20 ms·

Microsoft announces the Surface Pro 3

275 points by sz4kerto 12y ago

JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
Looks awesome. I always say I won't buy a tablet until it is as useful as my laptop - this is a great step in that direction with the multi position stand, 12" screen, core i7, thin and light...Will I actually enter the tablet world?
jlockfre 12y ago
It's nice but it must suck when faced by the behemoth that is the iPad.
- watty 12y ago
  The differentiator is the OS. One of them is for play, the other is for productivity. Comparing full Windows 8.1 to iOS is Apples to Oranges.
  - integraton 12y ago
    Keep telling yourself that. Meanwhile, back here in reality, iOS dominates the enterprise: http://media.www1.good.com/documents/rpt-mobility-index-q413.pdf http://media.www1.good.com/documents/rpt-mobility-index-q413...
    - integraton 12y ago
      Hacker News 2014: where empty, baseless Microsoft marketing regurgitation gets upvotes and actual statistics get downvotes. Keep making enemies, Microsoft. That'll be a very effective strategy.
      - nivla 12y ago
        OR maybe Hacker News 2014: where people grew up to look past their fanboism and review a product for what it is.
        integraton 12y ago
        Not among the microsoft fanboys, clearly, which is the entirely point. But, you know, why don't you go ahead and regurgitate a Microsoft market phrase since that apparently trumps actual facts. Note that I'm the only person who actually cited a real source with hard numbers in this discussion, and I've been the most downvoted. Go figure. I suppose we've already established that actual facts are irrelevant to you people.
        nivla 12y ago
        How many MS fanboys do you think there are on HN? If there were any considerable, this MS pro post like any other wouldn't get flagged off from the frontpage in less than 8 hours. >why don't you go ahead and regurgitate a Microsoft market phrase since that apparently trumps actual facts. What facts are your referring to? That iOS dominates the enterprise world? It may but its rarely work related, my gf and her colleagues got awarded an iPad from work (she is not a techie), the most she does is email some documents and maybe make minor excel modifications. Its shouldn't take a genius to figure out that the current versions of tablets are anything but a productivity tool. I am not going to say Surface dominates the enterprise market but more realistically no tablet dominates it yet. However on a wild guess, I believe a hybrid version of any OS on a tablet would be the future.
        deleted 12y ago
        [deleted]
        integraton 12y ago
        > It may but its rarely work related What data do you have to support this obviously unfounded statement? Let's see: > my gf and her colleagues ...
        nivla 12y ago
        umm its a statement based on my observation and not a fact... I can only make an assumption on what goes around me. If you want to believe that iPad is the tablet that replaces the enterprise workload and would replace the desktops in the corporate world, then by all means be my guest to that illusion. However don't go around expecting everyone to buy into it. I think you want to live within that "fact" so its a pointless to make an argument.
    - watty 12y ago
      iOS is great for certain tasks but comparing it to OSX or Windows for productivity is silly. I have 3 iOS devices in my household, we love them. None of us use it for work though, they're leisure devices. No one at my company uses iOS for work, they use Windows and OSX. Also, your link is showing smart phones and tablets used at work, which certainly favor iOS. What does this have to do with the Microsoft Surface?
      - integraton 12y ago
        I agree, what does anything have to do with the Microsoft Surface? As I can tell, it has virtually no traction for "work," which makes it entirely irrelevant outside of the flood of fanboys in announcement discussions on the internet.
sz4kerto 12y ago
3:2 screen ratio is a killer feature. The size (800g, 9.1 mm) is quite unbelievable as well.
- higherpurpose 12y ago
  Except there's not much point to a 12" portrait tablet. How often do you think you'd be using such a tablet in portrait mode?
  - grayclhn 12y ago
    I use my ipad in portrait mode for reading pdfs and because it's easier to hold; I don't think that changing the aspect ratio would make much of a difference for either of those tasks, but it would make typing in landscape mode much better
  - rayiner 12y ago
    12" portrait is the right size for working with Word documents and PDFs.
    - dragonwriter 12y ago
      Well, 14" would be better for letter-sized documents, but 12" is tolerably close to right.
      - sliverstorm 12y ago
        Do you print your letters on US Legal or something like that?
        dragonwriter 12y ago
        > Do you print your letters on US Legal or something like that? No, "letter size" was a reference to US Letter, which is 8.5"x11", which has a 13.9" diagonal, so a 14" screen would be about right (a little small for a 100% display if it is 3:2, because US Letter has a 1.29:1 aspect ratio rather than 1.5:1.) US Legal is 8.5"x14" which is closer to 3:2 (1.65:1) but also 16.4" diagonal.
rbanffy 12y ago
Looks good, but I was expecting a screen with the same specs as Google's Chromebook Pixel. I understand that, beyond a certain point, pixel density ceases to be relevant, but the different numbers mean this is a different part. Now, I wonder how good would Linux support be. Also, weighting a keyboardless tablet with a MacBook air is disingenuous at best.
- JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
  They put the typecover on - stills weigh less.
  - yulaow 12y ago
    Image link that prove it: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BoF3_u-IgAE2WBh.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BoF3_u-IgAE2WBh.jpg
    - TillE 12y ago
      After seeing that photo, "this other device with a significantly larger screen weighs more" isn't so impressive.
      - JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
        No, not at all. I stated elsewhere: The point of the comparison isn't to compare the two products against each other, but rather to suggest that the Surface is more power/technology for less weight as a portable device.
      - sp332 12y ago
        Macbook Airs have 11.6" or 13.3" screens. So it's about 1 inch difference in either direction.
        rayiner 12y ago
        You mean 0.4 versus 1.3?
josefresco 12y ago
Microsoft needs to keep at it. While this iteration is great, the platform will not flourish if they falter or take a release cycle off. Consistent upgrades to the Surface hardware, and support of the developer community is key to winning the overall tablet war for MS.
- astrodust 12y ago
  While it's great to see Microsoft innovating like this and pushing their product aggressively forward, it must really chafe with their OEM community. Why would you buy some clunky classic notebook when you can get a Surface 3 for virtually the same price? It's basically impossible for OEMs to compete when Microsoft can include Windows for free and they have to pay a premium to bundle it.
  - mikerg87 12y ago
    I really haven't seen the surface pro compete on price. Similar Lenovo offerings for 256GB and 512GB SSD ultra books have similar pricing. I honestly think MS shopped around the concept of surface to OEMS and I think the OEMs said "Pass. No Thanks. we'll stick with our incremental and existing form factors". I think MS was forced into a corner and concluded they needed to go it on their own.
    - JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
      Kind of like how Razer built their own laptop - the OEMs have stagnated and their hardware isn't competing on an innovation front.
  - josefresco 12y ago
    This new surface starts at $799 which puts it clearly in thee mid-range notebook market where there are plenty of compelling alternative laptops, many of which sport clearly superior hardware. Bump it up to an i5 or i7 and I'm sure the price will be north of $1K. The premium paid here is the form factor and it's related features so the comparison to traditional laptops isn't valid (even if MS is making it). Maybe if you're cross shopping svelte, premium laptops the Surface 3 would be an option, but not for someone looking for a $400 i3 Windows laptop.
agscala 12y ago
This sure is a bummer for people who recently bought a Surface Pro 2 (like me). It's unreal that a 6-month old $1200 machine already is outdated
- DanAndersen 12y ago
  The thing to remember is that you don't have to have the latest greatest thing. In worlds where a Surface Pro 3 was coming out now, and worlds where that wasn't happening, your Surface Pro 2 would still be able to do the same things. The presence of something newer doesn't need to diminish your existing possessions.
- maguirre 12y ago
  I wanted to buy a Surface Pro 2 but the model I wanted has been out of stock at the Microsoft Store for a few weeks now.
  - steele 12y ago
    You may be in luck then as early adopters dump their 256Gb models on craigslist and ebay.
- rickyc091 12y ago
  Yeah, looks like Surface follows a 8-9 month cycle. I bought SP2 right when it came out and then they bumped the processor by a little a month later.
- sliverstorm 12y ago
  It isn't all that outdated, and it isn't anything we haven't already run into with phones. The latest $600-800 iPhone is routinely outdated every, what, 18 months? I do feel your pain a little though, I bought a Moto G just before they added the SD card slot & 4G. You've just got to come to terms with the fact that device lifetime is longer than the product cycle.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  Its really not unreal -- there's new computer hardware coming out all the time. Its been true for decades that hardware you buy today isn't going to be top of the line in 6 months. But what's going to be available in six months doesn't do you any good today, either.
tompagenet2 12y ago
Really impressed by this, especially the 3:2 ratio screen which will be great for writing and for browsing, and amazing for photos. The pen looks great. I've recently been given an iPad by work as part of a trial. It's great for quick e-mails, but really seems hard for me to get 'proper' work done. This might be the thing - shame I have to pay for it.
