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Microsoft Wants You To Trade Your MacBook Air In For a Surface Pro 3
mpicpp writes with news about a new Microsoft trade-in program to encourage sales of the new Surface Pro 3. Microsoft is offering a limited time Surface Pro 3 promotion via which users can get up to $650 in store credit for trading in certain Apple MacBook Air models. The new promotion, running June 20 to July 31, 2014 -- "or while supplies last" -- requires users to bring MacBook Airs into select Microsoft retail stores in the U.S., Puerto Rico and Canada. (The trade-in isn't valid online.)...To get the maximum ($650) value, users have to apply the store credit toward the purchase of a Surface Pro 3, the most recent model of the company's Intel-based Surface tablets.
The MBA and MBP are both fine machines. My wife get's a computer that works most of the time. I get a computer with a bash shell on which I can do my thing. Neither have shown any tendency to falls apart, unlike every Asus, Lenovo, Toshiba and HP we've had.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
Derp. Surface Pros can do things that no other tablet can. Your jealousy is showing.
Er really?
Maybe visit a sysadmin or software dev conference. Macbook Air's are pretty common and for a good reason.
Calm your nerd rage down a bit.
Not likely...
Trade in a real computer for "store credit" towards an overpriced model of a POS tablet no one wants...
"Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
That trade in is simple enough - Do Not Want. Not even free.
I will take one of those used Airs off their hands.
In 'good' condition... they're worth more than that on Craigslist...
What this tells me is that Microsoft has given up trying to promote the Surface as a tablet. It's a laptop that happens to have a detachable keyboard. Note that they didn't even try to offer a trade-in of ipads for the surface, which would be a more reasonable comparison if the surface was successful as a tablet. The ipad is a different use case, and Microsoft just doesn't play well in that space.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
They'll do anything to pick them up cheaply, even trade some unwanted Surface 3's for some!
Jokes aside (and please don't mod for flamebait, it's sarcasm above, downmod for a bad joke if anything) ...
I don't think will go much. You're assuming that someone values their $1000+ dollar MacBook Air at $650 and values the Surface at something worth the discount. Considering the amount of work you'd have to do to migrate (either Windows to Mac, or Mac to Windows) you have to think about 200-300 realistically for swapping costs. Makes good headlines (as we see here) but won't help much.
To get one of the trade in Mac Book Air (s) ??
I am sure ebay is full of cheap damaged Macbooks which power on and don't have screen cracks or water damage. Buy for less than $650, resell Surface, profit!
Trade in a real computer for a POS tablet no one wants...
...and drive hundreds of miles to do so.
If Microsoft wants any uptake on promotions like this, Microsoft needs to get more aggressive about opening retail stores. The closest Microsoft Store is 112 miles away from where I live according to Bing Maps. But then Apple isn't a lot better, with a 90 mile drive to its nearest corporate retail store (as opposed to a local franchised dealer in town).
"While supplies last." That's the funniest thing I've heard all day.
Any insufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.
Man. What idiot marketing shill came up with that harebrained scheme? Talk about corporate desperation. So we'll trade in a perfectly good MBA for half what it's worth in credit toward a glorified tablet that M$ can't seem to give away? (yes, I know that's last year's news but no reason to believe anything will change with version 3 IMHO). No thanks. I'm not really a huge fan of the MBA either, but this is ridiculous.
Deja Moo: The distinct feeling that you've heard this bull before.
If all I had were a bunch of crappy Surface Pro 3 bricks running some terrible version of windows, I'd trade it *and* pay you for your MacBook Air, too!
(written on a satisfied-customer's MacBook Air)
If anyone did take them up on the offer I'd be amazed.
the MacBook Air isn't a tablet though. It runs the full version of OS X (and Win 8, or whatever else you want to install for that matter).
Who sponsored your crappy hardware? M$oft. NSA again?
Last thing we need is your calling home Pukeware Pro
Try again but this time during Bingo for senior citizens. This is your target demographic.
Microsoft couldn't pay me to get a Surface, much less give up my Macbook
Make it 2 of your top of the line surface 3 pros and I will do it. Because you need to make it a sweet deal for me to jump to a platform known to have issues and very very low adoption rate.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Derp. Surface Pros can do things that no other tablet can. Your jealousy is showing.
M$ has been trying to marketing tablets longer than apple has; nobody except M$ fanboyz wanted them back in the WinCE days; and nobody except the fanboyz want them now.
It's more brilliant than you think—now the Microsoft employees who came up with this idea can get MacBooks without getting their boss's signature! In theory, anyway.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
the MacBook Air isn't a tablet though. It runs the full version of OS X (and Win 8, or whatever else you want to install for that matter).
And the Surface Pro 3 isn't just a tablet either. It comes with full Windows 8.1, not the RT version, so you can run whatever desktop apps you like.
I'll give you $5 for your $20 bill!
I think I'm going to like this new MS CEO...
Microsoft is desperate.
How can you tell?
Let's reverse this...can you imagine if Apple gave a similar $$ discount on Macbook Air & iPads in trade for a Microsoft Surface?
bummed out x-mas gift recipients would line up around the corner!
Thank you Dave Raggett
Seriously. I love the MacBook Air I got a couple of years ago. The thing works very well, and even runs the occasional VMWare Fusion image of Windows 7 I need to run occasionally off of a portable thunderbolt drive. On a whim I got one of the earlier Surface tablets when the wife and I were in Vegas and they had a Kiosk where they were practically giving them away - but for the life of me still cannot use it for anything truly productive.
Trade in a MacBook Air for a surface?! Sorry Microsoft. You've been a day late and a dollar short ever since Ballmer pissed on the idea of tablets and smartphones and Apple smoked you and ate you for breakfast. Apple would have to skullf**k a small, disabled child onstage during their next keynote to even _think_ of falling behind enough for you to catch up to relevancy.
Microsoft - As long as I can virtualize your OS, take a snapshot and rollback when your OS takes a dive and run it all on a machine that, you know, _works_ I won't buy another piece of hardware branded by you. Ever.
And as another poster mentioned, "While supplies last." Really? Wow, even with Steve "Developers Developers Developers" Ballmer gone, you _still_ have a great sense of humor.
Never have a philosophy which supports a lack of courage
Who would do it? Nobody.
It's an expensive piece of hardware whose performance doesn't justify the cost and whose size makes it a terrible fucking tablet. I could buy a Nexus 7 and a tolerable decent notebook for less than a Surface 3 and have the best of both worlds.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Wow, it seems even Microsoft would rather have Apple's product than their own.
I am literally 3000 tokens away from the chaotic crossbow --Stephen
It really isn't. I bet all of 2 people take them up on this offer, and only then because they are dazed and confused.
Fortunately, I was not drinking any liquid at the time I read this article. I would have spoilt my carefully maintained MBA keyboard and screen.
Windows 8.X IS A F'ING MESS! I have a visceral dislike of it. And if one with geekish traits has trouble navigating the thing, you seriously expect novices to get to first base with it? The damn "charms" hidden bar, (which is where the important stuff hides) resists being found where the documentation says its supposed to be.
Microsoft would do better to port their enterprise software in such a way that it is platform agnostic because I'm not planning to recommend companies deploy windows 8 anytime soon.
Here recently I run by the store on the way home to pick up some milk. Was in a rush and left my Surface Pro on the front seat, in plain view.
When I came out, I discovered someone had broken into my car and left three more Surface Pro's :(
And this deserves a whole article on slashdot ??
Learn to read Mr.Keyboard Commando, or did you purposefully snip the "we've had" of the end of his sentence for the sake of an arguement ?
Can you prove than none of HIS laptops haven't fallen apart as he claimed?
I see you "liar" insult, and raise you a "dumb twat"
Microsoft wants Apple users to trade their laptops for Microsoft tablets. How thick are they?
Next up: Microsoft wants you to trade your Playstation 4 in for an Xbox One and only offers you a 200$ rebate for for it, too.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
Inspirion 1720 is going strong after 7 years of non stop usage and it runs flawlessly with Linux Mint 14/Mate. Only thing I replaced was to put in a SSD and I spilt a full glass of beer on the KB which eventually need to be replaced. So does that make Dell's as good as your Mac's?
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Surface Pros can do things that no other tablet can. Your jealousy is showing.
That's nice and all, but your lack of useful and relevant examples is rather glaring.
I don't think anyone here is denying that the Surface line is trying to do something that's quite a bit different from what other tablets are doing. They're definitely targeting a different set of use cases than what the iPad, Fire, or Galaxy Tab lines are hitting, and I have no doubt that the Surface Pro can do stuff no other tablet can. But the important question isn't, "Does it do stuff no one else can?" The important question to ask is, "Are the things it can do of interest to people and executed well?" And based on sales numbers, professional reviews, and numerous firsthand accounts both here and elsewhere, the answer is a resounding, "No".
Really, when you get down to it, the Surface line is simply a fresh iteration of the same strategy Microsoft has been employing in the tablet space since the early 2000s: put Windows everywhere so that users can have the power of a "PC" in their hand. The only thing that's changed is the execution, and you don't need to look long and hard at Windows 8 reviews to know that they botched that as well. The strategy may actually work for them if it is executed properly, but the fact that the market stayed nascent for ten years until a competitor introduced a device employing an alternative strategy indicates that they didn't get it right then, and the fact that the Surface line hasn't seen any real uptake should be good indications that either the strategy is a losing one or else that they have yet to execute properly on it.
TL;DR: Just because a device can do stuff other devices can't doesn't mean it's a good idea. We don't want compact cars with truck beds, wedding cakes from Burger King, or tight-fitting exercise shorts made of designer denim. In trying to be both a tablet and laptop, the Surface ended up being good at neither.
I don't even like Apple and I wouldn't trade a macbook for a surface pro. Hell, I'd be hard pressed to trade my first gen Nexus 7 for a surface pro.
That is actually true. All the other tablets are too lighweight to kill a cat when you throw them at the feline.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Hold up: you're missing an important distinction.
The MacBook Air isn't just a laptop. It is a laptop. That's all it is, and it's a darn good laptop. It does laptop things really well.
By not just being a tablet, the Surface has failed to be good at being anything at all. If you pit it against laptops, it's under-specced for the price. For that sort of money, you can do a lot better elsewhere. And if you pit it against tablets, it's lacking apps and overpriced. It's in a weird space between the two that no one is interested in. I commend them for trying something different than everyone else and trying to carve out a unique niche (really, I do!), but I don't see how this particular execution of their strategy can be painted as anything other than an extended failure that has yet to turn the corner. I honestly hope it will, but it has yet to do so.
Gosh, why not? I can see someone looking at their MBA saying, "It works perfectly, has a great OS, awesome battery life, and does everything I could ask for and does it fast. I need to dump this for a barely functional device with an actively antagonistic OS sold by a company unable to secure a wet paper bag or make software that works acceptably. All this for far less battery life and far more money. I wish I had 2 MBAs to trade in!",
Back to the real world....
Did I mention that the day after the S3's release I was at a press event on a bus full of journalists. Anand has his S3 and in less than 24 hours it broke. The entire bus full of tech journos all concluded it was better that way.
That said, some people do like it. Microsoft traded in an absolute monopoly lock on the desktop to cater to 10% of their base. Clever that MS management, clever.
-Charlie
I stand outside the MS store with a sign: "I'll pay $660 for the first working 2012 or later MBA 13 4/256" They get their cash, I get a very nice MBA for a song, and if the Surface3 is all that they'll still head into the store and buy it. MS store managers can't legally use a taser, right?
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Yeah, this was my first thought too, what is Micro$soft going to do with all those MBP???
Yes if your primary concern is saving a few dollars you could have a clumsy solution where you have multiple devices that you have to carry and sync data between.
Microsoft must be really desperate.
No thanks.... oh, and no thanks on that Air thing either... love my Nexus 10 tablet. :)
Heh. And for folks who have a Microsoft store nearby, stop in and ask if they have any used MBAs for sale ;)
I say again "HA!". I think I would rather use something with MacOS than Win8. MacOS was designed for idiots, Windows 8 was designed by idiots.
Yeah, okay. Good luck with that.
I currently have a Surface Pro2 with Ubuntu running. It is my first non-Apple computer in more than 10 years. Which I bought reluctantly when my previous MacBook died and did not like any of the current out-dated models.
For the most part, everything in Ubuntu runs great on the Surface Pro2, except Wi-Fi which is flaky due to sucky proprietary Marvell drivers.
In any case, it is now my primary work computer, and I am very happy with it, although I do really like the newer Surface Pro3 with larger screen and better kickstand.
Apple MacBook Airs are horrible out of date compared to Surface Pro2 & Pro3. No retina display, no touch display, and no pen input. And I trust Linux much more that NSA backdoor'ed OSX and Windows.
The fact is that Microsoft is now making excellent laptop/tablet hardware, even though their OS has issues. I wish that people look at things objectively and stop giving praise to a company that use to innovate but now refuses to upgrade hardware to meet customer's needs. (I am still
Surface Pro series just keeps getting better. Looks like apple is going to have its ass handed to it. As soon as Microsoft releases a file manager for wp8. ..
.
Oh. Nevermind, and you cheap linux morons can't afford it anyway.
I've recently started school and shopped around for a small device that would allow me to take notes in class. It came down to the Mac Book Air and the Surface Pro 2. Ultimately, I realized that there was no way the Surface would balance on those half desks in the lecture halls of my school. I decided I needed a keyboard that would support the screen. The Surface just can't do that. The designers assume you will be sitting a full desk.
-- A cat is no trade for integrity!
You would need to give me an equivalent tables plus at least 100 dollar so I can rebuy apps.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The non-RT surface was never a tablet competitor.
Virtually all the software people run on x86 is primarily designed for desktop use, and the gap between it and tablet universe's UI and software base progress is widening, not shrinking.
Apple killed them for two reasons - Apple understood the fundamental difference between how consumers use tablets and computers and catered to each market appropriately (rather than a half-assed worst-of-both-worlds one-size-fits-all attempt at both)... and (with the relatively recent exception of the screen specs) Apple killed MS on ultrabook hardware - while microsoft was selling Ultrabook (x86, non-RT) surfare with i3, a single USB port, 64-128GB storage and 2-4GB RAM (poorly suited for both desktop use and tablet use), MBA's have been doing i7/8GB/512GB for 3 years now, fit in well with desktop use, with all above-baseline upgrades but the SSD coming at a relatively minor cost increase.
In short, Apple has been selling grown-up computers cleverly disguised as ultrabooks, which people already used for work. Microsoft has been selling not-quite-grown-up computers stupidly disguised as tablets.
More (either more specialised or more under-the-hood) reasons people feel MBA's win out by a landslide -
- Server-grade external I/O - I run an nVidia Geforce660Ti eGPU, on native Windows, on my MBA thunderbolt port. I can game, desktop-hardware-grade, driving a 30'' screen on my MBA. I outperform recent alienware laptops.
Others use that I/O for external storage.
- Internal I/O - An MBA2013 with a 256GB or higher SSD does sustained read/write of ~650-700MB/sec - due to the absence of a SATA controller (raw PCIe storage ftw).
- MBA adds OSX to the list of OS's you can easily run (I personally prefer it for everything but gaming as the native OS and run everything else (windows for work, linux) in VMs)
- If you're on an apple home environment (phones, audio/video-sinks, etc, macs do more).
