Ah. Well, yes. Aside from storage, comparing specs across platforms is a bit suspect since the different OS's perform differently. I agree with you there.

On a tablet? Not really. Most have plenty of proprietary issues that make changing software quite hard. Depends on the manufacturer quite a bit as well.

I have no fewer than 25 ROMs to choose from for my tablet that would work just fine. Guess it depends on what you consider to be "quite hard."

ASUS, Google offer monetary compenstation for Nexus 7 tablets bought before price drop

By Joe Pollicino http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.en...writer_rss.gif posted Nov 9th 2012 4:47PM

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget..../11/18-pm.jpeg

Bought yourself a shiny new Nexus 7 before just before the priced dropped on October 29th and feel a bit slighted? ASUS and Google want to turn your frown upside down, each offering their own compensation. Folks in Europe who purchased any variant of the tablet from ASUS prior to October 30th are eligible to a redeem a 25-pound or 30-euro coupon for its online shop. Apparently, the deal has been in place since October 30th, and you'll have until the 30th of this month to submit your proof of purchase (from sanctioned dealers, naturally) and apply. Sure, it may not be as nice as a Google Play credit for apps or cash in-pocket, but at least ASUS is showing it can share at least some love for early adopters. Europeans should move their cursors over to the ASUS source link below for all the details.
Tracking back to Google, Droid-Life notes that Google's price protection policy might have you covered for some cash-back, as well. If you purchased the 16GB model from Google Play between the 14th and the 29th of October, you have until about the 13th of this month to get a refund for the price difference (15 days from the initial price drop). As always, check out the Google link below for more details.

Fair enough. I guess I don't really consider that changing the software. How many of those 25 ROMS are nothing more than minor modifications to the stock ROM or AOSP?

Maybe I don't understand what you're getting at. What types of software changes are you referring to if you're not talking about different ROMs and apps?

Kind of curious about the Nook Color deal for my kids. Has anyone installed the ICS or JB ROM on this? HOw well does it perform?

Regardless of your platform of choice, I can honestly say that after using an iPad Mini for a week, I'm starting to think that the 7-8" size range is quite possibly the ideal size for tablets. At least for when it comes to content consumption.

I stopped by the apple store this morning and checked it out. I would agree.

I think my next iPad may be this size but with a retina display. I've got a 27" iMac with 32GB of RAM and a fusion drive to take care of first though.

A buddy and I stopped at B&N last night to look at Nooks for his dad. We were looking at their newest models, and they were just odd. The touch interface did not perform well. You could try swiping or tapping and many times the device did not act accordingly. It could be that changing the OS would help, but it was bizarre.

I'm not referring to the new ones. Just the Nook Color that is being clearanced. This is just for a kid.

Yeah, that's why I noted it was the new one. I just happened to have that experience last night and thought I would note it.

<header id="article-header" class="photo instapaper_ignore " style="display: block; border-bottom-style: none; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; width: 321.20001220703125px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 27.493331909179688px; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); background-position: 100% 100%; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat;">Surface Pro's $899 Price Tag Aimed At Businesses, Not You
Mark Hachman yesterdayhttp://readwrite.com/files/styles/80..._surface_1.png
</header><section id="article-content" class="instapaper_body" style="display: block; margin-bottom: 0px; zoom: 1; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 27.493331909179688px; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> Microsoft has priced its Surface Pro Windows 8 tablet, due in January, at about the same level as an ultrabook - only without that pesky keyboard.

In a blog post, Microsoft Surface chief Panos Panay revealed the price: $899 for a Surface Pro with Windows 8 and 64GB of flash storage, and $999 for the 128GB version. That's consistent with what Microsoft indicated at the Surface launch this past summer: that the Surface RT would be priced on par with rival tablets, and that the Surface Pro, which includes an Intel Core processor like the ones used by the majority of PCs and uses a standard version of the Windows 8 operating system, would be priced comparably with an ultrabook.
There's a minor gotcha, though: While each Surface Pro version will include the new Surface Pen stylus, they won't include either a Touch Cover or Type Cover, meaning that users will have to shell out an additional $119 for the Touch Cover or $129 for the Type Cover with the more fully-formed keyboard. Users can also buy (or may already own) a third-party Bluetooth keyboard.

For reference, the Microsoft Surface RTwith 32GB of storage without a cover was priced at $499, while adding a Touch Cover bumped it to $599. The 64GB version of the Windows RT Surface, with a black Touch Cover, is $699. That was slightly less the Apple iPad with the Retina Display, which costs $499 for a 16GB version, and $599 for a 32GB model. Both cost more than a number of Android tablets, however.

Surface Pro Is A Keyboard-Less Ultrabook

But when you think about the Surface Pro, you need to think about ultrabooks as much as tablets. From a specifications perspective, the Surface Pro compares well to a notebook: It has a Intel Core i5 processor, which gives a graphics boost to the Surface Pro's 10.6-inch, 16:9 ClearType touchscreen running at 1920 x 1080 resolution. It also includes a Mini DisplayPort to drive an external display up to 2560 x 1440 resolution, plus Bluetooth and a full-size USB 3.0 port.
Oddly enough, the Swedish site Webhallen took a lot of heat earlier this year forpublishing what it thought would be the expected price of the Surface Pro: just over $800, with other models priced significantly higher. And you know - it turns out they were right on the money.
"It’s clear with the Surface Pro pricing Microsoft is targeting notebooks, not tablets," Patrick Moorhead, principal analyst with Moor Insights, said in an email to ReadWrite. "Very few people will pay $899 for a tablet but they will for a notebook. The Surface Pro with the Type Cover makes a very nice compact and light solution."

