Slashdot Mirror
Software Uses Almost 1/2 the Storage On 32GB Surface Tablet
First time accepted submitter jigamo writes "Microsoft's newly released Surface tablets are available in 32 and 64 GB capacities. The company has disclosed how much of that space is available to the user. After taking into account Windows RT, Microsoft Office, built-in apps, and Windows recovery tools, nearly 13 GB of the available space is eliminated from user accessible storage. Microsoft's recommendations for adding additional capacity are to use cloud storage, a memory card, or a USB storage device."
Ok, so you're accounting for what is likely to be the largest single software install (as in storage) available for the unit outside of the OS. What is it without the Office package?
Well, it's actually kind of cool that the user can pop in a memory card. I guess I have gotten a little to used to iProducts that don't allow such niceties.
Yeah but you can just pop in an SDXC mini-SD card for $50 have have another 64GB for music/movies which is what fills a device.
That's the thing I do not agree with. It's like saying "Hey, we know you bought a 32GB tablet, but we decided to use half of all the space on the tablet so you should go out and buy MORE stuff to make up for the space we use!"
By pure coincidence, 13 Gb with no expansion slot is all you get on a Nexus 7 16 Gb.
...and you can buy three for the price of a surface giving you about 39gb of space :)
And how much is it to add an additional 32gb or 64gb to your iPad if you hit your storage limit?
You swap some data out to external storage, just as Microsoft recommends
I'm unfamiliar with recent changes to iOS. How exactly should an iPad user "swap some data out to external storage" without the help of a PC running iTunes?
Like Windows Phone 7. You could plug in an SD card for more space. Oh, except then you can no longer remove it because files are split across the internal drive and the SD.