Has Microsoft 'out-Appled' Apple at the laptop game with Surfaces?

[thadoggfather]

I don't know all the surface models, so not sure which models I'm referring to specifically but every single time I see them in the wild, Best Buy, or MS store, I am genuinely impressed - by the aesthetic, the feel, the quality of the screen relatively speaking, and the ports offered. It feels like one is actually getting their money's worth. And it has a touchscreen embedded in the display for some models, something I have seen actual use for despite Tim Cook's moaning that macOS and touch on screen must be treated separately.

my base 2016 non touchbar is still trucking along fine in 2020, but I think I will give MS's lineup serious consideration when this thing finally kicks the bucket... which hopefully isn't soon since laptops are expensive and a utility more than a lust object like iPhone upgrades.

I know its running on win10 (which I actually find ok, not my favorite but no win8), and I do love macOS, but its feeling like the hardware isn't staying fresh anymore. I'm also staying on Sierra for dear life still because High Sierra and upwards nukes the P3 color gamut, and washes out the display on my unit. I've verified this every time I try a new OS (high Sierra, Mojave on external SSD- haven't tried Catalina but can only suspect the same since it was never documented as an issue in the first place, but I am all too observant to these things).. And the battery life will most certainly take a nose dive if I were to upgrade, a critical feature of a good laptop as I don't want to be tethered to a wall (its not an iMac).

I don't really want another MBP that is identical in physical form to the one I've had forever, it feels ripe for a refresh, and even beyond slightly trimmed bezels with the 16" and back to scissor keyboard

This isn't an Apple bashing thread, or to make anyone doubt their purchase they're perfectly happy with - as a reminder, my whole tech line up is pretty much Apple and will still be for a while one way or the other, and I post on MR regularly... but man... I think they need to stop resting on their laurels, including, yes , the 16"

There's no way as it stands now I'd feel comfortable pay anywhere close to $2k for a Mac laptop

And the 16" has impressive acoustics and this and that, but I still cant help but feel like its been launched long in the tooth

Then again, maybe I could cheap out and get a MBAir with retina as a compromise, but I really feel in a pickle whenever I am up for a laptop upgrade. I guess the best I can hope for is this laptop survives several more years while I'm not digging this era of Mac laptops, or at least what they've done (rather have not done) since I last hunkered down

I also really frigging hate the touchbar. I don't care if it has a nice feature or two, or if the ESC key has been physically extracted from it in case of 16", I just want function keys, and I'd pay slightly more to have them that's how much I want them- I want to press them from muscle memory, and I don't want to have to spend the extra second to be aware of what UI is on the touchbar as it dynamically changes per app which is both good and bad. I'm still not convinced after all these years it isn't 98% a gimmick, and I hate that it's forced upon me. the non touchbar is a rarity now. Unless again, I go MBAir.

 

[PhoneI]

Any laptop that doesn't support thunderbolt at this point should never be considered.

 

[thadoggfather]

Any laptop that doesn't support thunderbolt at this point should never be considered.

even if I don't use it myself?

I had a 2011 13" MacBook Air with USB 2.0 ports and a thunderbolt port, the year before they added USB 3.0, and I will admit, it was awesome and breathed new life into the machine when I picked up a depreciated thunderbolt dock to make docking easier, add ethernet by docking, and USB 3.0 port extension / easy display out options, but that was some time ago.

--

I also really don't appreciate that at some point update in Sierra, Apple stopped offering hourly battery estimates for time remaining. Though I never took it as verdict, it was some indicator beyond percentage dropping like a rock to see how much energy consumption my workflow is using up. I missed it so much, I went through the hassle of backing up the plist or whatever from the older build, and carrying it over to the new one until the last version of Sierra so that I don't not have it. Totally absurd for Apple to continuously opt to be even less transparent. Especially when things don't "just work"

And on the dongle front, I have several dongles especially when Apple discounted them to offset the public backlash, and I even have the USB-C multi AV dongle when I had my 2015 12" MB, but I'd be lying if I didn't say that I'm SICK of dongle management. So I attach dongles to my most used peripherals, its still tedious. Just give users a frigging normal port or two. Half a decade after the USB-C only laptop era was unveiled (with 12") we *still* aren't there. When Johnathan Morrison asked Schiller about the dongle situation with the 16", Schiller's response was "I carry around dongles like you guys." I don't think thats an acceptable explanation.

