An Adventure in White Chocolate

Monday, May 20, 2013 0

Yesterday, if you read my blog, was of course World Baking Day and I have to tell you that after blogging (and confessing), about my obsession with glass cylindrical storage containers, I did get around to some serious and enjoyable baking to live up to the spirit of the day.
 
What made the day even more of an occasion, after buying “John Whaite Bakes” (winner of “The Great British Bakeoff” 2012), book just last weekend, I decided to pick out a recipe to try out.  I wish I could confess to having picked exacly which recipe on the spare of the moment on the day, but since buying and flicking through the pages, I’d already had this recipe picked out for at least five days in advanced and had sought out the ingredients when completing my weekly grocery shop.
 
White Chocolate and Raspberry Cake
 
First up for World Baking Day and the first recipe from my new inspiration was a raspberry sponge cake with a white chocolate ganache.  The amateur baker I am, I’ve never really created my own ganache before, so was a bit apprehensive about what I was doing with this creamy chocolatey centre for my cake, but always ready to try out something new and learn.
 
I have to admit that I thought I knew exactly what I was doing, only to find that I couldn’t get my ganache to thicken quite as much as I’d hoped.  Chocolate can be a tricky thing and having seen chocolatier Paul Young at the Durham Food Festival last year, there is a lot more skill than first meets the eye. 
 
Fortunately, the Internet is a wonderful place to find answers and a quick search instantly revealed what I was doing wrong; not enough whipping!  My first instinct of wanting to simply add more chocolate being completely wrong, but a quick whizz of the mixture in my Magimix soon thickened up the ganache ready for the cake.
 
The Proof is in the Eating
 
After having tasted the cake, my initial first bite without the ganache, I thought the bitterness of the raspberries was ultimately going to disappoint my whole baking adventure, but on the second bite, this time with the white chocolate ganache, the bitterness was instantly taken away with the smooth and silky white chocolate taste.
 
A perfectly balanced taste and now a firm favourite recipe that I’m sure to repeat again and again.  The John Whaite book is full of great ideas and I can thoroughtly recommend that you seek it out and give some of them a try – I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

World Baking Day

Sunday, May 19, 2013 0

Today, much to my surprise, is ‘World Baking Day’ – presumably a day for amateur bakers everywhere to rejoice and celebrate with a few cakes, biscuits, breads and the like, what better way to celebrate?  Home baking is undoubtedly on the rise thanks in part to the success of “The Great British Bake Off”, Paul Hollywood and the legendary Mary Berry.

As an amateur baker myself – purely as a way to de-stress, relax and escape from the crazy world of IT - what better day is there though for me to start blogging about my own baking and cooking exploits than this very day?  It will certainly make a change from writing about technology and Microsoft!

So without further ado, here is my first baking post, hope you enjoy!

Jars, Jars, Jars

Whenever I watch any sort of food or cooking show on TV, the one thing that I always notice is just how many of the chefs have all of their ingredients stored in glass jars, seemingly making it incredibly easy to store, air tight and make pouring and measuring the ingredients look rather easy when in front of the TV cameras.

Of course, having seen so many jars on TV I, of course, had to replicate this set up in my own kitchen.  Kilner seems to be the brand to buy, so off I went to locate and purchase them for storage of all my flours and sugars.

Having used them for a few months now, I have to admit that I have developed a little bit of a fondness for my jars.  They look so much better than storing ingredients in the paper containers that flour and sugars are bought in, but more than that I find that the glass jars have a great tactile feel to them that just bring a smile to my face every time I get to grab one out of the cupboard and measure out its contents.

There is a downside to my jars though; I seem to have developed a bit of an obsession with them and seem to look at them in the various cook shop stores, having to tear myself away from buying another – there is always something that can be stored within a glass jar!

Despite managing to resist buying another thus far, I do want one more as I’m hoping to create a sourdough starter for my next bready projects I hope to attempt at some point.

I blame ‘The Great British Bake Off’ for my obsession with jars (although they aren’t solely responsible), and am already pining for a freestanding mixer having seen them in just about every baking challenge.  My research has already been complete, I know exactly which one I want, I just have to persuade myself into treating myself to one now – and justifying buying one rather than continuing to use my Maximix food processor.

Undoubtedly I will succumb to my desires and buy one – but it all started with the jars.  Oh the simple, glass storage jar!

