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I used the original Surface Book (13in) as a college student for a year, and I think you are spot-on. For me, as a student, it was a beautiful device. For that
by filoleg 7y ago
I used the original Surface Book (13in) as a college student for a year, and I think you are spot-on.
For me, as a student, it was a beautiful device. For that academic year, my notes were more impeccable and organized than I could have ever imagined my notes to be. OneNote is a pleasure to work with. Writing on Surface Book feels great. Downloading lecture pdfs/powerpoints and highlighting/annotating stuff on top of them was very useful. The machine ran fast enough for me to actually write code and use it as a normal machine too, with no limitations. As a daily driver, it was great.
But all the cons you listed were true as well. My current daily driver is a newer MBP, but I still eye Surface line all the time, hoping that one day it will get to the point where I would want to pick it up again as my daily driver.
- sylens 7y agoI think it will take a hardware redesign at this point, which I hope comes with USB4 that allows them to break dock compatibility as well. The 15 inch version doesn't need to detach. Just let it flip around like a ThinkPad X1 Yoga, therefore allowing you to put all of the compute stuff in the base as well. Go for 8 cores and give me the best mobile video card on the market and I'll buy one so fast.
- filoleg 7y agoGreat point about flipping around vs. detaching. During my year with a surface book, at no point I just detached the tablet and used it on its own. When I wanted a "tablet" mode, I would usually disconnect the tablet, turn it around, attach it, and then close. Which essentially flips it around and puts in the same position as X1 Yoga.