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Surface Hub 2 Coming in 2019, Looks Amazing (arstechnica.com)

Posted by msmash on from the new-shiny-devices dept.

Microsoft gave an early look at its next-generation Surface Hub 2 today. It will go on sale next year, with certain selected customers testing it this year. From a report: Microsoft's Surface Hub, its conference room computer, was something of a surprise hit. The system has been in short supply since its launch about three years ago, especially in its 84-inch version: its combination of video conferencing and whiteboarding makes it a collaborative tool with few direct competitors. The central feature of the new system is that it's a 50.5-inch 4K display with a rotating mount. Instead of the traditional 16:9 aspect ratio, the Surface Hub 2 has the same 3:2 ratio of Microsoft's other Surface systems.

62 comments

  1. "Looks amazing" by Type44Q · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Looks amazing

    Considering the manufacturer of said product, looks are about all we can hope for.

    1. Re:"Looks amazing" by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

      Microsoft just repackages screens made in Korea. They used to do this in Wilsonville, Oregon, but are moving all production to China. And, truth be know, most Microsoft hardware is fairly decent. The biggest problem with the 84 inch Surface Hub was the 200 point weight; it meant in addition to spending $25K for the screen, you had to spend another $25K reinforcing the wall in your conference room to hold it up! The silliest thing about the Surface Hub 2 is the suggesting that people will join 4 of them together into super large screen, like they won't be bothered at all by the lines between the screens.

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
  2. No need to RTFA by houghi · · Score: 0

    This is Mucrosoft. This mrans that in a year it will loook completely different. Could be a beeper that just shows you ads.

    --
    Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  3. Frist post! by WallyL · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I realize every couple of years somebody markets something like this, that never quite lives up to its hype. But, every time, it gets us a little bit closer to Star Trek!

    1. Re:Frist post! by forkfail · · Score: 1

      You mean, to us all being assimilated into the MS^H^HBorg Collective?

      --
      Check your premises.
    2. Re:Frist post! by The-Ixian · · Score: 1

      That reminds me... what ever happened to the Bill Gates Borg icon for MS stories?

      --
      My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
    3. Re:Frist post! by forkfail · · Score: 1

      *points back*

      Over there, right next to the tin and pine and slackware and small ISPs and a buzzfeed free internet and tech sites managed by technical people.

      *sighs*

      --
      Check your premises.
    4. Re:Frist post! by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

      Given all the MS astroturfing the site has lately, I'm guessing the new owners were afraid MS would fire them.

      It's ok, I still see bill borg when I see MS and do not for a minute believe they are even slightly less evil than they used to be.

  4. Best product in its category. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I've used most conference room systems and I can say matter of fact that this one is the best. Nothing else even comes close really. From the initial setup, through use and then even when closing up things it is just better in every way. Calling it revolutionary doesn't even do it justice.

    1. Re:Best product in its category. by Joce640k · · Score: 2

      It turns out that you can make some sales by solving people's problems instead of just spending all your time trying to trick/bludgeon them into using your Internet browser and search engine.

      Imagine that!

      --
      No sig today...
    2. Re:Best product in its category. by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      A conference room system features:
      A Video Camera: Which most people want turned off because seeing people talking on the screen isn't helpful, plus you want to mute and turn off video on yourself and your team so they can discuss issues privately. Also the Video gets in the way of a screen shot or a presentation.

      Some Sort of Smart Board features: Either a stylus or touch interface. All seems good, until you realize most of the presenters don't know how to use it, save the data or in order to have it seen by everyone in the meeting it is high up so it is difficult to reach.

      These things are a wast of money.

      Just get a good size TV (Get a 4K if you feel like it, but most of the time you will lower the resolution to 1k or below so people can see the text) Have cords to plug in your VGA, DVI and HDMI to it. So you can plug in your laptop. Finally get a separate good quality Conference room phone. Loud and crisp enough to hear from, and able to pick up with what you are saying clearly.

