Earlier today at a press event in NYC, Acer showed off a handful of new PCs they’ll be releasing over the next few weeks. The machines are mainly tablets and laptops ranging in size from 11.6 inches to 15.6 inches. But we know a lot of you are clamoring for a tablet running Windows 8 in the range between 7 and 8-inches. Turns out they’re closer than we thought.
The Verge was tipped by a reader of an Amazon listing for the Acer W3-810 – a device that wasn’t shown off or announced at the event in New York City. What’s unique about this premature listing is the size of the device. The W3 clocks in at 8 inches. Unfortunately, the listing has already been pulled from Amazon.
Here are the rest of the specs of the little machine.
- 8.1 inch, 1280x800 display
- 1.8GHz Intel Atom dual-core processor
- 2GB of RAM
- 32GB of storage
- 2 megapixel cameras up front and in the rear
- 1 microUSB 2.0 port
- Micro HDMI port
- Weighing in at 1.1 pounds
- 8 hours of battery life
The best part of all this is the price. In the above configuration the W3 will cost a cool $379.99. Putting it up against products like the iPad Mini. You’ll remember that we expect the next update to Windows 8 to include support for devices in the 7 to 8 inch range. Additionally, those devices will support lower resolution displays, like the one found in the Acer W3, at the expense of losing out on the ability to snap apps to one side. The price isn’t close to the $200 mark that Intel’s CEO boasted a few weeks back, but it’s a fairly competitive price.
The other products that Acer actually revealed today are fairly tame. Acer refreshed their V5 and V7 series laptops. The Aspire P3 is a new product that is part ultrabook and part convertible. It’s an intriguing device that packs either a Core i3 or i5 processor. Here's a video showing it off:
Acer Aspire P3
However, the most interesting device is the Aspire R7. I’ll let the video below do the talking for that.
Acer Aspire R7
Hit up the Windows Experience Blog for full details on the lineup of Acer products. Between the announced products and the upcoming 8 inch tablet, which piques your interest the most?
Source: The Verge
Reader comments
8.1 inch Windows 8 tablet from Acer gets priced on Amazon
I'm tempted to sell my Surface RT for this baby. Yes i LOVE the hardware of the Surface, I think it is the best aroud, but at that price and it being a full laptop, I don't think I can pass it up. Decisions, desicions....
Love that commercial...
I need one around kindle pricing dude... I don't care about office excel, I just want the windows8 apps that I use on daily basis... EBay,amazon,wpcentral, make it 200 bucks come on
Im sure later this year when they announce RT tablets with 8.1 the price points will be lower maybe between $200-$300.
Some of you guys are too geeky(nothing wrong with that). At this price point i want it!
All i really need is a good backpack now for my toys.
Do Windows 8 tablets have virtual keyboards? Also, can they only be used in landscape mode? Is their a portrait mode?
Yes to virtual keyboards. There are two varitions and you can do pen input as well. They can be used in either landscape or portrait.
Thanks Sam!
It's nice to see Windows 8 tablets having higher quality standards than the majority of Android tablets.
More expensive than the iPad Mini, but it does have better hardware and more features (micro HDMI, 32 GB of storage).
On a related note, this makes the Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 look vastly overpriced at $400.
Looks like early adopter pricing and specs wth the present Atoms not the Bay-Trail-T.
With the Nexus 7 hitting the shevles with 1080P and $199 pricing later in the year what's the price for a better buillt MS alternative?
1080P for video out is huge as a presentation class tablet for sue with larger screens.
I believe that Google strategy on the Nexus line was to price it at near cost. Secondly, until the Nexus 7 and 10 came out; it was to position it as a cloud computing device like the Nexus 4 smartphone with only bare memory in it like 8 and 16gb. But the competition made the tablets expand their memory capacity and hype the pixels on the displays.
Windows tablets needs to follow the competition to get at least HD quality sceen displays or they will be at again - - - at a disadvantage hardware wise.
Love the 3... Maybe it was because of all the Tiesto... LOL
It's nice to see PC's being designed around the software something that really gave macbooks the advantage
Would be all over this......only if apps the i use on the nexus7 (it was a freebie) are available on windows8
Any reason the ⅓ snapping is being removed from the 8". I get its a smaller screen, but it should still work nicely. One of my favorite WinRT features.
