25 ms·

"The diagonally-oriented camera is strange. In the one orientation it’s optimized for, it’s slightly annoying. In any other orientation, it’s almost intolerable

"The diagonally-oriented camera is strange. In the one orientation it’s optimized for, it’s slightly annoying. In any other orientation, it’s almost intolerable. " "The built-in front-facing camera for Skype is angled so that it’ll work great when the kickstand is open, but again, only for Danny DeVito, or maybe for people who want to show off their chests in Skype." ------ "The Touch Cover is one of the Surface’s biggest innovations. I thought I would hate it, but I didn’t. It’s not like typing on a completely flat surface: each “key” is raised slightly, so while there isn’t any mechanical feedback, it does feel a bit like a keyboard." "The Type Cover (the one with real keys) just works. I’ve got big hands that often struggle on undersized keyboards, but I can type very quickly on the Type Cover." ------ "He showed me Office, which was almost unusable: it was extremely sluggish, and touch targets were tiny and difficult to hit." "So quickly, in fact, that I can outrun Microsoft Word on the Surface. I get the feeling that the Surface RT’s CPU or Word code just can’t keep up with my typing. Here’s an example video:" ------- "The standard gestures don’t help, requiring many in-from-the-edge swipes that not only aren’t discoverable" "After waiting over a minute for the machine to boot and launch the mail app, I got a blank gradient screen. User interface 101: if the app needs to be set up on the first launch, offer to do that, please. Folks from Twitter suggested that I swipe out from the right side and click Accounts" -- So, can we conclude that these observations might be real (V. 1) problems without resorting to ad-homs regarding the author?

