Microsoft potentially giving away quad-core Windows 8 slate at BUILD

We try and only bring you rumors and the like that we trust nearly completely here at TNW Microsoft. Today we are going to step back from that and cover something that is potentially true, but that we are not comfortable giving our full nod to.

Microsoft could be set to give attendees of the BUILD conference a quad-core Windows 8 slate device. Yes, at the bottom of the post we have images of the purported tablet. There is a zero chance of Microsoft confirming, or denying this story, so we cannot lean upon the company itself as any sort of functional arbiter.

So, tread carefully, but we would be remiss to not bring you what we have right now. A post was written by Alan Burchill, an IT consultant who deals with Microsoft products, who was at the company’s Tech Ed New Zealand event, that reported images of the quad-core slate and contained the following quote:

What is very interesting is that device was a “Quad Core Windows Slate that will be give out at an upcoming Microsoft Event”… Hmmm…

‘Hmm,’ indeed. We are going to hold off on sharing the images until the end of the post, but let’s talk about what this means. The quad-core element is nearly certainly a four-core ARM processor. I can’t think of anything that makes sense, and TNW Microsoft is not alone in the thought. Now, to the “upcoming Microsoft Event” line. Frankly, what else could that be but BUILD? BUILD is the spiritual ancestor of PDC, an event at which Microsoft was notorious for giving developers toys to play with.

And why did it do that? To provide them with a playground to test the latest from the company. In other words, it gave them a sample to test, in hopes of convincing them to build for the platform. Microsoft is set to unveil much of Windows 8 at BUILD, so what better time to get hardware into the hands of attendees then at that moment? Google, it must be said, has a history of giving away hardware as well at its developer functions.

Why are we skeptical of all this? Because we don’t know Mr. Burchill. But we do know ZDNet, and they found enough to go on with the story to write a piece of a skeptical nature, as did we. Therefore, if all this is a hoax, at least we will  have someone to share the egg-on-face with.

Enjoy the pictures, and sound off in the comments with your thoughts: