Microsoft Surface Tablet announced

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The fact you can't do something as elementary as jot down notes with an iPad makes it a joke.
Huh? You can jot down notes just fine in the iPad and it's backed up into the cloud as well, either using the built in app with iCloud or OneNote with SkyDrive.
 
It is? i thought someone said this thing had a fan making a bunch of noise, might be mistaken tho.

Also... how do you run an i5 (pro version) in such a small enclosure without a fan? The ARM RT tablet i can believe running "fanless".
Ah, you're a bit mixed up.

The Surface runs a Nvidia Tegra ARM SoC. It's fanless.
The Surface Pro has a ULV i5. It has active (fan) cooling in the form of a vent around the perimeter of the entire device. No word on noise or heat so you can't really make judgements on that just yet.
 
Huh? You can jot down notes just fine in the iPad and it's backed up into the cloud as well, either using the built in app with iCloud or OneNote with SkyDrive.

Have you tried jotting down notes on an iPad in class? With the form factor and on-screen keyboard, they could not give you a jankier experience if they tried. It's awful.
 
Huh? You can jot down notes just fine in the iPad and it's backed up into the cloud as well, either using the built in app with iCloud or OneNote with SkyDrive.

With what, your finger? Seriously?

The RT version of the Surface needs stylus support, too.
 
If they price this right, MS could have a huge hit on their hands that could do the following:

1) Grab pretty much all of the non-iPad tablet market, as long as the apps come
2) Really hurt third-party laptop vendors in the Enterprise.

Especially on point #2, unless you work with graphic design, the current Holy Grail of the Enterprise is an all in one PC/tablet that doesn't take up a lot of space and serves the needs of 90% of corporate America - which is basically Outlook and MS Office. If they come in around $500, this thing has the potential to be huge.

While the iPad has made inroads into corporations, they are ancillary devices, for the most part.
 
If they price this right, MS could have a huge hit on their hands that could do the following:

1) Grab pretty much all of the non-iPad tablet market, as long as the apps come
2) Really hurt third-party laptop vendors in the Enterprise.

Especially on point #2, unless you work with graphic design, the current Holy Grail of the Enterprise is an all in one PC/tablet that doesn't take up a lot of space and serves the needs of 90% of corporate America - which is basically Outlook and MS Office. If they come in around $500, this thing has the potential to be huge.

While the iPad has made inroads into corporations, they are ancillary devices, for the most part.
price which one around 500? RT will obviously be around 500 but ultrabook pricing for the win8 one means more closer to 1000.
 
I was simply matching your hyperbole.
What hyperbole? When people bring up true multitasking arguments against the iPhone, they clearly mean the fact that apps are suspended instead of left running. Yes, there are background services developers can use, but they still make arguments that you can't have IRC running in the background or have an app be continually "live" to download data in the background.
 
Any specs on the most expensive 64 bit version? If it was a wacom digitizer plus pen AND great GFX card I'll buy it over a macbook for work
 
I written notes with and recorded audio from many meetings on my ipad with no problem (or physical keyboard), so it's a case of YMMV.

Do you know how to touch-type? If you can't properly type on a physical keyboard, I can see how an iPad could work, but even then I think it would be completely off-putting. Tactile feedback is simply strictly superior for typing. I wrote this entire post in seconds without once looking at the keyboard and it feels AMAZING compared to an iPad, even with my janky old keyboard.

Writing a longer post like this on an iPad- which I've tried to do- is so annoying that I have to use the (not that great) voice recognition and mess around with inputting all the nonstandard words myself. Especially if there's significant cutting and pasting involved, which they did their best to implement but is REALLY awkward. The touch gesture now does too many things in a text field.
 
You can buy styluses for the iPad.

Also mixed things up. iPad has iWork. Does it work well?

iWork is great as far as I'm concerned. Pages and Keynote are excellent and Numbers isn't bad either, although I use it the least. I recently wrote a 1000+ word magazine article in Pages on a flight back to the States from Jordan without any issues. Landed in NYC and sent the article, in .doc format, to my editor over 4G. It was slick as hell. :)


BTW, MS hasn't released Office for iOS yet, but it is expected in the fall.
 
Comparing the ipad to the Surface Pro is a joke. The ipad is a toy compared to the pro. MS really stepped it up.

Well for one thing the Pro is alot closer to an ultrabook than an iPad, and it will probably be double the price. Comparisons between the two are dumb because they serve different purposes.

iWork is great as far as I'm concerned. Pages and Keynote are excellent and Numbers isn't bad either, although I use it the least. I recently wrote a 1000+ word magazine article in Pages on a flight back to the States from Jordan without any issues. Landed in NYC and sent the article, in .doc format, to my editor over 4G. It was slick as hell. :)


BTW, MS hasn't released Office for iOS yet, but it is expected in the fall.