Envisioning Interactivity

Monday, March 25, 2013 0


Touch screens have become common place in consumer technology – tablets, laptops and smart phones all have them built right in.  Voice controls are now sophisticated enough to allow you to talk directly to your devices and have them carry out a multitude of tasks without having to pick up or touch a single device.  And technologies such as Google Glass, Bing Vision and Kinect are all allowing us to interact with our devices by gesturing at rather sophisticated cameras.
Envisioning Centre
A few weeks back Microsoft unveiled their new and updated ‘Envisioning Centre’ featuring all of their latest technology thinking of what is just around the corner for us all.  It’s a real showcase of Microsoft technology and of what-could-be. 
It’s not the first time Microsoft have showed off its visions of the future – a few videos a couple of years back showed how we will interact with future devices yet to be invented and the world around us.  But these were concept videos; the envisioning centre is something a bit more real and closer to today’s realities.


What is most striking about the video of the Envisioning Centre is the amount of rather large touch screens that are scattered around the place, allowing the ‘family’ to simply touch, talk and show them various items to make the computer(s) work in a friendly and straight forward way.
Microsoft bought big touch screen specialists “Perceptive Pixel” to allow them to gain a foothold in this business, so it’s no real surprise that they see the big screen as part of future tech, but with some of the other emerging technologies coming up, will touch screens ever become cheap enough, fast enough?
Touch Screens
Whilst the price of touch screens are coming down all the time thanks to the rise of tablets and all-in-one PCs, if you search for a large touch screen display you’ll see that the prices are still rather expensive compared to the non-touch screen versions of the same displays.
Undoubtedly the price of large touch screens will come down in price to more affordable levels; but I’m still left unsure that they are the future of organisations for those users working at traditional office desks where space is still a limiting factor – but the traditional office is changing constantly and the office is heading in a direction of enabling ‘work from anywhere’ and is a whole different blog post for perhaps another day.
But is the touch screen really all that with some of the other up-and-coming technologies?
Leap Motion
Leap Motion technology is something that I’m extremely excited about and can’t wait to get my hands (or not), on it.  It’s basically a small camera based system that plugs into the USB port of your computer that then allows Kinect-like interactions with your computer by waving your fingers or a pencil at the screen without ever having to physically touch anything.
 


The technology is extremely impressive and has a wide ranging number of applications, but what impresses me even more about this tiny device is the price.  On release in May of this year, it will go on sale for around only $60!  For that price you can enable any screen or projected display to be fully interactive without breaking the bank.
What’s more Leap has already started working on integrating their technology directly into laptop computers.  This could change the way users interact with their devices in a big, big way and could lead to a paradigm shift away from the mouse and track pad tech.
It should come as no surprise that Microsoft has also been working on changing their Kinect technology to work in similar ways, but it’s important to remember that Kinect is a very different technology for tracking the whole moment of a person and its environment rather that the subset movements of hand, fingers and close range objects.
In order for Microsoft to compete with Leap however, they will have to make their Kinect sensors much smaller than what it is today; I’m sure they’ve already started work on this a long time ago and have something in the pipeline that would fit into a laptop or tablet bezel, but this change would be worth doing overall.
MYO
About a year ago I watched a Microsoft Research conference online featuring a couple of young engineers who claimed to have Jedi powers and were able to demonstrate their skills to switch lights on and off simply by waving their hand.
Amazed at the online video, I watched the full interview to see how it actually worked.  It turns out that these engineers hadn’t been trained by a Jedi Master, but instead had developed a band that wrapped around the arm of the wear that measured their muscle movements and in doing so, translated those movements into the tangible action of switching the lights on and off.
The technology in the video was rather bulky, however they promised that future iterations would be much more refined.  Fast forward to today and another company – Myo - (not affiliated with Microsoft from what I can tell), have developed their own interactive armband that can be used to control computers and other enabled technologies simply by moving their arm, hand and fingers in an appropriate way.
 

The way the band works is simply revolutionary and fascinating for an outsider – or at least for me, to know that we (humans) have the knowledge and know-how of how muscle groups work together and translate them into movements that are then transposed into interactions on the screen.
What’s more, the price of the Myo band is set to retail for only $150, which makes the device affordable as a technology for further development.  This is the type of technology that would be worthy enough to be built directly into a smart watch.
Interaction Technology is in our Hands
Whilst the touch screen will play a part in future devices and interactions, as these two technologies demonstrate that it won’t be along in how we interact with our computers and peripherals.  Interaction technologies are developing at a rapid pace and at a cost that makes the affordable to put into the hands (or at least close to the hands), of the average user.
The future is coming.

A Smart Gimmick?