So now Microsoft matched the CPU/RAM/disk specs of (the now nearly a year old) MBA. Okay.
Not quite so on the I/O, but that's a niche most non-techo consumers neither understand nor care about.
Until Apple release their update, Microsoft is ahead on screen capability (res and touch) and cost. On paper it looks "fair enough".
Sadly for them, it's not as simple as a specs comparison. This isn't a showoff between gaming motherboards on Toms Hardware.
They're still dead though - not having understood what Apple did.
Apple didn't justify producing the MBA in the millions (=MASSIVELY underpricing every ultrabook on the market) by raiding Lenovo's x-series or Sony Vaio ultrabook userbases (which were MUCH, MUCH smaller - tens of thousands rather than millions).
Apple justified it by raiding THEIR OWN MOMENTUM - their very own *existing install base* of cheap macs - the white plastic toilet-seat-cover macbooks.
Back in MS land, what MS's dumbshit marketers don't understand is that the only people who need Surface 3's today are not mac users with MBA's (who are very unlikely to touch a surface... particularly those with a brand new 2013 MBA), most mac users not leaning towards mac products for specs anyway, and those that do (like me..) Microsoft can't really sway because it loses out on those.
The people who need those surface 3's are the HUGE install-base of people with an old desktop PCs, Microsoft's equivalent of the toilet sear covers.
Sadly, Microsoft has NO CLUE how to go to market and reach that userbase with the surface... which is why they'll sell too few surfaces, lose money, not justify the supply chain, not be able to go to scale on their production, fail to woo their partners into making their own (like google did with android) with a credible reference platform, fail to drop prices sustainably... and have Apple eath their lunch for another year.
I would have liked to see better competition.
-
Think of it as trading your new hope for a phantom menace.
...Ford is offering a rebate on a new Fiesta (with power locks and windows!) for anybody willing to trade in their Tesla Model S.
Apple commercials show people doing actual useful things with their gear. MS commercials show people magically dancing through time and space with their gear.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
It's an expensive piece of hardware whose performance doesn't justify the cost and whose size makes it a terrible fucking tablet. I could buy a Nexus 7 and a tolerable decent notebook for less than a Surface 3 and have the best of both worlds.
The Macbook Air is not a tablet, doorknob. And even Microsoft knows no fool would hand over their Air when the average Air gets over 800$ on Ebay and is a very different beast compared to the Surface. It's purely for attention and frankly just makes them look desperate for sales. M$ always did suck at marketing.
And a huge tablet like a Surface 3 isn't clumsy?
My Nexus 7 and 15" notebook both fit nicely in my case, and combined cost at least a couple of hundred bucks less than the Surface 3. If I was to spend that much on a laptop, I'd get a helluva better unit than this underpower device.
If it works for you, great. Myself, I consider it an appalling waste of money.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Trade in my Ferrari for a ford? are they nutz?
I understand one have to abandon its MacBook to Microsoft to enjoy the deal, is that right?
What Microsoft will do with the MacBook? And the data it contains?
"Syncing data between devices"? It's 2014 - this is a solved problem.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I have had about the same experience, with one exception. In 2006 at a new job, my employer bought me a 17" HP that was built like a tank and worked flawlessly for six years. Of course it cost more than a comparable Macbook at the time. Battery life was awfule, as in I had to buy new batteries every 18 months, but it worked great. It also weighed as much as a tank. I currently use a 13" Retina Macbook Pro that is better in every way.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
Hahahahahahah yeah fucking right I'll trade my laptop in for a shitty Windows-based ipad knockoff, sure why not.
Calm your nerd rage down a bit.
Corporate drones insist their companies to buy them overpriced toys so they can feel adequate in the company of other desperate status seekers. News at 11.
But really, how about you guys just continue with your fanboy bitch slap fight? That's what everybody involved with this article wants you to do, because there's no other reason to choose either of these gadgets over better specced and better priced alternatives.
MS and Apple marketing types love to pretend it's a two-horse race...
It's ok bro, Steve Jobs is not going to rise from the dead and let you slob on his knob if you keep shilling for him.
I used to be a die-hard Windows user throughout the 90s and early 21st century. Until 2011 when I bought my MacBook Pro. I've now come to the sad realization that, in the post Windows XP world, Windows sucks. My employer even gave me a Lenovo ThinkPad to use last year and it sits on my desk collecting dust while my own personal MacBook Pro does most of the work. Apple just makes a good, solid machine that just works. Most of the "clone" manufacturers make cheap crap systems for $300 a pop that you'll replace every year because they'll fall apart. And don't even get me started on "Windows 8".
I first thought this was a joke but apparently they really think people will turn in a Macbook Air and then pay almost $500 on top of losing their Macbook Air. This reminds me somewhat of the HP tablet discount fail.
Nice try at sounding like you have a valid argument, but even your own link doesn't support your claims. I don't know if you're just a fanboy or display this glorious level of intelligence in general, but either way your should have been modded "troll" or just ignored. Let's break down this BS and obvious bias of yours, shall we?