Thanks for clearing things up.
 
Comparing the ipad to the Surface Pro is a joke. The ipad is a toy compared to the pro. MS really stepped it up.

They aren't going to be priced remotely similar either so it's a dumb comparison either way. The pro is almost more akin to the air or an ultrabook. MS specifically said they'll be priced similar to them as well.
 
The fact that tobor has firmly planted himself in this thread is reason enough for me to think this product is the first real contender to the iPad.
 
I want full control over my files if I want to. Not restricted to Apple managing it all for me because they know best.

Same reason I hate iTunes.

That's fine, but the iPad can still do what you said it can't do. Moving the goalposts to "doesn't do it the way I want" is a good move.
 
With what, your finger? Seriously?
Oh you mean THAT....
I haven't hand written anything besides filling out some simple forms and my signature for years so I guess I wouldn't know. Always hated any task that required any sort of finesse with a pen and pencil when I was in school and I always typed my assignments.
 
They aren't going to be priced remotely similar either so it's a dumb comparison either way. The pro is almost more akin to the air or an ultrabook. MS specifically said they'll be priced similar to them as well.

My money is on the same price as the smaller MB Air, so it eats Air's lunch completely.
 
Well for one thing the Pro is alot closer to an ultrabook than an iPad, and it will probably be double the price. Comparisons between the two are dumb because they serve different purposes.



Thanks for clearing things up.

They don't really. You would need to compare it to owning a superior tablet AND an ultrabook without the need of owning two portable devices.
 
That's fine, but the iPad can still do what you said it can't do. Moving the goalposts to "doesn't do it the way I want" is a good move.

The iPad doesn't let me organize my files myself.

And on top of that, the most efficient way to use the Apple approved file organization is to do it on another computer and sync it. That's telling.
 
Any specs on the most expensive 64 bit version? If it was a wacom digitizer plus pen AND great GFX card I'll buy it over a macbook for work

No hard specs, but I'd expect just the Ivy Bridge GFX. Haven't seen a lot of ultrabooks with dedicated video, although it is possible:

http://www.cnet.com/laptops/asus-zenbook-prime-ux32vd/4505-3121_7-35307495.html

UX32VD has an 620M + integrated, for example. Apparently that card can run D3 on medium at decent frame rates, although the computer it's in can go up to 1080p, where I imagine it'll have to run on low or with lower shadows.
 
Any specs on the most expensive 64 bit version? If it was a wacom digitizer plus pen AND great GFX card I'll buy it over a macbook for work
It will have underclocked Intel IVB graphics, just like the Macbook Air. It may even be further underclocked than the air, it all depends on the thermal capacity of the chassis.
 
It doesn't have a stylus, although I'm sure someone will make a Windows RT tablet with a stylus if not MS.

sorry, i was speaking about the pro, which is pretty much the only one I'm interested in.

I think that the RT and the ipad, it's pretty much a draw game, except apple will win for some time on the app store.

The pro though, holy potential. I'm drooling at the idea of this taking over corporate, which it has a very real shot at doing. Straight integration with GPOs and all the enterprise stuff, happy sys admins everywhere, board members using and praising it. This should in turn stimulate the app store and might prompt the desktop app makers to start making metro versions of their apps to try and grab the new market.

I'll probably buy one just to give someone some money for attacking the whole touch/mouse/keyboard mess seriously.

EDIT: MS should get some credit for not delivering up another weaksauce solution that looks half baked and they didn't think about it.

Seems like they have a vision for windows 8 now and that vision seems pretty interesting.

Can't wait to play binding of isaac on my sweet new tablet.
 
I just wanted to say, that this shit looks amazing, and I hope everyone who shit-talked Microsoft and this tablet before it was even fucking announced should be face-deep in crow right about now.
 
I just wanted to say, that this shit looks amazing, and I hope everyone who shit-talked Microsoft and this tablet before it was even fucking announced should be face-deep in crow right about now.

Doubting Microsoft should be the default behaviour. This being good is the exception.
 
What hyperbole? When people bring up true multitasking arguments against the iPhone, they clearly mean the fact that apps are suspended instead of left running. Yes, there are background services developers can use, but they still make arguments that you can't have IRC running in the background or have an app be continually "live" to download data in the background.

On Windows RT you could leave an IRC application snapped and actually use it without leaving what you're currently working on.
 
They don't really. You would need to compare it to owning a superior tablet AND an ultrabook.

Will still have to see about that. There's still alot of factors we don't know, like the battery life, how comfortable is the aspect ratio for portrait viewing, quality of screen vs iPad and I'm honestly curious if the keyboard will be any good, because that flatness is really worrying. So far this is the exact direction I want microsoft to go with win 8 but I'll have to see the final execution first.

Also I hope to god they price this right.
 
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