5 ms·

Kinda tired debating the surface pro on HN, but you hit the nail on the head. This is a desktop computer that sacrifices very little, yet is the size of an iPad

by _wmd 13y ago

Kinda tired debating the surface pro on HN, but you hit the nail on the head. This is a desktop computer that sacrifices very little, yet is the size of an iPad with comparable usability. Anyone who voluntarily indoctrinated themselves on the merits of toy mobile operating systems will never understand how awesome the Pro-range surfaces are. Much like the HTC Dream was basically a first generation joke, I'm hopeful and very much intend to be carrying one of Surface's offspring in my backpack in a few years time.

tadfisher 13y ago
Hell, I'm interested in using one with Linux (if they've got the wacom issues sorted out, that is).
- wfraser 13y ago
  The only problem with using Linux is that there isn't (as far as I can tell) a good Linux UI that's very touch-friendly. The closest one is Unity, and well, that's all I need to say there. (I realize some people like it, but I'm just not one of them, sorry...) I'm excited to see what comes of the Ubuntu tablet distro, but at the same time, they were the ones who made Unity, which isn't really good at anything. So I'm not super optimistic either. Windows's "metro" UI is obviously touch friendly, but even the desktop can be made touch friendly-ish via its DPI scaling, which I think works pretty well. I haven't been able to get that same usability out of any Linux desktop environment yet. (If someone has, I'd love to know about it!)
  - vanderZwan 13y ago
    > The only problem with using Linux is that there isn't (as far as I can tell) a good Linux UI that's very touch-friendly. The closest one is Unity, and well, that's all I need to say there. (I realize some people like it, but I'm just not one of them, sorry...) I hope Jolla and Sailfish will help in that department.
  - peatmoss 13y ago
    Does this mean that the surface pro 2 is a good choice for those of us who don't mind Unity?
    - wfraser 13y ago
      Yeah, from a technical standpoint, it runs pretty well. There's still at least one hardware compat issue to be resolved (when I last tried Ubuntu Saucy beta, the wifi didn't work), but it was very performant, and looked nice.
      - peatmoss 13y ago
        That's good to know. No wifi would be a pretty big buzzkill though. I like the idea of replacing my Mac/iPad combo with a single device. It sounds like the high-DPI screen would be a reasonable replacement for my iPad (a.k.a. PDF journal reader) but I'm far too invested having a competent Unix-like environment on the computer side to live in Windows. Ubuntu's "convergence" tablet vision cannot come quickly enough.
  - ewzimm 13y ago
    KDE is further along than Unity but still needs a little development to be perfect: http://plasma-active.org/ http://plasma-active.org/
    - wfraser 13y ago
      Wow, thanks! I didn't know about that. I'll try it!
- calciphus 13y ago
  I run my dev servers in VMWare in Ubuntu on my Surface Pro. It's good enough, but more than a little fussy when it comes to touch (or the wacom issues), so I tend to just use it with the keyboard.

by _wmd 13y ago

tadfisher 13y ago

Hell, I'm interested in using one with Linux (if they've got the wacom issues sorted out, that is).

wfraser 13y ago
The only problem with using Linux is that there isn't (as far as I can tell) a good Linux UI that's very touch-friendly. The closest one is Unity, and well, that's all I need to say there. (I realize some people like it, but I'm just not one of them, sorry...) I'm excited to see what comes of the Ubuntu tablet distro, but at the same time, they were the ones who made Unity, which isn't really good at anything. So I'm not super optimistic either. Windows's "metro" UI is obviously touch friendly, but even the desktop can be made touch friendly-ish via its DPI scaling, which I think works pretty well. I haven't been able to get that same usability out of any Linux desktop environment yet. (If someone has, I'd love to know about it!)
- vanderZwan 13y ago
  > The only problem with using Linux is that there isn't (as far as I can tell) a good Linux UI that's very touch-friendly. The closest one is Unity, and well, that's all I need to say there. (I realize some people like it, but I'm just not one of them, sorry...) I hope Jolla and Sailfish will help in that department.
- peatmoss 13y ago
  Does this mean that the surface pro 2 is a good choice for those of us who don't mind Unity?
  - wfraser 13y ago
    Yeah, from a technical standpoint, it runs pretty well. There's still at least one hardware compat issue to be resolved (when I last tried Ubuntu Saucy beta, the wifi didn't work), but it was very performant, and looked nice.
    - peatmoss 13y ago
      That's good to know. No wifi would be a pretty big buzzkill though. I like the idea of replacing my Mac/iPad combo with a single device. It sounds like the high-DPI screen would be a reasonable replacement for my iPad (a.k.a. PDF journal reader) but I'm far too invested having a competent Unix-like environment on the computer side to live in Windows. Ubuntu's "convergence" tablet vision cannot come quickly enough.
- ewzimm 13y ago
  KDE is further along than Unity but still needs a little development to be perfect: http://plasma-active.org/ http://plasma-active.org/
  - wfraser 13y ago
    Wow, thanks! I didn't know about that. I'll try it!
calciphus 13y ago
I run my dev servers in VMWare in Ubuntu on my Surface Pro. It's good enough, but more than a little fussy when it comes to touch (or the wacom issues), so I tend to just use it with the keyboard.