Microsoft's Turtle and Pure 'Pink' phones and Surface Tablet: take 2
By Thomas Ricker 
posted Sep 21st 2009 4:44AM
posted Sep 21st 2009 4:44AM
Foley also addressed 9to5Mac's tease of a "much, much bigger and juicier" rumor related to a Microsoft tablet in the late prototype phases. According to her sources, a new Microsoft tablet is part of something called "Alchemy Ventures" and contains at least one exec from Microsoft's Surface team and is presumably led by our buddy, J Allard. You'll recall that Microsoft was already rumored to be working on "Oahu" a Surface-based tablet for consumers. So when might we see it? Mary Jo speculates that Microsoft could be waiting to see what Apple's working on before showing off Redmond's competing design. In other words: February.
[Via WMPowerUser]
Read -- "Turtle" pic
Read -- Mary-Jo Foley on Pink and Tablet
So this spells the end of WinMo OEM business? Not a big surprise considering the number of
WinMo partners have jumped ship to Android.
Doesn't see why it has to spell the end of non-microsoft WinMo phones.
And who has jumped ship from WinMo for android? Any of the serious WinMo developers are doing Android AND WinMo concurrently
Show me one partner that is no longer developing WinMo phones.
Checking your post history, you're like a broken record. I hope you're at least getting paid for this otherwise you're just a sad individual.
Where can I get all these fabled Android phones? I keep on hearing lots of rumours but whenever I look all I find are a couple of ugly, underpowered phones that don't offer anything useful other than another route to give Google all my private information.
@insky
Well, while they haven't jumped ship to Android, and therefore I'm not sure who Martin H is referring to, Palm have confirmed that they will no longer be developing Windows Mobile-based smartphones. I'm wondering whether Motorola might be going this route as well given recent announcements.
Is'nt it the point of an open source platform like Android to make the handset cheaper for the consumer by not charging for the OS.HTC Magic was released for almost US$700 without contract where i live and thats a lot more than HTC Winmo phones with similar or better specs.
And i heard Sense UI is still sluggish as of now.WTF?
It was a matter of time WinMo OEM comes to halt. But people didn't predict it
comes as quick as it is now. 2010 will be the final year for WinMo OEM business.
You heard it here. Okay.
That's why MS is shitting in his pants and keep posting vaporware while the competitors
are working quietly. WinMo revenue is declining much faster than MS could post vaporware.
Martin, Mega and Brad - all the same user.
Not sure what the agenda is here - posting the same nonsense under different names - but like someone said it is kind of sad.
At least make your profile private - you might then begin to start fooling some people.
Needs to be sooner than end of 2010 Microsoft.
Serious question: why?
They didn't call it turtle because it'll be here quick.
I would say it needs to be sooner only because they are already many years late to market with a next generation device. Being a 6.5 user for quite some time, that doesn't count as next gen.
But its not as if wm is doing poorly in sales. Its just that its starting to be forgotten and forsaken.
well put Ruben.
I use WinMo and have been using 6.5 for a while now but it is essential that MS get the WM7 devices to market sooner rather than later. If they still don't reveal or release until after iPhone OS 4.0 then we will get a lot more 'WinMo is demised', 'Death of WinMo', 'OEMs are all dropping WinMo' comments and that will become the general consensus.
The majority of people outside the tech and business world dont even know about WinMo - and I'm guessing that is not where MS wants to be.
i dunno about that pic, the screw has 4 notches, not 3 like the zune HD
It just means you will be screwed four time over instead of three when you buy this instead of the Zune.
And thus the iPhone ensures you will never be screwed? What do you mean?
Wow, why the hell do you have to bring the iPhone to every post?
*cough* Motorola PEBL ripoff *cough* Palm-pre ripoff *cough*
Sorry guys, my throat is a little rough today.
You know.. an apple a day keeps the *cough* away ;)
The only really surprising thing about this is that we are all here and awake to comment on this...
yea,and the whole world lives in the USA
It's 10:42am where I am and I'm usually awake at this time.