BrentOzar 14y ago
Hi. Brent here, the post author. Thanks for making the point. I had hoped that by recording videos of the problems, I wouldn't get attacked as just making off the cuff observations. Readers can see the problems for themselves. Still getting attacked by the fanbois, though, and that's a little disappointing.
- UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
  I don't think anything you do can reach that audience. The only thing that MIGHT alter their perception is trying it themselves and even then it takes a lot. But outside of that niche group I think your videos very well demonstrate the issues in a fairly indefensible way. The save issue in particular is the worst as you never treat people's files/work with that much disregard.
  - jseliger 14y ago
    Good point. If you post virtually anything online in front of an audience of any size, someone is going to vehemently or ignorantly disagree ("Puppies are cute;" "NO THEY'RE NOT"). I wrote about the problem here: http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2009/12/30/trolls-comments-and-slashdot-thoughts-on-the-response-to-avatar/ http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2009/12/30/trolls-comments-and... but have noticed it elsewhere, too, and the larger the size of the audience, the more likely it is to have some number of vocal and ignorant members.
- rlu 14y ago
  You're right. However, given that your problems other than the kick stand are rather odd bugs specific to you (haven't seen anyone else have the problems you had with Mail and saving in Word) would you not consider perhaps getting the device replaced over straight up returning it? As for Word being slow...I agree that is inexcusable. If I were you I probably would have tried getting the free update to the final version from Windows Update to see if the problem has been fixed. I dunno. I guess I'm looking at it from a glass half full perspective because I like mine and don't experience the problems you do.
  - chris_wot 14y ago
    I don't think those bugs would be fixed by replacing the device.
    - rlu 14y ago
      Well neither mine nor my friend's experience the problems that he was having.
- mistermann 14y ago
  Brent, could you comment on the performance of the browser, specifically, how it behaves when, from a fairly hefty page, clicking through to another fairly hefty page, and then clicking back to your original page. I read a lot of forums on my iPad 3, and oone thing that drives me up the wall is when clicking back, the 5 second pause for the original page to reload from the server (rather than cached memory) and jump you back down to where you were. This is one of the main annoyances that I was hoping would be better on the surface, so hopefully you can comment on it.
  - BrentOzar 14y ago
    Unfortunately, I already returned it. Your best bet is to get one of the folks who really love their Surfaces to record videos similar to mine. I've heard a lot of anecdotal stories about "It works fine on mine" but I haven't seen anyone post similar videos demoing that it works. I'd want to see it working myself if I was you - I wouldn't take anyone's word at this point.
- mmind 14y ago
  The issue is that your post is written with the idea of creating controversy (look at the title). Everybody is entitled to their own opinions, but IMHO one day is not enough to properly judge any piece of complex technology. I am writing this on my RT and I am very surprised with your post, specially when the word preview issues are easily fixed with a simple SW update that is coming soon, as Office is already RTM. A technologist would not ditch this beauty after a couple of hours playing with it, my $0.02.
  - BrentOzar 14y ago
    Mmind - hmm, no, I didn't write it to create controversy. All of my blog post titles start with why, what, how, etc, and I wanted to explain why I wasn't posting the original in-depth review that I'd promised my readers after I preordered the Surface RT. I actually walked away from the post without thinking twice. When you say "the word preview issues are easily fixed with a simple SW update that is coming soon, as Office is already RTM" - how do you know they're fixed in an update that's "coming soon"?
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
    - mmind 14y ago
      Hi Brent, I trust the Office team, and they have been very clear to call this a preview (it shows in the top of the document) so I expect some issues. I obviously can not know if your specific problem is already fixed in the RTM version (that released a couple weeks ago) but usually the Office team releases high quality products. I did not experience your CPU/word problem yet, you asked for a video, and I posted it here: http://youtu.be/104W1g94tIM http://youtu.be/104W1g94tIM As you can see, I enabled the new task manager, that is really cool and you can see how the Tegra 3 CPU (4 cores) does not even notice the typing, even with tons of spelling mistakes to force a worst case scenario. It is really a pity you did not have it a bit longer, I have an Ipad 1st gen, a galaxy tab 10.1 1st gen (yes, I had it even before I could install ICS, my lord) and now a 1st gen surface and man, this device is impressing me so far. When I connected my Galaxy nexus to it and it opened the windows explorer so I could use it to transfer my videos to You Tube I realized how huge is having Windows in a Tablet, it is not a PC but boy is powerful, full USB not only client, but server support.