Any reason the ⅓ snapping is being removed from the 8". I get its a smaller screen, but it should still work nicely. One of my favorite WinRT features.
Microsoft set the limit on snapping apps (it's a 320px split, rather than 1/3rd) at a screen width of 1366px so anything less won't work without a hack. Still, 8.1 is bringing new snap options so there's potential even 8" devices will support some kind of snap.
I hope so, it's one of my favourite features too!
I think this just might be my tablet. I've always wanted to realize my dream of taking over for Tiesto. Lol. Seriously a nice looking device.
Can win8 tablets have a phone function, like rumored HTC RT 7"?
And won't it kill future winphone8 phablets?
Tiësto the highest paid EDM DJ this commercial is badass
Damnit, you bragged about the commercial before I could lol. Yeah, I thought it would be a great movie theatre commercial.
I can't believe people pay to see some dude with headphones stand behind gear pumping his fist to computer music.
I feel the same.
The first manufacturer who releases a 7-8 inch Win8 tablet with 1080p screen and Intel Bay Trail gets my money
no full USB 3, and no micro SDXC = no way I will even consider it even if it would be for $100, not to mention $370, thats just f-ing stupid
Can you name any other non windows tab that includes that, except sdxc.
Hate the fact that it has to be landscape oriented (I know WRT can rotate, but the layout of the live tiles gets all messed up and most of the apps aren't even ready for portrait mode). Microsoft should have made it in a way that it would be nice to be used both in landscape and portrait views, like the iPad or some android tablets. Now it's probably too late because many apps on the store were made to work in landscape only and I doubt many of the devs are whiling to update them.
Totally agree with you! Reading stuff in landscape is inconvenient. I just hoping that Microsoft just copies Apple's 4:3 ratio in their new 8" tablet and their hardware manufacturers run with that demenisions too. After all; Apple iPad accounts for over 70% of the market share. People who use the iPad; use it mostly in portrait mode. I have a 10" iPad retina and I use it about 90% for reading stuff online and reading ebooks. The only ones that use it in landscape mode more then portrait mode are realtors to show clients homes.
I admit that I use my iPad 4 90% of the time in landscape but if I was going for an 8" tablet I would want to use it mainly on portrait, so I could comfortably hold it with one hand and use the other to interact with the screen. Using it in landscape makes it impossible to hold it side to side with just one hand, so the main advantage is gone.
You'd have to have alien hands like this dude.
Look at the picture for this article above! He is holding the Acer with one hand in "portrait mode"! LOL! Another alien? This planet is going to hell with the invaders taken over WP Central!
Can't wait to get a windows 8 tablet that can take a sim (4G). If any of you know, please let me know. I've seen Panasonic toughpad and the HP slate 2 online, but even though they should be available with sim, can't find any
The Acer W511 and some of the Samsung ATIV Smart PCs have sim slots, they're usually about £50/$100 more expensive than the standard versions. I'm not sure if any of them come with 4G though.
Actually, I may have seen a 4G version of the W511 before but it was direct from Vodafone with a contract...
I have a nexus 7 and I really like it. I bought it before I knew anything about Windows 8 coming out. I use it strictly for gaming. I really enjoy my Lumia 920 and am very curious how a Windows 8 tablet would be. Maybe I'll go pic some money off my money tree I have in the back yard and go pick one up. I would love to have a phone and tablet that are compatible to play around with. Not that Windows is right now but there working on it. I wish Asus would make a Windows tablet, my nexus 7 is great quality and feels great in my hands. Shhhhhh, don't tell anyone that i like an Android device, that's blasphemy!! ;)
I would like to see an 8 incher with an AMD z60 processor. I'm sure it'll be cheaper than clover trail counterparts also!
The Windows 8 era is here, I can feel it :'( so happy. (Oh and yeah, Apple is screwed)
What's an apple? It's a greenish looking fruit right? ;)
I think some are red and a few of them are pink. Whatever, good juice in a box.
Good juice only if you buy the pure "not from concentrate" stuff Tropicana makes in EU, haven't seen it is US, except for orange.
Hey, Mango is good juice! ;)
Try simply apple I find it rather tasty and not from concentrate.
