Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

New Surface Pro

microsoft.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

381–390 of 606 posts

Re: New Surface Pro

#381

Post by personlurking »

iaskwhy wrote: post #114
nailer wrote: post #41

One import thing with all Surface laptops that most people don't know: > Support is limited to the country you purchased the device in. Eg: - If you buy an Apple laptop, and need a repair, they'll fix it if it's in warranty, regardless of where you are. - If you buy a Microsoft laptop, and need a warranty repair done in a different country, Microsoft won't help you. I purchased a Surface Book (which I love) in a Micr…

"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…

Good to know. I'm about to buy an MBA in Portugal.

IIRC, there's an authorized retailer in Lisbon (Chiado). Warranty-wise, I wonder how buying one there factors in vs. getting one from anywhere that sells them new (like FNAC).

Re: New Surface Pro

#382

Post by fredsir »

freeone3000 wrote: post #369
romaniv wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had really bad experience with Surface Pro 3 (lots of hardware and software issues), but I have to say this: Microsoft is trying to do the right thing here. There is no reason tablets should be dumb-down media consumption devices when they have computing power equivalent to desktop PCs of a few years ago. But to be used as real computers they must have keyboard and stylus by default and must allow to install arbitr…

Surface Pros run Windows 10, so they have the same UI as other computers. I don't see the problem?

If the UI/UX is bad for any one or all devices it runs it, that is a problem.

Re: New Surface Pro

#383

Post by j45 »

apapli wrote: post #7

I love my Pro 4. This video won't convince me to upgrade, but I'll be a tad jealous of every new starter at our firm who gets assigned one!

I'm inching towards getting a Pro 4 to use as a extended display for my Mac. Need some native windows again after switching to MacOS. A Surface Pro 4 will be discounted and not a bad pick up.

Re: New Surface Pro

#384

Post by gbl08ma »

devereaux wrote: post #361

The keyboard looks bad. I don't want the oversized left and right arrows. I want pageup and pagedown there instead. The XPS 13 2-in-1 is better for me if only for this reason. The XPS also comes with a pen, USB-C, and a decent hardware configuration like 16Gb of ram because we are in 2017!!! I just wish I could get QHD+ screen. No option on dell.com, while I see that on https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N5MV7YA so it must…

I own a Surface Pro 3 with the SP4 type cover (i.e. the version before the one that just came out and which is basically the same). I thought I'd miss all the keys from my laptop and desktop keyboards. Turns out, there are lots of hidden shortcuts. I got used to doing Fn+Arrows for Home/End/PageUp/PageDown and now I wish I could use that on other keyboards too. To me it's easier than having to reach for those keys when they are to the right or to the top of the keyboard, so much that I think I type a bit faster on the type cover, as long as I'm properly seated and the keyboard is on a solid surface (e.g. a desk).

I find the keyboard very good (the right menu key is a bit useless, but you can remap that using many methods) and the touchpad is the best I've used too, although it's probably not as good as the ones in Macbooks.

If the keyboard is the only thing holding you back, rethink it. You should be more worried about the price and the kickstand which is not a problem for me but might be for you, especially if your legs are short and you intend on using it on your lap a lot.

Re: New Surface Pro

#385

Post by sixothree »

Joeri wrote: post #330
passive wrote: post #199

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…

Do you actually use it in tablet mode? I always wonder how many surface pro buyers actually use it as anything but a laptop.

Anecdotally I never actually use my surface as a laptop. When it's docked I use keyboard mouse etc. When it's not I use the OSK and touch.

They keyboard cover is nice, but I find it to be an incredibly annoying add-on to what I consider a perfect form-factor.

Re: New Surface Pro

#386

Post by wooter »

MichaelGG wrote: post #337
wooter wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counter-example: I worked in ML research at one of the largest companies in the field (in the billions of predictions per day) and 16GB was more than enough to do anything I would ever do on a laptop/tablet/etc.. Furthermore, I found that solutions which couldn't be successfully worked on with Basically, when the difference between a dev sample and a prod sample is 3+ orders of magnitude, your ability to scale the pr…

I'm using 13GB right now just doing some normal web/backend dev. 4GB to a Linux VM running VScode and some servers. Then add Outlook/VS/Firefox/Chrome and a bunch of other utilities and I'm there. I've only got about 40 open tabs total (few docs, few Azure, few GCP, several reading), across all browsers so I'm not going nuts on that side.

Yea... I never said you couldn't saturate the memory, just that if it saturates 16 GB easily, its a shitty architecture. you're running a 4GB VM to run an IDE inside it... and "40 tabs"? That could be anything between a couple MB and X GB depending on the content. Not really a measure of anything. Just think about how much more efficient Chrome/Google is being than you're 4GB+ VSCode (text editor) set up.