- kbriankelley 14y ago
  I find this situation hilarious. Most of the time you get attacked for being a Microsoft evangelist since you're a Microsoft MVP for SQL Server as well as being an MCM for SQL Server 2008. Now you're being attacked for being a Microsoft hater. That's irony.
  - BrentOzar 14y ago
    Howdy sir! Yeah, making it through yesterday took a really thick skin. The Internet - gotta take the bad with the good.
nextstep 14y ago
Recently, HN is quick to yell "fanboy" at anything critical of a direct competitor to an Apple product. But from the multiple Surface reviews posted here over the past few days, it seems like the consensus (even among those that aren't labeled "fanboys") is that the surface has considerable drawbacks while costing more than an iPad.
- Mythbusters 14y ago
  >> while costing more than an iPad and where did you get that from?
  - alexdias 14y ago
    I would guess he's thinking of the 3rd gen iPad price, which was $479 if I recall correctly (for the 16GB version; the 32GB Surface has around 20GB of usable space).
- powertower 14y ago
  > But from the multiple Surface reviews posted here over the past few days You mean all those negative reviews that get upvoted to the front-page. Thats what happens here, the positive reviews usually get ignored, get flagged, or die quickly. Unless it's an Apple product. "Surface RT" is not "Surface for Windows 8 Pro". Windows RT is a stripped down version of Windows designed for lower power CPUs. It's also designed to be 100% Metro based. You can't install non-metro apps on it, you can't even buy Windows RT, it has to be pre-installed on each device. "Surface RT" is a touch-based device for holding in your hands while surfing the net and using the typical social apps. The use-case of an attached keyboard and the fully fledged Office app suite is not what this device is primarly for. What makes this even worse, is that the preview version of Office is not yet fully reliable, has not been ported to Metro, and opens up in Desktop-mode. There are still bugs to work out. While the guy gave a good review, it does not represent the typical use-case for Windows RT devices any more than the iPad would represent the use-case of a Desktop PC.
  - mitchty 14y ago
macspoofing 14y ago
I played around with the Surface for a few hours and I had almost the exact same experience as the author. I like the iPad but I also really wanted to like the Surface. I just can't.
mtgx 14y ago
The problem with Windows "apps" is that they are made inefficient and un-optimized by default, because they were targeted at much more powerful processors, and as processors became even more powerful, they didn't care about increasing the performance or at least keeping it at the previous level (and not slower). Developers never really cared about netbooks, and these devices, either with ARM processors or with Atom, are only at that level. So most Windows apps will struggle on these machines, while most apps on iOS or Android will be a lot faster on the same processors, because their low-end target was something like a 600 Mhz ARM11 CPU.
- Mythbusters 14y ago
  >> The problem with Windows "apps" is that they are made inefficient and un-optimized by default Very knowledgeable opinion sir. This is indeed true. Us as windows developers are required to add a sleep statement every few lines of code so as it not make it appear responsive.
  - CountSessine 14y ago
    Very knowledgeable opinion sir. This is indeed true. Us as windows developers are required to add a sleep statement every few lines of code so as it not make it appear responsive. A sleep() statement?! Novice! That won't even busy-wait! I like to loop around for a few thousand times writing nonsense to dummy variables. I earned those time slices - no way am I going to just give them back to the OS scheduler.
    - Moto7451 14y ago
      Haha, perhaps you've implemented this technique before: http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/The-Speedup-Loop.aspx http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/The-Speedup-Loop.aspx
  - pestaa 14y ago
    I'm sure that comment means that developers do not put much effort into optimizing their Windows apps, not that they make them resource-intensive on purpose. No need to twist his words around.
pooriaazimi 14y ago
People might miss it (you should really mention it on top of your post!), the first quotes are from Marco Arment (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4705299 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4705299), which was discussed earlier today (and flagged by many, too!) - people dismissed his critiques because he's obviously an Apple fan, but apparently at least part of his critiques were (maybe) correct.
- Anechoic 14y ago
  I was afraid that mentioning Marco's name directly would lead to my post getting buried without consideration, so I left it as an exercise for the reader. Looks like my worries were unfounded.
Splines 14y ago
> "So quickly, in fact, that I can outrun Microsoft Word on the Surface. I get the feeling that the Surface RT’s CPU or Word code just can’t keep up with my typing. Here’s an example video:" I'm on the Word team in Office and I'm coming into this thread incredibly late, but FWIW the slow typing on ARM was something we couldn't fully address in time for the preview release. Word RTM (ARM and x86/x64) has much better performance. One of the challenges we had was that for a large majority of the product cycle we didn't even know about the Surface. We were looking at ARM early on, but the hardware we had was prerelease hardware from MSFT partners that had varying levels of performance. Even now we don't know a whole lot about the Surface. It's a little frustrating, since we (Office) hit RTM we're eagerly awaiting the point at which new Surface RTs will have Office RTM baked into them. The preview release is seriously many many months old from the RTM release, and it's painful to think that this is what customers are going to see from Office when they turn on their shiny new device.
- cageface 14y ago
  Interesting. Thanks for the insider's insight. Is Microsoft really serious about challenging the iPad juggernaut with this kind of inattention to detail?
  - Splines 14y ago
    > Is Microsoft really serious about challenging the iPad juggernaut with this kind of inattention to detail? Not sure where you're going with this, but given the amount of effort and ambition around the Surface, I would say that Microsoft is absolutely serious. As for Word, there was a limited number of things we could do and fix in a finite amount of time. Trade-offs need to be made.
    - chris_wot 14y ago
      No offense here, and I realise that you probably aren't in management, but if you can't fix a problem with slow typing and you're on the Word team, then the release should have been put back. Seriously.
    - 14y ago
goggles99 14y ago
LOL there is so much bias from this "review" (if we can even call it that) It is oozing out of my speakers. The Drama in the reviewers voice is so unmistakable that it is almost sickening. Did he write a "B" script for this and rehearse too? I would not be surprised. Why would you return a device after 24 hours of owning it? Do you not expect any learning curve here? This is pretty much a Mac user attitude. Macs and IOS have very dumbed down interfaces. That works well for many people who want to check their email and surf the web without having to learn anything at all. The productivity that can be realized with a more complex (or one which requires more learning) interface can rarely be achieved following this mantra, but it is good for Grandma and aunt Hilda. The camera angle is off only if you put it way too close to yourself or are extraordinarily tall (the first clue of obvious sabotage and misinformation). I would have preferred a variable angled kickstand too, but then all I would hear is complaints about it not being strong enough. Your complaint about the word slowness WAS somewhat valid (has been fixed and updated now), but already knowing that this was a beta product before even buying the device - did you really not expect any problems with it? Your overly dramatic video is like pointing out that the sun is hot (beta software has bugs duh - thus the word beta). Anyway - how about updating to the final version that come out today (unless you already returned your tablet). Your complaint about After waiting over a minute for the machine to boot and launch the mail app is clearly grasping at anything to bash over the head of Microsoft. First off - how often do you reboot a tablet? For me it's about once every two months so this is a really minor issue. Secondly, you are counting the time it takes you to slowly hunt and pack your password (REALLY?) thirdly - It is clear that either you did a factory restore of the device. (WinRT apps are very slow to open the first time. Mail opens up in about half a second for me after the first launch and configuration) or you have a lemon. BTW I just timed myself and I can boot up (yes from a powered off state), log in - and open Mail in 38 seconds on MY Surface tab. It is funny to read the YouTube comments of your videos and read things like "I have never experienced that problem" and "Like trying to access Google Docs with a Hotmail account. People need to start using their brains or stop trying to bash unnecessarily when we know the true problem." and "Turn off smooth typing, stop using word beta, and use the tactile keyboard." and "I played with one of these at Microsoft store and it worked much better than yours, did you mess something up on it already?" The most embarrassing part FOR YOU must have been when you made such drama over repeatedly not being able to log into SkyDrive with your non valid third-party email address (PEBKAT LOL). There are several commenter on that video saying that they never had the problem. BTW neither have I (We just use the proper Account and it works - you should try it). Do you try to log into Google docs with your Yahoo account also? There are clearly a few quirks that Microsoft will no doubt be putting out updates for in the near future, but really all this drama is clearly manufactured. The mail and word issued have already been addressed and updates have been made available for them. If the best that your nitpicking and dramatic expression could do is point out mostly user errors and bugs that have now been fixed. I would take this "review" as a good reason to buy this device.