      These things look cool, but rarely ever utilized.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    3. Re:Best product in its category. by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      It turns out that you can make some sales by solving people's problems instead of just spending all your time trying to trick/bludgeon them into using your Internet browser and search engine.

      Yeah, and once you've got them hooked, then you try to trick them!

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    4. Re:Best product in its category. by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

      Your check is in the mail.

    5. Re:Best product in its category. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If goddamn Microsoft is an improvement, this market must be absolute shit indeed!

    6. Re:Best product in its category. by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

      Look, if you post AC they won't know to whom to make a check out to, this is shilling 101. You need some relatively unique userID at least, try using the MD5 hash of your favorite porno?

    7. Re:Best product in its category. by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

      If anything, it's over-engineered. Two speakers, two cameras, two WiFi access points... redundancy is good, but only if money is no object.

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
    8. Re: Best product in its category. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thatâ(TM)s the spirit. Why try to improve these terrible experiences we can when we can just live with it? Work like we did in 1980. Itâ(TM)s the slashdot way!

    9. Re:Best product in its category. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Translation: "I've never been to a company that did a lot of video conferences therefore no one else does that at their company, so no one would ever purchase these. . . "

      DUde, calm the fuck down, there are ashit ton of companies that have a bunch of the Surface Hub1. If you are a primarily Skype 4 Bus for your unified coms telephony platform, then most likely you've got at least one of these in each of your offices.

    10. Re: Best product in its category. by oakgrove · · Score: 0

      Turn """smart""" quotes off on your fucking iToy before commenting again

      --
      The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
    11. Re:Best product in its category. by jezwel · · Score: 1

      We're moving to S4B very soon, however we're not using these things. A normal HDTV, plus special S4B phones (with video conferencing camera and cordless microphones) that can accept and attend calendar invites is working pretty well so far. These might be wanted when we've completed the voice migration, I wouldn't put it past a few people to order them.

    12. Re: Best product in its category. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They are amazing once u get one you will change your mind.

  5. Has anyone used one of these? by UnknowingFool · · Score: 3, Informative

    I have yet to see one much less use one since the launch 3 years ago so I don't know how common they are. I don't doubt that they might be in short supply but the last sales figures I got were 2 years ago: 2000 units That's hardly record shattering.

    --
    Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    1. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Company replaced a Cisco system with the Surface Hub. The UI was confusing to users, and the integration was error prone. Somebody would schedule a Skype meeting and spend the first 10-20 minutes trying to get the hub to join the meeting, show the speakers on both ends, or to show the presentation content. Often it took one or two reboots for the system to even join a meeting instead of being stuck as "Joining meeting...".

    2. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by jellomizer · · Score: 1

      Sounds like the Cisco system too. Just replace Skype with Webex

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    3. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      (that link also says those were orders not necessarily sales)

    4. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 2

      I have yet to see one much less use one since the launch 3 years ago so I don't know how common they are. I don't doubt that they might be in short supply but the last sales figures I got were 2 years ago: 2000 units [thurrott.com] That's hardly record shattering.

      no, just about everyone uses a 4k tv, a camera, some proprietary software whose best feature is a local guy to call when it breaks, and a polycom. Large corporations throw webex in there, which is nice for the guy who is working from home.

      Honestly i don't want meetings to get too smooth or people will schedule *even more of them*, and i will be forced to get 100% of my work done outside of work hours.

    5. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by ElizabethGreene · · Score: 2

      I used one at a large accounting firm in Georgia and again at a Bank in Delaware. It's nice kit when you have local and remote people joining a meeting. If the room is invited then you walk in, tap the screen to start the meeting, and the audio connects without having to dial out and enter a pin and all that. If you use it as a whiteboard you can email the output to yourself or everyone in the meeting easily too.