- thrownaway2424 12y ago
  It's really irritating that Lenovo won't source these for the X-series laptops.
skrebbel 12y ago
Just when I was "boohoo"-ing over Sony Vaios entirely leaving (WORLD & ~JAPAN), MS does this. Awesome. I would probably buy one if I didn't just buy a new laptop 2 months ago. The slightly bigger screen also makes this a worthy competitor to "real" laptops (as in, 13" and up) - a first for the Surface IMO.
ssdfsdf 12y ago
Why are they still trying to turn a tablet into a desktop? They are different things, with different purposes - not everything needs to be the same thing. Tablet All The Things!!
- pedalpete 12y ago
  Try looking at it another way. I have my laptop plugged into my monitor 90% of the time, and I use it with a keyboard and mouse attached. So, I rarely touch the hardware. When I do, use my laptop, I'm using it for the same type of things I would use a tablet for 70% of the time. Rarely am I actually doing any coding on it, but when I need to, I need to. Therefore, I can add a 3rd device, a tablet, into the mix, but why bother? One well built device now handles 100% of my use cases. I suspect many people don't use the surface as a tablet most of the time, but when you want to, it's nice to have that capability.
pling 12y ago
I still can't get my head round paying for one of these at £1000+ when it's effectively disposable if anything goes wrong. I bought a used i7 Lenovo T410 a couple of weeks back for £150. Totally serviceable and the battery it came with lasts 6 hours. This will be my workstation for a couple of years, plus if its like my T400 it lives in the back of the sofa and takes a beating every day. I'd kill a surface in about two days.
- watty 12y ago
  You bought a used laptop which is slower, no touch screen, digitizer, pen, Windows 8, SSD, etc. That's like comparing an old Blackberry to the iPhone 5. There's really no reason to try and compare them.
  - pling 12y ago
    I don't use a touch screen or a pen. It's fully supported on windows 8 and I stuck my Samsung 840 Pro in it. It does however have a decent keyboard, a trackpoint, 3G card, a service reputation and a bomb proof chassis. All of which reduce the ownership risk and make my day slightly better.
    - tok 12y ago
      plus 150 quid... That's about 100 dollars cheaper than what I can find in the states with those specs. Additionally if a part fails, MUCH easier to fix. Comparing apples to oranges as both devices serve a moderately different purpose. Mainly body position while using them (Laying flat and using my finger directly on the screen to read books and watch movies or sitting up and using my finger on the keyboard to read books and watch movies).
    - slantyyz 12y ago
      >> I don't use a touch screen or a pen. Simply put, the Surface Pro isn't designed for people with your use case. And more likely than not, your laptop isn't useful for the people MS had in mind for the Surface Pro.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
bane 12y ago
I'm starting to see more and more Surface devices in my area. It seems to be getting popular with the Starbuck's salesguy crowd who need something as compact as a tablet, but they can use real applications on. I know that's kind of cliche, but you don't really "get" that meaning until you walk into a coffee shop and see 2 or 3 people sitting around with tablets sticking up on the tables. The Android and iPad guys are usually surfing the web while the Surface guy is editing a spreadsheet or doing something in Powerpoint. Actually a great network effect is getting a presentation of some business proposal off of a Surface. Everybody who see the presentation usually asks what kind of Android tablet it is, and it suddenly turns every real-estate sales guy in the area into an impromptu Microsoft sales guy, extolling the virtues of the device and OS. They're still too pricey by my estimation. You should be able to get one of these (maybe a low-ebd 32GB model) with keyboard for $799. I don't get why the keyboard/cover is an optional buy.
- IBM 12y ago
  They've kind of killed this whole angle of "Surface is for getting work done" after they hedged by releasing Office on iPad.
  - mkr-hn 12y ago
    There's a long list of tasks not covered by Office that you still can't do all that well on an iPad or Android device.
    - sorahn 12y ago
      And the surface is better?
      - mkr-hn 12y ago
        It runs almost everything you need in a 3D, music, photography, writing, or digital art workflow.
      - pjmlp 12y ago
        Yes, because you can switch to a full desktop mode without being constrained to a jailed mode as in iOS and Android. For example, you cannot do programming on the go, without being connected to a server that handles your development tasks.
crayola 12y ago
$799. Impressive. I think this is a big moment for Microsoft.
- Osiris 12y ago
  Impressive, as in cheap or expensive? It depends on your perspective.
  - crayola 12y ago
    I meant cheap for what it is (or seems to be).
    - Nerdfest 12y ago
      Strange, I think it's the opposite. That's a lot of money for an i3 with little memory. It's cheap next to a MacBook Air perhaps, but still quite expensive.
      - joshstrange 12y ago
        MacBook Air base model ($900): * 1.4GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor * Turbo Boost up to 2.7GHz * Intel HD Graphics 5000 * 4GB memory * 128GB PCIe-based flash storage The base Surface is cheaper than the Air but the second tier Surface (The one with more or less parity) is $100 more than the Air.
        slantyyz 12y ago
        Don't forget that with the Surface, you're also paying a premium for the touchscreen and digitizer with pen, which is not available on an MBA. Edit-- removed the word "Wacom", turned out to be a false assumption.
        kayoone 12y ago
        however for $100 more you get a High DPI touchscreen and a digital pen but the GPU (HD4400) is a bit slower.
rubiquity 12y ago
> When you write notes using OneNote you can then click the top of the stylus again, just like an ordinary pen, and it will sync those notes up to the cloud instantly so they're available elsewhere. Elsewhere -- as in the laptop you will inevitably go crawling back to when it's time to get real work done. It's always humorous when an article about a device that is supposed to kill the laptop ends on a note like that.
- Deinos 12y ago
  Yeah, he could not have possibly meant your phone, work issued pc/laptop, etc...
  - rubiquity 12y ago
    Why differentiate between a personally owned and work issued desktop/laptop?
    - dragonwriter 12y ago
      Because on of them I'm making the purchase decision for and one of them someone else is. So if I work at a place that isn't BYOD friendly, and have to do certain things on my work-issued desktop, its very good if I can easily access the notes from my personal tablet convertible that I'd prefer to take to meetings when I am using that desktop.
- teamonkey 12y ago
  I use my Surface to take notes in meetings. The notes are transparently synced to my main desktop machine, ready to be broken into tasks or emailed out. If I've taken notes with the pen, the desktop version is able to convert them into text. It's a workflow that is working out well for me.
archagon 12y ago
I wonder what the battery life and graphics performance are like? If they're decent (6+ hours of moderate use, plays CS:GO at 60fps), this will be a really great machine. The latest i7s tend to have pretty good integrated graphics, so I think at least that won't be an issue.
- sz4kerto 12y ago
  They claim that it's +20% compared to SP2, and SP2 achieved 8:51 on the Verge's battery test.
- kayoone 12y ago
  Looks like HD4400 which is not great, but should run older games on 720p pretty good.
  - archagon 12y ago
    Ah, that's too bad. I was hoping for Iris graphics. (CS:GO at 60 might still be doable, though.)
yulaow 12y ago
Did I miss that or they said nothing about the battery duration? For me that's a very important information. For the rest is a really great piece of hw edit: Yep I missed: "Over ~20% more battery life than any product Surface has shipped before" and: " battery life is up to 9 hours on the Surface Pro 3."
- msh 12y ago
  The anandtech live blog says it's 20% better than surface pro 2.
  - tdicola 12y ago
    What version are they testing though, the Core i3? What is the Core i7 battery life I wonder...
    - MikusR 12y ago
      Idle power consumption of Cores is about the same.
      - tdicola 12y ago
        I really hope a real world battery test isn't just checking stuff at idle.
- gcb0 12y ago
  ...and how hot it gets! "The first surface that can't boil your eggs" would be a slogan that make me buy one.
tdicola 12y ago
Really akward that they made a point of saying the device is 'fanless' when it clearly has a fan and vents around the side. Sure it might be a very nice and quiet fan, but it sounds disingenuous to be saying there isn't one.
- vxNsr 12y ago
  Yeah I watched the event and I didn't understand that part, he first called it fanless and then waxed poetic about how nice and hidden the vent is and how thin the fan is. Maybe marketing told him that it was okay?
higherpurpose 12y ago
Figured that Tom Warren would write the most hyped-up sensationalist Microsoft PR-fed headline for this.
bcoates 12y ago
I was holding out for this announcement to upgrade my Surface Pro, which I've been happily using as a main work PC for more than a year now. I'm not big on the size/aspect ratio change--I don't carry a bag around, and the current surface is about as large as I'd want to handle. A bigger, presumably floppier keyboard isn't too enticing either. 3:2 makes the portrait mode go from silly to potentially useable, except for the part where almost no Windows programs are actually usable in portrait mode, and of course the keyboard requires landscape mode anyway. With no interesting spec upgrades over the Pro 2 (I was hoping for LTE, or more ports) I think I'll get one of those instead.
- nlawalker 12y ago
  3:2 is the feature that makes me actually want one of these now. I find that 16:9 on a screen the size of the Surface's is okay for watching video and not much else. I have the original "RT" Surface and my biggest complaint, even over the awful performance, is the aspect ratio. It's not comfortable to hold in your hands in either orientation and it isn't helpful for most productivity-related stuff. Portrait orientation is important to me, but there are very few applications that I actually use in it, the top one being a browser. With a keyboard attached in landscape, the extra screen area will be extremely welcome.
mikerg87 12y ago
Small things continue to kill the surface pro acceptance: - The Surface site on the surface site hasn't updated with surface pro 3 info/pricing. The run way for this is long, why isn't the site updated or ready to go? - Accessories are notoriously out of stock. Why are they hard to get? Docking station, keyboards, mice. Fix that. - The dock has 10/100 Ethernet. In 2013-2014? Why? - Updates for firmware and drivers assume enterprise infrastructure. Without the infrastructure you need a manual upgrade using command line tools. The updates don't come through the normal windows update channel. You have to discover them on your own. - The track pad on the type/touch cover is flaky . Its forever getting stuck in a fixed place and stuck on gestures you cant turn off or control. You end up having to disconnect the cover and reconnect. this is stupid for an elite/pro device. Despite the gripes these devices continue to show promise and I see them more and more around airports and coffee shops.
- rdfi 12y ago
  When the cursor gets stuck, just press one of the arrow keys to unstuck it (works for my Surface Pro Gen 1 with the type cover).
- mrbill 12y ago
  I've got a Surface Pro 1 (with Type Cover 2), and have never had problems getting firmware and driver updates from Microsoft Update. Have no idea what you're talking about regarding "manual upgrade" with CLI tools.
  - mikerg87 12y ago
    I was talking about these driver/update packs for Surface Pro 2: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=38826 http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=3882.... I've never seen these updates come through standard Windows Update for the Surface Pro 2.
    - teamonkey 12y ago
      "This firmware and driver package contains drivers for all of the components in the Surface Pro device, as well as updates to the system firmware that have been released via Windows Update."
ggreer 12y ago
That's a really nice piece of hardware. I've used MacBook Airs since 2010, but the Surface 3 looks to be strictly dominating in the hardware department. Unfortunately, I don't think Microsoft will convert many OS X devs unless they make some changes to their software. One of the advantages of OS X is that it's a Unix, and lots of Unix software runs on it. It's not hard to compile tools such as nmap, Vim, or steam locomotive. It would be very interesting if Microsoft made Windows a Unix. They could bundle bash or zsh, add the typical BSD tools, and (most importantly) build a cc front-end for the Visual Studio compiler. They'd also have to ship a libc of their own. To save effort, they could base it on BSD's libc. It'd be like Cygwin, but installed by default and officially supported and maintained. With such a set-up, you'd be able to run your unix tools alongside Adobe CS and Outlook. You wouldn't have to worry about driver support, since Microsoft made the hardware and the OS (just like Apple). The only thing missing would be the ability to dual-boot OS X (to test on Safari or other OS X stuff).
- paperwork 12y ago
  I'm rooting for MS. My (not so serious) test for windows is simple: the day I can resize dos command prompt as easily as terminal windows on linux/osx is the day Microsoft I need to seriously consider going back to windows :)
  - pjmlp 12y ago
    Properties -> Settings -> Layout -> change res -> Save. I never understood why some people make such a big fuss out of it.
    - rschmitty 12y ago
      Because that is a huge fuss to do what practically every other app can easily do by dragging the border, including other windows apps. Sometimes you need to change your prompt to be a different size and an annoying 5 step thing is a big fuss
      - deleted 12y ago
aw3c2 12y ago
Anyone wanna sponsor a broke but aspiring student (me!) with one? :)
ldd- 12y ago
As a proud Gen 1 Surface Pro owner, this looks spectacular. My Surface replaced my laptop, and while I definitely had my issues with the transition (trackpad sucks so often use external mouse, aspect ratio is inconvenient for Office, display angle is limiting, and no built-in LTE), I've ultimately come to enjoy using it. I've almost always got it with me, and I've found I've become nearly as productive on it as I was with my laptop. I've been willing to make the "nearly" tradeoff since I have it on me more often, so more opportunity to be productive, and I do use it as a tablet in ways that I obviously couldn't with my laptop. The updates in the Gen 3 address nearly all of my gripes (why can't they integrate LTE??). I'm not sure if I'll pick up a 3, but only because my Gen 1 is less than 2 years old and still under warranty. If not a Gen 3, then a Gen 4 will definitely be on my shopping list. I can't imagine I'll go back to a normal laptop. I guess I'm exactly who they are targeting.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > The updates in the Gen 3 address nearly all of my gripes (why can't they integrate LTE??). I suspect that enough of the people who want LTE have shareable (wirelessly or with wires) LTE modem with them at all times as to make the added cost of integrated LTE not a particularly effective selling point for the added cost (and very much not attractive for the base model, so it would necessitate added SKUs, as well.)
  - ldd- 12y ago
    Oh indubitably! It was really more of a rhetorical question, but it is my biggest lingering gripe and wish the segmentations would work in my favor to make it a viable/valuable option for them. It's just frustrating to see that the Surface 2 (not pro) has integrated LTE as an option, but it's not available for the Pro line.
- codeulike 12y ago
  Yeah I have a Surface Pro 1 and I now use it for everything - development, taking notes, writing apps, playing minecraft, scribbling on PDFs. The direction they're taking the Pro 3 seems to be a good clear message at last 'the tablet that can replace your laptop' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E The bigger screen is a good move I think. I've started using the ArcTouch mouse with my surface when I'm out and about, rather than the touchpad on the cover. Works pretty nicely and folds flat. But then I've always preferred a proper mouse to a touchpad.
pjmlp 12y ago
The ability to use Visual Studio on the go, while keeping the capabilities of a tablet is quite nice. It sure is on my list, in case I need a laptop replacement.
bch 12y ago
If this has good support from *BSD (or perhaps, Linux) -- this sounds like it might be the device that'd tip me from laptop to tablet user as a primary machine.
bratsche 12y ago
One thing that Microsoft could learn from Apple is to have their online store ready immediately. Sure, you can't always buy Apple stuff immediately when it's announced (see Mac Pro), but you can always go onto the online store and 'window shop'.
err4nt 12y ago
> According to Microsoft’s Panos Panay, “This is the tablet that can replace your tablet.” Does that man have his doctorate in Tautology, or a PhD in saying the same things twice?
- seunosewa 12y ago
  The second "tablet" in that sentence really means "iPad".
- sp332 12y ago
  This tablet will replace your tablet (probably an iPad).
MikusR 12y ago
And there goes Samsung Note Pro 12.2. The Surface Pro 3 cost's the same, is only 1mm thicker and 50g heavier. And runs full Office and Photoshop.
nmolo 12y ago
The only downside to this is the HD 4400 graphics unit. [1] I'm worried about it running everything smoothly at 2k. The HD 5000 is much better suited to run at that resolution. [1] http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/download/presskits/surface/docs/Surface3ProFS.docx http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/download/presskits/surfa...
- nmolo 12y ago
  After talking to people in the know, the reason they didn't upgrade to the Haswell with HD 5000 is they didn't want the increase in power related to having the extra graphics units.
- tkmcc 12y ago
  My Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus has a HD 4400 graphics unit and runs fine at 3200 x 1800, so you shouldn't have to worry unless you're doing something pretty graphically intensive.
  - Encosia 12y ago
    Same here. I run graphical software like Office and Photoshop on my 3200x1800 ATIV Book 9 Plus and haven't noticed any performance issues.
iandanforth 12y ago
Warning, rant. Why the duck isn't there information on the Surface Pro 3 on the MS website? Apple has done this so well, for so long, I am pissed-off MS can't get its act together. You make an announcement, you need presence on the web. You need to start your customers expectations building, whet their appetite, and tease them. Their experience starts now and right now that experience is reading news articles and reading a press release. Pathetic. Where is the video of the announcement? Where are the beautiful images and specs. Where are the carefully and lovingly crafted pages that sell this hardware to me? Tomorrow isn't good enough. Next week is utter failure. You step off stage, your site is live. Period.
- justin66 12y ago
  > Apple has done this so well, for so long, I am pissed-off MS can't get its act together. Apple doesn't pre-announce products at all, do they? This was sloppy (Microsoft is going to have something up for preorders tomorrow, why not just put it up when the speech is finished?) but it's not something Apple even does.
  - MBCook 12y ago
    As soon as Apple's press event is done, anything they've announced is up on their site to read about or often buy. Is MS announces something, you should be able to go to microsoft.com to read about it.
    - justin66 12y ago
      You seem to be deliberately missing the point. Apple doesn't pre-announce products at all. Criticizing the way Microsoft did it is reasonable. Making a comparison to Apple while doing so is a little bit nonsensical. If Apple were to get into the habit of pre-announcing products would they put detailed product data on the web? Would they allow for preorders, as Microsoft is apparently going to do tomorrow? Who knows? Not having to make decisions like that is part of the advantage of not pre-announcing products.
      - 12y ago
bitwize 12y ago
Awwww, man. N-Trig pen.
themodelplumber 12y ago
I look at the environment in which the product was presented and it's just one no-no after another. Check out this photo: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2014/05/20/microsoft-unveils-new-touch-cover-surface-pro-3-68-larger-trackpad-magnetic-sealing-mode/ http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2014/05/20/microsoft-unveils... They've picked some awful desaturated blue/green wallpaper image that clashes with the tiles that are supposed to be so great in Windows. Then the tiles themselves have this weird whitespace issue that creates an imbalanced appearance and even allows some tiles to use a right-aligned symbol rather than the default center. To say nothing of the shirt Panay is wearing. Nice and shiny, I'll give it that. Then I watch the MS dubstep ad for this product and it's just a bunch of meaningless flash. You don't even get to see people smiling, just music and lights (dah dah-dah). Oh and a pen writing on the screen, as if that's some miracle of modern technology. You can take notes with pictures in them, too. This is a step up from most Windows laptops, I'm sure, but the presentation really needs improvement. There is amateur work that is so much better than this. Example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugmR9nq3Yiw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugmR9nq3Yiw -- Wacom review done by an Australian cartoonist.
- rdrdss23 12y ago
  I have a similar issue with the Metro color scheme. It's incredibly overstimulating. Each time I open the start menu, I feel like I just walked in to a kindergarten. I wish there was a way to make it black and white b.c applications icons are generally colored as it is (but get washed out by the tsunami of color coming at you)
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
codeulike 12y ago
Some interesting decisions here. No RT version. Home button on the short edge not the long edge. Clear marketing message: "The Tablet that Can Replace Your Laptop" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E I think they might finally be figuring out what they've got here.
codeulike 12y ago
Any word on the batter life, what with it being thinner and lighter the previous models?
c0ldfusion 12y ago
No wonder it's cheaper - N-trig instead of Wacom. (I'm not commenting on the technical merits of either choice, just that one tends to be cheaper than the other.)
- slantyyz 12y ago
  The parallax and purported improvements in accuracy are a big deal though. Even with a >100 point calibration, the stylus on my Surface Pro gets weird tracking on the screen's edges or when the pen is held at off angles. I was sold once Panay clicked the Stylus and popped up OneNote instantly. There's a lot of value in that for people like me who still prefer to use a pen to take notes.
  - c0ldfusion 12y ago
    Yes, N-trig's edge performance is better. But Wacom is better supported in terms of software, has more granular pressure sensitivity and the pen does not require a battery.
iaskwhy 12y ago
For reference: Surface Pro 3: 12" @ 2160x1440 => 216 PPI MacBook Air 11": 11.6" @ 1366x768 => 135 PPI MacBook Air 13": 13.3" @ 1440x900 => 128 PPI MacBook Pro 13" (Retina): 13.3" @ 2560x1600 => 227 PPI (Rumor) MacBook Air 12" (Retina): 12" @ 2304x1440 => 226 PPI
- dgarrett 12y ago
  Don't forget the horrors of Windows high DPI scaling. Poor, blurry Google Chrome. Edit: I was inspired to look into it a little more, and it looks like Chrome does have high-DPI support: https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/forum/#!topic/chromium-dev/U_K1NHuMLic https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/forum/#!topic/chrom... It has to be enabled by a registry key and seems to break Chrome's notification tray icon.
  - iaskwhy 12y ago
    I was actually thinking about asking that, I have no idea how things will look at such high resolutions. I do use Windows on a Macbook Air 13" and it's pretty much retina to me but I'm getting old, I don't think I'll recognise a pixel anymore during the upcoming years. :)
  - teamonkey 12y ago
    Win8 desktop is definitely better than Win7. The worst thing is that the scaling (and touch) breaks all the non-standard GUI kits. XMind, for example, has icons that you can hardly see on my Pro2. Unity3D's GUI scales up correctly but there are a whole load of fixed-sized panels that become too large to be useful. Chrome's font rendering is still screwed even on low DPI windows machines, especially if Google Web Fonts are used.
- dublinben 12y ago
  Dell XPS 13: 13.3" @ 1920x1080 = 166 PPI Asus Zenbook Prime: 13.3" @ 1920x1080 = 166 PPI Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga: 12.5" @ 1920x1080 = 176 PPI Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro: 13.3" @ 3200x1800 = 276 PPI
ChuckMcM 12y ago
I would love to see Microsoft come out with Windows/Developer which targeted people who were creating applications rather take existing Windows, which focusses on the big market of App users, and bolting on some developerness. I could imagine something like CTRL-Alt-F4 on Linux where you press the key combo and the Windows/Apps view is replaced with the Windows/Develop view. Easy access to terminal screens, build tools, layout creators, etc.
- bigdubs 12y ago
  Win+D is the desktop shortcut. I know you were talking more about a general OS paradigm but you can get pretty close.
vondur 12y ago
While the device is nice, I still see it as very niche-y item. It's too expensive once you add in a more reasonable amount of storage and the keyboard. For those who benefit from the stylus, I can totally see it being a really useful device. I don't think it will fare any better than the previous iterations.
jarnix 12y ago
Anyone tried the keyboard on this model ? It's unusable, it's too soft. Did someone try another keyboard for the Surface ?
interpol_p 12y ago
Does anyone know how the N-Trig digitiser compares with Wacom? I'm interested in this as a Cintiq replacement.
ihsw 12y ago
Price is too high, it'll never sell in the volume they expect to get (unless their expectations are quite low).
sswezey 12y ago
Unrelated to the actual article content, but what kind of website autoplays two videos when loading the page?! One is annoying enough, but to have two videos start simultaneous doesn't even make sense. That is a terrible user experience.
borgchick 12y ago
Anyone else felt like the presentation was done by the Shamwow guy?
Rudism 12y ago
I bought a Surface Pro 2 a while back, mostly excited about the digitizer. I was definitely not disappointed. From a casual digital artist's perspective (read: I draw a webcomic and occasionally dabble in hobbyist animation), this is a dream device. The ability to sit at my desk with the tablet hooked up to KVM via a USB hub, write and edit my script like on any desktop computer, then simply unplug and start drawing right on the screen is an amazingly satisfying work-flow. Looks like the Surface Pro 3 will only make that even better with the larger screen area. With the right tools that are touch-enabled for panning, zooming, and rotating, it's basically the perfect way to work.
shawn-butler 12y ago
Does anyone have any actual working experience with the new pen/stylus capabilities? The only interesting part of the surface pro was the Wacom digitizer and they are ditching it. Pricepoint is more attractive, that is for certain.
listic 12y ago
Which CPUs are there in Surface Pro 3? I was sure the Broadwell Microsoft won't release them for another half a year, because Broadwell CPUs are not announced yet and are expected early next year, or for Christmas season at best. I wonder whether they are the same Haswell CPUs as in SP2, or did MS get a very special treatment from Intel for Broadwell CPUs?
sadris 12y ago
Is this an x86 or ARM cpu?
- Aldo_MX 12y ago
  x86
doczoidberg 12y ago
This is a notebook killer literally. It is for taking notes as a notebook should do. Maybe it is a laptop killer for some too. Comparisons with Ipad and ohter tablets are ridiculous. This is a working machine. I think this will be my next machine. Nobody in the press has mentioned the new power connector by the way. If you look at the docking station all connections are done by this connector. I hope there will be a cable based adapter for usb+dp+power too.
evanmoran 12y ago
Notice in the video he didn't weigh an iPad, he weighed the MacBook Air. Microsoft is going after laptops – not tablets – with the Surface. This makes sense to me because when I'm working I need a keyboard (typing is just too important). When I'm in a meeting I want to jot notes down with a stylus (feels more personal then typing). This is a pretty impressive bridge between these ideals.
dudus 12y ago
I don't see GPS anywhere mentioned in the article or the specs on Microsoft site[1]. Is this taken for granted or did they really not included a GPS sensor with this? It even mentions the digital compass and gyroscope sensors. I'm having a bad feeling about this. [1] http://www.microsoft.com/surface/en-us/products/surface-pro-3 http://www.microsoft.com/surface/en-us/products/surface-pro-...
tdicola 12y ago
Was anyone else really uncomfortable with Panos singling out Joanna Stern during the event? I don't know if he was trying to praise or berate her, but it just looked terrible and made me feel uncomfortable about the whole thing. Really weird why they would do that--I have no idea what message they were trying to send but it doesn't seem like a good one.
garg 12y ago
Quite a lot of digital artists were using the surface pro 2 instead of buying the Wacom companion. I think the n-trig stylus will scare a lot of them away from the surface pro 3.
olegkikin 12y ago
What strange pricing. i7/256GB = $1,549 i7/512GB = $1,949 That's a lot of money for a slightly larger SSD.
mung 12y ago
How can it be 3:2 aspect and HD at the same time? It's one or the other or it has rectangle pixels. Edit: nevermind... comes in 3:2 AND HD display. This is what happens when you read while doing something else.

