Does anyone know what happened to the Surface Duo?

dch82@lemmy.zip to Technology@lemmy.world – 31 points –

Microsoft were pioneering the foldable phone trend, then after the Surface Duo 2, silently discontinued the lineup.

Of course it might be its awkward dual screen system, but that wouldn’t be the full story.

Anyone know (and is allowed to disclose) any further details on the demise of the Surface Duo?

12

You are viewing a single comment

It was not a good phone, and had even worse software. So they discontinued it. I don’t know why they don’t just make a normal phone.

It's interesting how often Microsoft managed to bring truly innovative products a few years too early to market and then just silently fails.

They had tablets in the early 00s, ARM laptops, folding phones, media centers.

The current CEO doesn’t like anything that doesn’t create subscription revenue. Products like this end up abandoned or canceled.

It's because being "first" to market only matters if you do the work to cross the bare minimum threshold for people to want your product. If your software is shit (like pretty much everything Microsoft does; their PC share is leaning massively on inertia), you're not going to create a market. Insufficient hardware can also be an issue, but it's usually not Microsoft's.

Was the tablet's touchscreen as responsive as iPad's? What was the operating system? If Windows, I can see how it failed. Previous versions of Windows were mouse-and-keyboard-first. I think Windows 8 was the 1st to truly consider touch and iPados was still better.

Microsoft had an Arm Surface device a few years ago. It had a 💩 chip.