When Microsoft announced the Surface tablet (it officially called it a PC) back in June, it peaked the interest of many techies. At the same time, there was some question of how serious this was after not announcing availability or even letting journalists play with the prototypes. Since then there’s been lots of rumors and speculations. Tuesday, Microsoft made the Windows RT version of the tablet available for pre-order for a October 26th delivery date.
The tablet, will initially be available in 32 and 64GB versions. The 32GB without a touch cover is $499. Models bundled with black touch covers are $599 for 32GB and $699 for the 64GB. The colored versions of the cover are $119 extra and the more laptop-esque type cover is $129 extra.
For the final hardware, the Surface has a 10.6” 1366×768 16:9 screen. That’s high definition by TV video standards and typical for a small ultrabook, but if you’re looking for a retina-type display, this isn’t it. The CPU is an ARM-compatible NVIDIA Tegra 3 T30 quad core at 1.4ghz and it has 2GB of system memory. One interesting note is that while there is a MicroSDXC slot, it is officially listed as a reader. Until these actually get into users hands, we won’t know if this slot augments system storage like it does on Android smartphones and tablets or if the hybrid OS treats it like a computer would.
As of right now, there do not seem to be any retailers lined up to carry the Surface, so the only place to order one would be Microsoft’s online store. If you’re interested in the Intel-powered and Windows 8 equipped Surface Pro, that device is still MIA. Perhaps we’ll find out more on October 26th.
Geekbeat coverage of Surface Event
I was excited when they were first announced. Now after seeing the price, I have no interest at all especially when it doesnt even come with the keyboard.