BrentOzar 14y ago

Hi. Brent here, the post author. Thanks for making the point. I had hoped that by recording videos of the problems, I wouldn't get attacked as just making off the cuff observations. Readers can see the problems for themselves. Still getting attacked by the fanbois, though, and that's a little disappointing.

UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
I don't think anything you do can reach that audience. The only thing that MIGHT alter their perception is trying it themselves and even then it takes a lot. But outside of that niche group I think your videos very well demonstrate the issues in a fairly indefensible way. The save issue in particular is the worst as you never treat people's files/work with that much disregard.
- jseliger 14y ago
  Good point. If you post virtually anything online in front of an audience of any size, someone is going to vehemently or ignorantly disagree ("Puppies are cute;" "NO THEY'RE NOT"). I wrote about the problem here: http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2009/12/30/trolls-comments-and-slashdot-thoughts-on-the-response-to-avatar/ http://jseliger.wordpress.com/2009/12/30/trolls-comments-and... but have noticed it elsewhere, too, and the larger the size of the audience, the more likely it is to have some number of vocal and ignorant members.
rlu 14y ago
You're right. However, given that your problems other than the kick stand are rather odd bugs specific to you (haven't seen anyone else have the problems you had with Mail and saving in Word) would you not consider perhaps getting the device replaced over straight up returning it? As for Word being slow...I agree that is inexcusable. If I were you I probably would have tried getting the free update to the final version from Windows Update to see if the problem has been fixed. I dunno. I guess I'm looking at it from a glass half full perspective because I like mine and don't experience the problems you do.
- chris_wot 14y ago
  I don't think those bugs would be fixed by replacing the device.
  - rlu 14y ago
    Well neither mine nor my friend's experience the problems that he was having.
mistermann 14y ago
Brent, could you comment on the performance of the browser, specifically, how it behaves when, from a fairly hefty page, clicking through to another fairly hefty page, and then clicking back to your original page. I read a lot of forums on my iPad 3, and oone thing that drives me up the wall is when clicking back, the 5 second pause for the original page to reload from the server (rather than cached memory) and jump you back down to where you were. This is one of the main annoyances that I was hoping would be better on the surface, so hopefully you can comment on it.
- BrentOzar 14y ago
  Unfortunately, I already returned it. Your best bet is to get one of the folks who really love their Surfaces to record videos similar to mine. I've heard a lot of anecdotal stories about "It works fine on mine" but I haven't seen anyone post similar videos demoing that it works. I'd want to see it working myself if I was you - I wouldn't take anyone's word at this point.
mmind 14y ago
The issue is that your post is written with the idea of creating controversy (look at the title). Everybody is entitled to their own opinions, but IMHO one day is not enough to properly judge any piece of complex technology. I am writing this on my RT and I am very surprised with your post, specially when the word preview issues are easily fixed with a simple SW update that is coming soon, as Office is already RTM. A technologist would not ditch this beauty after a couple of hours playing with it, my $0.02.
- BrentOzar 14y ago
  Mmind - hmm, no, I didn't write it to create controversy. All of my blog post titles start with why, what, how, etc, and I wanted to explain why I wasn't posting the original in-depth review that I'd promised my readers after I preordered the Surface RT. I actually walked away from the post without thinking twice. When you say "the word preview issues are easily fixed with a simple SW update that is coming soon, as Office is already RTM" - how do you know they're fixed in an update that's "coming soon"?
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - mmind 14y ago
    Hi Brent, I trust the Office team, and they have been very clear to call this a preview (it shows in the top of the document) so I expect some issues. I obviously can not know if your specific problem is already fixed in the RTM version (that released a couple weeks ago) but usually the Office team releases high quality products. I did not experience your CPU/word problem yet, you asked for a video, and I posted it here: http://youtu.be/104W1g94tIM http://youtu.be/104W1g94tIM As you can see, I enabled the new task manager, that is really cool and you can see how the Tegra 3 CPU (4 cores) does not even notice the typing, even with tons of spelling mistakes to force a worst case scenario. It is really a pity you did not have it a bit longer, I have an Ipad 1st gen, a galaxy tab 10.1 1st gen (yes, I had it even before I could install ICS, my lord) and now a 1st gen surface and man, this device is impressing me so far. When I connected my Galaxy nexus to it and it opened the windows explorer so I could use it to transfer my videos to You Tube I realized how huge is having Windows in a Tablet, it is not a PC but boy is powerful, full USB not only client, but server support.
kbriankelley 14y ago
I find this situation hilarious. Most of the time you get attacked for being a Microsoft evangelist since you're a Microsoft MVP for SQL Server as well as being an MCM for SQL Server 2008. Now you're being attacked for being a Microsoft hater. That's irony.
- BrentOzar 14y ago
  Howdy sir! Yeah, making it through yesterday took a really thick skin. The Internet - gotta take the bad with the good.

nextstep 14y ago

Recently, HN is quick to yell "fanboy" at anything critical of a direct competitor to an Apple product. But from the multiple Surface reviews posted here over the past few days, it seems like the consensus (even among those that aren't labeled "fanboys") is that the surface has considerable drawbacks while costing more than an iPad.

