I love Apple's hardware build quality and the Surfacebook is every bit as good to me. I am lean towards one for sure.
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If you didn't have your MacBook Pro, what would you go for?
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I love Apple's hardware build quality and the Surfacebook is every bit as good to me. I am lean towards one for sure.
Can vouch the same, Surface Book is easily a match for Apple`s build quality. Keyboard for me is superb, has all the stability of the new MBP with more traditional travel and beautifully positive feedback. Bottom line is if your ok with Windows 10, you will be pleased with the Surface Book, being every bit a premium product.
The Surface Book is not perfect mind, being compromised as all portables are, however it certainly a superior solution for my professional needs versus the new MBP, having features I rather fear the Mac will never see, or be so late to implemented they will be near irrelevant
Another thread with more MR members with the Surface Book, and likely a better venue for discussion
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The Surface Book would also be my choice. However, it wouldn't save money since the equivalent Surface Book to my 2016 15" MBP is priced $100 more than what I have. My purchase was a 2.6GHz MBP upgraded to 1TB storage and 460 graphics. The Surface screen is smaller, too, though it does have the touch screen. Most of my use of the MBP is connected to 1 or 2 external displays and drives, so the touchscreen wouldn't be much use for me. Still, if I couldn't get the MBP I have, it is probably what I'd go with.
There is no question that MS made a very unique product with the Surface Book, and that the design and execution are well done, but it wouldn't be a computer of my choice. My issues with it:
- Only slower dual-core CPUs
- Too bulky (that hinge makes the package thicker than any current Mac, which means discomfort when using a messenger bag)
- Too much focus on tablet hybrid mode, which I consider to be of very limited use
Frankly, I am a bit confused about the hardware choice in the Surface Book. They are cutting down on the CPU, using only the lowest-performance models, but at the same time they put in a relatively powerful GPU (esp. in the performance base version). Who is this laptop for? People who need a business laptop don't need the GPU (in fact, they would be better off without the GPU). Creative professionals would certainly benefit from a quad core CPU better than from a beefier GPU, unless they are involved in very particular niche workflows. In fact, if I wouldn't know better, I'd say that MS is targeting this thing on gamers...
- Only slower dual-core CPUs
- Too bulky (that hinge makes the package thicker than any current Mac, which means discomfort when using a messenger bag)
- Too much focus on tablet hybrid mode, which I consider to be of very limited use
Frankly, I am a bit confused about the hardware choice in the Surface Book. They are cutting down on the CPU, using only the lowest-performance models, but at the same time they put in a relatively powerful GPU (esp. in the performance base version). Who is this laptop for? People who need a business laptop don't need the GPU (in fact, they would be better off without the GPU). Creative professionals would certainly benefit from a quad core CPU better than from a beefier GPU, unless they are involved in very particular niche workflows. In fact, if I wouldn't know better, I'd say that MS is targeting this thing on gamers...
Nonsense the Surface Book is not anywhere close to being aimed as a gaming notebook, portability is certainly not class leading, equally not the drama you portray it to be, with mine being live and direct from Papua New Guinea. Yep big surprise my portables are actually used as portables, not surfing the desk 24/7. Surface book is designed to have a usage in the region of 80% notebook, 20% tablet this is obvious from the battery capacity alone.
Surprise, surprise compared to a 13" MBP nor does the Surface Book lag behind, which is exactly what Microsoft compares it to. I know as I own and use both in a professional role. Your "low performance" is likely based on TDP. Microsoft have never as far as I am aware pitted the current Surface Book against the 15" MBP, then again it might be very interesting if Surface Book 2 does compete. Don't worry there`s a bright side your MBP will be thinner. As ever you can only see from your own perspective, and nobody else's...
Tip; Some do use applications that can lever a powerful dGPU acceleration as a function of their workflow, and the the 3:2 display is slight giveaway that the intended use is not predominantly "Call of Duty". The big difference Microsoft listened to it`s users, going very much against the current trend producing a slightly thicker, heavier notebook with a good deal more performance, while Apple offers you what it thinks is best for Apple`s margins.
Only thing confuses me is why you think a 2 in 1 notebook specifically designed for business & professional use is aimed at gamers, or maybe what you just really want to say is "it`s crap because it`s not Apple" for that at least I would give you more credibility...
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Why would it need the higher-spec GPU if it's designed for business & professional use? What else is a fast GPU really good for? Save money and power by using a lower-spec GPU instead. Hell, some peoples' definition of "business & professional use" could get by with integrated graphics.
