Just when you thought you’d gotten used to the idea of Windows 8 tablets with a minimum screen size of 10 inches comes the Acer Iconia W3, the world’s first Windows 8 tablet to ship with a screen with a screen size of 8 inches.
Yes, Windows 8 is coming to smaller tablets and the first manufacturer to deliver a device is Acer with the Iconia W3. They’ve packed a front and rear-facing 2 megapixel camera, Wi-Fi, an Intel Atom processor and an 8.1 inch LED display at a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels into a stupidly thin and small device.
Did we mention it’s also running Windows 8, so all the desktop applications you aren’t ready to part with just yet will run on this machine. Unfortunately, the only real issue is a dearth of full-size USB ports on the machine -there aren’t any, though it does have connections for televisions and monitors.
At a price of $379 for 32GB of internal storage at Staples I’d say the low end is going to eat this thing up. This machine should help Microsoft comfortably attack the dearth of low end Android tablets and the iPad mini.