Especially because when someone picks up any iPhone (barring 11 Pro's), they still cant connect the included cable.

In a sense, it feels like I'm going the extra mile to make it work for me

Another fun oddity is I've found recently even on the last version of Sierra, the BT stack is broken. Tried pairing a MS bluetooth mouse, tried pairing that Logitech Triathlon mouse, NEITHER work. It works fine on same hardware on win10, works on iOS 13 on my 2018 12.9" iPad Pro, but NOT Sierra. I get its a few years old, and I would hope that the BT stack is fixed but I've read it was messed up for High Sierra too... and haven't had issues with any other bluetooth devices including my old school Magic Trackpad and bluetooth keyboards. That is beyond pathetic, and my only explanation is Apple didn't care because they assumed everyone would only be interested in apple bluetooth mice. And I refuse to update for all the aforementioned reasons, which I'm not convinced won't fix this issue. Sort of a last straw of bending to Apple's way. It's ok, I'll use a wired mouse for the occasions I want to use a mouse with my laptop, but what a basic thing that was botched. I've even tried unpairing all devices, and resetting the module in debug mode as some troubleshooting articles outlined, NADA! Cant even use an off the shelf bluetooth mouse with this thing.

Also for reference - I'm "the guy" who dug up ways to scale the 12" rMB beyond the limited 1280x800 DPI, so it didn't feel like a Tonka Toy and reported my findings. It worked beautifully when I did have a 12" as my only machine, before upgrading to the 13" nTB:

Scale 1680x1050 on rMB without an app

Sorry this post has become such a jumbled mess from what it originally was but there is now a script by a dev on GitHub that automates a lot of this, and after some fiddling I got it working with Big Sur PB1 this morning. Check this post out for a Big Sur walkthrough...

forums.macrumors.com

...maybe if I do opt for an MS laptop next, like how I dual boot win10 now for when I need it (and I do need it sometimes), I can get a laptop down the road whose hardware specs has been validated to work with Hackintosh, and dual boot that when I want the gracefulness of macOS. I really dunno anymore. It's not like Mac laptops don't have their strengths they do, I'm just wondering if its all worth it. Whereas years ago, it used to be a thoughtless purchase decision.

I wish Apple would be willing to sit down with people like me, or even give me a ring, so I can give them free consulting for what we want, I'd be willing to give them my time and input FOR FREE, but hopefully someone scours these forums that works for Cupertino. I want a better product! And no, I don't take it personal that they don't haha. Also, I'm assuming no one actually cares what people like I want, and are currently disappointed by, since their sales and more importantly stocks, are doing just fine without my 2 cents (but I think Mac sales are declining whereas PC sales in general are up - maybe thats a hint??)

 

[coachingguy]

I picked up a base 2018 Surface Pro at Best Buy last spring for about $425... I’ve been all Apple since 83... but I wanted to give the Surface a try... The Surface is what the MBA should have been... I don’t use it often, but have been impressed. Great coffee shop and travel machine.

Apple could learn some things.

 

[MacNut]

Apple missed the boat on touch and boxed themselves into a corner now. They will never admit that the surface did it right and Apple was late to the party. I can see Apple eventually doing a touch screen because they don't have a choice.

 

[robvas]

The Book is a brick. The Surface keyboard attachment for the Pro is beyond awkward. I want a real 'laptop' so I'll stick with my MacBook

 

[MacNut]

The Book is a brick. The Surface keyboard attachment for the Pro is beyond awkward. I want a real 'laptop' so I'll stick with my MacBook

A lot of people want a brick that can do something. Not what Apple is shoving into underpowered cases. I would take a MPB that is thicker if it can handle heat better.

 

[thadoggfather]

The Book is a brick. The Surface keyboard attachment for the Pro is beyond awkward. I want a real 'laptop' so I'll stick with my MacBook

Cramming that top config i9 in the thin chassis proved to be problematic with the expensive 2018's, with throttling and overheating.

So I think they do have an issue on their hands, with some configurations. it should've been designed to accommodate future silicone, that's why they made the 16" thicker. And now that they did, no one is complaining about it because Apple did it and Apple does no wrong, even when they right their wrongs

Shrug

 

[bill-p]

It's not like Windows laptops, save for the extra thicc workstation ones, are doing any better with i9, so stop blaming Apple.

Blame the right culprit: Intel.

