It’s about the price. If the new pads are at least $200 less than iPad, people will buy them. They won’t kill the iPad, just as Android phones haven’t killed the iPhone.
Apple competes in the premium price market. They have owned that market for quite a while. Just as Windows computers are about half the price of Mac computers, the Windows pads will probably be considerably cheaper than the iPads. If the Windows pads cost as much as iPads, they won’t sell.
The “commodity” computer/pad/phone market is a huge one that Apple doesn’t address. Unfortunately for Microsoft, they aren’t the only operating system for that market and Android got there first. I predict a slow but steady sales growth curve for the new Windows tablets with a price point slightly above Android tablets and significantly below Apple tablets.
Windows 8 tablets/hybrids won't take too long to outsell Android tablets, mostly because Windows 8 hybrids will run the over 6 million Windows 7 programs from the get go in Desktop mode. Android tablets don't really have much of a market share right now. Outselling the iPad is another matter altogether. That is going to take quite a while.
Not quite true anymore. If you compare like for like - the Apple computers are very competitive with anyone. Compare a specific Mac Book Air, then compare an industrial case (not a cheap plastic case) with identical specs from Dell, HP, Leveno or anyone else - you will find that Apple is usually cheaper.
Compare the 9.7 inch tablets made for Android and price-compare them against the iPads - again, like-for-like. You will find that the other tablets are about the same price (or more expensive) than the iPad. In the case of Blackberry, they had to knock their price from $699 down to $149 to sell their inventory - they were MORE expensive than the similiar equipped iPad.
The age of the "Mac Tax" is gone.