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Microsoft Surface, it’s new and shiny

Posted in Microsoft on June 15, 2007 at 8:10 pm

Went to the Microsoft site today, and on the home page saw “Microsoft Surface The future of computing is at your fingertips”. As I said in the title, it looked shiny and new, so I clicked it.

It looked like the usual MS launch of ’something new’ as it was a page with little on it except for a flash object it the middle.

But I must admit the product on the page intrigued me, I do believe if MS Surface is aimed at the right people and lives up to it’s promise it could really be something exciting!

I should explain…

The Microsoft Surface, is exactly what it says it is. Its a 30inch Surface created by Microsoft. The Surface is basically a table, and a touchscreen with something extra. The touchscreen allows you to ‘grab’ objects like photo’s, music tracks, menu items and more, with just your finger. The screen is not a standard touch screen where you can only touch the screen in one place at a time, it is able to recognise multiple ‘grabs’ and objects at once.

The “something extra” I mentioned earlier is that you can place objects on to the Surface, and it will be recognised via the built in Bluetooth adapter. You should be able to put your PDA and your camera on the Surface and drag photo’s from your camera to your PDA.

The virtual concierge service also seems quite interesting, you can use the Surface to plan a route, and send it to your PDA. This could be an interesting feature.

As I said before, I think the surface could really do well, if Microsoft can create worthy applications and genuine uses for it. I like the idea of it being in bars/restaurants and customers being able to make there order using the Surface, but how practical it is remains to be seen.

There is one other thing that could make or break the surface, the price. Microsoft don’t seem to give an idea of the price of the Surface on the site.

If you like the sound of the surface, you can see it for yourself at http://www.microsoft.com/surface/