sounds plausible
Whatever the 'holiday seasnon' effect, good to remember iPad was launched in March, same with iPad 2 and 3 so I wouldn't be hasty like some to mark WOA October as a potential fail point for Microsoft.
In fact a deferred launch with a flagship WOA tablet or ten in March/April 2013 would make a lot of sense. By that time Tegra 4 based tablets vs. iPad 4 could be an interesting competition and WOA would avoid the 'catch up' aura of Android in the tablet space that might attach to an October launch.
Surely Microsoft will have finally decided on a brand name for WOA by Summer so vendors could do something for October, at least to target developers. Hard to see room for a hit product so early. Personally I'm not interested in WOA until theres a quad-core iPad competitor unless I need one for WOA dev. work and not holding breath on that.
As far as x86 Win8 tablets/convertables before Christmas, pricing and specs are still complete unknowns so dteailed speculation pretty fruitless. A product with thought out spec. and aggressive priicing for holiday season could be a game changer but given the Ultrabook debacle hard not to be sceptical whether PC vendors have learned yet what needs to be done to make a successful x86 tablet. Also, Intel need to bring 22nm into thespace before the Win8 tablet platform can really shine on x86, as with WOA a matter for 2013.
Next year should be interesting, not least because of heavy pressure on Apple to change the yearly update model that has worked so well and pushed stock into the stratosphere. .