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It turns out that I need to be cautious with this post because, it turns out, that I have been wrong before; when Apple launched their now infamous iPad, I predicted that people would buy them and then tire of them and they’d all end up stashed away in some drawer never to be seen again.  How very wrong; and to make me even more wrong, I’ve recently purchased (at long last) a Microsoft Surface Pro tablet.
 
Being wrong about the popularity of touch screen tablet devices is one thing, but it seems that the ‘next big thing’ is coming and I am once again being sceptical on its arrival and overall usage.  It seems every tech company has one in their pipeline though for imminent launch – what is it?  A smart watch.
 
A Gimmick Device?
 
Way back in August oflast year I marvelled at the prospect of the Martian smart watch, so I totally understand the appeal for tech companies to produce a smart watch that becomes part of their line-up of gadgets, but the more I think about it the less interested I am in actually buying one as something more than just a gimmick device.
 
Let me explain why;
 
My phone (a Windows Phone 8, Nokia Lumia 920), has a great feature called “TellMe”, which is similar to features found on Apple and Android phones in the form of Siri.  It allows me to talk to my phone to call people, send messages, search the internet and the like.  It works really well (and will only ever improve as voice technologies mature and digital assistants become better at predicting our actions and ever more helpful).
 
I only ever seem to really use these voice features though when I’m in the car, which makes sense because at any other time I can simply take my phone with its rather elegant and beautiful display out of my pocket and do whatever I need to do with it.  In the car, my hands are firmly on the wheel and my eyes are on the road – so I use a Bluetooth headset instead, which works remarkably well allowing me to talk and interact with my phone and contacts whilst I drive.
 
Yes I need to remember to wear my headset whenever I drive, where a watch that you wear every day will be always on your wrist.  But the headset works because it allows my interactions with my device to remain private or at least semi-private because only I can hear my text messages being read to me or only I can hear the caller on the other end of the phone; where a speaker based system broadcasts to all of those in range – perhaps this isn’t a big problem for most people, given most in-car systems pair up your phone with the in-car stereo, but using your watch to have conversations outside of the car in more public places could become a bigger concern for some people.
 
My bigger issue over a smart watch though is battery life.  When you get home from work, or arrive back at your home after a busy day, it’s likely that you put your phone on charge – taking off your watch and charging that every couple of days isn’t common practice and will take wearers a bit of time to adjust, I can especially see problems for those who forget to charge up their wrist wear and then have to go without a time piece for the rest of their day or until the next opportunity to charge up.
 
Nothing New
 
Like tablet computers, before Apple launched the iPad, the smart watch is nothing new.  Others have ventured into this type of wearable computer device before, only to reverse their feels around such a product and remove it from the market due to poor sales.
 
Times have changed though and so has the technology that we carry around in our pockets.  Voice controlled technology without doubt  has its place and I’m sure anyone who releases a smart watch will undoubtedly sell a bunch of units to those who need one.  But as an overall concept, can Apple or Google sell smart watches to the masses?
 
As I’m being cautious on the issue, I’m going to say that I don’t know.  Perhaps existing high end watch makers such as Tag Heuer, Hublot, Sekio, etc, could produce some fantastic and very attractive watches with some built in tech that connects to open-platform software with the watch, perhaps using dual batteries to power the watch mechanics and the smart elements independently, but can Apple, Google and the like do the same?
 
Whilst I don’t doubt their design prowess in some of their tech, watches are precision instruments that sell for high prices and are not all the same.  They say more about a person than their phones do and I’m just not sure that it’s right.
 
Conclusion
 
Without doubt the smart watch is coming and it’s going to be an interesting few months after the first big company release their wares before it can be determined if the concept is strong enough for people to continue to use their smart watch beyond the period of time where the gimmick has ran out.
 
I’ll remain unconvinced until this time.  That’s not to say that I don’t think the devices won’t be cool though, I’ve no doubt that at launch I’ll ‘want’ and be amazed at just what the little device is capable of doing and how the more clever folk amongst us will develop and push a new breed of applications and make it do things that many of us have never even thought of.
 
But until Tag produce one in partnership with Microsoft, I doubt I’ll be trading in my dumb, but elegant, precision, reliable, battery powered analogue watch.

The Great British What Could've Been

Saturday, February 2, 2013 0

Whilst I longer harbour a desire to be a technology writer someday (though I’d need to be a lot more disciplined…and possibly a lot better at actual writing), if my career path in IT ever did come to an end, then I’d most likely want to fall into the world of food in some way.
 
