Tablet

Archaeologists have found a clay tablet bearing the earliest known writing in Europe, a 3,350-year-old specimen, which makes it at least 150 years older than other known tablets from the region. Found in one of the palaces linked to Greece's King Nestor of Trojan War fame, the tablet not only is older than expected, but also appears at a site, called Iklaina, where researchers did not expect to find writing, said its discoverer, Michael Cosmopoulos of the University of Missouri-St.

Microsoft has announced the pricing for its Surface tablet with Windows 8 Pro. The tablet, which will be available in January, will cost $899 for a 64GB version and $999 for a 128GB version, the company said in a blog post Thursday. Quiz: What set the Internet on fire in 2012? Surface with Windows 8 Pro, known as Surface Pro, looks the same as Surface with Windows RT, which is already on the market. Both include a dark titanium VaporMG casing, dual 2x2 MIMO antennas and a kickstand.

Microsoft caught our attention on Thursday with a media invitation to a super-secret event in Los Angeles: "This will be a major Microsoft announcement -- you will not want to miss it. " Although the tech giant gave no hints about what it was planning to announce at the Monday event (heck, the invite didn't even say where it would take place!), a source has told the Wrap that Microsoft plans to unveil a tablet to rival Apple's iPad. The entertainment blog said the company plans to introduce a Microsoft-branded-and-manufactured tablet at the event, "marking a foray into a new hardware category that would put the company in direct competition" with Apple.

Fresh off a billion-dollar court loss to Apple, Samsung introduced a myriad of new devices this week, including the sequel to the Galaxy Note, a new Android-powered camera and a Windows 8 tablet. Samsung's latest edition of its smartphone/tablet hybrid, the Galaxy Note II, improves on the oversized phone the South Korean company introduced to the U.S. earlier this year by making it more powerful, thinner and lighter. The phone's screen size has gotten bigger, increasing from 5.3 inches to 5.5 inches.

Rumors and leaks may have hurt Apple in the tablet market during this year's third quarter, resulting in a significant loss of market share, a report Monday says. The Cupertino company went from controlling 65.5% of the market during the 2012 second quarter to 50.4% in the third quarter, according to IDC , a tech analytics firm. IDC said it believes the rumors surrounding the iPad mini led a "sizable percentage of consumers" who were interested in getting an iPad to wait and see what Apple would offer and to sit out making a purchase during the third quarter.

A new report says tablet shipments will surpass notebooks by 2016 to become the dominant type of mobile computer sold around the world. The report, put out by NPD Display Search , finds that the number of tablets that will be shipped between now and 2017 will increase at a compounded annual growth rate of 28%. That would take the number of tablet shipments up from 121 million units this year to more than 400 million five years from now....

Microsoft won't be able to release the Surface Pro tablet in January as it originally said, but the tech giant will miss its deadline only by a few days. The Redmond, Wash.,-based company announced Tuesday that the Surface Pro will go on sale Feb. 9. The Surface Pro starts at $899 and offers more power and capabilities than the Surface RT. Unlike its limited sibling, the Surface Pro can run Windows 7 applications and uses Windows 8 Pro. PHOTOS: Tech we want to see in 2013 The base model Surface Pro comes with 64 gigabytes of storage and a stylus that Microsoft is calling the "Surface pen. " The Surface Pro runs on an Intel Core i5 processor and its 10.6-inch screen has a full HD 1,920 by 1,080 pixel resolution, which is an improvement over the display on the Surface RT. The Surface Pro is also available in a 128 GB version for $999.

Samsung has shipped 5 million units of its Galaxy Note hybrid device, the South Korean electronics giant said. The Note was announced last year by the company and hit AT&T stores last month with the intention of trailblazing a new market, as the device is larger than most smartphones but not quite as big as typical tablets. The device, which comes with a stylus called the "S Pen," comes with an 8 megapixel rear camera, can shoot in 1080p and has a 5.3-inch touchscreen with 1280x800 pixel resolution.

Apple does not have the highest market share when it comes to smartphones -- unless you just look at wealthier people. According to a new report, when it comes to users whose net worth is more than $100,000, the Cupertino, Calif., company's iPhone and iPad remain the phone and tablet of choice, respectively. And for the most part, Apple's market share only increases the higher up the asset scale you look, according to the report from Spectrem Group, a research firm that specializes in the affluent and retirement markets.

With impressive specs, the Nexus 10 seems like a special tablet, at least on paper. When put through a real-world test, Google's latest tablet performed well for the price but not enough to brag about to friends. The Nexus 10 is the flagship high-end Android tablet of the season. It has a starting price of $399 for a 16-gigabyte model and features a 10-inch screen with a 2,560-by-1,600-pixel resolution and 300-pixel-per-inch (PPI) density. It sounds like a better deal than what you get from Apple for its $499 16 GB, 9.7-inch iPad, which has a 2,048-by-1,536 resolution and 264 PPI. But once in use, the Nexus 10 does feel like it's worth about $100 less than its Apple rival.