Microsoft Offers $650 To MacBook Users Who Switch To A Surface Tablet (techcrunch.com)

After Wednesday's announcement of their new Surface Studio tablet, Microsoft launched a campaign to entice MacBook users to try Surface tablets. An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes TechCrunch: Essentially, the company is offering MacBook owners $650 toward a Surface Pro or Surface Book, if they trade in their Apple laptop. Sure, it's all promotion, but it's the sort of gag that affords the company opportunity to showcase its perceived advantages over Cupertino as the company looks to appeal more and more toward creatives -- a category long dominated by Apple.
The offer is only valid through November 7th, according to Microsoft's official rules, and the deal does not extend to iPads.

Comments

What does it showcase?

[taxman_10m]

Reeks of desperation.

Re:Networking/implementation issue mostly

[MightyMartian]

Microsoft has done something very bizarre to WiFi in Windows 10. I have network dropouts on Wifi routers that have worked consistently with Androids, iOS devices and earlier versions of Windows. It actually has been extremely frustrating, as we're using some Lenovo Windows 10 mini-PCs plugged into TVs for advertising services and playing videos at some locations. Windows 10 is constantly "semi-forgetting" networks, so it shows the network as visible, but won't autoconnect. Sometimes a reboot fixes it, but the usual solution is to forget the network and then rejoin, sometimes with a reboot. We've experienced the same thing with several laptops that were upgraded to Windows 10, and we chalked it up to old drivers, but these Lenovo devices come with Windows 10 preinstalled, and a pretty new devices so I don't buy the notion that it's a driver issue. In fact, I got a Windows 10 7" tablet when I bought my new notebook from the Microsoft Store, and it suffers the same issue on occasion, losing the network, and I have to tell the OS to forget it and then usually I can bring it back, but it's a pain.

I'm positive that the rewritten WiFi modules in Windows 10 are just plain buggy. In fact, everything about Windows 10, even the new start menu, seem very fragile, and it takes little more than an update or some setting change to lead to the UI getting fucked up. My latest favorite is my Start menu suddenly becoming transparent. Go on the net, and lo and behold, it's an issue, with a fix which worked for me, but according to reports, may not last long. I've had other issues with Edge and start menus where the solution literally came down to "Cook profile, start from scratch".

Windows 10 has some technical advantages, but since they adopted the sort of "perpetual beta" release model, the quality assurance has gone right down the shits. It feels like they're releasing updates that haven't been fully tested, and then relying upon the telemetry to phone home and tell the mother ship that some UI update has broken some installs.

Re:Networking/implementation issue mostly

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Windows 10 is constantly "semi-forgetting" networks, so it shows the network as visible, but won't autoconnect. Sometimes a reboot fixes it, but the usual solution is to forget the network and then rejoin, sometimes with a reboot.

I don't use Win 10 but I have several friends that report the same thing. It just drops the connection randomly. Some people step away for a moment and come back and the connection is visible but no longer connected.

Oftentimes reentering the password doesn't work (it always says it's "wrong", even when we know damn well it's been entered correctly). As you mention, they usually have to to forget the network and then rediscover/rejoin it. This happens with both laptops and desktops.