275 points by sz4kerto 12y ago

Looks awesome. I always say I won't buy a tablet until it is as useful as my laptop - this is a great step in that direction with the multi position stand, 12" screen, core i7, thin and light...Will I actually enter the tablet world?

jlockfre 12y ago

It's nice but it must suck when faced by the behemoth that is the iPad.

watty 12y ago
The differentiator is the OS. One of them is for play, the other is for productivity. Comparing full Windows 8.1 to iOS is Apples to Oranges.
- integraton 12y ago
  Keep telling yourself that. Meanwhile, back here in reality, iOS dominates the enterprise: http://media.www1.good.com/documents/rpt-mobility-index-q413.pdf http://media.www1.good.com/documents/rpt-mobility-index-q413...
  - integraton 12y ago
    Hacker News 2014: where empty, baseless Microsoft marketing regurgitation gets upvotes and actual statistics get downvotes. Keep making enemies, Microsoft. That'll be a very effective strategy.
    - nivla 12y ago
      OR maybe Hacker News 2014: where people grew up to look past their fanboism and review a product for what it is.
      - integraton 12y ago
        Not among the microsoft fanboys, clearly, which is the entirely point. But, you know, why don't you go ahead and regurgitate a Microsoft market phrase since that apparently trumps actual facts. Note that I'm the only person who actually cited a real source with hard numbers in this discussion, and I've been the most downvoted. Go figure. I suppose we've already established that actual facts are irrelevant to you people.
        nivla 12y ago
        How many MS fanboys do you think there are on HN? If there were any considerable, this MS pro post like any other wouldn't get flagged off from the frontpage in less than 8 hours. >why don't you go ahead and regurgitate a Microsoft market phrase since that apparently trumps actual facts. What facts are your referring to? That iOS dominates the enterprise world? It may but its rarely work related, my gf and her colleagues got awarded an iPad from work (she is not a techie), the most she does is email some documents and maybe make minor excel modifications. Its shouldn't take a genius to figure out that the current versions of tablets are anything but a productivity tool. I am not going to say Surface dominates the enterprise market but more realistically no tablet dominates it yet. However on a wild guess, I believe a hybrid version of any OS on a tablet would be the future.
        deleted 12y ago
        [deleted]
        integraton 12y ago
        > It may but its rarely work related What data do you have to support this obviously unfounded statement? Let's see: > my gf and her colleagues ...
        nivla 12y ago
        umm its a statement based on my observation and not a fact... I can only make an assumption on what goes around me. If you want to believe that iPad is the tablet that replaces the enterprise workload and would replace the desktops in the corporate world, then by all means be my guest to that illusion. However don't go around expecting everyone to buy into it. I think you want to live within that "fact" so its a pointless to make an argument.
  - watty 12y ago
    iOS is great for certain tasks but comparing it to OSX or Windows for productivity is silly. I have 3 iOS devices in my household, we love them. None of us use it for work though, they're leisure devices. No one at my company uses iOS for work, they use Windows and OSX. Also, your link is showing smart phones and tablets used at work, which certainly favor iOS. What does this have to do with the Microsoft Surface?
    - integraton 12y ago
      I agree, what does anything have to do with the Microsoft Surface? As I can tell, it has virtually no traction for "work," which makes it entirely irrelevant outside of the flood of fanboys in announcement discussions on the internet.

sz4kerto 12y ago

3:2 screen ratio is a killer feature. The size (800g, 9.1 mm) is quite unbelievable as well.

higherpurpose 12y ago
Except there's not much point to a 12" portrait tablet. How often do you think you'd be using such a tablet in portrait mode?
- grayclhn 12y ago
  I use my ipad in portrait mode for reading pdfs and because it's easier to hold; I don't think that changing the aspect ratio would make much of a difference for either of those tasks, but it would make typing in landscape mode much better
- rayiner 12y ago
  12" portrait is the right size for working with Word documents and PDFs.
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    Well, 14" would be better for letter-sized documents, but 12" is tolerably close to right.
    - sliverstorm 12y ago
      Do you print your letters on US Legal or something like that?
      - dragonwriter 12y ago
        > Do you print your letters on US Legal or something like that? No, "letter size" was a reference to US Letter, which is 8.5"x11", which has a 13.9" diagonal, so a 14" screen would be about right (a little small for a 100% display if it is 3:2, because US Letter has a 1.29:1 aspect ratio rather than 1.5:1.) US Legal is 8.5"x14" which is closer to 3:2 (1.65:1) but also 16.4" diagonal.

rbanffy 12y ago

Looks good, but I was expecting a screen with the same specs as Google's Chromebook Pixel. I understand that, beyond a certain point, pixel density ceases to be relevant, but the different numbers mean this is a different part. Now, I wonder how good would Linux support be. Also, weighting a keyboardless tablet with a MacBook air is disingenuous at best.

JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
They put the typecover on - stills weigh less.
- yulaow 12y ago
  Image link that prove it: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BoF3_u-IgAE2WBh.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BoF3_u-IgAE2WBh.jpg
  - TillE 12y ago
    After seeing that photo, "this other device with a significantly larger screen weighs more" isn't so impressive.
    - JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
      No, not at all. I stated elsewhere: The point of the comparison isn't to compare the two products against each other, but rather to suggest that the Surface is more power/technology for less weight as a portable device.
    - sp332 12y ago
      Macbook Airs have 11.6" or 13.3" screens. So it's about 1 inch difference in either direction.
      - rayiner 12y ago
        You mean 0.4 versus 1.3?

josefresco 12y ago

Microsoft needs to keep at it. While this iteration is great, the platform will not flourish if they falter or take a release cycle off. Consistent upgrades to the Surface hardware, and support of the developer community is key to winning the overall tablet war for MS.

astrodust 12y ago
While it's great to see Microsoft innovating like this and pushing their product aggressively forward, it must really chafe with their OEM community. Why would you buy some clunky classic notebook when you can get a Surface 3 for virtually the same price? It's basically impossible for OEMs to compete when Microsoft can include Windows for free and they have to pay a premium to bundle it.
- mikerg87 12y ago
  I really haven't seen the surface pro compete on price. Similar Lenovo offerings for 256GB and 512GB SSD ultra books have similar pricing. I honestly think MS shopped around the concept of surface to OEMS and I think the OEMs said "Pass. No Thanks. we'll stick with our incremental and existing form factors". I think MS was forced into a corner and concluded they needed to go it on their own.
  - JimmaDaRustla 12y ago
    Kind of like how Razer built their own laptop - the OEMs have stagnated and their hardware isn't competing on an innovation front.
- josefresco 12y ago
  This new surface starts at $799 which puts it clearly in thee mid-range notebook market where there are plenty of compelling alternative laptops, many of which sport clearly superior hardware. Bump it up to an i5 or i7 and I'm sure the price will be north of $1K. The premium paid here is the form factor and it's related features so the comparison to traditional laptops isn't valid (even if MS is making it). Maybe if you're cross shopping svelte, premium laptops the Surface 3 would be an option, but not for someone looking for a $400 i3 Windows laptop.

agscala 12y ago

This sure is a bummer for people who recently bought a Surface Pro 2 (like me). It's unreal that a 6-month old $1200 machine already is outdated

DanAndersen 12y ago
The thing to remember is that you don't have to have the latest greatest thing. In worlds where a Surface Pro 3 was coming out now, and worlds where that wasn't happening, your Surface Pro 2 would still be able to do the same things. The presence of something newer doesn't need to diminish your existing possessions.
maguirre 12y ago
I wanted to buy a Surface Pro 2 but the model I wanted has been out of stock at the Microsoft Store for a few weeks now.
- steele 12y ago
  You may be in luck then as early adopters dump their 256Gb models on craigslist and ebay.
rickyc091 12y ago
Yeah, looks like Surface follows a 8-9 month cycle. I bought SP2 right when it came out and then they bumped the processor by a little a month later.
sliverstorm 12y ago
It isn't all that outdated, and it isn't anything we haven't already run into with phones. The latest $600-800 iPhone is routinely outdated every, what, 18 months? I do feel your pain a little though, I bought a Moto G just before they added the SD card slot & 4G. You've just got to come to terms with the fact that device lifetime is longer than the product cycle.
dragonwriter 12y ago
Its really not unreal -- there's new computer hardware coming out all the time. Its been true for decades that hardware you buy today isn't going to be top of the line in 6 months. But what's going to be available in six months doesn't do you any good today, either.

tompagenet2 12y ago

Really impressed by this, especially the 3:2 ratio screen which will be great for writing and for browsing, and amazing for photos. The pen looks great. I've recently been given an iPad by work as part of a trial. It's great for quick e-mails, but really seems hard for me to get 'proper' work done. This might be the thing - shame I have to pay for it.

thrownaway2424 12y ago
It's really irritating that Lenovo won't source these for the X-series laptops.

