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Microsoft Surface

HMCTech

By HMCTech
in Mobile Devices & Tablets

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RichCowell

RichCowell

Posted
Posted
Has anyone used both keyboards? Might have to buy without trying, which is a pain. At the moment is was thinking about the type keyboard as it is more like the keyboard I currently use.

 

I've got both keyboards, got it with the Touch keyboard initially, and it is usable, but you're not entirely sure whether it's registered the key press, so it's not as good as the Type keyboard, which is more like a laptop keyboard and far easier...

 

Going to buy the next one without a keyboard and pass on the Touch keyboard with it...

Arthur

Arthur

Posted
Posted

Surface Pro sales begin on 9th February in the US and Canada, starting at $899 « The Verge

 

Microsoft is finally naming a date for its Surface Pro launch today: February 9th. The software giant may have missed its January release date promise, but the Windows 8-powered tablet will be available to purchase next month from retailers in the US and Canada. Microsoft is "taking a phased approach" with Surface Pro availability that may disappoint some international customers. "It will be available initially in the US and Canada with additional markets to follow in the coming weeks and months," says a spokesperson.

 

Microsoft's latest Surface tablet runs on a full version of Windows 8, meaning it will support existing desktop applications in addition to the new Windows 8-style ones. The Surface Pro is similar to Microsoft's Surface RT tablet on the exterior, with a 10.6-inch screen and support for Touch and Type Covers. However, pen support and a Full HD display with an Intel Core i5 processor means this tablet is significantly better specs wise. Earlier this month The Verge got an early look at Microsoft's Surface Pro tablet. We were particularly impressed with the display and the accuracy of the pen that Microsoft has supplied with this tablet. There's some trade offs with the Surface Pro compared to the RT, with an increased thickness and weight combination, but the speed and desktop apps support may make up for that.

 

$899 translates to approx. £570 ex. VAT (or £680 inc. VAT).

SYNACK

SYNACK

Posted
Posted
Yay, another phased approach meaning if it does not do really well in the US they won't bother anywhere else even if there is a market. They really know how not to drum up hype and support.
Arthur

Arthur

Posted
Posted (edited)
Yay, another phased approach

At least that's better than Google's approach where you have to spend months F5'ing their Nexus 4, 7 & 10 webpages hoping 'Sold Out' will change back to 'In Stock' and that their webservers don't crash during the 30 second window you have to place the order. :)

Edited by Arthur
SYNACK

SYNACK

Posted
Posted
At least that's better than Google's approach where you have to spend months F5'ing their Nexus 4, 7 & 10 webpages hoping 'Sold Out' will change back to 'In Stock' and that their webservers don't crash during the 30 second window you have to place the order. :)

 

That process is nowhere near as disapointing as when you actually get the device.

SYNACK

SYNACK

Posted
Posted
Has anyone got any ideas on connecting these to a projector wirelessly?

 

Epson network projection software if you have the right projectors. There is network projection stuff built in to windows that uses reverse RDP. There are few devices that support it but a raspberry pi could probably be retrofitted to use that or even a reverse vnc connection.

Arthur

Arthur

Posted
Posted

Microsoft's 64GB Surface Pro will only have 23GB usable storage « The Verge

 

Microsoft's Surface Pro tablet, due on February 9th, will have a smaller amount of storage space than expected. A company spokesperson has confirmed to The Verge that the 64GB edition of Surface Pro will have 23GB of free storage out of the box. The 128GB model will have 83GB of free storage. It appears that the Windows 8 install, built-in apps, and a recovery partition will make up the 41GB total on the base Surface Pro model.

 

Microsoft says users will be able to free up additional storage space by "creating a backup bootable USB and deleting the recovery partition," but out of the box they'll be left with as little as 36 percent of the advertised storage available. The storage situation is similar to Microsoft's Surface RT tablet. The Windows RT operating system, that powers Surface RT, accounts for half of the 32GB disk space on the entry model. Microsoft's Surface Pro supports USB 3.0 hard drives and microSDXC cards, meaning there are ways to extend the storage.

 

^ Better get the 128GB model or move the recovery partition to a USB flash drive!

SYNACK

SYNACK

Posted
Posted (edited)

Hmm, could have done with being thinner, it'll never get a modeling contract. :-P

 

The teardown should be interesting.

Edited by SYNACK
flyinghaggis

flyinghaggis

Posted
Posted (edited)

As expected I'm disapointed with the 4 hours battery life which is enough to put me off it. It's a shame as I really liked the form factor/design of the SurfaceRT and would have been tempted by it with a more power efficient x86 CPU under the hood.

 

Hopefully later in the year when MS refresh the line we'll see a haswell based Surface pro with a better battery life. Or possibly a Tegra4 based RT model with a larger store/app selection.