You see I’ve always enjoyed food – both the cooking of and almost certainly of the eating!  Back in my younger days at school when I was undecided between a career in food or IT (before inevitably the IT took over and almost failed the course), I took ‘domestic science’ or ‘food technology’ or whatever the latest description of those classes are these days.
 
It wasn’t a popular choice for boys – only three other males were in my class and whilst the first year went rather well and enjoyed the projects, by the time the second year had rolled around it was obvious that my passion was more towards the technology of the IT arena and I quickly lost interest in the year-long “bread” project that was the second year of my food course.
 
I did eventually pass the course with a ‘D’ with absolutely zero effort and whilst my enjoyment of making food was to simmer for some time, it seems today that it will never quite disappear forever; there is a lot more interest left in me yet!
 
Since moving into my own house over two years and living alone, many of my work colleagues have assumed that my life would be full of ‘take-aways’ and ‘eating out’, but that couldn’t be any further from the truth! 
 
I found that I was unlocked from the cooking of my parents and free to re-learn and re-kindle my passion for ingredients and producing food that was fresh, delicious and produced by my very own hands.  It has been a bit of a re-learning curve – and there is still a long way left for me to go before I reach mastery of the food arts, but with so much inspiration on television in the form of Gordon Ramsay, Jamie Oliver and other celebrity chefs, in addition to fantastic programming like “The Great British Bake Off” that really do fire up those urges to start baking and making, how could one not!
 
My cook book collection is growing – everything from Chinese food, Japanese, Jamie Oliver, Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood – and as the collection grows, so does my curiosity to challenge myself to try something new and delicious made entirely from scratch.  It’s not always possible, of course, I mean who wants to cook from scratch after a long day in the office?  But that’s what weekends are designed for; the time to be creative and try something new!
Today, for example, I’ve made a simple Victoria Sponge, inspired by a Mary Berry recipe, a pork Thai red curry with Paul Hollywood inspired homemade wraps….and that’s just Saturday – tomorrow, who know what I will challenge myself to produce?  The only thing I can be sure of, is that I’ll enjoy every second of being in the kitchen and in couple of years’ time, who knows, maybe I’ll even re-think my career in computing and trade it all in?

My Top 5 in Tech: 2012

Sunday, January 6, 2013 0


For the past few years, I’ve compiled my top five in tech lists and they are always a shock and a pleasure to look back over year after year – not only as a reminder of what I thought were the defining gadgets in my life, but also to track just how far and how quickly technology moves on, as well as how some items can stand the test of time.

In 2011 my number one item, the Amazon Kindle, is still very much a device that I really adore, so much so that at the end of this very year I treated myself to the new Kindle Paperwhite – truly a gadget that continues to thrive.

A reminder of last year’s top five can be found here, but in order here they are again:

  1. Amazon Kindle
  2. Nokia Lumia 800
  3. LaCie Network Space 2
  4. Microsoft Touch Mouse 
  5. Dyson Hot

Without further ado then, let’s get to 2012 and in reverse order…..

NUMBER FIVE: MagiMix 4150 Food Processor

Admittedly, this is a last minute addition to my top five list having only just purchased it in last week; but I’ve been in the market for a food processor for a couple of years now, but had failed to find ‘the one’ that would finally make me put my hand in my pocket and purchase. 

MagiMix is a manufacture renowned for quality and as soon as I seen Amazon include this model in their ‘Lightening Deals’ section for only £155 I knew I had to have one.  Whilst I’m yet to actually use the machine at this time of writing, I have received and looked in awe of the quality, finish and design of the item – it really is a diamond.
The model I’ve purchased has an 800 watt motor, which runs almost silently and whilst the machine is extremely heavy, the 12 year warranty for the motor that accompanies the processor screams quality and brilliance.  The mixing blades and slicers are capable of producing an endless amount of food dishes from breads to pastries to slices and dices of whatever you can think of.
The innovation is pretty funky too – the design of two bowls in one (some models actually offer three), is original and as genius as anything Apple or Dyson are capable of producing in their own design workshops.  This really is a beautiful kitchen appliance.

I can’t wait to start using this machine for real and to see what it is actually capable of and that’s why I simply had to include it in my top five.

NUMBER FOUR: Microsoft OneNote & SkyDrive

Amazing to think that two years ago, Microsoft Live Mesh was my number one in tech as the very starting ground to the movement towards the cloud and the very foundation of Microsoft SkyDrive which has simply flourished throughout this year as Live Mesh moves towards its retirement.

