Microsoft Announces Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2

JBytes said:
I saw one on a commuter train last week. The fellow had it laid out -- keyboard, kickstand and all -- on a backpack which was resting on his lap. The whole setup looked so awkward and cumbersome, I couldn't help but chortle.
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I have only seen one in use. On the TV show Elementary. Holmes was using it in the bathroom presumably while taking a dump. Not really the best ad for the tablet particularly since the reason such things get used is that many companies give units to the prop houses for free to encourage their use. So you can't count on an appearance meaning anything.

(Although rumor has it that Apple doesn't do this and any production that wants to use anything Apple has to buy it outright. Although they are fairly generous with giving permission to use their items on screen, even with logos showing)
 
PracticalMac said:
RAM?

WTH would it need 8GB or RAM when iPad does fine with 512MB?

(but if its drive space, epic fail, even with SD slot)
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64-bit apps, plus the Windows desktop does real multitasking (apps don't get tombstones when they're in the background).

Many apps can use huge amounts of RAM, and tend to be run together. Big spreadsheets, big databases, professional-quality photo and video editing apps (Photoshop especially), software development tools. And the whole point of Surface Pro is that it can run these apps with this kind of data load, but iPads can't.

For serious software developers, 8GB RAM can actually be very cramped.
 
Renzatic said:
Honestly, if Apple were to release an iPad with a stylus digitizer, that'd dull a good bit of the appeal of the Surface Pro for me.

Course you'd still need the software to take full advantage of it, and to get that software, you'd need more ram, so it's not something that'd change overnight. But it would be a first step.

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Hell if I know. On a guess, I'd say about 30%.
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In NYC anytime I visit any chase or att corporate buildings. It's 90% apple laptops being used for employee's bringing their own device. Yep I know there is a big world out there but 30% I don't think do.
 
When the surface pro comes down to about $600, I'd consider getting one. By that time I'm sure there would be plenty of touch friendly apps.
 
Renzatic said:
Honestly, if Apple were to release an iPad with a stylus digitizer, that'd dull a good bit of the appeal of the Surface Pro for me.

Course you'd still need the software to take full advantage of it, and to get that software, you'd need more ram, so it's not something that'd change overnight. But it would be a first step.
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Or it wouldn't because Apple would come up with a new way of doing the whole thing.

Then again not that many folks, looking at the whole picture and not just the geeks on sites like this, really need 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity. A quarter of that would be more than enough for most users. A tenth that even. What is really needed by almost all users are things like better display quality for outdoor use, better sensitivity for handwriting etc. If smaller sensitive points came with thousands of levels of pressure great, especially if it didn't greatly affect battery etc. If not, most would say ditch the tons of levels for now. Better to be able hand write clearly with only 120 levels or such.

And remember, Apple focuses on the majority so they would think that way as well.
 
osofast240sx said:
In NYC anytime I visit any chase or att corporate buildings. It's 90% apple laptops being used for employee's bringing their own device. Yep I know there is a big world out there but 30% I don't think do.
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What does that have to do with our original argument? We were talking about how large a chunk of the 90% of the MS userbase is only using Windows due to being given one for work related reasons. You said about 80%, I said about 30%. Now you're talking about Macs and BYOD at workplaces? B isn't following A here.
 
Over at Microsoft they must have a hard time using their toilets, they're so clogged with money...
 
pacalis said:
But I rarely see a MBA on a plane. It's not a corporate computer, and the screen res sucks. Also you get pretty poor battery life on bootcamp. I sometimes see a few MBPs (the 15's are awful to use on a plane, I have one) or other crappy laptops like dells, hps and lenovos.
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While I still see more Windows laptops than Macs, I see primarily MBA's when I _DO_ see a Mac being used on a tray table. And if you fly international business/first, its almost entirely MBA's with the occasional ultralight windows rigs.

My 13" MBA remains my primary computing device. Yes, Parallels/BootCamp isn't a GREAT experience on it, but I can run the odd Windows app when I've no other alternative available on OSX. But most people who buy Mac's already know that going in and don't buy one if they primarily need a Windows device. So I'm not sure that's a rational benchmark.
 
Microsoft just doesn't get it...they have been making software for crappy tablets way before the iPad. XP for tablets was pure crap!!! The reason they failed is because unlike Apple they are willing to put out a crappy product and think people will come back to buy another because they are the only game in town. They are now squeezed by both Apple and Android in the mobile space, and cannot back down this time.

Microsoft has ruined its "brand image" by dropping support for so many products lately (Windows 7 phones not upgrade-able to Windows 8, Kin, Zune) nobody wants to get stuck with another looser product.

Windows Tablets are a double fail because they are also running windows 8 OS which very few people like or even want to get used to. Most consider Windows 8 a complete downgrade. I work as an Microsoft IT professional and we have no plans to upgrade to Windows in its current form. Too much hassle to send all the users for windows 8 classes, and still be subjected to Windows 8 navigation issues.

