A few months back, I discussed my first impressions of Windows 8, Microsoft's daring update to the operating system that runs the vast majority of the planet's personal computers. I concluded that Windows 8 was not a necessary upgrade for people who have Windows 7 machines, but was a great choice for a laptop, and that even without a touchscreen enabled screen, it featured a lively and useful interface.
But I had little personal experience dealing with Windows 8 with touch or on a tablet. I've since bought my own Windows 8-based tablet from Asus. I also was loaned a Microsoft Surface RT tablet for a few weeks. Would I recommend Windows 8 tabs, which have not been selling well in the market? Yes. No. Maybe.
Touch by itself is great. Touch combined with keyboard and mouse is fantastic. Windows 8 likely does that combination better than anything else on the market. You may or may not need that combination.
I started this column in my neighbourhood cafe using my Asus tablet paired with a portable Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. And it was excellent being able to move back and forth between mouse and keyboard and touch controls to interact with the tablet, especially when using Word. The physical keyboard made creating text easy, while the ability to touch the screen to multitask between programs and scroll, pinch and zoom was a joy.
I finished this column at home by connecting the tablet to my non-touch monitor but still using the keyboard and mouse. I immediately missed being able to touch the screen. I was hooked on touch, but I also wanted a real keyboard and mouse.
Ideally this is the future of our computing devices, where we have the choice to use whatever control interface - keyboard, mouse, touch, or even voice at some future date - makes sense for the need of the moment. Call it "touch plus." Windows 8 tries very hard to move us to that future. The problem for you as a consumer is a) do you need that future right now; b) what kind of device to buy if you do.
What you choose depends on price, preference and need, and as always with Windows, choices range from really cool to awful. My own setup of tablet, keyboard and mouse slides nicely into a 10-inch storage bag. It fits my needs of being light, portable and most of all flexible. I can use the tablet by itself to surf the web on the sofa, connect it to my TV to watch Netflix, or I can take out the keyboard and mouse, set it up on my kitchen table and turn my tablet into a capable productivity machine.
But it's not necessarily economical. The tablet cost me $400 on sale, which is $100 less than any Windows tablet available on the market right now. The Bluetooth keyboard and mouse cost me another $150. Add this up and you are spending as much, if not more, than an average Windows 8 laptop, which is more powerful and might suit your needs better.
Windows 8 tablets come in two flavours of operating system, the RT version and the full Windows 8 version. RT is cheaper, but can't run legacy software not designed specifically for Windows 8. Yes, that's confusing.
The RT tablets are closest to the iPad in function and ability, but have a lot fewer apps available, which makes the iPad a superior tablet experience. But they do come helpfully pre-installed with productivity programs like Word. The Surface also has the best tablet-based keyboard out there.
The tablets with the full version of Windows 8 are laptops in tablet form. They might look like iPads but are far more powerful. They are expensive but versatile.
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