Acer Announces First 8-inch Windows 8 Tablet Priced at $379

By Jane McEntegart
published

It's the first, but it won't be the last.

Rumors of smaller form-factor Windows 8 tablets have been doing the rounds for months. This week at Computex 2013, Acer announced the world's first 8-inch Windows 8 tablet. Dubbed the Acer Iconia W3, the 8.1-inch tablet boasts a 1280 x 800 display and runs on Intel's dual-core 1.8 GHz Z2760 Atom processor.

 

It also has micro-HDMI and Micro-USB ports, MicroSD, 32 GB or 64 GB of storage, a front-facing camera, a rear-facing camera (both 2-megapixels),  Bluetooth 4.0 and 802.11b/g/n. Most interestingly, Acer is also bundling Microsoft Office Home & Student 2013 with the laptop. The package includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote at no additional expense and will come pre-installed on the laptop.

Both the 64 GB and 32 GB models are set to go up for pre-order tomorrow, June 4, with the former boasting a competitive $379.99 price tag. Customers can throw in a full-size Bluetooth keyboard dock but it'll cost around $90. Pricing for the 64 GB model was not revealed. 

Jane McEntegart
14 Comments Comment from the forums
  • DelightfulDucklings
    Still waiting for Haswell based Windows 8 tablet, hopefully some are revealed shortly
    Reply
  • Joe Vete
    Junk hardware, junk software. I think i'll stick with my 11" Macbook Air running OS X and Windows 7 with Parallels desktop.
    Reply
  • vmem
    hmm, with a Z2760 Atom it could be DOA
    I thought people already showed that you get a less than "snappy" experience with the current gen Atom
    Reply
  • teh_chem
    Holy ugly tablet, Batman.
    I'm "meh" about Windows 8 tablets. But it appears to me what they're all missing is a keyboard dock with expanded battery.
    Reply
  • w8gaming
    I do not know why Acer keep insisting making cheap W8 tablet with small storage. It is not that much more expensive to make a 128GB model. The 32Gb model would have very little storage left with Microsoft Office being included. That will leave almost no space for user to install any meaningful application. The microSD slot is too low to run application from.
    Reply
  • Mike Friesen
    "Both the 64 GB and 32 GB models are set to go up for pre-order tomorrow, June 4, with the former boasting a competitive $379.99 price tag... Pricing for the 64 GB model was not revealed. "
    Pretty sure the former would mean the 64 gig...
    Reply
  • Scott Yang
    It's not bad, but I think more APPs are more important.
    Reply
  • pckitty4427
    I can't say I'm a fan of the white bezels on Acer tabs.
    Reply
  • sna
    10909143 said:
    I do not know why Acer keep insisting making cheap W8 tablet with small storage. It is not that much more expensive to make a 128GB model. The 32Gb model would have very little storage left with Microsoft Office being included. That will leave almost no space for user to install any meaningful application. The microSD slot is too low to run application from.

    I dont see you complaining about most of the Android Tablets have 16/8G only ..

    If you want 128G then get an i3/i5 Tablet , the new haswell operate at 7 watts .

    I would never pay for an Atom Tablet with high storage for one reason , it is a very slow machine ... and should be very affordable to justify going slow.
    Reply
  • damianrobertjones
    "I thought people already showed that you get a less than "snappy" experience with the current gen Atom"
    Please check out the Anandtech review which shows that performance is actually pretty damn good.
    Reply