As I said, I was confused by the choice of hardware: weak CPUs and relatively fast GPUs. Usually, for professional applications, users who need a fast GPU, also need a fast CPU.
My "low performance" is based on the fact that the Surface Pro uses the low-tier dual-core CPUs. Thats not really a matter of dispute, its just a fact. Its the same class of CPUs that are used in the MacBook Air and the non-TouchBar MBP 13". And yes, these CPUs are slower than the TouchBar 13" — of course you need to look at sustained performance to truly see the difference, in burst workflows they are all more or less the same.
Of course GPU is important for many professional applications. But again, so is the CPU. The Surface Book trades off CPU performance for the GPU performance. Again, the only obvious application for this that comes to my mind is either gaming or maybe some niche content creation workflow that can indeed offload all of the processing to the GPU. But its not a tradeoff that would benefit an average photo or video editor. Especially the "Performance Base" version — literally the only thing you get there is a fast mid-range GPU. Whom is this product for? I know you say "MS listened to the users", but what kind of workflow scales that much with raw GPU performance? It is just very weird to me to pack a fairly powerful GPU into a computer but leave out the CPU... it surely looks very good on paper, but does it actually bring noticeable benefits to the actual users? If you look at reviews: the only difference in performance is seen in gaming benchmark. Did anyone actually test professional applications that can leverage the GPU?
And of course, the matter of connectivity. Why is there no thunderbolt? Already the omission of Thunderbolt kind of suggests that the product is not really aimed at professional content creators, which certainly benefit from having a fast scratch disk etc. But then, why the powerful GPU? Do you see what I mean? I just can't wrap my head around this product. Its very nice and well executed, but I just don't get this particular combination of hardware and features.
And also, there is the question of MS's marketing tactics. They tell you "we have much faster graphics than the MBP" but neglect to tell you that in order to achieve that they have downgraded the CPU. In fact, their product page seems to hide any details about the CPU, just stating "i5 or i7". They don't even make it clear that its a dual-core CPU! Same with the 940M version — they just say Nvidia dGPU. Its weird and I am not comfortable with it.
Simple answer is that some applications can take advantage of the dGPU significantly accelerating the output, some can and do require a dGPU as a minimum requirement. Suggesting the Surface Book is aimed at gaming is the same as suggesting the MBP is a gaming machine. it`s possible to an extent, equally not the intended purpose
As ever "Professional" is defined by the user not the hardware, a professional chooses the hardware that offer him/her the best tool for the job. My wife for instance runs her business 80% on Android, equally few would question her professional status...
Q-6
As stated I own and use both; performance is comparable, Surface Book pulls ahead where & when the dGPU offers advantage. You talk about the CPU`s like they are junk, just BS, only reduction is TDP and from my direct observations Microsoft has that well under control with no throttling, with CPU pegging at maximum frequency. My own Surface Book i7 holds 3.4GHz as long as you need it to. Seriously nonsense my 28W 2014 rMBP is a little slower than my 2016 15W Surface Book. Stark and truthful reality is you will never see the difference in "real world use" and if you it will be immeasurable outside of synthetic benchmarks.
Actually enough; just repeat these simple words " I don't like it, because Apple didn't make it" and I am confused as for some people it might actually be a better product. Your just twisting words MS have has not downgraded the CPU it remains the same Skylake i5 or i7, new Performance Base clearly states GTX 965M, original Surface Book with dGPU is different as it`s a custom chip with less memory, however memory running a faster clock DDR5 which dependant on the application brings positive or negative result.
Your totally discounting what the Surface Book is capable of, completely missing the 2 in 1 potential, had Apple produced such a portable you guy`s would be raving about it, Apple didn't and it sucks. Getting to a point where I think that some of you are paid to be here, as the arguments are so completely ridiculous, Surface Book = gamers like rallycross = boats.
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Highly Recommended, and I am 20 years plus with Apple which speaks volumes.
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Probably another ThinkPad. They're what I used before I went hard on MacOS and they'll probably be what I go back to if I decide to use a PC as a home machine ever again.
I am certainly not talking about the CPUs like they are junk
I think you are just taking this a bit too personal. I am simply stating the fact that the CPUs Microsoft uses in their laptops are the slower and cheaper models. Its a very capable CPU and more than sufficient for a normal business user, who probably spends most of the time doing spreadsheets and and word processing. Still, the fact remains that in computationally intensive workflows the 28W variants of the same CPU will perform better. And yes, your 15W Skylake will outperform 28W Haswell. Again, it doesn't make the Surface Book a bad computer (I never claimed that its a bad computer). I am simply saying the its a computer that sacrifices performance to achieve some other design goals. Which make it a weird product in my book, because of the reasons I have stated in my previous post — its a laptop that appears to be performance oriented, but then, also kind of isn't.
