Live data from Hacker News

New Surface Pro

microsoft.com

311–320 of 606 posts

Re: New Surface Pro

#311

> The most versatile laptop. ...that doesn't ship with a keyboard (pen isn't included either). No USB-C. 16GB RAM maximum.

> No USB-C What would you even plug into it? It's not like USB-C accessories are readily stocked everywhere, I'm still carrying around dongles all day for my TouchBar MBP. If the laptop shipped with USB-C people would be whinging they need dongles, literally can't win.

Not really, if they replaced either mini-DP or the surface charging port.

I have a 4k monitor with a USB hub and it connects via USB-C. So I can just plug in one cable for power, video, keyboard and mouse. On the surface that means three cables coming out of both sides of the thing, and one of the cables going to a USB hub since there is only one USB port. But I guess you could use the dongle, assuming it supports HDMI output.

That monitor is 2 years old now, I bought it with my 2015 macbook.

Re: New Surface Pro

#312
post #306
post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still want to be able to transfer data to/from my phone (S7) and my camera. I still want to use my headset. These things are going to last for several years; as such I'm not buying a laptop without USB-A any time soon.

bluetooth? wifi? the future is wireless (hopefully, imo)

I tried a bluetooth headset but it had enough extra latency to throw me off (I play rhythm games sometimes). In theory my wifi's fast enough for copying data to/from my phone, but I don't think it offers an easy way to do that (and my camera doesn't have wifi at all).

Re: New Surface Pro

#313
post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you know since when it's two-years? Apple's warranty has been (still is?) only one year in Germany IIRC.

For a long time. Note that there is a difference between the manufacturer's warranty (voluntary) and the seller's warranty (two years mandatory, "Gewährleistung" in German). When Apple talks about their warranty they mean the former. They even have a page outlining the difference: https://www.apple.com/de/legal/statutory-warranty/

"For further information please contact the seller"

It is kind of cheeky, since in most cases for Apple products, the seller is also Apple.

Re: New Surface Pro

#314

I've been using a Surface Pro 3 as my one-and-only for almost 3 years, and it really feels like time to upgrade, so I've been looking forward to this one. My workload is probably something like 40% reading, 30% writing, 25% coding, and 5% running code, and the Surface has been a nearly ideal form factor for this. The new "Surface Pro" ticks a lot of boxes for me: - Supports my existing keyboard, pen, dock, and power…

Their reasoning might be if you need 16GB you're probably a professional, doing professional work on the laptop. So you should be able to afford to pay more.

Re: New Surface Pro

#316

Look I'm a fan but until I see it running some real heavy artillery (Ableton Live 9 Suite, Massive, AmpliTube, and a half-dozen VSTs) in real-time vs. the competition, then it's just another hollow claim. Sure, hardware and performance are getting better. Sure, the Surface Dial is a massive game changer in the long term. But, look, the problem with marketing to creative people is that they take it sort of as a challe…

I run FL Studio and a bunch of VSTs, and I agree with you on at least this: the processor still can't meet the need if you use a lot of synth, and 16GiB RAM is still too small if you replace the synths with samplers instead.

Re: New Surface Pro

#317
post #117
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure...except you have to buy a $200 dock to connect it to anything. Why can't I buy a $40 (or Chinese equivalent for $20) adapter to connect it to things? Why isn't there a pin-out or open standard? I know the magnetic factor would be a problem for this use-case - it would often be too "heavy" for the magnets.

I bought a Kensington dock, I think it is the model I linked to below, but I paid way less for it on amazon. Works great. https://www.kensington.com/au/au/4491/33972/sd3500v-universa...

If it's anything like the Kensington sd3600p I had, not so great. Buried far below anything else was the not so little detail that if you plugged in a 4K display, USB3 ports on the dock would downshift to USB2, and GigE to 100mbps (why bother?).

Re: New Surface Pro

#318
post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If you buy an Apple laptop, and need a repair, they'll fix it if it's in warranty, regardless of where you are." This can be misleading. I bought my Macbook Air in Portugal, had 2y warranty there. Then moved to the UK and the brick stopped working. Went to an Apple Store and since it was after the 1y warranty offered when you buy it in the UK, they rejected replacing it for me. Eventually went to Portugal to visit m…

There is (currently) a two-year EU-mandated warranty, Apple was even taken to court for not emphasizing this enough when selling AppleCare.

Notice that this only applies to B2C transactions. Company-bought products do not have that protection.

Re: New Surface Pro

#319

> Surface Pro boasts 50% longer battery life than Surface Pro 4, 2.5x more performance than Surface Pro 3 Why do they compare it to the Surface Pro 3, and not the 4??

Because "1x the performance of a Surface Pro 4" didn't get past the guys in marketing.

Re: New Surface Pro

#320
post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

USB-C is already shipping on cheap desktops, a lot of smartphones, and many laptops. In two years Apple won't ship any computers with USB-A. USB-C has arrived: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/shop/laptops-with-usb-c

Sure, but most of my USB-A stuff will still be fine in 2 years, and much of it in 5. I won't have acquired enough USB-C things in 2 years to care much about it.

But what things other than flash drives (Who even uses those anymore) have ports built in? I have a USB-C -> USB 3.0 mini-b cable that I use for my external hard drives that cost me about $5.
Post reply on HN