skrebbel 12y ago

Just when I was "boohoo"-ing over Sony Vaios entirely leaving (WORLD & ~JAPAN), MS does this. Awesome. I would probably buy one if I didn't just buy a new laptop 2 months ago. The slightly bigger screen also makes this a worthy competitor to "real" laptops (as in, 13" and up) - a first for the Surface IMO.

ssdfsdf 12y ago

Why are they still trying to turn a tablet into a desktop? They are different things, with different purposes - not everything needs to be the same thing. Tablet All The Things!!

pedalpete 12y ago
Try looking at it another way. I have my laptop plugged into my monitor 90% of the time, and I use it with a keyboard and mouse attached. So, I rarely touch the hardware. When I do, use my laptop, I'm using it for the same type of things I would use a tablet for 70% of the time. Rarely am I actually doing any coding on it, but when I need to, I need to. Therefore, I can add a 3rd device, a tablet, into the mix, but why bother? One well built device now handles 100% of my use cases. I suspect many people don't use the surface as a tablet most of the time, but when you want to, it's nice to have that capability.

pling 12y ago

I still can't get my head round paying for one of these at £1000+ when it's effectively disposable if anything goes wrong. I bought a used i7 Lenovo T410 a couple of weeks back for £150. Totally serviceable and the battery it came with lasts 6 hours. This will be my workstation for a couple of years, plus if its like my T400 it lives in the back of the sofa and takes a beating every day. I'd kill a surface in about two days.

watty 12y ago
You bought a used laptop which is slower, no touch screen, digitizer, pen, Windows 8, SSD, etc. That's like comparing an old Blackberry to the iPhone 5. There's really no reason to try and compare them.
- pling 12y ago
  I don't use a touch screen or a pen. It's fully supported on windows 8 and I stuck my Samsung 840 Pro in it. It does however have a decent keyboard, a trackpoint, 3G card, a service reputation and a bomb proof chassis. All of which reduce the ownership risk and make my day slightly better.
  - tok 12y ago
    plus 150 quid... That's about 100 dollars cheaper than what I can find in the states with those specs. Additionally if a part fails, MUCH easier to fix. Comparing apples to oranges as both devices serve a moderately different purpose. Mainly body position while using them (Laying flat and using my finger directly on the screen to read books and watch movies or sitting up and using my finger on the keyboard to read books and watch movies).
  - slantyyz 12y ago
    >> I don't use a touch screen or a pen. Simply put, the Surface Pro isn't designed for people with your use case. And more likely than not, your laptop isn't useful for the people MS had in mind for the Surface Pro.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

bane 12y ago

I'm starting to see more and more Surface devices in my area. It seems to be getting popular with the Starbuck's salesguy crowd who need something as compact as a tablet, but they can use real applications on. I know that's kind of cliche, but you don't really "get" that meaning until you walk into a coffee shop and see 2 or 3 people sitting around with tablets sticking up on the tables. The Android and iPad guys are usually surfing the web while the Surface guy is editing a spreadsheet or doing something in Powerpoint. Actually a great network effect is getting a presentation of some business proposal off of a Surface. Everybody who see the presentation usually asks what kind of Android tablet it is, and it suddenly turns every real-estate sales guy in the area into an impromptu Microsoft sales guy, extolling the virtues of the device and OS. They're still too pricey by my estimation. You should be able to get one of these (maybe a low-ebd 32GB model) with keyboard for $799. I don't get why the keyboard/cover is an optional buy.

IBM 12y ago
They've kind of killed this whole angle of "Surface is for getting work done" after they hedged by releasing Office on iPad.
- mkr-hn 12y ago
  There's a long list of tasks not covered by Office that you still can't do all that well on an iPad or Android device.
  - sorahn 12y ago
    And the surface is better?
    - mkr-hn 12y ago
      It runs almost everything you need in a 3D, music, photography, writing, or digital art workflow.
    - pjmlp 12y ago
      Yes, because you can switch to a full desktop mode without being constrained to a jailed mode as in iOS and Android. For example, you cannot do programming on the go, without being connected to a server that handles your development tasks.

crayola 12y ago

$799. Impressive. I think this is a big moment for Microsoft.

Osiris 12y ago
Impressive, as in cheap or expensive? It depends on your perspective.
- crayola 12y ago
  I meant cheap for what it is (or seems to be).
  - Nerdfest 12y ago
    Strange, I think it's the opposite. That's a lot of money for an i3 with little memory. It's cheap next to a MacBook Air perhaps, but still quite expensive.
    - joshstrange 12y ago
      MacBook Air base model ($900): * 1.4GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor * Turbo Boost up to 2.7GHz * Intel HD Graphics 5000 * 4GB memory * 128GB PCIe-based flash storage The base Surface is cheaper than the Air but the second tier Surface (The one with more or less parity) is $100 more than the Air.
      - slantyyz 12y ago
        Don't forget that with the Surface, you're also paying a premium for the touchscreen and digitizer with pen, which is not available on an MBA. Edit-- removed the word "Wacom", turned out to be a false assumption.
      - kayoone 12y ago
        however for $100 more you get a High DPI touchscreen and a digital pen but the GPU (HD4400) is a bit slower.

rubiquity 12y ago

> When you write notes using OneNote you can then click the top of the stylus again, just like an ordinary pen, and it will sync those notes up to the cloud instantly so they're available elsewhere. Elsewhere -- as in the laptop you will inevitably go crawling back to when it's time to get real work done. It's always humorous when an article about a device that is supposed to kill the laptop ends on a note like that.

Deinos 12y ago
Yeah, he could not have possibly meant your phone, work issued pc/laptop, etc...
- rubiquity 12y ago
  Why differentiate between a personally owned and work issued desktop/laptop?
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    Because on of them I'm making the purchase decision for and one of them someone else is. So if I work at a place that isn't BYOD friendly, and have to do certain things on my work-issued desktop, its very good if I can easily access the notes from my personal tablet convertible that I'd prefer to take to meetings when I am using that desktop.
teamonkey 12y ago
I use my Surface to take notes in meetings. The notes are transparently synced to my main desktop machine, ready to be broken into tasks or emailed out. If I've taken notes with the pen, the desktop version is able to convert them into text. It's a workflow that is working out well for me.

archagon 12y ago

I wonder what the battery life and graphics performance are like? If they're decent (6+ hours of moderate use, plays CS:GO at 60fps), this will be a really great machine. The latest i7s tend to have pretty good integrated graphics, so I think at least that won't be an issue.

sz4kerto 12y ago
They claim that it's +20% compared to SP2, and SP2 achieved 8:51 on the Verge's battery test.
kayoone 12y ago
Looks like HD4400 which is not great, but should run older games on 720p pretty good.
- archagon 12y ago
  Ah, that's too bad. I was hoping for Iris graphics. (CS:GO at 60 might still be doable, though.)

yulaow 12y ago

Did I miss that or they said nothing about the battery duration? For me that's a very important information. For the rest is a really great piece of hw edit: Yep I missed: "Over ~20% more battery life than any product Surface has shipped before" and: " battery life is up to 9 hours on the Surface Pro 3."

msh 12y ago
The anandtech live blog says it's 20% better than surface pro 2.
- tdicola 12y ago
  What version are they testing though, the Core i3? What is the Core i7 battery life I wonder...
  - MikusR 12y ago
    Idle power consumption of Cores is about the same.
    - tdicola 12y ago
      I really hope a real world battery test isn't just checking stuff at idle.
gcb0 12y ago
...and how hot it gets! "The first surface that can't boil your eggs" would be a slogan that make me buy one.

tdicola 12y ago

Really akward that they made a point of saying the device is 'fanless' when it clearly has a fan and vents around the side. Sure it might be a very nice and quiet fan, but it sounds disingenuous to be saying there isn't one.

vxNsr 12y ago
Yeah I watched the event and I didn't understand that part, he first called it fanless and then waxed poetic about how nice and hidden the vent is and how thin the fan is. Maybe marketing told him that it was okay?

higherpurpose 12y ago

Figured that Tom Warren would write the most hyped-up sensationalist Microsoft PR-fed headline for this.

bcoates 12y ago

I was holding out for this announcement to upgrade my Surface Pro, which I've been happily using as a main work PC for more than a year now. I'm not big on the size/aspect ratio change--I don't carry a bag around, and the current surface is about as large as I'd want to handle. A bigger, presumably floppier keyboard isn't too enticing either. 3:2 makes the portrait mode go from silly to potentially useable, except for the part where almost no Windows programs are actually usable in portrait mode, and of course the keyboard requires landscape mode anyway. With no interesting spec upgrades over the Pro 2 (I was hoping for LTE, or more ports) I think I'll get one of those instead.

