back to article Windows 8 fondleslabs rock up on eBay

Can't wait to touch and poke a Windows 8 fondleslab? Well now you can, but it'll cost you big bucks. A trio of Samsung tablets running the developer preview of Windows 8, which were dished out to 5,000 attendees of Microsoft's BUILD Conference, have popped up on auction site eBay. Microsoft has not yet given a release date …

COMMENTS

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  1. Ed 11

    A fool...

    ... and his money are easily parted.

    1. Giles Jones Gold badge

      Competitive advantage

      You think?

      Perhaps a little optimistic, but those wishing to get ahead of the competition but are unable to get the software will want to have a look.

      1. JarekG
        Facepalm

        You can get the software for free from buildwindows.com

  2. Arrrggghh-otron

    Andoid?

    Has Cyanogen started work on the Android port yet?

  3. Andy Watt

    This is excellent news!

    I for one welcome our new Apple-business-model Micro$oft. They've managed to find a way to start the meme that their fondleslabs are _even more expensive_ than iPads, and do it via a (sort of) product leak!

    Great stuff, and nobody needs to get arrested to make it work.

  4. Michael Habel

    Haven't Microsoft a history of crippling there Devices

    I see to recall a story, not to long ago in fact, [url]http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/07/wp7_update_hack/[/url]

    Where Microsoft nuked their users who dared to put a Tow over the line,

    While I can appreciate the sentiment of being first, +3,000(insert Currency of choice HERE).

    Seems to me nothing more the having to much Money and not enough Cents...

  5. Blarkon

    Works fine on an ASUS EP121

    Win 8 Dev works great on the ASUS EP 121 fondleslap which is substantially cheaper than what these people are paying for a Win 8 touchscreen. Has very similar specs as well.

    1. Steve Knox

      "fondleslap"!?

      Cheeky devil!

  6. Rikster

    Apples & well never mind ...

    You can’t really say that this tablet PC is has similar specs to an iPad, it’s like comparing a Porsche 911 to an F1 Ferrari. A Porsche 911is fast and for the consumer, but an F1 Ferrari is not mass produced and is not designed for the road.

    Back to the point, The Windows 8 Build Developer Tablet, is exactly that, a developer tablet. Its for the track not the road. Plus it has quite higher specs than an iPad. Sandy Bridge Core i5. 4gb DDR3 USB HDMI . . .

    As regards the price, is it really that unreasonable, the meerkats toys that you get when signing up for insurance from comparethemarket.com sell on ebay for around £150. Exclusive free stuff always sells on the ol’ bay for a lot more than its true value. But thats life . . .

    1. RegKees

      and to keep it all running, you get a nice noisy fan...

      Come next year, W8 obviously cannot afford to require a Ferrari anymore. (and it won't)

      But the problem for the iPad's competition so far has been that Apple has build a Porsche at the price point of a Toyota. It's hard to tell what MS's OS can do to break this, other than sponsoring the hardware. With Apple having more cash at hand than MS now, it's a steep road up.

  7. Semaj

    What I want to Know

    Will we be able to format these devices and reinstall windows if required or buy a version of them without the os (hence saving a few quid) and use our (legitimately acquired) existing licences that we have from (for example) Technet?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      without the os

      > or buy a version of them without the os

      It seems to me that you can. This one comes with Android and with a 'trial licence' for Windows. Presumably it would be priced 'to teh moon' if they included Windows and Office. I wonder how many they caught having to fork out another few $hundred for what they thought they had bought.

      I see they have dropped the price from $NZ826+15%GST by $NZ300. Who would pay the original price when an iPad can be had for that, and you don't have to separately pay for OS software. Battery life ???

      http://www.digitaltek.co.nz/categories/10-inch-android-tablet-pc/winpad-p100-dual-os-10-166ghz-2gb-32gb

      """ ----------------

      Dual OS Android 2.2 10" 1.66GHZ 2GB 32GB

      New Model: Slim Body, Less Weight.

      Specifications:

      Android 2.2 OS

      Windows 7 Ultimate (Evaluation Version, No License)

      """ ----------------

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    winning bidder's username...

    s_jobs

  9. Nate Amsden

    no ARM yet huh

    kind of surprising, would not of expected these tablets to be running Intel core i5 processors but rather some variant of ARM..

  10. Doug 3

    gawd, not even close to the iPad specs

    that thing is a beast and even thinking there was any comparison to an iPad shows either ignorance or a lame attempt at clicks because of the inclusion of the iPad name.

    FYI, that beast runs an Intel Core i5-2467M 1.6GHz dual core CPU, 4GB RAM, and 64GB SSD.

    if you think Intel's Core i5 are comparable to Apples ARM A5 you need to go back to school.

    1. John Herz
      Unhappy

      And battery?

      With an i5, I wonder what the battery life is?

    2. Gordon 10

      Weight?

  11. Andus McCoatover
    Windows

    Premium price for Microsoft fiddling

    Shouldn't that be..

    Premium price for Microsoft diddling?

    Sorry, missus, didn't see you were otherwise engaged..

  12. Jolyon Smith

    Battery?

    I imagine it uses an out-board battery to supplement the on-board device, using a flexible power delivery interconnect to attach to the external battery pack.

    Sounds irksome, but the upside is that the external battery is pervasive with connection points on most walls in every home, office and hotel.

    :)

  13. Goat Jam
    FAIL

    Core i5 + 4GB RAM + 64GB SSD

    Yep, pretty much minimum requirements to run a MS OS these days.

    I predict that when Win8 tablets ship they will ALL be highly specc'ed devices like this one that are heavy, expensive and have really crappy battery life.

    The often promised inexpensive and lightweight ARM tablets will be "real soon now" for a year or two, only to be embarrassingly canceled to be remembered as yet another technical failure on the part of a company who have clearly lost their mojo ( which happened back in the early 2000's, natch)

    The sooner MS get back to their core business (patent trolling) the better.

    1. E 2

      Almost

      I'm finding that after approx 8 months of updates from MS, my Win7/64 C:\Windows directory tree is hitting 40+ GB (well actually that's Win7/64 + Visual Studio 2010 OS cruft). So I'm not at all sure a 64 GB SDD is big enough!

  14. E 2

    There's a sucker

    born every day!

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