That's a restatement of the obvious. Microsoft has always made hardware. Their keyboards and mice have been consistently nice over the years, unlike some of A

That's a restatement of the obvious. Microsoft has always made hardware. Their keyboards and mice have been consistently nice over the years, unlike some of Apple's abominations (e.g. The puck-mouse). The Xbox and it's associated peripherals represented a major expansion for MS's hardware group that has paid off very well. They also have a few odd-ball corporate devices (such as the old table-surface). There was also that unfortunate foray into mp3 players... (Arguably the Zune was good, but MS's brand was too uncool at the time for the Zune to gain traction before smartphones killed the market for mp3 players.) Hopefully the new surface will fare better!