Well I not interested in low end tablets. I want the top end - Retina display and 4:3 screen ratio. 8" is ideal but not a RT; a Pro tablet that I can run Windows apps in too. Storage of 128GB or more. USB 3.0. Got to remember Windows 8 takes around 20GB of memory initself. I willing to pay $1,200 for something I want!
I just want one that can use a digitizer. I'm a hell of an artist...ok, no not really. But when I do feel like it, I would like an accurate interpretation of my stick drawings :-)
I was just about to buy a Galaxy Tab 2. Seeing this gives me hope for a cheaper Windows 8 tablet which is what I really want. Give me a 300 dollar - RT or standard - and it is a day one purchase from me.
Bam! You said exactly what I was thinking.
I'll ++++++1 it.
Should've used a macbook in the coffee shop scene and said something like "put that toy away please." :D
Still kinda expensive at that price but future looks good.
I agree! I hope this is just the beginning of a tablet war where prices are driven down due to many tablets release.
Let it begin!!!
Screen ratio is 16x10 where Surface is 16x9. 2GB mem? I mean it's fine as i've run Win7 on 1.5GB without a problem and Win8 uses less resources right?
Can't wait to see this and others, esp. Surface 7-8 inch and Asus. I'd say especially Asus since they've done a good job putting out reasonably priced W8 touch laptops. Dell and their XPS design would be neat too.
Awesome, I can't wait! And it's currently above the minimum resolution for Windows 8, it's just too low for the snap view. Blue should change that, since the snap width won't be fixed-width.
And for different display sizes, the autoscaling will also help. The newest leaked build indicates that Windows will automatically detect number of pixels and size of display to determine what size it needs to scale to.
Of course, be cool to add pinch and stretch to the desktop in touch mode.
Now we're talking. Please let me get rid of this dang Nexus 7.
+1
Time for a real tablet :)
Exactly. Nexus Schmexus.
Notice it is portrait oriented too.
But the R7 - dang. That's an incredible design. Throw Haswell in that and I'll drop some coin, maybe buy the 8" as a companion device.
Both are intriguing. The 8" with Bay Trail and a keyboard dock with hookup to an external monitor could be a full-time computer if networked to external storage. The R7 looks like a no-compromise device, perhaps too big to take notes on in the field though.
I would love a tablet like this. The price puts it about $500 w/ a keyboard dock. Give me extra juice in the dock and this is my next laptop!
Wait, was there a keyboard advertised with it?
You mind as well buy a full windows tablet for that price.
Acer asking for $1000 for a W700 Full HD, what are they? Smokin' dope.
No, crack!
Meanwhile the guys at Nokia remain with their arses on their seats watching the cars pass by...
Arghhhh >_
Who says they aren't developing anything? Would you rather see something boring and that looks like all others, or would you rather see a fully developed tablet that doesn't look like the rest?
The problem is not that they aren't developing. The problem is that they are already far far behind. And they'll keep behind if they don't start working harder and faster. The tablet design is almost certainly closed by now. They have no reason to keep delaying apart from lack of will I think.
Nokia can't just release a 6-7" phablet independently of Microsoft updating the OS to accommodate it, there are already plenty of rumours swirling about that it is happening though so hopefully we'll see something like this announced (and released soon after) at the Nokia event in a couple of weeks.
It's not that they're delaying, it's simply as you said: Microsoft is behind in this arena at the moment, I love Windows Phone but there's still lots for them to do and I'm sure they're scrambling to get things like this done as soon as they can. Especially as Nokia (with 80% WP market share?) will be hounding them to hurry up.
I do wonder what is going on with the Windows Phone team though, they were a seemingly well oiled machine until Mango and Tango and then kind of fell apart while putting WP8 together. Hopefully they're putting themselves together quietly in the background now but with the rumours of WP 8.1 delayed into 2014 I'm not sure how confident I am...
They should just allow Nokia to fork WP8 off (like Amazon did to Android for Kindle) and then re-merge them in 2014 at some point. I trust Nokia to do a much quicker and better job than Microsoft at this stage (see Nokia Music vs. Xbox Music).
