Microsoft and Apple face different challenges to adapt You can always count on Apple to spoil a Microsoft party. So it is with next Tuesday's expected unveiling of the latest iPad models - the same day that Microsoft had already earmarked for the launch of its new Surface tablets. It also comes hot on the heels of this Thursday's release of the upgraded Windows 8.1, as Microsoft makes up for the missteps of last year's launch of its first touchscreen operating system. Events of the next few days will also show just how differently the companies that have dominated personal computing are adapting to sea-changes in the tablet market. A flood of cheap Android machines has spilled over from the smartphone market into the tablet world. And demand for 10-inch tablets may have hit a high, with growth now moving to cheaper seven-inch models. For its part, Microsoft is still trying to square the circle between PCs and tablets. But the fact that it is getting better at the job doesn't make this any more optimal as a product strategy. For traditional PC users, the software company has thrown in the towel after trying to foist its new user interface - complete with its screen of colourful tiles - on them. Instead, Windows 8.1 machines will be allowed to boot straight to the old-fashioned desktop view. The return of the familiar "Start" button (though not the full Start menu it used to launch) is another concession to the fact that Microsoft demanded too much of PC users as it tried to impose its own vision of touchscreen computing on them. Not forcing a tiled interface on to customers who prefer their computers with keyboards is nothing more than common courtesy. However, having given up on coercing Windows customers to make the leap into the new touchscreen world, Microsoft will have to do a much better job of selling the merits of its software's capabilities. Last year, the cool reception for Windows 8 could be blamed on the lack of decent hardware designed to show it off to maximum effect. That is no longer an excuse. Intel's low power Haswell chips are in full production, making possible much cheaper machines with longer battery life. PC makers have also had more time to experiment with new formats such as hybrid PC/tablet "convertibles," which are meant to make the most of the new operating system. If these hybrids don't sell in volume, there will be no hiding. The break with the past is made all the starker by the antipathy that Microsoft's venture into tablet hardware has stirred among former PC allies. Meg Whitman, Hewlett-Packard's chief executive, pointedly told her investors last week that Microsoft and Intel were turning into "outright competitors." There is no going back. The question for Microsoft's next chief executive will be how quickly to move beyond Steve Ballmer's straddle between the PC and tablet worlds - and how much of the company's traditional software profits to put at risk. Apple is also in transition as it responds to the evolution of the touchscreen computing market that it invented. But its adaptation is altogether more orderly. As with last month's unveiling of new iPhones, one of the most important questions at its iPad event will be price. Last year's launch of the iPad mini showed that Apple was prepared to take a small dent to its profit margin to slow the erosion of its share of the tablet market. The choice now will be whether to hold the line on price and give up more market share - or, as with the iPhone, fork the iPad mini into two devices. Apple could offer a new iPad showing off the latest technology at an unchanged price, plus a "last year's model" dressed up in new clothing but at a lower price point - rather like the iPhone 5c. If recent history is anything to go by, any price reductions at this point are likely to be miserly. Apple has made a calculated decision that it can hold on to and even expand the "quality" (for which read, most profitable) end of the market by making only modest cuts and accepting the slightest reductions in profit margins. The trouble is, declining margins and falling market share are difficult messages to convey to Wall Street. Investors see the trend lines and tend to extrapolate: why shouldn't the adjustment downwards turn into an irresistible slide? Tim Cook has been monotonously consistent in his insistence that Apple will hold the line - refusing to sacrifice quality in response to the flood of cheaper knock-off tablets and smartphones hitting the market. Next week is guaranteed to bring more of the same.