brotkasten
Member
Yeah, a keyboard with build-in stand automatically makes it a non-competitor for the Surface, imo. It's like the first-gen Surface that had only one kickstand angle.
Microsoft Surface Pro 4 announced: "better in nearly every way" (The Verge)
- Thread starter Anton Sugar
- Start date
- Status
Yeah, a keyboard with build-in stand automatically makes it a non-competitor for the Surface, imo. It's like the first-gen Surface that had only one kickstand angle.
Ok, the external screens not waking up since last patch is really starting to piss me off, every other time I leave my desk and come back, I need to reboot cause only the SP4 screen wakes up, removing the dock cable does not help, removing the displayports reattaching does not help.
Joel Was Right
Member
What are the best Surface app guys? I'm conflicted on whether to buy a SP4 again or an iPad Pro.
They sell millions of these devices, some people online voicing their problems is not indicative of widespread issues.
what do you mean "What are the best Surface app guys?"... for digital illustration??
Joel Was Right
Member
Media consumption, productivity apps
Hey guys, sorry I'm new to this thread. Just curious about the general consensus of the SP4. I'll be doing a lot of travelling for work this year, and was considering getting one of these (I have a MacBook, but a windows device, especially a more portable one, would be beneficial) so i was just wondering if people are generally happy.
Are there any models I should stay away from? Is the lowest tier model really worth avoiding? I don't plan on gaming a ton, but I'll definitely load up Steam and throw on some more basic games for when I'm bored. I'll also be doing a lot of note taking, film watching, etc.
Are there any models I should stay away from? Is the lowest tier model really worth avoiding? I don't plan on gaming a ton, but I'll definitely load up Steam and throw on some more basic games for when I'm bored. I'll also be doing a lot of note taking, film watching, etc.
Full version of Office, desktop VLC, Netflix (app or browser).
I mean, it's a regular laptop in another formfactor, you can run whatever on it.
PhoenixSFT
Member
Would anyone who installed Windows 10 to their Surface Pro 3 let me know what they think? I'd like to upgrade, but I've also gotten used to 8.1 and don't want to upgrade to something that could, potentially, be worse.
I think most of us are quite happy with our SP4s. I know I love mine, but I've been on the Surface train for a few years now.
All the models are good, but if you want to do some gaming, then probably the i5 is a safe bet. I don't think you'll need 8 gb of RAM, based on your proposed uses, but you might if you want to "future proof" your purchase. I picked up the i5/128 model and have zero complaints.
Thanks for the info!
I like my Pro 3 better after upgrading to Win 10 for sure. It's a more "PC like" experience with enough options to make it tablet-like if you want.
Love my win10 SP3. There was a bug that I had to contact MS service to fix. But after that it works flawlessly. Never had any crashes or anything. Use it to develop indie games, everything seems great though there's a bit of slow down when using Photoshop and editing large files.
But the interface is great, I can make it like a tablet when I detach the keyboard, and make it like a desktop when Im working. It even replaces my primary desktop now. Though I never used win 8.1 to compare, I felt its as good if not better than win7.
I mostly bought my SP4 for artwork, so I evaluated both for a while before deciding.
The SP4 applications are just Windows apps, and most of them are a pretty lukewarm experience if used with a touchscreen exclusively.
Clip Studio Paint has an amazing touch screen interface, The zoom and rotation with fingers works great, and the Command Bar allows me to put the tools I do need within reach even when working full screen.
I use TouchKey to add three small extra buttons while I'm drawing: Tab, Enter, and Escape.
Happy to share my setup if people are interested.
I was prepared for my SP4 to be useful ONLY for drawing, but it's now become my main PC. I already have an 2010 i7 laptop with 8GB RAM and SSD, so I figured I didn't need a new portable machine, but my 4GB i5 Surface Pro is a better machine.
I wasn't sure whether the 4GB would be enough when I bought it, but I haven't ran into RAM problems at all. As for storage space, I bought a 128GB Micro SSD card which all my Steam games and some other files live on.
I really like my Surface Pro 4, especially how light it is, so I carry it in my bag every day.
Forsete
Member
Thats odd, no more issues here. It is very fast to wake up, but before this latest update it would refuse to wake up from sleep often. You would se the little red light (for the IR camera) come on but the screen was black.
I've had issues with resuming after sleep since the last update as well, mostly when docked, and sometimes when undocked, (no need to reboot when undocked, just press the power button twice and it usually wakes up correctly).
But new Windows 10 update from 1:st of March (cumulative update)
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/update-history-windows-10
Hopefully it fixes most hibernation/sleep issues.
Could do with the SSD in the Surface maybe? I'll test a file copy while docked (GBit network), will return with results soon.
Edit: fluctuates between 80 and 100MB/s copying a 5GB file over a Gbit network (wired connection). Our AP doesn't support fast networks and I'm a bit too far away from it anyway so only get max 78Mbit connection (fluctuates down to 39 alot), so can't really test Wi-fi copying.
sometimes i game
Member
If you're comparing to a ipad pro it comes down to if you want a device that is more tablet (ipad) or more desktop (surface). The verge had a great video on this.
I use the Microsoft suite of apps the most, from one note to office to mail, poki for pocket, iTunes, some Netflix and instapic, and a bunch of games like tomb raider go and halo Spartan assault.
Cortana is also becoming pretty valuable. "Hey Cortana, where are my packages" or "Hey Cortana what's the weather" is great. Siri never seems to be proactive and track packages or flights but Cortana does this really well.
Better UI and features for sure. Occasionally a hiccup but been updated enough to run pretty smoothly, recommend.
whats the best browser option these days? Any update to chrome to make it nice to use in fullscreen/touch mode? Or some way to sync chrome bookmarks/tabs into edge so I can use that for touchscreen and revert to chrome when used normally?
