Microsoft seeks to reinvent itself with Windows 8 - Telegraph.co.uk

While it is Apple that has shaped this new landscape, however, many analysts feel the iPad- maker is now taking on the role more usually associated with Microsoft: it has become the giant player, dominating but, if its two most recent launches are anything to go by, now struggling to innovate at the pace it once mustered. The iPhone 5 has been lauded as an excellent iPhone, and the iPad Mini is a well regarded tablet. But neither of these two devices has surprised users or critics with unexpected features. Samsung does that instead.

Windows 8, however, has garnered praise for being a system that is, in promise at least, designed with far more flair than is usually associated with Microsoft. The Surface tablet has been praised for exceptional design and caused more excitement than any other product this year. And on Monday Microsoft will finally unveil the phones that complement it. So there’s an outside chance that Microsoft, now in many ways the underdog, may yet take on Apple at its own game. The standards on both sides have never been higher, and the competition can only benefit consumers.