Mythbusters 14y ago
>> while costing more than an iPad and where did you get that from?
- alexdias 14y ago
  I would guess he's thinking of the 3rd gen iPad price, which was $479 if I recall correctly (for the 16GB version; the 32GB Surface has around 20GB of usable space).
powertower 14y ago
> But from the multiple Surface reviews posted here over the past few days You mean all those negative reviews that get upvoted to the front-page. Thats what happens here, the positive reviews usually get ignored, get flagged, or die quickly. Unless it's an Apple product. "Surface RT" is not "Surface for Windows 8 Pro". Windows RT is a stripped down version of Windows designed for lower power CPUs. It's also designed to be 100% Metro based. You can't install non-metro apps on it, you can't even buy Windows RT, it has to be pre-installed on each device. "Surface RT" is a touch-based device for holding in your hands while surfing the net and using the typical social apps. The use-case of an attached keyboard and the fully fledged Office app suite is not what this device is primarly for. What makes this even worse, is that the preview version of Office is not yet fully reliable, has not been ported to Metro, and opens up in Desktop-mode. There are still bugs to work out. While the guy gave a good review, it does not represent the typical use-case for Windows RT devices any more than the iPad would represent the use-case of a Desktop PC.
- mitchty 14y ago

macspoofing 14y ago

I played around with the Surface for a few hours and I had almost the exact same experience as the author. I like the iPad but I also really wanted to like the Surface. I just can't.

mtgx 14y ago

The problem with Windows "apps" is that they are made inefficient and un-optimized by default, because they were targeted at much more powerful processors, and as processors became even more powerful, they didn't care about increasing the performance or at least keeping it at the previous level (and not slower). Developers never really cared about netbooks, and these devices, either with ARM processors or with Atom, are only at that level. So most Windows apps will struggle on these machines, while most apps on iOS or Android will be a lot faster on the same processors, because their low-end target was something like a 600 Mhz ARM11 CPU.

Mythbusters 14y ago
>> The problem with Windows "apps" is that they are made inefficient and un-optimized by default Very knowledgeable opinion sir. This is indeed true. Us as windows developers are required to add a sleep statement every few lines of code so as it not make it appear responsive.
- CountSessine 14y ago
  Very knowledgeable opinion sir. This is indeed true. Us as windows developers are required to add a sleep statement every few lines of code so as it not make it appear responsive. A sleep() statement?! Novice! That won't even busy-wait! I like to loop around for a few thousand times writing nonsense to dummy variables. I earned those time slices - no way am I going to just give them back to the OS scheduler.
  - Moto7451 14y ago
    Haha, perhaps you've implemented this technique before: http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/The-Speedup-Loop.aspx http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/The-Speedup-Loop.aspx
- pestaa 14y ago
  I'm sure that comment means that developers do not put much effort into optimizing their Windows apps, not that they make them resource-intensive on purpose. No need to twist his words around.

pooriaazimi 14y ago

People might miss it (you should really mention it on top of your post!), the first quotes are from Marco Arment (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4705299 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4705299), which was discussed earlier today (and flagged by many, too!) - people dismissed his critiques because he's obviously an Apple fan, but apparently at least part of his critiques were (maybe) correct.

Anechoic 14y ago
I was afraid that mentioning Marco's name directly would lead to my post getting buried without consideration, so I left it as an exercise for the reader. Looks like my worries were unfounded.

