It's no great secret that Apple beat Microsoft (and basically everyone else) to the tablet market in the consumer space. Microsoft isn't happy about that.
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said that the company is hard at work in making a Windows-based tablet that'll go head-to-head against the iPad.
"They'll be shipping as soon as they are ready," Ballmer said. "It is job one urgency. No one is sleeping at the switch."
On the topic of Apple's success with the iPad, "they've sold certainly more than I'd like them to have sold."
While other companies are tuning special operating systems for its tablet devices, Microsoft is sticking with Windows 7.
"We have got to make things happen," he said. "We're in the process of doing that as we speak. We're working with our hardware partners. We're tuning Windows 7."
One nice side effect of having Windows 7 is that it'll be packed with features that many of us enjoy on our computers. "When you get your Windows 7 machine, it will print," Ballmer said. "Some people actually like to print every now and then."
Ballmer didn't comment when the tablets will be launching, other than "It ain't a long time from now." As for hardware, it'll be Intel-based rather than ARM.
"We're coming," he said. "We're coming full guns. The operating system is called Windows."
(Source: Cnet.)
