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Microsoft Finally Ships $8,999 Surface Hub (eweek.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from eWeek: Surface Hub, originally slated to ship last September and later missing its January 2016 release deadline, is finally being delivered to Microsoft's business customers, announced Brian Hall, general manager of Microsoft Devices Marketing, on Friday. The touch-enabled Windows 10-powered device, available in a 55-inch and a massive 84-inch model, features built-in cameras, a microphone array, Bluetooth, WiFi, motion sensors and near-field communications (NFC). It runs Skype for Business, Office and OneNote, providing an integrated collaboration experience, and at least with the 84-inch model, an expansive canvas for interactive presentations and virtual meetings. With the Surface Hub, Microsoft is making an aggressive push into the conferencing and collaboration market currently dominated by Cisco, Citrix and Polycom. "I couldn't be more proud to announce this milestone for our team, customers, and partners. We can't wait to see what people, teams and businesses will do with Surface Hub," said Hall in a March 25 announcement.
"Hey Bob. The new giant iPad has arrived."
"Hey everyone. Come see the new giant iPad."
Recycle PCs and build a wireless community network www.hillsborough.org.nz
How long does the battery last?
The low end model has a crappy i5, and the high end only gets you an i7, and the video resolutions are barely adequate for displays half (or a quarter) their size. You can get a 4k monitor (aka a TV) for a tenth the price, and better computers for half the price. The software better kick some royal ass or these things are going to find their way to the dumpster damn quick.
just a ghost in the machine.
The Android version does not support screen sharing, so it is useless for presentations.
The Mac and iOS versions are not stable and crash numerous times during meetings. (My record is >20 crashes in less than an hour with both clients.)
The HTML version is also too limited.
Even the Windows versions suffers from login issues, not present in the other ports, especially if you log in through a ADFS (Active Directory Feberation Services) corporate portal and have security restrictions.
In the end I cannot believe how bad Lync was and Skype for Business is, compared to any other alternative, including GoToMeeting, WebEx, etc.
If only, we were not forced to use this steaming pile of Microsoft meeting software at work.
How is that not rendered obsolete by one of those thingies you stick to the side of a standard 80" TV to make it tactile-like?
I don't see what this gargantuan iPad adds to a system built on:
- a very large cheap tv.
- one of those side-sensor thingies.
- simple software to coalesce the image and sensor output.
I don't know what those sensor thingies cost (we have them lying around in drawers and I just pick one up when needed), but they can't fall remotely close to $8K.
My first question for Microsoft is "why restrict what software I can use"? For example, maybe we'd prefer to use Zoom, Webex, or GotoMeeting? Perhaps we'd like to use the device for teaching and thus I need to run any number of software packages from Adobe CC, SPSS, or even Auto-CAD. Perhaps we need to browse the web with something besides Internet Explorer? Microsoft constantly jabs devices like the Chromebook/Chromebox for being limited in software options and then they run off and do exactly the same thing. Et tu Brute? I was hoping this device would end up being a nice competitor to products like the InFocus MondoPad or the Sharp Aquos but instead they've built a low-end Microsoft-only consumer device and slapped a business price tag on it.
It is called the "Surface Hub", but none of the above mentions any Hub-like functionality ?