Edited by flyinghaggis
john

john

Posted
Posted
I had a chance to have a good poke with the Surface RT at BETT and a number of the clones from Samsung, Lenovo and the Dell one we were lent by Microsoft. I have to say I really did like the Surface RT for build quality and the product its a very smart tool and looking forward to poking the Surface Pro, however the clones from others are great, I really liked the Samsung ones I tried (they had an Atom based unit and a Core i5 (think it was i5) unit as well (top end one tipping £1K!) but they were excellent, one design flaw on all the clones I saw is the docking connector is likely to get mangled in minutes in a school its multi-pin and very small / flymsy looking, only Lenovo had solved this issue by having making it so that you cannot twist / bend / screw the tablet into the key dock by sleeving it up so it just goes straight down and in.
CyberNerd

CyberNerd

Posted
Posted

From reading the reviews it does sound like a bit of a mashup - battery life too small to be useful as a tablet, yet too unwieldy to be useful as a laptop/desktop.

It does seem quite a high price to pay for some legacy apps. I'm sure in a few years time they will get it sorted, but I suspect the competition may have moved on by then!

gshaw

gshaw

Posted
Posted

Really disappointed at MS for not having at least one Pro on the stand at BETT. Originally wanted a Pro but without the opportunity to test one I've had my head turned by the Lenovo Helix instead...

 

Convertible Ultrabook Laptop & Tablet PC | ThinkPad Helix | 11.6" with Windows 8 (US)

 

If MS weren't trying to shift the spotlight onto their partners they've made a bit of a mess with the Surface launch, which is a shame as the physical design and quality of the product is excellent.

Guest Guest

Guest Guest

Posted
Posted
I had a chance to have a good poke with the Surface RT at BETT and a number of the clones from Samsung, Lenovo and the Dell one we were lent by Microsoft. I have to say I really did like the Surface RT for build quality and the product its a very smart tool and looking forward to poking the Surface Pro, however the clones from others are great, I really liked the Samsung ones I tried (they had an Atom based unit and a Core i5 (think it was i5) unit as well (top end one tipping £1K!) but they were excellent, one design flaw on all the clones I saw is the docking connector is likely to get mangled in minutes in a school its multi-pin and very small / flymsy looking, only Lenovo had solved this issue by having making it so that you cannot twist / bend / screw the tablet into the key dock by sleeving it up so it just goes straight down and in.

 

I've got a Samsung one on loan. As you foresaw the dock connector is broken. Unless you have it in a certain position it constantly connects and disconnects. Other than that build quality seems good... Shame.

Design however I'm not impressed. The screen is too wide so it's not particularly comfy to hold in landscape and far too top heavy to hold in portrait. The keyboard is too light in comparison to the screen and the hinge too tight. This makes opening it from laptop mode fiddly with you ending up bashing it down on the table as you do it - possibly how the connector has broke.

The model I have got is the Atom 2000 series iirc. Battery life is around 5 hours which is also a shame. 6 hours might have done but once the battery starts to die...

 

As a concept however, I'm impressed. Stylus on an app like ActivStudio is very easy to use and imo will see the death of IWBs, so long as we can find a reliable way to wirelessly project. A teacher can walk around the room and do everything they would on a IWB without the shortcomings such as casting a shadow/getting in the way of the image, short teachers don't have to reach up to the top of the board, calibration issues... Also the teacher can walk to a pupil and give it to them to do a task rather than get the kid out of his seat. This may be beneficial to the more shy kids as they don't have to stand up infront of their peers, plus you can sort of force it on them by putting it infront of them rather than the fight of "Johnny, come up to the front" "No miss"...

sted

sted

Posted
Posted
ive got an atom powered asus vivotab smart. battery ife is claimed a 9.5 hours i managed more than that playing silly games the weekend i got it. normal use i get 2-3 days. Not the fastest thing ever but its definitely usable office 2013 runs no issues and ive got a £3 from ebay cable that gives it a normal usb port
Arthur

Arthur

Posted
Posted
As expected I'm disapointed with the 4 hours battery life which is enough to put me off it.

What about the performance though? Both the SSD and processor are massively faster than anything you would get in an ARM or Atom tablet.

 

In my 128GB review sample, Surface Pro features a Micron C400 SSD. To put this in perspective, the C400 is in the same class of storage device that’s used in Apple’s MacBook Air. Although some ARM based SoCs feature SATA interfaces, pretty much all of them are paired with eMMC based NAND storage solutions that are horribly slow. The fastest sequential transfer rates I've managed on the 4th generation iPad are typically on the 20-30MB/s range, whereas the C400 in the Surface Pro is good for over 400MB/s in reads and just under 200MB/s in writes. (Source)

 

http://i.imgur.com/0kDnZBs.png

 

http://i.imgur.com/lNlsNyk.png

 

Compared to some Ultrabooks, the battery life isn't that bad.

 

http://i.imgur.com/K2fgxlG.jpg

Arthur

Arthur

Posted
Posted

Surface Pro Could Get External Battery, Microsoft Reveals « Mashable

 

The Surface engineering team hosted an AMA (ask me anything) about the Surface Pro on Reddit Wednesday afternoon, and one redditor asked if any kind of keyboard accessory with a built-in battery — which is the norm for other companies' Windows tablets such as the Samsung Series 7 — was in the works.

 

One of the multiple Microsoft engineers on the AMA, which was led by Surface general manager Panos Panay, replied that such an accessory would only be possible if the magnetic accessory connector was designed to transfer high current between the peripheral and tablet's battery.

 

Then he wrote, "Which we did..."

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