Intel has been on the 14nm process for-freaking-ever. All they've done is slowly creeping up TurboBoost frequency and bumping chips by a "generation" for the past 4 years.

So until Intel moves to 10nm, it makes no sense to move beyond quad-core in a laptop. Or at least that's how I feel about the whole situation.

As an aside, I'd agree that other laptop manufacturers have at least caught up with Apple when it comes to industrial design.

 

[NT1440]

They’re not bad. I support a Surface pro 3 and a surfacebook at work. I’ll gladly buy them new ones when it’s time but I’d personally never buy one of these for myself.

 

[keeper]

Ive have a 2016 13" MacBook Pro, however just ordered a Lenovo Yoga C940.
Upgraded
Processor - Intel Core i7-1065G7 This was a £170 upgrade from i5
Hard Drive - 512GB Solid State Drive, M.2 2280, PCIe This was a £30 upgrade from 256GB
Memory - 16GB LPDDR4X 3733MHz This was a £60 upgrade from 8 GB
3-YR On-site upgrade from 1-YR Depot/CCI delivery which was only £69.30
Total £1,311.65


Just can't get that kind of spec from Apple never mind a touch screen 2 in 1.
I'll keep my iPhone and iPad for now but Apple are slowly losing my custom in hardware and software service areas.

 

[topcat001]

I have a 5th gen Surface Pro and it's a very nice ultraportable.

The bad: It has some stability issues. For example, if it is hibernated and then woken up with the type cover detached (while it was sleeping) then it is very likely to bluescreen. It does not bother me too much because I can work around it (haven't tested this since November so not sure if it's been fixed). Windows 10 tablet mode is quite bad.

The good: Great screen, good battery life. Windows 10 has very good memory management and runs smoothly on my 8 GB RAM model even with lots of open apps. I do optimise my install though. I have the Surface Pencil and it's quite responsive (although the Apple Pencil on iPad beats it in terms of smoothness). My model is fanless but the thermals are still pretty good.

 

[pneves1975]

I remember seeing this kind of posts for years. In 2015 Apple was selling a 15 machine with Intel 4th generation CPUs. Everyone was bashing because 5th gen was available, they were using Q4'13 processors in 2015. The machines sold like hotcakes and today one can see lots of forum readers posting how great those machines were. I am rocking one of them right now...

Apple's value is not in the internals. Its the combo, its the user experience. It has problems? Sure it has. It is expensive? Yes, it is! Its still the best for me considering every angle? Surely!

Yes I would like to see a 16 with similar specs to a Surface 15 with only iGPU and 10th generation Ice Lake. Yes I would like to see Apple making a Pro machine without only the "photo and video professionals" in mind (are they as many in the world to warrant this approach? 🤔), but also tackling other needs. Not every professional needs dGPU, 8-core frying pans, but definitely would benefit from a bigger screen.

My 2c

 

[mkelly]

I don't know all the surface models, so not sure which models I'm referring to specifically but every single time I see them in the wild, Best Buy, or MS store, I am genuinely impressed - by the aesthetic, the feel, the quality of the screen relatively speaking, and the ports offered.

Yes... and no.

I have both a Surface Pro 5 and a Surface Book 2. I *really* like the design and overall “solidness” of both machines. However, I’ve run into a number of issues with them - *especially* the Surface Book 2. The detachable tablet isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. On multiple occasions the tablet has refused to undock, or, once it has, refuses to dock again. I’ve also had issues with the computer not recognizing its own keyboard base, and complaining that it is an unsupported USB device.

The Surface Pro 5 on the other hand has been much better, seeing as how it’s a less complicated beast overall. I do find the WiFi slow on both of them as compared to my Mac Mini and my ”old” 2016 15” MBP.

The biggest issue for me though has been the software experience. There are things I like a lot about Windows 10. But those are outweighed by the annoyances. Especially when it comes to Windows updates. Early last year my Surface Book 2 started to bluescreen on every single boot. I tried everything, including reinstalling Windows, but the problem kept happening. I thought it was a hardware issue, and just before I made an appt to take it in, I found this:

Microsoft Admits Normal Windows 10 Users Are 'Testing' Unstable Updates

Microsoft isn't just using Windows Insiders for beta testing. Microsoft is using you.

www.forbes.com

”Microsoft admits to testing Windows 10 updates on normal users”

Basically, if you click “Check for Updates” in the Windows update tool, Microsoft assumes that you are an ”advanced user” (because normal users don’t) and (at the time) may elect to send you not-quite-ready-for-prime time updates, without warning you.