"I’ve given up on having Surface RT compete with an iPad," Moorhead added. "To do that, it would need to be priced at $699. But it isn’t. Therefore, I am looking at it through the new lens of a notebook. Microsoft won’t sell nearly as many at $899 as they would at $699, and overall, they won’t sell many."

That means that our earlier analysis is still in play. Sarah Rotman Epps, a consumer and mobile analyst for Forrester Research, said in July that Microsoft could be worried about competing with its manufacturing partners like Asus or Dell. One way to avoid that problem, she said, would be to price the Surface high enough to avoid direct competition.
“Keeping the price point of the Surface high limits the threat to Microsoft’s OEM [original equipment manufacturing] partners,” Rotman Epps said. “At a $1,000 price point, this won’t be a mass market product, but it will still have the desired effect of exciting consumers and inspiring OEMs to do more with hardware design for Windows 8.”

The Case For The Surface Pro

Earlier this year, I made the case for the Surface Pro as the ultimate business tablet. The Surface Pro has little competition in that arena. The iPad is being used in some corporate environments, but what pressure both might have felt from specifically business-oriented products like the Cisco Cius and RIM PlayBook have largely evaporated.

While I didn't know the price at the time, that's largely immaterial: Once you start aligning a product with corporate budgets, products begin to be measured less on price than on feature sets, especially as the value of the employee using it increases. The included digitizer pen will also satisfy content creators and other creative types; the tablet includes a "Palm Block" technology that will allow users to rest their hands on the tablet.

The most important aspect of the Surface Pro is its ability to run Windows; my recenttrip to Dubai to explore Windows 8 applications revealed that yes, companies are developing apps for Windows 8, and some are using Windows RT. But it simply costs less to develop an app for one Windows platform, especially where legacy, Windows 7-era apps are involved.

The question, of course, is whether or not Microsoft truly wants to sell its own tablets, clear out space for its hardware partners or essentialy offer another premioum service in the vein of the Microsoft Signature experience, where the company will sell you a notebook free of the third-party bloatware that hardware partners often load.

NPD released some unsettling news on Thursday: Third-party Windows 8 tablets are virtually non-existent at 1% of all retail sales from mid-October to mid-November, and Windows device sales are down 21% overall from a year ago (see Is Windows 8 Winning? Microsoft Say Yes; Data Say No). A super-expensive Surface Pro won't help those numbers. But if companies are looking for a Windows 8 tablet for professional use, the Surface Pro will still likely be their number one choice.
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I made the trek to the Microsoft store yesterday and spent some time with the Surface. Random thoughts and observations below.

- More employees at the Microsoft store than shoppers and I didn't see anyone walk out of the store with something they purchased.
- I had no less than four people attack me when I came in asking if I needed help.
- While I messed around with the low-end keyboard cover I listened to an employee talk to some potential buyers. They were asked at one point how someone would get stuff onto the surface and the guy said "you put everything into your Skydrive account" as if they should know what that was. When they were getting ready to leave he aggressively said "are you considering an iPad?" They responded that they were and he says "The thing about the Surface is that you're not limited by anything. The iPad is for entertainment only so if you want to do anything like work or writing then you should get a Surface."

They looked at him with a very puzzled look and walked out.

- I asked to see the other keyboard and the same guy directed me to a station with one and told me to open Word. That's a pet peeve of mine since I hate Word with the power of a thousand suns.

- The Surface doesn't come with FDE (full disc encryption) enabled by default. That's a big oversight if you ask me for a device like this.

- At setup, the first user is an administrator.

- The RT version doesn't have most of the other Windows 8 Intel stuff removed. Lots of references in the registry to Intel drivers and such.

- I asked about putting it into disc mode, as I'm interested in what it would take to pull an image of one. The tech said he didn't know and after I told him why I was interested he told me that the RT tablets have been a real problem for them. Since x86 code won't execute, none of their internal support tools work. That means that if someone comes in with a problem tablet, they just swap it out.

It's easy to poke fun at that, only to have any number of folks on here point out that this is what happens with a borked iPad. The difference, though, is that this is much more local storage centric. I'm sure that one of the coached selling points is that Windows should make it more serviceable, when at this point it's really not.

- The low end keyboard isn't all that great. I'd put it on par with typing on the screen.

- The high end keyboard was nicer, but not nearly as good of an experience as using my Apple Bluetooth keyboard with my iPad.

- To get a feel for it, I wrote out a couple simple HTML pages the old fashioned way. In Notepad. I bring this up since tons power users (not muggles who think Word is the only way to type a document) would want a real editor like Sublime, UltraEdit or Notepad++. Of course none of that should be expected to work on the RT version...and those developers would have to develop Metro versions. That seems like something outside the scope of what the developers I just listed would want to do. If anyone would, it would be Sublime because it's all new code and cross platform but the Metro UI restrictions would make it tough for them to do so efficiently.

- If you're using it as a laptop replacement and plan on using the touch cover a lot, I hope you're the right height. The angle at which the Surface sits with the kickstand obviously is not adjustable from what I could see.

- Since I was Christmas shopping I didn't have my notes on the Registry changes in Win8 with me so I can't speak to the new artifacts that have been created in there for the Metro style apps.

Overall I think it's a neat little piece of hardware, but it still falls into a gap without a market.

And in regards to the Surface Pro, by the way, that would cost as much as an 11" MacBook Air. The Verge seems to think that it's the best ultrabook to use if you're running Windows.