and Microsoft just happened to be there which I wasn’t expecting. Specifically, they were there showing off Windows 8 running on a Samsung Series 7 11.6” tablet. I had ran the Developer Preview of Windows 8 on my older HP tablet which was an OK experience but the hardware was not optimized for Windows 8.
The Series 7 is designed for Windows 7 but I have to say that the early experience was impressive. The hardware is not as portable as my iPad but I consider this tablet to be a different use case than the iPad. MS had a wireless keyboard and the very stylish and sleek docking port for the tablet. I quickly imagined this being my portable solution. I’m actually tempted to get the existing setup running Windows 7. My current laptop is more of a desktop replacement machine and every time I travel I wish I had something along the lines of an ultrabook but the flexibility of a tablet.
My early experience with Windows 8 running on this tablet was pretty nice. The MS rep pulled out his phone and compared the Metro interface on the Windows 8 Phone to the Metro Interface running on the tablet. He spoke to a couple of use cases with factory workers and integration with ERP applications. It is a compelling story from an enterprise support and application development perspective.
I’m looking forward to getting a couple of these in the lab and really stretching it out a bit. I’m really interested in the Intel platform and seeing how end users actually take to these devices and what type of real world battery life they get.