Yes, definitively taking this too personal. If I have a question about the design goal of a specific product, it doesn't mean that "I don't like it because Apple didn't make it". Frankly, if Apple discontinued the higher-end 13" model and made an MBA with a weak dedicated GPU, I'd be among the first to go WTF about it.
You are not reading what I am saying. I was talking about relative downgrade — they didn't use a faster CPU variant in order to fit a dedicated GPU. Which is a fair design tradeoff. Still, I'd prefer it to be clearly communicated to the customer. There are a lot of i5 and a lot of i7 CPUs and some of the i5 are faster than some of the i7.
I think its much more likely that MS doesn't openly advertise it as 940M (which it is) simply because 940M doesn't sound very impressive. "Custom Nvidia chip" sounds much better. And yes, you don't have that danger with the 965M, which is known to be a very capable mid-range gaming card. Again, marketing.
I would be raving about it, sure, about how I am disappointed with Apple. One of the reasons why I like Apple products is exactly because they don't do the 2 in 1 things. But I guess this is the point where we will have to agree to disagree on. There is no doubt that MS is one of the truly innovative companies in the hardware space, which I think is great. I don't necessarily agree with their design choices and these are certainly not computers for me — too slow, too bulky, too limited connectivity. But its very nice to see that there is still some choice and divergence of designs in the industry.
We could same similar of Apple to sacrifice it's once battery supremacy in terms of longevity is also kind of weird turn of events with removing some physical keys and along with 500 nits that's not sustainable. There's not much point for some having a fast processor etc that dies in the field
. If anything tbMBP is edging ever closer to tethered to the wall like typical gaming laptops. This would concern me more than the SB hinge wont fit my messenger bag As you are probably more aware than I quad core is not the only consideration but is certainly indicative of better performance but it's does help if you have software capable of utilising it to the fullest, given that already more limited choice of software for MAC's your already hard against the wall.
Most peoples thoughts of mathematical/computational software starts at Excel which I understand only addresses 1 core on Macs
As you already noted there is a good case for a trade off with 2 cores and a DGPU for some, MS seem to opt for this route currently maybe SB2 will opt for quad core and it will be interesting how they tackle this and 32GB Ram. I think Apple will have a harder time with the current thinness regime IMO but we will have to wait till Q4 to see.
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If the MacBook Pro line didn't exist, I would probably get a SurfaceBook. It's actually the main Windows computer I was looking at before the 2016 MacBook Pro was announced. I wouldn't use the touchscreen capability that much, but I like the build quality and battery life. But as cool as the hinge design is, I don't think it's particularly practical for storage. Before my 2016 MBP, I had a Sony VAIO Z (from when Sony still made VAIOs); the new ones look okay, but there just isn't enough information on them to make an informed decision.
We could same similar of Apple to sacrifice it's once battery supremacy in terms of longevity is also kind of weird turn of events with removing some physical keys and along with 500 nits that's not sustainable. There's not much point for some having a fast processor etc that dies in the field
And on full load, no laptop can have good battery life. Its even pointless to consider this scenario. The legal battery limit is 99.9 Wh, which means that you'd get around 1.5-2 hours max on full CPU load in best case-scenario. With the MBP's 76Wh battery, its 15-20 minutes less at max. Not enough to make a difference in real life. If you really want to tax the machine, you need to plug it in, no alternatives.
What is important is how long the battery lasts in mixed usage, during a normal workload. And here — at least in my experience — Apple made no sacrifices. My 2016 is not only significantly faster than the 2015 model but also lasts longer on battery in the same workflows. Again, these are facts. I have copied my data over to the 2016 model and continued doing the same work and I easily get 2-3 hours more per day now. This is a definitive improvement, even taking into account the fact that the 2015's battery has deteriorated over the last year.
Quad Core CPUs are also clock higher, so they will perform significantly better even for single-threaded loads. But of course you are right, if your workflow can't take advantage of parallelisation, the relative value of the quad core CPUs diminishes.
I am also very much looking forward to what the giants will come up to in the future!
Agreed and that's my point ( ie edging away from laptop ability which is weird given Apples thinness goals)
Glad your workflow is sustainable many think otherwise but maybe they are just doing more