Most people flocked to the iPad because it just worked, unlike Windows with its constant nagging for updates, patches, popups, malware, and viruses. Why would i want to get that experience back on my tablet after dealing with it a work all day???

I fully understand if you are using software that only works on the windows platform, where a Surface Pro 2 might make sense, but if it were me i would just work on a 3 year old laptop instead, and save my money.
 
'Small' Fail

I saw one of the Original Pros for the first time just a few days ago.
A client of mine had one and couldn't grasp the idea of to and from the Desktop.

Then I saw the super-tiny mouse pointer and tiny font and the person was using the tiny touch-pad to move around.

I'm not one to toss around the "FAIL" word, but that's the first thing that came to my mind.
 
The Surface Pro is a tablet for people with real performance needs. I understand that the iPad crowd doesn't want to pay for those specs when they can get a Facebook machine for half the money.

Comparing it to the Air is daft. The Air is not a tablet, the Surface is not an ultrabook.

Must me tough having to justify the kool-aid all the time to fit in.
 
kingtj said:
The point is, Microsoft didn't successfully innovate here. They took a successful idea (the iPad) and tried to copy-cat it while using their own desktop OS, shoe-horned into something they thought more suitable for a touch-screen. Turns out people aren't that excited about buying one. And now, they upgraded the hardware specs instead of addressing any of the real reasons people didn't buy it the first time around
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Yeah Microsoft just copied the iPad. If it wasn't for Apple, Microsoft would have never tried to put a desktop OS on a tablet.

windows-xp-tablet-pc-edition.jpg
 
ReallyBigFeet said:
While I still see more Windows laptops than Macs, I see primarily MBA's when I _DO_ see a Mac being used on a tray table. And if you fly international business/first, its almost entirely MBA's with the occasional ultralight windows rigs.

My 13" MBA remains my primary computing device. Yes, Parallels/BootCamp isn't a GREAT experience on it, but I can run the odd Windows app when I've no other alternative available on OSX. But most people who buy Mac's already know that going in and don't buy one if they primarily need a Windows device. So I'm not sure that's a rational benchmark.
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Even today's Surface keynote had multiple bloggers in the room on MBA's. :D
 
This release to me smacks of a release that is intended to keep the product "up to date" without major alterations to it thereby buying Microsoft some time to get their new CEO hired and on board before any major, major changes are made to all of the company's product lines and services offerings.

They know they screwed up with v1, it's most likely one of the final straws they had with Ballmer, they perhaps felt they needed to update the hardware to be seeming to be "still supporting the platform" and not (yet) abandoning it, but not wanting to invest heavily in either infrastructure or radically different hardware until they decide what their future is and where the Surface fits in that future, if it even does.

Still, they can't be expecting this to sell many given they haven't addressed the reasons v1 didn't sell.

It will be interesting to see what happens to this product once a new CEO is named.
 
Was in the Microsoft store this weekend. I like the stores, even if they are a carbon copy of Apple Store.

I tried out the Surface Tablets. They straight-up suck. Windows Metro is horrible. The deployed keyboards don't work, you can't type on them. And finding regular things like settings, "charms," and the rest is a monumental task in frustration.

Windows 8 phone, also pretty abysmal, those damn Metro tiles are really annoying in the small phone form factor. And if you don't have tiles filling every space, then you have these ugly black boxes. The entire package simply doesn't work very well.

OSX and IOS for me thanks.
 
Another waste of resources from MS, nothing here is a shocker. A year from now they will tell us that they had to write off 1.8 billion.
 
SayaSe said:
The Surface Pro is a tablet for people with real performance needs. I understand that the iPad crowd doesn't want to pay for those specs when they can get a Facebook machine for half the money.

Comparing it to the Air is daft. The Air is not a tablet, the Surface is not an ultrabook.

Must me tough having to justify the kool-aid all the time to fit in.
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Real performance needs? Really? What performance needs are you talking about exactly? The Surface twins are compromised laptops and compromised tablets.

To run all your "desktop" programs, you HAVE to have a keyboard and mouse, making the tablet form factor useless. When using them as tablets, you're really forced to hold it in landscape mode, because the OS and screen weren't built for portrait mode - because...well because it's really just a laptop screen that works best when used like a laptop.

I'm not saying Apple has everything figured out, but MS isn't offering anything new, just another version of what they (and their manufacturing partners) have already created.

If MS were actually trying to be creative, they'd make a 13" Surface in a more traditional screen aspect ratio so that it works more like the laptop that it is.
 
TheOrioles33 said:
Wait a minute. Sales were dismal for the Surface right? So why make a 2?

If first you don't succeed, try and try again. :)
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Honestly, I think canceling the Surface 2 would be more expensive for Microsoft than just letting it flow out the channels and cut your losses.

Question is if they canceled the design and build orders for the Surface 3 that I'm sure is in the middle of the CAD and layout packages as I write this.

Palm should have done that with the Folio. Instead, they let millions in stock go into electronics recycling without creating it into the champion Linux laptop that could have owned the Netbook market.
 
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