By Teresa von Fuchs
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
In more from AT&T, the carrier announced plans to install Microsoft’s giant touch-screen computers, called Surface, inside its retail outlets “giving customers the ability to explore their mobile worlds using touch and device-recognition technology.” AT&T said it would be the first company in the world to bring Microsoft Surface to life in a retail environment.
Originally Microsoft had announced that T-Mobile would be the first company to use the new computers in retail stores.
Beginning April 17, AT&T will deploy Microsoft Surface in select AT&T retail locations, including stores in New York City, Atlanta, San Antonio and San Francisco. Based on the success of these initial deployments, the carrier says it could expand the Surface across its 2,200 U.S.-based retail stores.
Microsoft’s Surface is a 30-inch table-like computer with a touch-based display. Users can: review features of a particular device or compare features of multiple devices by simply placing them on the display; view interactive coverage maps at the national, state, local or street level; and in the future, customers will be able to drag and drop ringtones, graphics, video and more by “grabbing” content from a menu on the display and “dropping” it into the phone.
AT&T said it will continue to collaborate with Microsoft on “new and innovative” ways to expand the Surface capabilities in AT&T stores.