I wonder if MS could come out with an updated pen that has some of the benefits of the apple pencil - eg can use with lighter pressure, and can be used at an angle for shading etc.
I wonder if MS could come out with an updated pen that has some of the benefits of the apple pencil - eg can use with lighter pressure, and can be used at an angle for shading etc.
Alx
Member
I have a Surface Pro 2 and Surface Pro 3, upgraded both to Win10 and it went fine, but I downgraded the Pro 2 to 8.1 soon after. The one thing I disliked with Win10 is the tablet mode that isn't as good as the default settings of 8.1, especially for web browsing. Edge has interesting features, but lacks some nice controls of modern IE , like swiping to go back/forward, to display shortcuts,... Also 10 is never 100% fullscreen, you always have that task bar appearing even when you don't want it. Also small things like swiping to the right to check the time.
I'd say 10 is better all-around and especially in desktop mode, but 8.1 is better for pure tablet usage.
I ditched Chrome entirely and decided to go for Opera. Best decision I ever made, as Chrome was gobbling my resources all the time. As for touchscreen support, I haven't seen any windows browser with amazing touch support.
Got the Shakes
Member
I don't dock mine, but since the last update everything has been working the way I expected it to when I first purchased it. Sleep works properly, battery life is closer to what I expected (although still not quite where I'd like), and I haven't seen a single crash since the 2-17 update.
Forsete
Member
Thanks for checking. 80-100MB/s is about what I get on my stationary via GBit, so thats very good.
I noticed I get 50MB/s while writing on AC network, but only 30MB/s while reading (I only tested reading when I first made the post, since it is usually what I do as I want to space on the SSD). Odd.
Next time I'll log into the router and see what speed it reports the connection being.
Investigation continues, but I suspect poor drivers from Marvel or whatever they are called.
Joel Was Right
Member
How are people here finding the sleep/wake? I had issues with it, and looking at Reddit, others are too.
my SB has be fine since the last two updates. Before that it was hit and miss if it would wake up correctly after sleeping, and the battery would take a killing whilst a sleep.
Ever since I downloaded the Intel graphics beta drivers, I've have no major problems with the sleep functionality in terms of reliability. Only problem I have is that at times, the surface gets really hot when in sleep mode and uses a lot of the battery. It's uncommon though.
ThoseDeafMutes
Member
My sleep wake issues are gone now, but now I'm getting hardcore graphics glitches in firefox.
Still had problems with the February update, got the March 1st update today, so haven't really been able to test yet.
@Forsete: got my SP4 at home now with an AC network, so will test some more copying, first test at 300Mbit reported connection got only 14MB/s, will check with wireshark to see if there are a lot of dropped packets tomorrow and report back.
@Forsete: got my SP4 at home now with an AC network, so will test some more copying, first test at 300Mbit reported connection got only 14MB/s, will check with wireshark to see if there are a lot of dropped packets tomorrow and report back.
Me too. But it's only Firefox. Probably some bug in Firefox's GPU rendering path.
Elitist1945
Member
My touch screen stopped working. Any idea why?
Forsete
Member
No issues here.. well, if for example I have the Surface placed on a desk with the keyboard folded over the screen and drop the keyboard, the device doesnt wake up, I have to press the spacebar before it does. But I suspect that is standard operating procedure? Or am I wrong?
Great, please report back.
I haven't done the test are wrote about earlier (checking which bandwidth the router is reporting), but I will try and get them done tomorrow. /lazy
Today I have been occupied by kicking my old Qnap NAS back to life after 1 year sitting collecting dust.
Joel Was Right
Member
Everytime I think about an SP4, I ask myself: why would someone invest in an iPad Pro as an alternative? What does that device do better?
Kibbles
Member
Dunno lol I never understood why people consider the iPad Pro a competitor, SP4 is an entirely different class running on a full operating system.
Got the Shakes
Member
The iPad Pro is a better tablet, the SP4 is the all around better device because of how functional it is.
Joel Was Right
Member
The iPad is a tablet, but the Pro has been labelled - and priced - into an almost different category even though its only distinctive feature is how [impractically] large it is.
Anyone else had troubles with Windows Hello since March update? Not recognizing me some times, and when going through the steps to increase accuracy it recognizes me, then when it's making a new pass to increase accuracy, it fails with "an error occurred, restart Windows Hello and try again".
Not on any preview rings, just standard 1511 release with latest Windows Updates.
Not on any preview rings, just standard 1511 release with latest Windows Updates.
I have a 128GB micro SD card, it works great. I have all my Steam games on there.
Eesh, really? SD cards are rarely fast enough to work well with games. It's probably a huge bottleneck as it won't just affect how long it takes to load a game, but also affect your frame rate for any game constantly trying to stream from disk.
Haven't had any issues, but I'll bear that in mind.
Just tested with H2testw, runs at 76.4 MByte/s, seems plenty for games.
I tried that once, with a super fast SD card even (only 64gb) But it was unusable - Steam was hanging all the time and game starts were super slow.
Better try a real test with lot's of small files and get those read/write data then.
Yeah, maybe. I don't play many PC games so I'll stick with this solution for now
I don't mind a little extra loading time, and everything I've played so far has worked okay. My SP4 is mostly for artwork and games development, so I don't have space to spare for oversized Steam games.
Totally fine. Runs games nicely from my limited experience. I play a good number of 2D games on Itch.io too. Biggest problem is once in a while you'll get a 3D game that insists on running at native res full screen.
I don't think you can use it with Bluetooth without third party software. Works with many games out of the box if you use USB though, some games even change overlay to match the DS4 buttons.
- Status