I don't totally agree. Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers. You can see how many articles a user has submitted and how often their submissions are accepted. Here goes, for the past week or so:
SomeoneFromBelgium (2/2 -- 100%)
Wave723 (2/2 -- 100%)
A_Mang (1/1 -- 100%)
FourG (1/1 -- 100%)
prisoninmate (33/49 -- 67.35%)
HughPickens.com (421/626 -- 67.25%)
skywire (2/3 -- 66.67%)
JasonKoebler (70/106 -- 66.04%)
mrspoonsi (99/183 -- 54.10%)
v3rgEz (70/131 -- 53.44%)
jones_supa (383/735 -- 52.11%)
dcblogs (149/286 -- 52.10%)
aarondubrow (33/64 -- 51.56%)
BVBigelow (2/4 -- 50.00%)
Mickeycaskill (33/70 -- 47.14%)
tlhIngan (32/68 -- 47.06%)
itwbennett (897/2074 -- 43.25%)
insitus (3/7 -- 42.86%)
msm1267 (99/234 -- 42.31%)
Freshly Exhumed (68/162 -- 41.98%)
theodp (1504/3633 -- 41.40%)
angry tapir (476/1152 -- 41.32%)
mspohr (22/55 -- 40.00%)
pacopico (30/78 -- 38.46%)
----- MEAN OF LISTED SUBMITTERS ----- (6582/17232 -- 38.20%)
schwit1 (443/1199 -- 36.95%)
eggboard (41/113 -- 36.28%)
MojoKid (684/1902 -- 35.96%)
Bruce66423 (41/131 -- 31.30%)
MikeChino (49/163 -- 30.06%)
Penguinisto (8/32 -- 25.00%)
coondoggie (670/2837 -- 23.62%)
mdsolar (156/693 -- 22.51%)
mmoorebz (6/28 -- 21.43%)
tripleevenfall (13/63 -- 20.63%)
Thelasko (9/52 -- 17.31%)
anderzole (4/24 -- 16.67%)
Lauren Weinstein (24/145 -- 16.55%)
twickline (2/124 -- 1.61%)
It's interesting because there's a huge variability in how often people have their articles posted. I'd say there's several users who flood the submission queue, but some of the users doing so aren't the ones you guys suspect of it. Also of interest is that there aren't any articles from StartsWithABang; it seems like the editors won't consider posting stories that link to Forbes. As for twickline, he seemed to submit a bunch of articles back in 2010 about new releases of open source software, but they were tagged as spam and the links were removed.
You aren't just paying for the hardware, you are paying for the R&D necessary to assemble to it all into a product you can just stick on a wall and expect normal users to work with. Sure, you could build your own, but how much time would you spend doing that, and would it all work seamlessly? For example, the Hub has two cameras that it switches between automatically when video conferencing so that it doesn't have to rely on a single fisheye to get a reasonable field of view. Were you planning to knock that up in Visual BASIC?
This reminds me of when electric vehicles first started to go mainstream, and armchair engineers thought they could build one for a fraction of the cost. Maybe they could (doubtful) but that's rather different to Joe Public wanting to buy a new car.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
55" fully integrated: $9000
Really good 55" screen: $1000
Touch sensor: $200
Software: $200 (Mostly Win10 license)
Vesa-mountable i7 PC: $1000
Mounting material: $100
Budget for hired team to make just one of these work: ~$6500
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
but they can't fall remotely close to $8K.
That depends. Do you already have a TV? If setting up a new meeting room, a new TV, commercial grade with custom bezel, mounting, remote connections for laptops, managed from a meeting room control unit from the likes of AMX, you'll be down $8k before you even look at smart features, collaboration or interactivity.
Shit most smart whiteboards cost over $3000 and only do a fraction of what this device is capable of.
Not many posters seem to realize what this device is actually for, and what its competition is. It's not meant to replace your living room TV or your monitor. Surface Hub is meant to replace 4 major devices: a computer, a projector, a conference phone, and an interactive whiteboard. Its big competitors are SMART, Promethean, Mimio, Infocus, and Sharp Aquos. Depending on size and features, their interactive displays tend to start around $3000, and are usually only replace the projector and whiteboard. Sharp's 80 inch board is $11k on Newegg, and Promethean's 84" lists at $15k.
Sure, you can hack together a cheap solution--big $1000 TV, a cheap digitizer from China for $300, a used conference phone, and a computer, but I can definitely see the allure of an all-in-one system at a moderate price premium. It's too expensive for my classrooms, but we're already planning on replacing our SMART Boards and projectors with an interactive TV in the next year or two. If MS offered one designed (and priced) for classrooms, I'd definitely be considering it.