nlawalker 12y ago
3:2 is the feature that makes me actually want one of these now. I find that 16:9 on a screen the size of the Surface's is okay for watching video and not much else. I have the original "RT" Surface and my biggest complaint, even over the awful performance, is the aspect ratio. It's not comfortable to hold in your hands in either orientation and it isn't helpful for most productivity-related stuff. Portrait orientation is important to me, but there are very few applications that I actually use in it, the top one being a browser. With a keyboard attached in landscape, the extra screen area will be extremely welcome.

mikerg87 12y ago

Small things continue to kill the surface pro acceptance: - The Surface site on the surface site hasn't updated with surface pro 3 info/pricing. The run way for this is long, why isn't the site updated or ready to go? - Accessories are notoriously out of stock. Why are they hard to get? Docking station, keyboards, mice. Fix that. - The dock has 10/100 Ethernet. In 2013-2014? Why? - Updates for firmware and drivers assume enterprise infrastructure. Without the infrastructure you need a manual upgrade using command line tools. The updates don't come through the normal windows update channel. You have to discover them on your own. - The track pad on the type/touch cover is flaky . Its forever getting stuck in a fixed place and stuck on gestures you cant turn off or control. You end up having to disconnect the cover and reconnect. this is stupid for an elite/pro device. Despite the gripes these devices continue to show promise and I see them more and more around airports and coffee shops.

rdfi 12y ago
When the cursor gets stuck, just press one of the arrow keys to unstuck it (works for my Surface Pro Gen 1 with the type cover).
mrbill 12y ago
I've got a Surface Pro 1 (with Type Cover 2), and have never had problems getting firmware and driver updates from Microsoft Update. Have no idea what you're talking about regarding "manual upgrade" with CLI tools.
- mikerg87 12y ago
  I was talking about these driver/update packs for Surface Pro 2: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=38826 http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=3882.... I've never seen these updates come through standard Windows Update for the Surface Pro 2.
  - teamonkey 12y ago
    "This firmware and driver package contains drivers for all of the components in the Surface Pro device, as well as updates to the system firmware that have been released via Windows Update."

ggreer 12y ago

That's a really nice piece of hardware. I've used MacBook Airs since 2010, but the Surface 3 looks to be strictly dominating in the hardware department. Unfortunately, I don't think Microsoft will convert many OS X devs unless they make some changes to their software. One of the advantages of OS X is that it's a Unix, and lots of Unix software runs on it. It's not hard to compile tools such as nmap, Vim, or steam locomotive. It would be very interesting if Microsoft made Windows a Unix. They could bundle bash or zsh, add the typical BSD tools, and (most importantly) build a cc front-end for the Visual Studio compiler. They'd also have to ship a libc of their own. To save effort, they could base it on BSD's libc. It'd be like Cygwin, but installed by default and officially supported and maintained. With such a set-up, you'd be able to run your unix tools alongside Adobe CS and Outlook. You wouldn't have to worry about driver support, since Microsoft made the hardware and the OS (just like Apple). The only thing missing would be the ability to dual-boot OS X (to test on Safari or other OS X stuff).

paperwork 12y ago
I'm rooting for MS. My (not so serious) test for windows is simple: the day I can resize dos command prompt as easily as terminal windows on linux/osx is the day Microsoft I need to seriously consider going back to windows :)
- pjmlp 12y ago
  Properties -> Settings -> Layout -> change res -> Save. I never understood why some people make such a big fuss out of it.
  - rschmitty 12y ago
    Because that is a huge fuss to do what practically every other app can easily do by dragging the border, including other windows apps. Sometimes you need to change your prompt to be a different size and an annoying 5 step thing is a big fuss
    - deleted 12y ago

aw3c2 12y ago

Anyone wanna sponsor a broke but aspiring student (me!) with one? :)

ldd- 12y ago

As a proud Gen 1 Surface Pro owner, this looks spectacular. My Surface replaced my laptop, and while I definitely had my issues with the transition (trackpad sucks so often use external mouse, aspect ratio is inconvenient for Office, display angle is limiting, and no built-in LTE), I've ultimately come to enjoy using it. I've almost always got it with me, and I've found I've become nearly as productive on it as I was with my laptop. I've been willing to make the "nearly" tradeoff since I have it on me more often, so more opportunity to be productive, and I do use it as a tablet in ways that I obviously couldn't with my laptop. The updates in the Gen 3 address nearly all of my gripes (why can't they integrate LTE??). I'm not sure if I'll pick up a 3, but only because my Gen 1 is less than 2 years old and still under warranty. If not a Gen 3, then a Gen 4 will definitely be on my shopping list. I can't imagine I'll go back to a normal laptop. I guess I'm exactly who they are targeting.

dragonwriter 12y ago
> The updates in the Gen 3 address nearly all of my gripes (why can't they integrate LTE??). I suspect that enough of the people who want LTE have shareable (wirelessly or with wires) LTE modem with them at all times as to make the added cost of integrated LTE not a particularly effective selling point for the added cost (and very much not attractive for the base model, so it would necessitate added SKUs, as well.)
- ldd- 12y ago
  Oh indubitably! It was really more of a rhetorical question, but it is my biggest lingering gripe and wish the segmentations would work in my favor to make it a viable/valuable option for them. It's just frustrating to see that the Surface 2 (not pro) has integrated LTE as an option, but it's not available for the Pro line.
codeulike 12y ago
Yeah I have a Surface Pro 1 and I now use it for everything - development, taking notes, writing apps, playing minecraft, scribbling on PDFs. The direction they're taking the Pro 3 seems to be a good clear message at last 'the tablet that can replace your laptop' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E The bigger screen is a good move I think. I've started using the ArcTouch mouse with my surface when I'm out and about, rather than the touchpad on the cover. Works pretty nicely and folds flat. But then I've always preferred a proper mouse to a touchpad.

pjmlp 12y ago

The ability to use Visual Studio on the go, while keeping the capabilities of a tablet is quite nice. It sure is on my list, in case I need a laptop replacement.

bch 12y ago

If this has good support from *BSD (or perhaps, Linux) -- this sounds like it might be the device that'd tip me from laptop to tablet user as a primary machine.

bratsche 12y ago

One thing that Microsoft could learn from Apple is to have their online store ready immediately. Sure, you can't always buy Apple stuff immediately when it's announced (see Mac Pro), but you can always go onto the online store and 'window shop'.

err4nt 12y ago

> According to Microsoft’s Panos Panay, “This is the tablet that can replace your tablet.” Does that man have his doctorate in Tautology, or a PhD in saying the same things twice?

seunosewa 12y ago
The second "tablet" in that sentence really means "iPad".
sp332 12y ago
This tablet will replace your tablet (probably an iPad).

MikusR 12y ago

And there goes Samsung Note Pro 12.2. The Surface Pro 3 cost's the same, is only 1mm thicker and 50g heavier. And runs full Office and Photoshop.

nmolo 12y ago

The only downside to this is the HD 4400 graphics unit. [1] I'm worried about it running everything smoothly at 2k. The HD 5000 is much better suited to run at that resolution. [1] http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/download/presskits/surface/docs/Surface3ProFS.docx http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/download/presskits/surfa...

nmolo 12y ago
After talking to people in the know, the reason they didn't upgrade to the Haswell with HD 5000 is they didn't want the increase in power related to having the extra graphics units.
tkmcc 12y ago
My Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus has a HD 4400 graphics unit and runs fine at 3200 x 1800, so you shouldn't have to worry unless you're doing something pretty graphically intensive.
- Encosia 12y ago
  Same here. I run graphical software like Office and Photoshop on my 3200x1800 ATIV Book 9 Plus and haven't noticed any performance issues.

iandanforth 12y ago

Warning, rant. Why the duck isn't there information on the Surface Pro 3 on the MS website? Apple has done this so well, for so long, I am pissed-off MS can't get its act together. You make an announcement, you need presence on the web. You need to start your customers expectations building, whet their appetite, and tease them. Their experience starts now and right now that experience is reading news articles and reading a press release. Pathetic. Where is the video of the announcement? Where are the beautiful images and specs. Where are the carefully and lovingly crafted pages that sell this hardware to me? Tomorrow isn't good enough. Next week is utter failure. You step off stage, your site is live. Period.

justin66 12y ago
> Apple has done this so well, for so long, I am pissed-off MS can't get its act together. Apple doesn't pre-announce products at all, do they? This was sloppy (Microsoft is going to have something up for preorders tomorrow, why not just put it up when the speech is finished?) but it's not something Apple even does.
- MBCook 12y ago
  As soon as Apple's press event is done, anything they've announced is up on their site to read about or often buy. Is MS announces something, you should be able to go to microsoft.com to read about it.
  - justin66 12y ago
    You seem to be deliberately missing the point. Apple doesn't pre-announce products at all. Criticizing the way Microsoft did it is reasonable. Making a comparison to Apple while doing so is a little bit nonsensical. If Apple were to get into the habit of pre-announcing products would they put detailed product data on the web? Would they allow for preorders, as Microsoft is apparently going to do tomorrow? Who knows? Not having to make decisions like that is part of the advantage of not pre-announcing products.
    - 12y ago

bitwize 12y ago

Awwww, man. N-Trig pen.