Nokia is waiting for Microsoft to get their act together so they can have a HD display with small form factor. Nokia has been ready for months; but Microsoft just say the lite with tablets like Nexus 7 and Apple's Mini future Retina display. Microsoft was caught off guard by the HD displays on small form factors like 7-8" displays. Currently they can only do 720p! With the "Blue" upgrade it should be HD quality but no Retina quality until later in the year or even till middle 2014!
Yeah but why would you need 1080p on a 7-8 inch device? Like you can see the difference on such small screen. 720p is enough for such size screens.
I am uses to typefaces that are completely solid black and are clear! No more broken letters for me - ever again! I love HD and even better retina quality letters on displays. It wonderful on the eyes! You can read forever and not get tired out! I cannot go back to 720p and just looking at a letter in the low end notebooks make me want to look away from the screen.
Agreed 1080p is a sales gimmick, the naked eye cannot tell the difference unless your holding it right in front of your face. If that's the case it want be to long before your eyes give out anyway then it really want matter.
1080p on a small display is irrelevant. As others have said, the human eye can NOT distinguish 720p from 1080p. Retina display is one thing, HD is another. And 720p is HD enough on a tablet. You can have 1080p but you will not be able to tell the difference except it will consume more energy.
Regardless, Nokia doesn't need Microsoft to pull their act together. They could simply release the tablet with W8Pro and release it with good hardware. Then the "Blue" update can come whenever Microsoft feels its too late ('cause Microsoft keeps falling behind when it comes to updates that bring their OS's closer to the current leaders).
I have a 4.3" 720p display (341ppi) on my 8X and it looks amazing, the same display on an 8" screen would still look good but not as amazingly crisp. To get the same crispness would require a resolution of about 2048x1440! Obviously that sounds crazxy right now for a device that small, but that's where we're heading (it's almost the same resolution as the retina iPad).
It's all down to how close you hold the screen to your face and the smaller the device the more likely it is going to be held closer than a larger device. This is how 1366x768 laptops have managed to become common in even 15" laptops, they're not great, but they still look fine from the distance laptops are used from.
While I agree that you don't need 300ppi on everything (a lot of tech reviews annoy the hell outta me when they complain about a 1366x768 display on a 10" device like the Surface etc.) it's not something to be so easily dismissed. Especially when by Christmas there'll probably be a retina iPad Mini on the market. Every device doesn't need a 300ppi+ screen, but there should be options for those who want it.
What about if they are developing a tablet that is just a dumb screen and is entirely powered wirelessly by your phone. This will be the future of tablets - there's no diffrence between the processor of an iPhone and and iPad so why replicate it when you can have all your apps and data on one device.
That is what Asus did with the Padfone. However I don't think Nokia would go that way, otherwise they would have done it when they launched the L920. To try and release something like that now would be nightmarish since they would have to decide how many phones would support that, if only the 920. And if only the 920 would support that, how about that damn 928 for Verizon that we keep being pestered about? It's very hard now to do a thing like that.
I believe they'll be better off with a stand-alone tablet.
Damn smexy tablet!!!
Bring on the 8 inchers! Lenovo, where you be at?
I'm so buying like 2 or 3 of these...one for each room.
LOL they must pay you too much to be able to live bill gates style... I'm totally hating on you because I'm jealous. I can't buy a new device till September.
That's what she said.
That "8 inches is enough"?
Size matters my friend.
Giggety
Lenovo?? I'm sure they'll make something good, but I'm surprised you didn't say Surface or Nokia.
Lenovo are the best PC manufacturer at the moment so it makes sense to want a tablet from them.
MY last PC was a Lenovo. Great machine.. They do good work..
Finally, 8 inch Win8 tablet. They pulled it to sucker us into buying the oversize tablets first. Then, BAM. Here's what you've been waiting for. 8 inches of hard.
That hand is.... Long?
Neh... he's just "holding it wrong" ;)
Dang that guy must have E.T. sized hands.
Can not unsee now.... o.O
Bad photoshop is bad photoshop.
LMFAO
Looked awesome until I noticed the creepy hands.
Hahahaa!! >_< can't stop seeing it arrgh
Eww, those are creepy. They didn't even try to make it look natural.
LOL!!
His wife is lucky... :P
I'm holding my 7 inch Nexus in the same manner. Nothing odd. 8 inch aren't that much bigger.