Microsoft is about to enter the tablet wars. The software giant is set to announce that it will start making its own tablet computer to challenge the iPad and Android-based devices, according to a report Friday in the Wall Street Journal's All ThingsD blog. The unveiling will come at an event scheduled for Monday in Los Angeles where Microsoft has promised a "major announcement. " The self-branded tablet would mark a radical switch from Microsoft's traditional strategy in which it has made computer software and allowed its hardware partners mostly free rein in building the device to run it. The tablet would represent the first time that Microsoft has designed and built both the hardware and software for a computer. It does however have hardware experience in its failed Zune music player as well as the far more successful Xbox gaming console. The move comes as Apple's iPad, and to a lesser extent Android-based tablets, cannibalize sales of the desktop and tablet computers running Microsoft's Windows operating system. Microsoft is set to release a new version of the operating system, Windows 8, later this year. The new software has been optimized to run tablets as well as traditional PCs.
