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TechCrunch and Others On the Microsoft Surface Pro 3
TechCrunch's video introduction (not intended as a full review) to the recently introduced Microsoft Surface Pro 3 has mostly good things to say about the device. Reviewer Alex Wilhelm compares it to his MacBook Air, and though he's not sure that the Surface is a better fit for all-day typing than the 11" Air (slightly larger, slightly heavier than the Surface), he says the Surface does a good job of integrating input options (both finger and stylus input) that the Air -- and most laptops -- just don't have. The Washington Post's Hayley Tsukayama also compares the Surface to the Air, rather than to an Android or Apple tablet, writing, "It's heavy for a tablet, sure, but light for a laptop at 1.7 pounds. And while it doesn't have the array of ports that laptops do, you can make do with the two that it does have, a mini-display port that's good for presentations and a USB 3.0 that's good for, well, everything else. You will probably need a hub to get everything you want of this, though. (Or you could go to using Bluetooth accessories, which the Surface Pro 3 will also support.)" Ars Technica has an informative hands-on review as well, but one which parts from these by emphatically describing the Surface as a tablet, not a laptop; Ars reviewer Peter Bright gives high marks for many aspects of the design and materials, though he says his experience with the included pressure-sensitive pen was "problematic." (His initial sample pen had to be replaced, and even when it did work, it lacks tilt sensing.) Troubling for anyone who would prefer to use it as a laptop, Bright says the Surface 3 is better than its forebears but still an awkward fit for using on an actual lap, and that despite the improvements Microsoft's made it therefore isn't quite the system he's looking for.
Costs more than the laptop and tablet it is supposed to replace and not actually better than having seperate units.
I give it credit for the improvements that is has made, but the price is too damn high!
When you've driven a product name into the ground, it's probably time to pick a new name. And no, I don't mean "Surface Pro 3 GOLD" :-)
I know how shitty the old ones were, I won't consider buying anything from Microsoft called "Surface" -- ever. Pick a new name if you want me to consider buying one.
Stop it, Microsoft. It's sad.
From TFA:
"The pen doesn't include the tilt/orientation support that the high-end Wacom pens support. In this regard, it's no different from the previous Surface Pros, as they didn't appear to have tilt support either. If this is a feature you want in a tablet, you'll have to fork out for one of Wacom's extraordinarily expensive Cintiq devices."
Anyone expected pressure-senility and tilt support for under $2k?
It's an improvement upon the SP2, and we have not one, but TWO developers using them here as their primary desktop.
8GB ram, Core i5, reasonable (if limited in variety) connectivity options. These guys are developing significant C++ code (~1.4mil lines of code over 30 or so projects with a total build time for ~3 hours from scratch, ironically they're compiling everything from scratch in closer to 2 hours, SSD in the SP vs SAS RAID5 our normal workstations use I guess) without any productivity loss, same desktop monitors as their old PCs, same keyboard/mouse, just running on a small tablet.
The only real issue is lack of storage (we do machine learning / computer vision, our test sets are about 3TB worth of video/images/annotations) which can't be stored on these tablets for obvious reasons.
These are plenty usable as replacements for laptops, and in some cases even desktops - if you don't have the need for a high powered GPU.
Not logging in since I got a security certificate warning ...
My wife's Surface Pro is an odd beast. It's fast. Well made. (Largely) free of bloatware (and what little there was, like the Expedia app, was easily defenestrated).
But she rarely uses it as a tablet (says she likes Metro, but doesn't like Windows' habit of bouncing her between Work and Play UIs [Office user], so in went Start8 and ModernMix so she can do her thing exclusively in Work mode). Refuses to use the stylus. If she wants to randomly surf the web she grabs either her phone or an actual tablet. Metro and the touch interface got so in the way of what she needs to do (work away from the office) that she's unlikely to ever willingly use Metro; I don't think she's alone in this. And, for better or worse, Metro is how MS pitched the Surface.
Microsoft faces an uphill battle to get people to work past these entrenched habits and odd (OS-related) design choices.
FWIW, I think MS would've had an easier time with market acceptance of the Surface Pro if the launch of Win 8 / Metro had been better handled. It's very hard to take a tool designed for production (specced and priced like an ultrabook) seriously if it boots into a UI designed for consumption which makes it look like an expensive, chunky iPad. And the situation wasn't helped much with naming confusion with the Surface which is (was?) an iPad competitor.
So a netbook with a touchscreen?
At five times the price.