But… there are 3 challenges Microsoft need to overcome:

1. Quality
Who would sensibly choose to ship a new tablet with a dedicated docking station when said dock will not charge the tablet without first applying firmware updates. People expect new products to work out of the box.

2. What is it, who is the market
Microsoft appear to be focusing the entire range on consumers, yet the top i7 device is so naturally suited to business use. They have a opportunity to revolutionize business computing, especially for us old road warriors. Leave the consumers with the iPads and focus on the higher value business. Compete on quality and battery life more, but mostly innovate around the pen within office – aim to totally replace notepads without the need for typing. OneNote is a superb step in the right direction, but the desktop version is so much better than the tablet one.
One thing that showed this lack of business focus was at setup where they lead with setting up a Microsoft account. To get the device onto a work domain you must click to setup a new MS account, then opt to login via a domain. Once setup you add your existing MS account – tortuous.

3. Marketing and awareness
This device is cool but other than a few ads they are not doing anything obvious to build awareness – it’s a new form factor so stop selling a weird looking laptop and show off the new pen based tablet. Get them into the hands of people in the public eye for example.