This reporter wants to see Microsoft manufacturing it’s own PC’s running Windows. As much as I wouldn’t mind seeing what Microsoft would come up with, I don’t think it would be very successful. Yes, it worked for Apple, barely. The reason Microsoft won the operating system wars back in the 80’s and 90’s was due to it’s open architecture. You could buy any PC, or build your own, and put MS-DOS or Windows on it (or OS/2 Warp, if you wanted).
Apple locked their OS into their own hardware. This left out us hobbyists, as well as many of the third party manufacturers. People like to have choices (except for the Applites, they want the same thing as everyone else) and alternatives. Android is successful because there are so many different models. Microsoft is successful because there are so many different models of PC’s to buy – from entry level, low cost office PC’s to high end gaming machines. Apple tried to allow clones at one time, but it was already a Microsoft dominated world. They didn’t do as well as they needed to, and they felt the bite.
I don’t think Microsoft should enter into the PC manufacturing industry. It’d be cool to see what they came up with, but it would kill many of the third party PC builders.
While starting a PC business might seem insane given the state of the market, Microsoft isn’t starting from scratch. It already has a hugely successful PC hardware business in the form of the Xbox – which is a PC in all but name. Yes, there were “red ring of death” issues early on, but that bit of hardware has helped the entertainment division contribute $9 billion in quarterly revenue, and proves the public will happily buy made-by-Microsoft kit.