[Banner18]

The surface is on both Bestbuy.com and staples.com home pages!!!

Let's go MS!!!

[inteller]

i think the real point of this is to see them in person though. I mean, you could order them online already.

[CoopII]

Not in Canada yet.

CoopII

[inteller]

I am glad to see they are on the front page. Obviously a Microsoft requirement, but still lol that it gets less page space at Staples than the office chairs and paper. Still questioning that decision. Office Depot seems to be more focused on tech.

[Banner18]

i think the real point of this is to see them in person though. I mean, you could order them online already.

Agreed, but for just announcing it yesterday I was pretty impressed...

[Digital Savior]

Microsoft probably put incentives on these as well to sell. Wouldn't surprise me to see something to $50-$100 per tablet. And if they didn't, they probably should. As great as these are, I think employees will need a push to recommend a Surface over something iOS or Android.

[inteller]

yeah they have some wiggle room on these. I know back in the old days of working office stores they would ofer incentives for selling one brand over another.

[ninjaap]

YES!!! Now I'm going to wait till it gets closer to Christmas and hope BestBuy puts out some type of bundle with accessories! Putting an item like this in retail stores will usually result in different type of incentives for consumers from each retailer. Profit margin on these devices are probably pretty low so they gotta attract us with specials and bundles :)

[KingCrimson]

Don't buy it on Amazon.com yet, it's 3rd party resellers who are gouging people!

[ninjaap]

Don't buy it on Amazon.com yet, it's 3rd party resellers who are gouging people!

Probably the same sellers from eBay!

[goofysam]

my wife picked mine up in a local Staples yesterday (12/14).

[George Ponder]

Nice to see the availability opening up. If we see any big time sales prices, it may make the launch day price sting a little more though...

[mas90guru]

My local Staples has one Surface on display. No keyboard. The screen on the surface is password locked. Very poor display of the Surface. All around there are functioning displays of Nooks and Kindle's (all working for people to try).

[inteller]

take a picture and shame them on their twitter page.

[smartrthanu]

My local Best Buy has a lot of them in stock but none on display. Seems logical /s

[ninjaap]

I called the closest Staples to me and asked if they had one on display that I could play with, said they won't have one till next week, probably, but had them in stock.

[rich4A1]

I just checked out a local Staples. When I walked into the store, there is a sign saying Suface Is Here. The demo unit is on but with no internet connection, so can't try couple things. It's located somwhow odd, that it's not among other PCs, but somwhow by itself. Store associate was fairly positive toward it though, showed me those Win 8 gestures and so on, unlike those at BestBuy I encountered earlier.

I don't know it's the optically bonded display or what, but I just can't walk around without noticing that the screen on Surface looks better than all others. Staples store associate kind of agreed with me.

[stephen_az]

My local Staples has one Surface on display. No keyboard. The screen on the surface is password locked. Very poor display of the Surface. All around there are functioning displays of Nooks and Kindle's (all working for people to try).

Did you point out to them that it was locked? That is usually an oversight which will be quickly addressed if pointed out.

[inteller]

I don't know it's the optically bonded display or what, but I just can't walk around without noticing that the screen on Surface looks better than all others. Staples store associate kind of agreed with me.

that's because it is.

[vertigoOne]

Due to the timing of all of this I cannot help but think that MS is banking on the Surface Pro being much higher demand than the RT.

[inteller]

no not really. But thye have to get through this inventory so they can release a Surface 2. Dell will be out with their XPS tablet sporting next gen ARM tech in the Snapdragon S4 so inventory will move slower after that. The Surface Pro is in a completely different price point and usage scenario.

[MSNY]

I went to best buy today and they had a fully functioning Surface on display, and i gotta say, i was impressed. They put it next to a Samsung ATIV tablet, but the surface looked so much better,

[Kainz15]

I just picked myself up a new one from Best Buy today in Iowa after playing around with a display model for a while! It's replacing my 3rd gen iPad

[vertigoOne]

no not really. But thye have to get through this inventory so they can release a Surface 2. Dell will be out with their XPS tablet sporting next gen ARM tech in the Snapdragon S4 so inventory will move slower after that. The Surface Pro is in a completely different price point and usage scenario.

Why wouldn't they have worked out their retail plans before releasing the RT if that was the case? And with the 360 being available in every retailer that sells electronics I don't think those partnerships would have been very difficult to negotiate, so I don't think the delay is at all unintentional. And I know that the Surface Pro is a completely different category of product, as I will be getting one in addition to my RT, but I have no doubt that they will be displayed at retail side by side.

[wharfratg]

Went to check out the Surface RT this weekend at Best Buy. They had it set up on the kickstand next to a Win 8 touch screen computer without any fanfare. After talking to one of the workers, she was nice enough to get a touch keyboard out from the back so that I could test drive it. However, she took it away when I was done. No one would really be interested in the Surface unless they were looking for it or stumbled upon it and figured out what it was all about.