The "M$" was a pretty good clue that you were incapable of giving a rational argument. However, the giveaway was the fact that you used a story that talks about how the first generation of product line X (Surface RT tablets) sold poorly. Specifically, you use that story to claim that the manufacturer "can't seem to give away" the third version of product line Y (Surface Pro), which has sold fairly well and sometimes had trouble meeting demand. I mean, seriously, the entire content of that article aside from the second paragraph doesn't even mention the Pro, and when the article was written the Pro had only just gone on sale in a few markets... and sold out in many of them just as fast (as the comments are quick to point out). Notice how there wasn't even a third version of the RT announced? The RT line is crap, mostly due to Microsoft intentionally making it crap, but the Pro line has done quite well.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
..... I'll trade my Macbook Air in for a Surface Pro 3!" .... said no one, ever.
And the circle of life continues to spin, occasionally wobbling on its axis thanks to the weighty presence of dumb.
And a huge tablet like a Surface 3 isn't clumsy?
No. In fact it's a lot less clumsy than juggling a 15" laptop and a 7" tablet. Why have 2 devices when you only need one? I don't want to have to deal with this "syncing to the cloud" crap when I'm travelling, it's much easier and convenient to have one device. If I needed a lot of computing power then maybe I would need something else but frankly there haven't been necessary gains in hardware for the last few years, my 3 year old MBA still works just fine, i don't see any reason to upgrade it.
My Nexus 7 and 15" notebook both fit nicely in my case, and combined cost at least a couple of hundred bucks less than the Surface 3. If I was to spend that much on a laptop, I'd get a helluva better unit than this underpower device.
The thing is I can't find a high resolution, touchscreen laptop with an active stylus and even if I did the lack of a detachable keyboard would make it horribly awkward to use (unless it was like that lenovo yoga one maybe, though being able to remove the keyboard makes it less cumbersome).
If it works for you, great. Myself, I consider it an appalling waste of money.
I consider anything that isn't appropriate for what I'm doing an appalling waste of money too, clearly this device doesn't fit your purpose so why are you so concerned about it? The overarching criticism here is that "it doesn't fit my workflow" or "it doesn't appeal to the broad consumer base" and that somehow that makes the product bad, well it doesn't have to do those things. You think desktop Linux or Nokia's N900 or Google Glass or Chromebooks or whatever are bad just because they don't fit some particular person's workflow or don't appeal to everybody?
You don't even know the difference between the Surface RT and the Surface Pro, do you? I'll grant you the branding is idiotic, but I can tell you're an idiot even though you didn't specify which Surface you bought. The RT line is the one that they've had trouble selling; the Pro has never been available anywhere near so cheap as you suggest, even when dumping the old inventory after a new version came out.
You're like somebody claiming they'll never buy an iMac because they once bought an iPad and couldn't figure out how to run Photoshop on it or hook a mouse up to it. Seriously. You're being *exactly* that stupid.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
...from my cold dead hands...
Compared to a comparably-specced 15" laptop, a 12" diagonal 0.5" thick laptop/tablet hybrid is certainly not clumsy, no. Compared to that plus a separate device (which is too big to put in a pocket)... are you high?
Oh, and where'd you get the idea that they're underpowered, anyhow? Aside from gaming due to the lack of a separate GPU and an 8GB limit on RAM, they have very good specs. The CPU is better than you'd get in most 15" laptops, and the display is better than all of them (yes, including Apple's). The SSD and battery life are also both excellent... and for anything even vaguely in the same weight class, the price is actually cheap. So yes, you could get a more powerful Lenovo or something for the cost of the higher-end Pro 3 models, but the power brick and battery would each weigh as much as the entire Surface does (and the battery probably wouldn't last as long), it wouldn't support stylus input, and you'd have to buy *several* of those laptops to get the same number of pixels.
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
One of the most intriguing areas of marketing is irrational consumerism.
It flies in the face of economics and common sense.
I've tried, several times in different businesses, giving products & services away for free to cultivate a customer base.
People love free stuff and value it right?
Actually, no.
What I've learned from doing this is that people only value things that you make them pay for.
If you drop the price of something, or make it free, the consumer perceives the value of what you gave them as low or valueless.
You discover this later when you turn off the freebies, or raise the price.
Charge a premium for your product, or service, and your consumer will, in most cases, believe it's worth it and treat it with reverence.
Apple's been clever at never dropping the perception of value in what they make, thus maintaining the value of their brand.
You'd think those well educated, experienced, business types at Microsoft would know better.
They really need to address the already dreadful consumer perception of the MS brand value and this is doing the opposite.
Surface Pros can't write code in Swift. Deal breaker for me. Have fun with that cheap Java rip-off otherwise known as C#.
they can't afford Apple products either. After all, if I had a Surface Pro 3, and I could sucker someone into giving me a Macbook Air for it, I'd do it in a heartbeat.
I'm going to do this with the Airs I bought for my kids to use at school.
Right after I trade in my Cadillac and some cash for a Kia. Then I'll pay more to trade in this Retina Pro for a Samsung tablet.
hawk
I actually did switch from a 2011 Macbook Air (the dual core 2GB RAM, 13" model) to a Surface Pro 1, a little while before the Surface Pro 2 came out. Why? Because, through gradual changes in my client base and their worlds, I found myself spending more and more time in powershell, Hyper-V management and other purely Microsoft centric tasks. So I ended up Bootcamping my MBA to Windows 8 (required for Hyper-V 2012+ management), so it was now basically a PC, anyway. Then, once a guy next to me got a DynaDock with his Surface Pro, I realised I could dock it to a couple of nice, big monitors and keyboard and mouse and it's frankly more powerful than my 2011 MBA was.