      For joining a meeting the learning curve is effectively zero. The other bits, whiteboarding and presenting from the board, take a minute to figure it out but is intuitive after that. The trick is finding the controls that first time.

      (I work as a PFE for Microsoft, therefore my opinion is invalid.)

    6. Re: Has anyone used one of these? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We have sold a shit load with customers ordering 50 at a time. They are amazing devices and i love using one.

    7. Re: Has anyone used one of these? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Umm i say your company messed up with install and config. I use those every day and they work perfectly and its a 1 touch join so what was the problem? If you invite the device to the meeting its one button and you are in. Consider hiring a certified partner to set it up properly. Our Cisco guys admit that they are awesome compared to spark boards.

    8. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by Donkey+Kong+Cluster · · Score: 1

      We do have one Surface Hub and using it as a collaborative drawing board is amazing. Not only because of the sharing capabilities, but I felt no delays when drawing (something I would expect when drawing on Windows).

      Whiteboards were not so popular in certain teams until they brought Surface Hub.

    9. Re:Has anyone used one of these? by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      We use it. .... Mostly to show off fancy gear to prospective clients. Not for anything practical. It is fun to play with though.

  6. Dr Jones posts comment, looks amazing. by uCallHimDrJ0NES · · Score: 1

    I can't help it.

    --
    Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
    1. Re:Dr Jones posts comment, looks amazing. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes I do

  7. "Looks amazing" is *not* a valid headline by TheDarkener · · Score: 3, Funny

    Slashdot editors need to remember journalism class. Next we'll see, "NVidia releases new drivers, and you won't guess what Linus did next!"

    --
    It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
    1. Re:"Looks amazing" is *not* a valid headline by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 0

      Next we'll see, "NVidia releases new drivers, and you won't guess what Linus did next!"

      No, given the topic the next headline will be "Make your surface hub calls work the first time, with this weird trick!"

    2. Re:"Looks amazing" is *not* a valid headline by forkfail · · Score: 1

      My money's on "What is your NVidia video card spirit totem? Take this quiz to find out!"

      or

      "37 Weird things that happened to people who didn't use NVidia. Number 23 will SHOCK you!"

      --
      Check your premises.
  8. Terrible headline, great product by turp182 · · Score: 4, Informative

    We have a Surface Hub 1. We use it everyday. It's nice to be able to switch from whiteboard (which has cool features like auto-tables and auto-shapes) to our intranet/internet, maybe fire up Excel.

    The people we collaborate with don't have one, so we are missing out on some of the best features (other regional office).

    It's nice that anyone at the Hub can just walk up and interact with others using it.

    It's not perfect (horrible external keyboard/touch pad, we could use different hardware I imagine) but we've really enjoyed it. It's the first "collaborative" hardware that I've found effective. People have commented that it's nice to be able to see us as well.

    --
    BlameBillCosby.com
    1. Re:Terrible headline, great product by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I used to work for a Fortune 500. They bought a gigantic smartboard for each large conference room.

      Mostly, low level techs spent time moving them to lesser used rooms to make space for larger meetings in the conference rooms.

      Other than the initial smartboard orientation, I saw the devices used maybe twice.

  9. What OS? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What OS can you use on this? If it's limited to Windows, then it won't be very useful no matter how good the hardware is. I only mention this because about 3 years ago I knew a guy who had a surface-something, but he was stuck with Windows on it, so this machine might have the same defect. Better safe than sorry.

    1. Re: What OS? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your snobbery is oozi onto the floor.

    2. Re:What OS? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Grow the fuck up.

    3. Re: What OS? by medmenz9553 · · Score: 1

      Its windows teams which is locked down windows they are meant for a company running skype for business not installing linux on it.

  10. Are you sure it's really 4K? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    ...it's a 50.5-inch 4K display with a rotating mount.

    Are your sure it's really 4K? The previous generation specs only refer to 3840 horizontal resolution, i.e. UHD, not 4096.