themodelplumber 12y ago

I look at the environment in which the product was presented and it's just one no-no after another. Check out this photo: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2014/05/20/microsoft-unveils-new-touch-cover-surface-pro-3-68-larger-trackpad-magnetic-sealing-mode/ http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2014/05/20/microsoft-unveils... They've picked some awful desaturated blue/green wallpaper image that clashes with the tiles that are supposed to be so great in Windows. Then the tiles themselves have this weird whitespace issue that creates an imbalanced appearance and even allows some tiles to use a right-aligned symbol rather than the default center. To say nothing of the shirt Panay is wearing. Nice and shiny, I'll give it that. Then I watch the MS dubstep ad for this product and it's just a bunch of meaningless flash. You don't even get to see people smiling, just music and lights (dah dah-dah). Oh and a pen writing on the screen, as if that's some miracle of modern technology. You can take notes with pictures in them, too. This is a step up from most Windows laptops, I'm sure, but the presentation really needs improvement. There is amateur work that is so much better than this. Example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugmR9nq3Yiw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugmR9nq3Yiw -- Wacom review done by an Australian cartoonist.

rdrdss23 12y ago
I have a similar issue with the Metro color scheme. It's incredibly overstimulating. Each time I open the start menu, I feel like I just walked in to a kindergarten. I wish there was a way to make it black and white b.c applications icons are generally colored as it is (but get washed out by the tsunami of color coming at you)
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

codeulike 12y ago

Some interesting decisions here. No RT version. Home button on the short edge not the long edge. Clear marketing message: "The Tablet that Can Replace Your Laptop" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t7rSZT_77E I think they might finally be figuring out what they've got here.

codeulike 12y ago

Any word on the batter life, what with it being thinner and lighter the previous models?

c0ldfusion 12y ago

No wonder it's cheaper - N-trig instead of Wacom. (I'm not commenting on the technical merits of either choice, just that one tends to be cheaper than the other.)

slantyyz 12y ago
The parallax and purported improvements in accuracy are a big deal though. Even with a >100 point calibration, the stylus on my Surface Pro gets weird tracking on the screen's edges or when the pen is held at off angles. I was sold once Panay clicked the Stylus and popped up OneNote instantly. There's a lot of value in that for people like me who still prefer to use a pen to take notes.
- c0ldfusion 12y ago
  Yes, N-trig's edge performance is better. But Wacom is better supported in terms of software, has more granular pressure sensitivity and the pen does not require a battery.

iaskwhy 12y ago

For reference: Surface Pro 3: 12" @ 2160x1440 => 216 PPI MacBook Air 11": 11.6" @ 1366x768 => 135 PPI MacBook Air 13": 13.3" @ 1440x900 => 128 PPI MacBook Pro 13" (Retina): 13.3" @ 2560x1600 => 227 PPI (Rumor) MacBook Air 12" (Retina): 12" @ 2304x1440 => 226 PPI

dgarrett 12y ago
Don't forget the horrors of Windows high DPI scaling. Poor, blurry Google Chrome. Edit: I was inspired to look into it a little more, and it looks like Chrome does have high-DPI support: https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/forum/#!topic/chromium-dev/U_K1NHuMLic https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/forum/#!topic/chrom... It has to be enabled by a registry key and seems to break Chrome's notification tray icon.
- iaskwhy 12y ago
  I was actually thinking about asking that, I have no idea how things will look at such high resolutions. I do use Windows on a Macbook Air 13" and it's pretty much retina to me but I'm getting old, I don't think I'll recognise a pixel anymore during the upcoming years. :)
- teamonkey 12y ago
  Win8 desktop is definitely better than Win7. The worst thing is that the scaling (and touch) breaks all the non-standard GUI kits. XMind, for example, has icons that you can hardly see on my Pro2. Unity3D's GUI scales up correctly but there are a whole load of fixed-sized panels that become too large to be useful. Chrome's font rendering is still screwed even on low DPI windows machines, especially if Google Web Fonts are used.
dublinben 12y ago
Dell XPS 13: 13.3" @ 1920x1080 = 166 PPI Asus Zenbook Prime: 13.3" @ 1920x1080 = 166 PPI Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga: 12.5" @ 1920x1080 = 176 PPI Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro: 13.3" @ 3200x1800 = 276 PPI

ChuckMcM 12y ago

I would love to see Microsoft come out with Windows/Developer which targeted people who were creating applications rather take existing Windows, which focusses on the big market of App users, and bolting on some developerness. I could imagine something like CTRL-Alt-F4 on Linux where you press the key combo and the Windows/Apps view is replaced with the Windows/Develop view. Easy access to terminal screens, build tools, layout creators, etc.

bigdubs 12y ago
Win+D is the desktop shortcut. I know you were talking more about a general OS paradigm but you can get pretty close.

vondur 12y ago

While the device is nice, I still see it as very niche-y item. It's too expensive once you add in a more reasonable amount of storage and the keyboard. For those who benefit from the stylus, I can totally see it being a really useful device. I don't think it will fare any better than the previous iterations.

jarnix 12y ago

Anyone tried the keyboard on this model ? It's unusable, it's too soft. Did someone try another keyboard for the Surface ?

interpol_p 12y ago

Does anyone know how the N-Trig digitiser compares with Wacom? I'm interested in this as a Cintiq replacement.

ihsw 12y ago

Price is too high, it'll never sell in the volume they expect to get (unless their expectations are quite low).

sswezey 12y ago

Unrelated to the actual article content, but what kind of website autoplays two videos when loading the page?! One is annoying enough, but to have two videos start simultaneous doesn't even make sense. That is a terrible user experience.

borgchick 12y ago

Anyone else felt like the presentation was done by the Shamwow guy?

Rudism 12y ago

I bought a Surface Pro 2 a while back, mostly excited about the digitizer. I was definitely not disappointed. From a casual digital artist's perspective (read: I draw a webcomic and occasionally dabble in hobbyist animation), this is a dream device. The ability to sit at my desk with the tablet hooked up to KVM via a USB hub, write and edit my script like on any desktop computer, then simply unplug and start drawing right on the screen is an amazingly satisfying work-flow. Looks like the Surface Pro 3 will only make that even better with the larger screen area. With the right tools that are touch-enabled for panning, zooming, and rotating, it's basically the perfect way to work.

shawn-butler 12y ago

Does anyone have any actual working experience with the new pen/stylus capabilities? The only interesting part of the surface pro was the Wacom digitizer and they are ditching it. Pricepoint is more attractive, that is for certain.

listic 12y ago

Which CPUs are there in Surface Pro 3? I was sure the Broadwell Microsoft won't release them for another half a year, because Broadwell CPUs are not announced yet and are expected early next year, or for Christmas season at best. I wonder whether they are the same Haswell CPUs as in SP2, or did MS get a very special treatment from Intel for Broadwell CPUs?

sadris 12y ago

Is this an x86 or ARM cpu?

Aldo_MX 12y ago
x86

doczoidberg 12y ago

This is a notebook killer literally. It is for taking notes as a notebook should do. Maybe it is a laptop killer for some too. Comparisons with Ipad and ohter tablets are ridiculous. This is a working machine. I think this will be my next machine. Nobody in the press has mentioned the new power connector by the way. If you look at the docking station all connections are done by this connector. I hope there will be a cable based adapter for usb+dp+power too.

evanmoran 12y ago

Notice in the video he didn't weigh an iPad, he weighed the MacBook Air. Microsoft is going after laptops – not tablets – with the Surface. This makes sense to me because when I'm working I need a keyboard (typing is just too important). When I'm in a meeting I want to jot notes down with a stylus (feels more personal then typing). This is a pretty impressive bridge between these ideals.

dudus 12y ago

I don't see GPS anywhere mentioned in the article or the specs on Microsoft site[1]. Is this taken for granted or did they really not included a GPS sensor with this? It even mentions the digital compass and gyroscope sensors. I'm having a bad feeling about this. [1] http://www.microsoft.com/surface/en-us/products/surface-pro-3 http://www.microsoft.com/surface/en-us/products/surface-pro-...

tdicola 12y ago

Was anyone else really uncomfortable with Panos singling out Joanna Stern during the event? I don't know if he was trying to praise or berate her, but it just looked terrible and made me feel uncomfortable about the whole thing. Really weird why they would do that--I have no idea what message they were trying to send but it doesn't seem like a good one.

garg 12y ago

Quite a lot of digital artists were using the surface pro 2 instead of buying the Wacom companion. I think the n-trig stylus will scare a lot of them away from the surface pro 3.

olegkikin 12y ago

What strange pricing. i7/256GB = $1,549 i7/512GB = $1,949 That's a lot of money for a slightly larger SSD.

mung 12y ago

How can it be 3:2 aspect and HD at the same time? It's one or the other or it has rectangle pixels. Edit: nevermind... comes in 3:2 AND HD display. This is what happens when you read while doing something else.