SkyDrive may not yet have the market recognition that ‘DropBox’ does yet, but having recently watched a friend of mine try to upload files onto his DropBox account via the browser and struggling to navigate and register through the confusing website, it brought to light just how simple to use and brilliant the Microsoft alternative is.

Combined this with a just as easy to use application to synchronise content between devices (including Apple, iOS, Android, Windows Phone and Windows itself), it really shines as an innovation worthy of recognition by the masses.  But that’s not where it ends for SkyDrive – it now has an Xbox application allowing you to view your photographs from your console, it plugs into other applications, forms the basis and default save location for Microsoft Office 2013 and OneNote.

And OneNote is truly my application of the year; it has become a hub for just about everything I do.  It stores my recipes, my work documentation, samples of my PowerShell scripts, my order numbers for tracking parcels and also my endless amounts of notes and website clippings that collect and take on my computer and my phone.  It really has become one of the most important applications that I use on a daily basis.

Combined with SkyDrive, all of these notes and documents are there at the very touch of my fingertips at all times, synchronised and completely up-to-date everywhere.  The Office 2013 is a delight to use and the OneNote MX touch enabled version (complete with revolutionary ‘formatting wheel’), is superb – and better yet, free!

It would be a crime to omit OneNote from my list, but it needs to be paired with SkyDrive in order for the real magic of this software to shine.  A tooth

NUMBER THREE: Colgate ProClinical A1500

A toothbrush?  If you’d have told me at the start of the year that a toothbrush would be in my tech top five for this year I’d have told  you that you’d be crazy.  How can a brush with an electric motor be regarded as a technological breakthrough of 2012, after all electric toothbrushes have been around for quite a long time already?

The answer is simple – just look at the tech behind the Colgate ProClinical A1500 brush.  The sensors contained within the device work like an accelerometer that you find in most modern day smart phones and depending on the angle and position of the brush, the speed and type of cleaning the brush provides adjusts accordingly to provide the best cleaning you can ever hope to achieve.

This really is a technological progression from previous electric brushes – this really is the invention of the ‘smart brush’, a brush that ‘thinks’ and changes, calculates and adjusts in real time.  It’s different, its modern and it works.

They are expensive (I thoroughly recommend that you shop around for them as prices really do differ), but they are brilliant.  In other years this technology could have been number one on my list, but in 2012 third is not a position to be simply disregarded.

NUMBER TWO: Windows Phone 8 & Nokia Lumia 920

Twelve months ago the Lumia 800 easily made my top five as Nokia finally woke up from their slump and decided to recapture some of the market lost to the Apple iPhone market.  Twelve months later Nokia have worked extremely hard to innovate and move the Lumia 800 forward and in some ways, they have even beaten this year’s iPhone 5 iteration. 

The PureView camera in the 920 is truly a market changing innovation that shifts mobile phone camera capabilities beyond what we have come to expect, wireless charging (originally seen in the Palm Pre), is back and the inclusion of NFC (Near Field Communications), is something that I believe Apple have really overlooked and missed from the iPhone 5.

NFC might be a hit or miss technology; something else may replace it rather quickly, but having purchased the Nokia Luna NFC Bluetooth headset (which I’d also recommend), this year it really does bridge the gaps between tricky technology (such as Bluetooth pairing), to something as simple as a tap of the device on the back of the phone.

But the hardware and innovations of Nokia are only part of the story; Microsoft have also been busy to move the phone market forward with Windows Phone 8.

Don’t be dazzled by the fact that tiles can now be re-sized, the improvements and changes go way deeper; the kernel is now based on the same technology as Windows operating systems meaning the phone technology now moves at the same pace as the desktop/laptop/tablet market and the coding of applications between desktop and mobile is much, much easier – bringing the markets closer together.

Visual changes in Windows Phone 8 however are also just as innovative; software camera lenses, digital wallets, kid’s corners, SkyDrive and Office 2013 innovations, a new Store, Smartglass for use with Xbox – the Microsoft phone really has become a pillar of their strategy and they deserve to be applauded for creating something that really has made the phone market look again at Microsoft and not discount them.  I believe in their strategy and wouldn’t hesitate for a second before recommending Microsoft Windows Phone 8 and Nokia Lumia 920 technology.

NUMBER ONE: Windows 8 & Surface

So, so much has been written already about Microsoft Windows 8 – some people love it, whilst others hate it and so many more people have been left unsure of it as an alternative from the already successful Windows 7 – which I can completely understand.

