Bloomberg reported that Microsoft won't have a true offering for the tablet until late next year, after the third version of Apple's iPad is expected to come to market and other Android tablets debut, sources told the wire service.
The report is not altogether surprising; in January Microsoft announced that Windows 8 would also be ported to ARM, the processor architecture that powers the majority of phones and tablets today, including the A-series chips from Apple. Microsoft has also used Windows XP (including a Tablet PC edition) and Windows 7 as tablet OSes, although they have also been used on desktop and mobile PCs.
Microsoft representatives declined to comment.
The report comes as market research Gartner lowered its forecast for PCs in 2011 and 2012 on Thursday, a revised projection based on what the firm called a "lack of enthusiasm" for mobile PCs.
Worldwide PC shipments are now forecast to reach 387.8 million units in 2011, a 10.5 percent increase from 2010, according to Gartner's preliminary forecast released Thursday. This is down from Gartner's previous projection of 15.9 percent growth this year. Gartner expects worldwide PC shipments to total 440.6 million units in 2012, a 13.6 percent jump where Gartner previously expected a 14.8 percent increase.
Gartner identified tablets as the primary reason for its lower forecast, but also said that other mobile devices, such as phones, are now stepping in and replacing the functionality traditionally enjoyed by the tablet PC.
"We expect growing consumer enthusiasm for mobile PC alternatives, such as the iPad and other media tablets, to dramatically slow home mobile PC sales, especially in mature markets," said George Shiffler, research director at Gartner, in a statement. "We once thought that mobile PC growth would continue to be sustained by consumers buying second and third mobile PCs as personal devices. However, we now believe that consumers are not only likely to forgo additional mobile PC buys but are also likely to extend the lifetimes of the mobile PCs they retain as they adopt media tablets and other mobile PC alternatives as their primary mobile device. Overall, we now expect home mobile PCs to average less than 10 percent annual growth in mature markets from 2011 through 2015."
Microsoft is generally tight-lipped about its operating system releases.
But in an Oct. 22 blog post from Microsoft Netherlands, the writer noted: "Furthermore, Microsoft is on course for the next version of Windows. But it will take about two years before 'Windows 8' is on the market."
Apparently, the lines were written as an afterthought to a commemorative entry about Windows 7's first anniversary, but was picked up, translated, and posted by winrumors.com. CNet also posted a screen grab from the blog.
This would mean at least three years between versions since Microsoft launched Windows 7 in October 2009, roughly two and a half years after its predecessor, Vista.
The blog post was later edited to remove all references to Windows 8.
Source: pcmag
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