So I sold my MBA on eBay (at almost as much as I paid for it, amazingly - incredible resale value) and switched to the SP1, which I am still using. I have pre-ordered a SP3, in fact, because I have been so happy with it (we don't get the Surface Pro 3 in Australia until September). It's smaller, lighter, faster and better suited to my current working life. I also love the pen, as I now spend about 40% of my week in meetings.
So overall, I don't think this is a bad thing - I just don't expect it to get heavily taken up. I think most MBA and MBP users will prefer to stick with what they have. The trust is, I use my Surface Pro like a desktop or a notepad (a literal, paper notepad, not a laptop notepad). I basically never use it as an actual laptop unless I have no alternative but then again, I pretty much hate all laptops, compared to the desktop experience.
Statistically and economically it is a two horse race.
How are you measuring the market? Hipster points?
I just purchased a Macbook Air with max options, cost me 2,000 USD. Why would I swap it for 650 dollars?
It makes no sense.
Can it run Linux ?
aaaaaaa
Have you used one? I've got my hands on it a few days ago, and I have to say that I'm impressed with how well it handles - much better than I expected a 12" thing to be. Weight-wise, it's actually on par with early 10" Android 4.x tablets from 3 years ago.
I also have a Nexus 7, and a tolerable decent notebook (a Thinkpad). They're both fine devices, and for many people they would be quite sufficient, but it's not the same as having a usable laptop and a usable tablet combined in a single device that weights under a kilogram and can be carried around in a small sleeve.
How many of the people calling this a stupid idea and furiously defending their macbooks have actually tried the Pro3?
Microsoft has had a "tablet" OS out since XP days... But until the RT experiment they never Changed anything about how the tablet based programs worked in over 10 years. Office XP on tablet XP is basically the same GUI as Office on Win 8.1. Microsoft just "changes the paint" but hasn't fixed the usability issues of old programs on modern tablets.
If MS were serious they'd say ANY Apple laptop. After all, what are they going to do with the trade-ins, open a store? No, they'll destroy them.
"It's in a weird space between the two that no one is interested in. "
People who don't want to own both a laptop AND a tablet aren't really that weird. Your basic complaint is that it's overpriced and that's pretty much it. I remember the days when everyone here considered Macs to be overpriced.... wonder how that worked out for Apple.
I had to change from a Linux desktop to a MacBookPro for work. It really only confirmed why I had never been interested in buying one for myself.
There are UI features in OS X which are clearly "Apple has always done things this way and we don't understand how you could want things different". The Unix-underneath is pretty good, but the BSD-ish toolchain is annoyingly out-of-date. The hardware support is (of course) excellent, but the keyboard is sadly a triumph of form over function - I use an external keyboard whenever I can.
I still wish I had my Linux desktop back.
I would consider trading in my iPad Air for a Surface Pro3.
Way of the dodo bitches
overpriced toys so they can feel adequate in the company of other desperate status seekers.
You unemployed guys are so bitter.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
That new Surface 3 device does seem nice. I wonder if I can put Mac OS on it
I'm sure you can just install 8.1 directly onto the Mac (and Linux / BSD), it works no problem. You don't need the surface pad. On the subject of which, I wonder what happened to the original MS "Surface" that used to live on a coffee table. I thought that was a fun idea. How about a Linux coffee table touch display?
The purpose of existence is to make money.
I can't see trading a MBA or MBP for this. I might replace an iPad or Android tablet, though that's still iffy. More likely, I'd replace a W8 laptop, but of course that wouldn't help MS.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
If you're really desperate to dump your MBA for a Surface Pro 3, do yourself a favor and sell it in the aftermarket. It's worth way more than the crappy $650 that MS is willing to give you (unless your MBA is destroyed). This is one of the reasons I've always bought Mac they hold their value better (I can typically sell them 2 years later for 60-80% of what I paid for them (try that with a Dell)).
You're going to need it. Getting a Mac user to switch to windows is like get a Muslim to convert to Christianity... it may happen... but it isn't going to be often. Who's going to give up 72 virgins or baby angels?
How are you measuring the market? Hipster points?
Utility.
Dell, HP, Lenovo and Toshiba have the corporate market sewn up.
If it wasn't for the operating system, the Air would be losing quickly this year against its competitors. It's about time that Apple released a Retina version, or an "Air" style version of the MBP.
Yes. For the same reason BMW's are so lovely. They only make a significant change to the body every 6 to 10 years. This means most people can't tell the difference between a 2006 and 2014 3 series. Heck, most people have to look at the badge to tell the series apart.
Google: "windows 8.1 reviews"
-techradar.com: 4.5/5
-pcmag.com: 4/5
-cnet.com: 4/5
-trustedreviews.com: 4/5
Google: "surface 3 reviews"
-techrader.com: 4.5/5
-engadget.com: 4/5 (user reviews aggregated by engadget have it at 8.8/10)
-cnet.com: 4/5
Note that these are the star ratings as shown by Google, so a 4/5 may actually be an 8/10 on the site.
