Microsoft slashes price of Surface RT

We all suspected that Microsoft's Surface was selling badly and now we have had confirmation. The company has slashed the price and not by a bit, but by a huge margin. Here in the UK the 32GB Surface RT was £399, but now it is just £279 (including VAT, the tax we pay on goods). Why is it not selling when tablets are so popular?

There are many reasons of course, and the price is just one factor. Selling it at the same price as the iPad when it offers less is a bad idea. The iPad is now a mature product with hundreds of thousands of fantastic apps and support from all the top software developers. The Surface has much less support and far fewer apps.

Windows 8 is a problem too. Microsoft has a vision of one operating system to rule them all, one operating system that runs on everything and everywhere - Windows. Astonishingly, the dream began as far back as 2001 when Windows XP was launched. It had tablet components built in, but tablets back then were little more than laptops with the screen folded flat. They weighed several pounds, were heavy to carry, and the touch screen was nothing like what we have today. Windows tablets were awful and never caught on.

More than a decade later Microsoft is still trying to create a Windows operating system that runs everywhere and on everything. Windows 8 achieves this and it runs both on the Surface RT tablet and desktop PCs. The problem is that it is a jack of all trades and master of none.

Windows 8 is strange on desktop PCs because it has a tablet interface which is at odds with the usual Windows desktop experience and some people don't like it. The Surface RT has problems too and it is possible to get to the traditional Windows desktop, in a limited sort of way. This is equally confusing and it is like running a desktop OS on a tablet.

What are people to expect from a tablet that runs Windows 8? It is confusing and what's more, it contains a lot of code that is unnecessary, leading to bloat that sucks the life out of the hardware. The Surface has to have 32GB of memory because the OS consumes so much whereas the iPad and Android tablets work happily with 16GB. I even have an early Nexus 7 with just 8GB of memory and it's fine.

I think Microsoft's vision of one OS is wrong. At the new lower price point I think the Surface RT will definitely generate more interest, but I doubt if it will generate sufficient to survive in the long term. It needs to sell millions to survive and I can see it quietly being scrapped after a year or two.

The Surface Pro is a different kettle of fish and it is more like an ultra light laptop with a detachable screen. It definitely has a future for people that want a tablet/laptop hybrid. Here Windows 8 makes sense and you can run desktop applications when the keyboard is attached and use it as a tablet when you pull the screen off. It is a neat idea that deserves to do well.

The Surface RT even at its new price point will continue to struggle because of cheap Android tablets and the better iPad. It is surely the beginning of the end for this device.