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Gateway's
M1200 Tablet PC, will you
want to buy one?
by Sam R. Clemens, Reviews Manager
April 29, 2003
The Gateway Tablet PC was generally received as having excellent manufacturing quality and ease of use. Everyone wanted to play with it and try it out. The curiosity level was amongst the highest I’ve seen for technology toys I’ve brought in to share. Unfortunately the very high price was a unanimous put down with just about everyone too.
Of the fifty-two students and faculty members I polled “would you buy a (any brand) Tablet PC?” Thirty-eight said no, eight said maybe someday, five said they would if the price came down a lot and one said yes.
Our Editor Keith Benicek, does a radio show in Los Angeles on KABC-AM and they ran a poll of their weekend listeners. The results were even worse; no one would buy a (any brand) Tablet PC. Has Microsoft over estimated the market? Is there even a market?
Would
you buy any Tablet PC? Our radio listener Poll
Click
on images for enlargements
Is this why you just
don’t see the Tablet PC promoted or advertised much if at all, except
Gateway? On recent expeditions to local CompUSA’s, Microcenter and
Fry’s we checked the displays, you just don’t see any Tablet
PC’s of any brand.
We think that Microsoft has strong-armed a lot of companies into coming out with a Tablet PC, and we also fell they have done so grudgingly. We also think that this decade’s incarnation of the “Microsoft Tablet PC” will be another flop, and it won’t be because of excellent hardware like Gateway’s Tablet PC M1200. It may be just an answer to a consumer question not asked.
Conclusion
–
We all loved the Gateway Tablet PC M1200. It is well thought out and beautifully
manufactured, our top choice of all the Tablet PC’s we’ve
seen. But, the price is prohibitively high for many potential buyers that
this computers evolution is intended for, even though you do get a heck
of a lot of hardware for the dollars you will spend.
| Tech-edge E-zine Rating: |  |
Tech Lab® gives the Gateway Tablet PC M1200 five thumbs up, but we give Microsoft Windows XP Tablet PC Edition, only two. We recommend that you consider the Gateway Tablet PC when you purchase. |
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