I'm not sure this makes it clear that either product was "botched."
If you pit it against laptops, it's under-specced for the price. For that sort of money, you can do a lot better elsewhere.
Can you show me this "elsewhere?" I'm honestly intrigued because the Surface actually seems to be priced fairly (maybe I'm picky but the only devices that do it for me are Apple, MS and Lenovo right now--the build quality and long-term user reviews for other brands, esp. Asus, Acer and Dell, scare me).
For the MBA (13"), Yoga 2 Pro and Surface 3, you can get a very similar build: Core i5, 256GB SSD, 8GB RAM, etc. The Lenovo is $1199, the MBA and the Surface are $1299. With the Surface you get the cool pen, but you have to pay extra for the keyboard.
The key differences seem to be the physical dimensions and the display.
Display: Lenovo wins with with a ridiculous 3200x1800 display; Microsoft comes next with 2160x1440; Apple's stuck in 1998 with 1440x900. .36" thick and weighs 1.76 pounds; the Yoga is .61" thick and weighs 3.06 pounds; the MBA is .68" thick and weighs 2.96 pounds.
Dimensions: the Surface is
I'd guess that when you add the keyboard to the Surface, it probably comes out close to the same thickness as the Yoga but a bit lighter.
The 11" MBA may be a more reasonable comparison ... it's $100 less for a similar configuration and is significantly lighter, but the screen resolution drops as well.
"It's in a weird space between the two that no one is interested in. "
People who don't want to own both a laptop AND a tablet aren't really that weird.
You're putting words in my mouth. I never said those people were weird. I said the space between the two classes of device was weird. Big difference. And not wanting to own both a laptop and tablet is fine, but there are different ways to approach that objective besides trying to make a tablet that acts like a laptop or a laptop that acts like a tablet, both of which have been tried numerous times and failed to gain any traction.
Your basic complaint is that it's overpriced and that's pretty much it. I remember the days when everyone here considered Macs to be overpriced.... wonder how that worked out for Apple.
My basic "complaint" isn't a complaint at all, which is to say, I have no problems with the situation, I'm merely analyzing why it's not working out for them and why I don't expect that to change. Even so, your comparison to Apple doesn't work, since you're ignoring the fact that the value proposition for Macs changed dramatically over the years (from overpriced nonsense that nearly brought Apple to bankruptcy, to overpriced in terms of hardware but offering significant value in other regards, to (mostly) overpriced in no way), whereas that hasn't happened with the Surface.
And it's a mischaracterization of what I said to suggest that it's merely an issue with it being overpriced. It's not just that, though that is one side to the coin. The other side to the coin is that it's under-performing in the areas that matter. To keep the price down after adding the tablet features, they had to skimp on the hardware that would have made it a competitive laptop while also shackling it with a PC OS that is getting overwhelmingly negative reviews, which means that they skimped on the simplicity that would have made it a compelling tablet. That's on top of the fact that it's coming up incredibly short in comparisons between the various app stores.
People who don't want to own both a laptop and tablet are perfectly reasonable for wanting that, but what they want is a full-fledged laptop and a full-fledged tablet, not something that comes up short in both regards.
I'll keep that in mind next time someone makes a baseless ad hominem attack in response to something that has nothing at all to do with Apple or Steve Jobs.
Calm your nerd rage down a bit.
Corporate drones insist their companies to buy them overpriced toys so they can feel adequate in the company of other desperate status seekers. News at 11.
That's funny, because no one else at my office wants a MacBook Air because they are too different from what they are used to. I have a MacBook Air and an iMac because I want a stable UNIX desktop with native MS Office without the constant hell of keeping a Linux box updated and dealing with apps that use a different UI toolkits. Like it or not, as far as commercial UNIX desktops go with a decent library of well supported common desktop applications, Apple is really the only game in town unless you just want to run Windows in VirtualBox.
And the Macbook Air isn't exactly poorly specced and it's QUITE well built. Sure you could probably find a cheaper PC laptop with a slightly zippier CPU but it still won't be quite the same machine. Apple does have some things going for it.
So, a quick, light, very thin dual-core mobile UNIX workstation with an SSD that I don't have to dick around with much to get a great productive system.... I'll pay an extra couple hundred for that. Some of us actually have work to do and don't want to have to jump through hoops to exchange data with others at work yet still want a UNIX box. We also want an OS that doesn't feel like a constant beta release with apps using a dozen different UI toolkits. Being able to run X11 apps if needed is nice too but that's usually not necessary.
Basically, Windows is ugly and inadequate for some of my needs, Linux/BSD kinda suck as desktop OS's, Sun is dead, SGI is dead, Oracle is evil..... doesn't leave you much choice if you want a ready-to-roll UNIX box these days that has the backing of any prominent commercial software vendors like MS or Adobe.
These promotions should be illegal nowadays. Even if recycled, this generates a lot more pollution than keeping your crappy but functionnal MacBook.
I love Microsoft, I'm windows server number 1 fan boy, and have made millions programming .net enterprise applications, but my Mac book air is the second greatest technological invention of my lifetime after my iPhone. I wouldn't take 3000$ cash to use a surface over my sexy perfect MacBook Air.
