It seems to be celebration time for IT gadget makers. Be it HP, Dell, Samsung or any other top IT products vendor, it is time to launch a product or a slew of them equipped with Windows 8.
As Microsoft slated the Windows launch for today, gadget makers have worked overtime to ready a product to mark the worldwide launch of the new computer operating system (OS). No one wants to be left behind. The most interesting of the products is a hybrid PC, the computer that doubles as a laptop and a tablet. You simply flip the display area, and your laptop turns into a tablet.
It, however, will take a couple of months for these products to hit the Indian market.
HP’s notebook portfolio, with the new OS, includes a hybrid PC (HP ENVY x2), an Ultrabook (HP SpectreXT TouchSmart Ultrabook) and notebooks with slim designs. While the hybrid product is priced at $850, the ultrabook is pegged at $1,400 in the US market.
Dell has already started begun taking pre-orders for its XPS 12 hybrid PC. It showcased it too at select meetings in the US for analysts and channel partners. “You don’t need to carry your laptop and tablet any longer. You just carry this, you can enjoy the best of both worlds,” a Dell executive told this correspondent, giving a preview of the device at San Francisco last week.
“How many computers can you carry each time you travel? You have to have your laptop for attending to relatively bigger jobs and your tablet to quickly keep in touch with the world. This hybrid PC would solve that problem,” he said.
Samsung, which is tapping multiple platforms to increase its market share, too has lined up smartphones and notebooks built on Windows 8. While launching the Galaxy Note 2 last month, Asim Warsi, Vice-President (Marketing – Mobile Business) of Samsung, promised that the company would come out with a Windows 8 tablet around the launch of the new OS.