Splines 14y ago

> "So quickly, in fact, that I can outrun Microsoft Word on the Surface. I get the feeling that the Surface RT’s CPU or Word code just can’t keep up with my typing. Here’s an example video:" I'm on the Word team in Office and I'm coming into this thread incredibly late, but FWIW the slow typing on ARM was something we couldn't fully address in time for the preview release. Word RTM (ARM and x86/x64) has much better performance. One of the challenges we had was that for a large majority of the product cycle we didn't even know about the Surface. We were looking at ARM early on, but the hardware we had was prerelease hardware from MSFT partners that had varying levels of performance. Even now we don't know a whole lot about the Surface. It's a little frustrating, since we (Office) hit RTM we're eagerly awaiting the point at which new Surface RTs will have Office RTM baked into them. The preview release is seriously many many months old from the RTM release, and it's painful to think that this is what customers are going to see from Office when they turn on their shiny new device.

cageface 14y ago
Interesting. Thanks for the insider's insight. Is Microsoft really serious about challenging the iPad juggernaut with this kind of inattention to detail?
- Splines 14y ago
  > Is Microsoft really serious about challenging the iPad juggernaut with this kind of inattention to detail? Not sure where you're going with this, but given the amount of effort and ambition around the Surface, I would say that Microsoft is absolutely serious. As for Word, there was a limited number of things we could do and fix in a finite amount of time. Trade-offs need to be made.
  - chris_wot 14y ago
    No offense here, and I realise that you probably aren't in management, but if you can't fix a problem with slow typing and you're on the Word team, then the release should have been put back. Seriously.
  - 14y ago

goggles99 14y ago

LOL there is so much bias from this "review" (if we can even call it that) It is oozing out of my speakers. The Drama in the reviewers voice is so unmistakable that it is almost sickening. Did he write a "B" script for this and rehearse too? I would not be surprised. Why would you return a device after 24 hours of owning it? Do you not expect any learning curve here? This is pretty much a Mac user attitude. Macs and IOS have very dumbed down interfaces. That works well for many people who want to check their email and surf the web without having to learn anything at all. The productivity that can be realized with a more complex (or one which requires more learning) interface can rarely be achieved following this mantra, but it is good for Grandma and aunt Hilda. The camera angle is off only if you put it way too close to yourself or are extraordinarily tall (the first clue of obvious sabotage and misinformation). I would have preferred a variable angled kickstand too, but then all I would hear is complaints about it not being strong enough. Your complaint about the word slowness WAS somewhat valid (has been fixed and updated now), but already knowing that this was a beta product before even buying the device - did you really not expect any problems with it? Your overly dramatic video is like pointing out that the sun is hot (beta software has bugs duh - thus the word beta). Anyway - how about updating to the final version that come out today (unless you already returned your tablet). Your complaint about After waiting over a minute for the machine to boot and launch the mail app is clearly grasping at anything to bash over the head of Microsoft. First off - how often do you reboot a tablet? For me it's about once every two months so this is a really minor issue. Secondly, you are counting the time it takes you to slowly hunt and pack your password (REALLY?) thirdly - It is clear that either you did a factory restore of the device. (WinRT apps are very slow to open the first time. Mail opens up in about half a second for me after the first launch and configuration) or you have a lemon. BTW I just timed myself and I can boot up (yes from a powered off state), log in - and open Mail in 38 seconds on MY Surface tab. It is funny to read the YouTube comments of your videos and read things like "I have never experienced that problem" and "Like trying to access Google Docs with a Hotmail account. People need to start using their brains or stop trying to bash unnecessarily when we know the true problem." and "Turn off smooth typing, stop using word beta, and use the tactile keyboard." and "I played with one of these at Microsoft store and it worked much better than yours, did you mess something up on it already?" The most embarrassing part FOR YOU must have been when you made such drama over repeatedly not being able to log into SkyDrive with your non valid third-party email address (PEBKAT LOL). There are several commenter on that video saying that they never had the problem. BTW neither have I (We just use the proper Account and it works - you should try it). Do you try to log into Google docs with your Yahoo account also? There are clearly a few quirks that Microsoft will no doubt be putting out updates for in the near future, but really all this drama is clearly manufactured. The mail and word issued have already been addressed and updates have been made available for them. If the best that your nitpicking and dramatic expression could do is point out mostly user errors and bugs that have now been fixed. I would take this "review" as a good reason to buy this device.