    1. Re:Are you sure it's really 4K? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Um, that is the very definition of 4k: 3840 × 2160.

    2. Re:Are you sure it's really 4K? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, that is the very definition of 4k: 3840 × 2160.

      Um, no it's not. 4K is defined as 4096 × 2160. 3840 × 2160 is defined as UHD.

      4K is a professional production and cinema standard; UHD is a consumer display and broadcast standard.

    3. Re:Are you sure it's really 4K? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, that is the very definition of 4k: 3840 × 2160.

      I know, math is hard, but I think we can blame Marketing for your confusion. Marketing has been going out of their way trying to confuse Joe Sixpack into believing that UHD is the same as 4K, but it isn't.

      4K: 4096 x 2160. A professional standard most of us are unlikely to encounter.

      UHD: 3840 x 2160. Quad-Full-HD, if it helps to clarify. This is the consumer standard most of us will encounter when it comes to TVs and monitors.

    4. Re:Are you sure it's really 4K? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Everyone says 4K to refer to 4K TVs and monitors. That's it.
      Anyway, another problem is the 16:9 format was wrong. The Japanese had analog widescreen HDTV with a 1.66:1 format (or 5:3, or 15:9). European film format was the same. So 16:9 is too wide, as can be seen on laptops and desktops.

    5. Re:Are you sure it's really 4K? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Everyone says 4K to refer to 4K TVs and monitors. That's it.

      Convince people that a dumb idea is true by simply repeating it over and over. In other words, Marketing. It doesn't change the math, however. Pi remains irrational even when legislators try to redefine it.

      Anyway, another problem is the 16:9 format was wrong.

      You got that right. The pixel height reduction versus 16:10 isn't huge, but it's definitely very noticeable on monitors.

  11. No demo at Build by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I asked about this product at Microsoft Build last week (it's ms' biggest yearly conference). The ms employees I asked, whose job was to direct people to specific product booth at the show floor (several clueless morons) hadn't even heard the name Surface Hub. Much less could they even show a demo of the old/existing one.

  12. Questionable claim from questionable source by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Consider the propensity of Peter Bright to spin Microsoft's most abysmal failures as spectacular successes, you'll have to forgive my skepticism when told that this product "looks amazing".

  13. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  14. OK. We're well over the shark now. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I mean - the political agendas of msmash are bad enough.

    But Microsoft advertisements as headlines on /. ?

    What's next? Cheery little buzzfeed-esque videos?

  15. Looks are what M$ has always been good at.... by Heebie · · Score: 1

    The term "vapourware" was coined in relation to them... everything of theirs LOOKS great.. then people get their hands on it and find out it's absolute shite. (except their fanboys... who just don't know there are infinitely better options for every single M$ product.. most of them free.)

  16. It's msmash, who posted this by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Microsoft shill, as far as I can tell.

    Today's Slashdot era Jon Katz, in a way.

  17. A shiny piece of shit by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 1

    Yes, it's a piece of shit, but look how shiny it is!

    Yeah, sorry but no way would buy one of these. It has several fatal flaws (weight, price, built-in malware, etc) but the real killer for me is the fact that it's a Microsoft product. That means it comes with a whole host of unwanted 'features', starting with the OS.

    Looks like it would make an awesome cutting board, though.

    --
    Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    1. Re:A shiny piece of shit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > Looks like it would make an awesome cutting board, though.

      The best feature is that this cutting board does not hold DNA evidence!

  18. Great question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The software is the paramount question. It doesn't matter what hardware it has if the software is some buggy shite from Bugrosoft.

  19. Windows only by nagora · · Score: 1

    We have dozens (literally) of SH1's in work and they are good as whiteboards but they're not compatible with anything other than Windows and they can't handle conference calls very well. It's a lot easier to use Hangouts or similar from individual machines. They're pretty good for lecture-style presentations where one person does all the talking but the inability to mute your own individual mic makes them awkward in other situations.

    --
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