Re: New Surface Pro

#387

Post by goatforce5 »

iaskwhy wrote: post #114
nailer wrote: post #41

One import thing with all Surface laptops that most people don't know: > Support is limited to the country you purchased the device in. Eg: - If you buy an Apple laptop, and need a repair, they'll fix it if it's in warranty, regardless of where you are. - If you buy a Microsoft laptop, and need a warranty repair done in a different country, Microsoft won't help you. I purchased a Surface Book (which I love) in a Micr…

"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…

I bought a MacBook in the UK and some time later when I was in the US they keyboard became faulty.

I walked in to a US Apple store and explained the problem. The Genius person agreed there was a fault and then started tapping away at their computer. He umm'ed and ahh'ed and called over a manager.

At this point I was thinking they were going to reject the warranty repair for some reason, but the manager ended up apologizing that they didn't have any UK-style MacBook replacement keyboards in stock, and they couldn't work out how to order the part in on their US system.

As it happens I had moved to the US, so getting a US keyboard was actually a bonus. I told them I was happy with a US keyboard, and 10 minutes later I was leaving the store with it installed in my MacBook.

Re: New Surface Pro

#388

Post by digi_owl »

chrismorgan wrote: post #31
franciscop wrote: post #8

They are still using the SurfaceDock with the SurfaceConnect Cable: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/accessories/surface-... , which does basically the same as USB-C. In an era when even Apple is rumored (and even if false, still plausible) to be switching to USB-C for the iPhone, Microsoft still tries to force a proprietary connector. Didn't they learn anything from IE? Even if it's good for them for a while,…

From what I’ve seen, USB-C is a disaster . The ports and cables all have to support specific profiles, which are just getting more and more complicated, for specific features to work, and there is no visual indication at all of this. If you got a cheap cable (which people will do), you may suddenly find that maybe charging doesn’t work. Or maybe it melts. Or maybe it doesn’t transfer data. Or maybe using it for a vid…

Pretty much.

What we like to think of as USB-C are actually 3 individual parts that an be swapped around as the OEMs feel like.

there is the 3.1 bus speed, that can be swapped for older and slower speeds.

There is the Power Delivery spec, that can be replaced with older or omitted entirely.

And then there is the C plug itself, that can be replace with an A or B plug when mixed with any of the above.

The only thing that the C plug offer on its own is hte aux pins that can be used to carry Displayport, HDMI or Thunderbolt signals. But again this depends on the OEM.

It is a downright combinatorial explosion, that is just waiting to set fire to something.

Hell, a while back there was a story about someone getting their phone drained because the C port allows bi-directional power delivery. And their powerpack used the C port for both charging itself and charging other devices. This, in combo with a phone that could charge other devices as an emergency option, allowed the two devices to ping pong a charge between them until both were run dry.

Frankly the C plug and related specs are overdesigned, trying to be all things to all people.

Re: New Surface Pro

#389

Post by mgkimsal »

iaskwhy wrote: post #114
nailer wrote: post #41

One import thing with all Surface laptops that most people don't know: > Support is limited to the country you purchased the device in. Eg: - If you buy an Apple laptop, and need a repair, they'll fix it if it's in warranty, regardless of where you are. - If you buy a Microsoft laptop, and need a warranty repair done in a different country, Microsoft won't help you. I purchased a Surface Book (which I love) in a Micr…

"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…

Counter experience (but it was 2009). I bought a used white macbook from craigslist in 2008. I'm from the US, and live in the US.

Was traveling in UK, and laptop keyboard cracked - big hole in the side of the keyboard. Took it to Apple store in London - forget which one - replaced at no cost in about 3 hours.

EDIT: per goatforce5's comment, I had a bit of 'umm' and 'ahh' when I was in London. I thought it would be "out of warranty", but it was the same thing - "not sure we have any parts to fit the US keyboard". They did find one, but that was the potential hold up.

Re: New Surface Pro

#390

Post by nucleardog »

Joeri wrote: post #330
passive wrote: post #199

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…

Do you actually use it in tablet mode? I always wonder how many surface pro buyers actually use it as anything but a laptop.

I use mine about 50/50.

At work it gets hauled around as a notebook for writing notes and annotating documents. If I find I need to do some more serious work, I just stand it on the table and start using the keyboard. When I get back to my desk it gets used as an ancillary laptop.

At home whether it's a laptop or tablet depends on what I'm doing. If I'm just mindlessly clicking through reddit while using it as a remote for Netflix, then I'm definitely just using it bare. If I decide I want to type out a lengthy reply to a Hacker News post or do some programming, I'll shift over to the coffee table with a keyboard.

Definitely see a lot of people that bought them with the best of intentions that don't really make full use of them. I've had my eyes on the "convertible" market for years, though, and I don't regret the purchase at all.

Post reply on HN