Why on ever earth not? It's just Win7 with an ugly 2-d wrapper GUI. Don't let yourself become a dinosaur!
Mike
(background: Am DB Developer/DBA. Have programmed in about 20 languages from Assembler to SQL on everything from IBM 360 to PC! Current machine: Maxed-out System-76 Bonobo running Mint, and a small army of VMs running other OSs - Windows for work, etc.
When I came to the US I got an H1B despite all the Fortran programmers (like me), 'cos they wouldn't learn new things.)
I meant iOS - the "easy, intuitive" interface from Apple. I've tried OSX and it's every bit as confusing as Linux GUIs and Windows to the first-time user, but that's a desktop OS, and the Metro side of W8 is a tablet GUI.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Honestly your comment would be valid if you'd actually used one, I think.
I'm definitely NOT a Microsoft shill; I have a Macbook Pro I still use for photo editing that I do rather like even if the lead-free solder on the GPU is a problem (I plan to fix soon). But anyway, for years I've avoided most Microsoft products; I have had several Android tablets, my MBP is my fourth, I've had Macs since the 604 days (and had an original Mac before that)... I've put Linux on dozens of laptops and still manage Linux boxes at work as well as storage and Windows servers. I tell you this because I want you to understand where I come from with my next statements:
I got a Surface Pro... first gen, 128GB storage, 4GB RAM. I have the Type Keyboard 2 attached to it. And you know what? When I leave the house it's the computer I take with me most often. It's small enough that I can carry it anywhere, and resilient enough that I don't worry about throwing it in the pannier of my motorbike. It'll survive... damn thing's built like a tank. Most times if I'm at a coffee shop, I'll be reclining with the keyboard folded up the back... or just detached and left in my car or bike. This little laptop/tablet hybrid has become my go-to device every single day.
Is it as good at photo editing as my MBP? No... the screen's not set up for that and the storage is WAY too small to manage my significant library of 12MP RAW pictures from my Nikon. But you know what? When I did a wedding shoot a couple of weeks back I was able to pull the Micro SD card out of my camera (it's in an SD adapter for my camera, but I digress), I was able to slip it into the MicroSD slot on my SP and then the happy couple were able to swipe through the raw, unedited shots from the wedding before they'd even finished their first drink. Then I was able to download the pics to the local storage, clean off the card and repeat the whole process at the reception. When I got home two days later I moved the pics to my MBP for editing. No muss, no fuss.
Is it a games machine? No... but no laptop is. I have a dedicated machine for that.
But damned if it hasn't become the most useful laptop I have. It's supplanted an iPad and a Nexus 7 in terms of tablet functionality because it can do everything they can. It's supplanted most of what my MBP used to do (you know, being portable...) because it does ALMOST everything that thing does. The high-end stuff I need to do (photo editing is resource heavy) just isn't great on the SP, but it doesn't have to be. Chances are my gaming rig will get some new hard drives and start serving duty as my Photoshop machine, too and the MBP will go up on eBay.
That's the thing though; the SP might not be what you need and might not fill a niche in your life. That's cool, but personally I've found my SP to fill niches I didn't think of when I first got it. I take notes during meetings using the stylus (which by the way is freaking awesome!) and I find myself whipping out my SP at work and propping it up on my desk as a third "reference material monitor" or even a photo frame if I feel like it. It's amazingly adaptable because it's a computer. The fact that it runs Windows is actually irrelevant to me any more. There's very little that can be done on OSX or Linux that can't be done on Windows. Hell, if I want to run X applications from my Linux servers I can fire up MobaXTerm, SSH in and launch whatever I want and have it seamlessly on my desktop. You know, just like I used to do with OSX. It's also no more locked down and limited than OSX, and it might even become the more open of the "big two" commercial OS's the way Apple is going. So what do I lose?
And there's the rub. For people who are really OS-agnostic in what they do (which should be everyone in 2014... seriously), the SP is a great laptop and a great tablet. It's heavy, yes... that's probably the worst thing I can say about it, but it's seriously no heavier than the first gen iPad that I still have gathering dust somewhere. At least it feels that way when I hold bo
I use a MacBook Air daily and it sees very heavy use - never have any issues with it like I've experienced with my Windows machines. Good luck with this deal Microshaft, anyone who's currently using a Mac probably won't want to give it up...you'd have to pry mine from my cold dead hands.
You unemployed guys are so bitter.
How do you know he's an Apple user? Most of those guys like to shill, something which he is clearly against.
From My dead cold hands Microsoft
no matter how good it is, it is human nature always wants to make things better
They can have my MacBook air when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
That was true until BMW decided to Bangle them all up, of course. Now, it's just... ugh.
So unless Microsoft is planning to throw in a keyboard for free. This is not that great of a deal. I would not trade a Macbook Air for a Surface Pro. Not because I think the Surface Pro is bad, but why is Microsoft trying to convert Mac users again? How about going after users who already use Windows? Maybe offer a good deal to trade in a Windows 7 PC? I never understood going after a non loyal user group? Like with car makers, which usually offer the best deals to repeat buyers. I still do not get the Microsoft marketing plan of going after a buyer who obviously is not a Windows fan.