Hewlett-Packard To Kill Windows 7 Tablet Project
Hewlett-Packard has killed off its much ballyhooed Windows 7 tablet computer, says a source who's been briefed on the matter. — The device was first unveiled by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at CES 2010 in January and was supposed to hit the market in mid 2010.
Context & Ripple Effects
The device was Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's CES 2010 showpiece — a confirmed January unveiling with a mid-2010 market date — meant to prove Windows belonged on slate hardware. Now a single source briefed on the matter tells TechCrunch HP has killed the project; the cancellation remains unconfirmed by either company.
Two threads make the report consequential rather than anecdotal. HP was already hedging: TechCrunch reported in January that the company had a second slate running Google's Android in parallel. And the story's widest pickup, Silicon Alley Insider, framed it bluntly — the tablet market is sprouting without Windows, putting Microsoft's desktop monopoly logic at risk across MSFT, GOOG, AAPL, HPQ and PALM alike.
First-order effects
- If the sourced report holds, HP's mid-2010 Windows 7 slate will not ship, erasing the flagship OEM demonstration of Windows on tablet form factors that Ballmer staged at CES.
- Microsoft loses its most visible hardware partner's commitment to a category it had just showcased, while the report leaves HP's slate roadmap publicly unresolved.
Second-order effects
- HP's Android slate moves from side bet to likeliest path to market, pulling a marquee Windows OEM toward Google's operating system for the new category.
- Silicon Alley Insider's framing — a tablet market growing up without Windows — hands competitors like Apple and Palm a narrative advantage: the category's reference devices run something else.
Third-order effects
- If OEMs treat Windows as optional rather than default in each new hardware category, the preload-driven distribution model that underpins Microsoft's PC franchise does not transfer automatically to tablets, forcing Microsoft to compete for placement instead of inheriting it.
- A pattern of flagship partners walking away from Windows slates would push hardware makers toward multi-OS portfolios — Windows, Android, and whatever else ships — fragmenting the assumption that one OS follows the PC maker everywhere.
The trend: The tablet category is emerging as the first major hardware wave where Windows is not the default operating system, testing whether Microsoft's PC-era distribution power survives without preloads.