Exactly my point....its mid afternoon on a freakin monday where I live.
Yep, same here...
If you're not the US, you are irrelevant.
@drumwiz86
ARE you the US ? ZOMG!!
But seriously, I use an iPhone now and I used two WinMo phones a lot earlier than they were released in the US so I find myself very relevant to this discussion thank you -- DOCTORWITHMD86
Looks to me like the forward and rear sections of the "turtle" dont line up...I'd throw this one back, or beat it to death with a baseball bat...depending on my mood at the time but likely the latter.
Thats a good point.The front panel of the slider will stick out on the sides even when the slider is closed coz its less curved and even KIRFs dont have such design loopholes.Anyway i dont think a twitter pic from 9to5mac is a reliable source.
I would love to get my hands on a surface tablet. I've got an HP tablet right now with Windows 7 running smoothly on it but I'd trade that in a second for surface.
If Ballmer is the reason why the post-Gates Microsoft has been quickly putting out high quality consumer products, we need to send that man an Edible Arrangement or something.
I've always been a fan of MS in the professional arena and I've liked the consumer products (against the grain) but the new stuff has been on the level of what people expect from a company attempting to remain relevant in the home. If the Zune HD is any indication of where they are going with Windows Phone (WinMo 7) they'll have made huge progress in five lines of buisness as far as I'm concerned: Zune HD, Windows 7, Server 2008 R2, Bing, Windows Phone. And that's not even including advancements in Office and Exchange 2010 which I'm loving and a lot of the other application servers they've improved. We can only hope they continue to push at this level. They finally have other companies looking to see what they're doing again and that competetion just makes everyone put out better products for us!
Hey! You have posted really great information. I like the these phones. Can you please tell me something more about the phone, its features and the new about it...
Ok, phone hasn't even come out and it's already looking wack.
Come on MS, don't disappoint me now, I've been low ranked for backing you up for crying out loud!
I can't pass judgement until a real pic is released but this rendering looks like a phone I will be passing up. MS should leave the phone making to those who actually make phones, ie: Samsung, HTC, LG, etc...
it looks like one of those slide "smartphone" wannabes. I haven't seen a good Sharp phone since, well, ever.
Dumb design. Slide phones like this didn't work for Motorola and it didn't work for Palm. Why continue down this path?
Look a phone! Oh, no, wait, actually it's a frisbee
What? Microsoft working on a table but waiting for Apple to show it's hand first? This is classic Microsoft FUD. They have no idea what to do in the tablet realm and need Apple to lead the way.
Actually, given what they did with Surface, I think they definitely could do some awesome things in the tablet realm.
One side of me thinks it would be awesome if they released a tablet before Apple. Not just a tablet, a good tablet. That would shove it in all those fanbois face.
The other side of me thinks if they are working on something they should wait until they see what Apple is doing, and then as soon as they can they should show something even better than what Apple did. This again would shove it in those fanbois faces. But, Microsoft would need to do it quickly after Apple otherwise we're just going to get another copying war.
Can you tell I'm sick of hearing whiney Apple fanbois?
You're an idiot for judging anything based on rumors.
I don't know why people keep saying that Microsoft is "too late in the game" with this one... For a cellphone, it s NEVER too late in the game. People change phones like once or twice a year, unlike other products, so i highly doubt the timing of entering a market really matters... i actually think is better, because Microsoft now has the chance to look at all the other companies at what they did good on, and what they failed in... so HOPEFULLY, Microsoft will just base their phones off what the consumer has proved to like better...
Wow! not soon... there will be a new iphone by then!
let me guess. when the apple tablet comes out, apple fans are gonna reave. when oahu comes out, apple fans are going to say: microsoft copied that!. well oahu is a surface tablet, and surface came out before the iphone. so yeah. and please, don't give proof by an image of a drawing. thats nto proof. ANYONE CAN DRAW THAT.
I can't wait for a home surface from MS. It will be awesome to rearrange photos and stuff.