That’s what happened to my Surface Book 2 - they deployed a new SB2 update that would only be installed if you manually checked for updates, and in this case it was a bad update that caused Surface Books to bluescreen on boot.

Now I know Apple also has a spotty track record when it comes to updates, but I’ve never experienced anything like that on my MacBooks ... so yeah, I do love my Surface machines, but I also think people should be forewarned before buying them. Have a look over at https://reddit.com/r/surface - there are some positive posts there, as well as more than a few negative ones with regards to hardware issues. There is a known CPU throttling issue that has been happening for *years* that Microsoft still hasn’t addressed.

 

[hvfsl]

I do IT support for a lot of different companies and I am starting to feel about Surfaces like I used to feel about Blackberrys, i.e. I hate them. If you need a Windows device that has a touch screen and don't plan to do a full days work on it, then it is OK. But even using MS Office for 8 hours can cause it to throttle on many of the models, meaning that users keep calling asking why it is running so slow. They seem to fail more than other laptops, although as mentioned previously I have had some just stop working because of Windows updates (so require a rebuild). HP and Lenovo make much better touch screen laptops, while they might not be quite as pretty, they seem to be a lot more reliable.

 

[Viamusic10000]

Idk the hinge on the surface makes the form factor inferior to a MacBook. It's not like its more upgradeable, cheaper or has better specs than the 16in. The materials aren't as premium and Windows isn't a good tablet os so idk. Im' fine with a MacBook for laptop things and a tablet for tablet things.

 

[leman]

Surface laptop is a very nice ultraportable and a worthy competitor of Air and 13” MBP (of course, lack of high-speec connectivity makes it meh, but not everyone needs it). Surface Book is a very different product altogether, one that I don’t find interesting or attractive in the least.

 

[maflynn]

I think MS is doing some really nice things, but I wouldn't quantify their actions as out-appling apple. I'm of the opinion that when they rolled out their laptops they definitely emulated apple, both in terms of design, but also pricing. Now they carvde a more unique identity.

I've owned Surface Pros and a Surface Book. Both decent laptops, but in all honesty, I'd probably not buy either one again. One large advantage that windows machines offer over Macs, is choice. You can get a slick sexy design, like the Razer, or significant upgrade/repairability like the ThinkPad, or huge 17" behemoth that could be a full desktop replacement. The sky's the limit, in selecting what you want at a budget that you're comfortable with.

 

[Smoothie]

I owned a Surface Pro 4 and it had a hardware failure shortly after the expiration of the extended warranty I purchased from MS. The device is extremely difficult to repair, so I recycled it. I'd never own another one.

 

[maflynn]

he device is extremely difficult to repair, so I recycled it. I'd never own another one.

Not for nothing, the same exact argument can and has been made regarding Macs.

With that said, it sux that your SP4 did not last as long as it ought too, and I'm not making any excuses related to the inadequacy of that product or its premature failure.

 

[jerryk]

Surface laptop don't have the best reputation. We have several top end Surface Book (1 and 2) models and had issues with them. They are fine for lighter work loads but really make a lot of fan noise and throttle badly with higher loads. We still use them, but only to do lighter tasks like audio recording with Audition. They work great at this because they are thin light, and take little space.

For the actually assembly of audio and video we use beefer desk-side systems with fast CPUs, GPU, and SSDs

 

[tarsins]

No. My Surface Book 2 took far too much time fiddling about with to make it work the way I wanted it to, then mysteriously reverted to an annoying, complaining child. I sold it.

When I have to use Windows (I support a legacy Windows accounting system) I genuinely find it more efficient to connect to my ancient Windows machine using RDP (Jump Desktop) from my MBP.

 

[Audit13]

No amount of specs, benchmarks, and looks are going to get people to leave macOS for Windows IMHO.

 

[AustinIllini]

Does it still run Windows?

Yeah, no, the Surface line may be the best of Windows, but they're still not in the same league as MacBooks because of that substandard operating system.

 

[maflynn]

substandard operating system.

Given the complaining and issues regarding Catalina, I think your argument that its a substandard OS, is weak. You may prefer macOS, but that doesn't mean objectively one is better then the other. Both operating systems have their own advantages and disadvantages.