Earlier this year I too was unsure and disliked the new OS, so much so I moved quickly back to Windows 7 from the beta/consumer previews of 8.  My early concerns were that Microsoft would re-visit the ‘Vista’ disaster – and yet, and yet – Microsoft completely turned it around on me; as soon as I got my head around the two sides to the new OS it has become a breath of fresh air and a delight to use.

I find myself using the ‘metro’ environment more and more, and split screen applications just help me to work.  The search ‘charm’ facility in Windows 8 is something unique and works phenomenally well.  The OS flows well (after about a week of getting used to how it works), and some where I really enjoy working and playing on my laptop.

Reading reviews of Windows 8 these past couple of months, you’d think that it was a software release to avoid, I couldn’t disagree more – even for those already running Windows 7.  My advice and message to all is to upgrade to 8 now, even more so whilst its cheap to upgrade – with another OS update rumoured to be coming soon to bring further improvements, the changes in 8 are not something Microsoft are going to back down on and having gotten used to the them myself, I agree with their stance completely; accept the changes and adapt now – it will be worth it, trust me.

The brilliance and difference of Windows 8 is why Microsoft felt they needed to produce their own tablet; a ‘showcase’ for the software they claimed, the Surface was born. 

Again, like the software, the reviews have been a mixed bag; everyone seems to agree that the device is a marvel to hold in your hands and is extremely well designed, with outstanding build quality, but is let down by a few quirks in the Windows 8 software (which have been ironed out) and the lack of applications overall.

The applications will come - it’s not all about the overall number of them - it’s about having the applications that you need to be available and I believe most of what I need is already available.  The Surface is a next generation concept and shouldn’t be compared to the iPad tablet; the Surface isn’t about applications, it’s about productivity – that is why Microsoft bundled the touch keyboard into the cover of their device.  The reviews are wrong because they haven’t been put in the right context – everyone wants to compare against Apple.

Surface isn’t all easy though; there is one major issue that I am still wrestling with myself and that’s the split between the RT and Pro versions.  Both have a place and purpose, the problem is that picking between them is extremely difficult for a computer user who expects as much as I do; the RT has a much longer battery life and is a modern tablet complete with Office, but is missing the handwriting features and application capability features the Pro can offer, albeit without the battery life and an additional cost of Office software.

It’s a tricky one to decide and probably the reason that I’ve had to combine my number one device for this year with the software that makes it work.  I believe in the product, but Microsoft really have to do more in 2013 to remove the confusion that surrounds these two great innovations.

Tell me the Price Already!

Wednesday, December 12, 2012 0

It’s all part of the show, part of the game, part of the experience; the combination of mystery, surprise, allure – and it’s all Steve Job’s fault (in my opinion)!  What am I talking about?  The product unveils and the secrecy that surrounds the modern day launch.
 
I’ll admit that these keynote speeches where the wrappers are taken off the next great shiny, must have product are extremely attractive and captivating to watch – why else would millions point their browsers towards these streaming videos and live blogs every year?
 
The problem I have is that they are now so carefully choreographed, to the point where us mere consumers are still left with a million and one questions at the end of them which are pondered in a never ending amount of speculation blog posting.  What ever happened to the Q&A sessions?!
 
My frustration of these on-message keynotes is actually directed towards Microsoft (but I’m still blaming Jobs – he started it!), and their Surface tablets.  You see, I’m really sold on the idea of a Microsoft touchscreen running Windows 8 and the Surface, as Microsoft likes to remind us, are the perfect stage for their new operating system.
 
The problem I have is that I’ve got my heart set on the Surface Pro as I believe it offers more to me (being an IT professional), than the Surface RT.  As the RT version has been available since November, a lot is known about them; availability, pricing, reviews, etc.  The Surface Pro, however, isn’t due until January 2013 and I’m happy to wait – apart from a small caveat; I want to know the price.
 
Microsoft are refusing to name the UK price for the Surface Pro; they’ve announced the US price, starting at $899 – but historically, a direct conversion to UK pound sterling doesn’t provide an accurate representation.  So, Microsoft have a very confused audience here in the UK; no more so than me and I’ve asked the @Surface account many times, but only get the standard “Unfortunately we do not have any pricing details for Surface Pro to share”.
 
 
Why are Microsoft frustrating their UK customers by withholding the price?  Personally, if the price is going to be too high, I’ll settle for the Surface RT and I’ll order that right now today.  If they announced a reasonable price then I’ll happily wait, with the full knowledge of exactly what I’ll need to save/spend when the time comes in January.
 
I blame Steve Jobs!

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