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The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

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Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#21

Post by brudgers »

bpatrianakos wrote: post #6

I'm sorry but I'm not buying it. Whenever I hear someone say "I'm not pro X" or "I'm not anti-Y" or "I'm not a Z apologist" it's always followed by a "but" that essentially amounts to "I've put my blinders on and trying my best to sound objective". Now, this could just be me but I really doubt it - the upgraded specs and compatibility don't mean anything to me even as a power user if I'm not able to comfortably work…

I'm sorry but I'm not buying it. Whenever I hear someone say "I hate to bring up Apple" it's always followed by a "but" that essentially amounts to "I've put my blinders on and trying my best to sound objective".

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#22

Post by omaranto »

nwh wrote: post #7
funkiee wrote: post #3

I can't agree with the statement, "It's a laptop!". It's almost impossible to use in your lap comfortably the way you would a laptop.

Everyone uses it like one though; I haven't seen one review even mention the on screen keyboard. Is there even one?

From what I've seen people don't use it as a "lap"top, but rather a "table"top or "desk"top, though. It does have an on screen keyboard.

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#23

Post by InclinedPlane »

bpatrianakos wrote: post #6

I'm sorry but I'm not buying it. Whenever I hear someone say "I'm not pro X" or "I'm not anti-Y" or "I'm not a Z apologist" it's always followed by a "but" that essentially amounts to "I've put my blinders on and trying my best to sound objective". Now, this could just be me but I really doubt it - the upgraded specs and compatibility don't mean anything to me even as a power user if I'm not able to comfortably work…

I think such a device does make sense, but I think the trick is getting it right, and doing the transition well. I suspect that the right choice is to actually morph the UI between a keyboard/mouse-centric mode and a touch-centric mode, trying to satisfy both modes simultaneously with some common interface is probably a mistake.

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#24

Post by nextparadigms »

How exactly? It's just an ultrabook, which aren't much more than a tiny niche market in the PC market right now. And it has a touchscreen does that make it a tablet? A tablet with 4 hours of battery life, that is heavier even than an iPad, that people have already quit for the lighter iPad Mini and Nexus 7's, and that costs twice as much even than the $500 iPad?

The PC is not back, and the falling PC sales during this year will prove it.

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#25

Post by nextparadigms »

cooldeal wrote: post #8

Here's the Anandtech review featured on HN just a few hours ago. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5175190 If that one got flagged off the front page then this one stands no chance. No point in wasting time writing up comments. Save your breath for the extremely negative posts, those will stay on the front page for days.

It did not get flagged off the front page. I watched it myself how it dropped to the bottom of the page. Getting flagged off the page would've meant disappearing from the top early on. Maybe it's too hard to admit people just don't care much about it.

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#26

Post by mrgreenfur »

a2tech wrote: post #12

Arstechnica posted an article this morning about the Surface Pro, and needless to say it is not complimentary: http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/02/microsoft-surface-wit...

The verge review wasn't very complimentary either, though I trust Ars more on this kind of thing: http://www.theverge.com/2013/2/5/3955130/microsoft-surface-p...

What are those TC guys smoking? Could it be delicious PR funded paid placement?

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#27

Post by rationalthink »

bpatrianakos wrote: post #6

I'm sorry but I'm not buying it. Whenever I hear someone say "I'm not pro X" or "I'm not anti-Y" or "I'm not a Z apologist" it's always followed by a "but" that essentially amounts to "I've put my blinders on and trying my best to sound objective". Now, this could just be me but I really doubt it - the upgraded specs and compatibility don't mean anything to me even as a power user if I'm not able to comfortably work…

"I really think the blending of tablets and laptops is a bad idea."

Reason? What's the problem with "touch interfaces plus a keyboard"? Many thought the iPad was a bad idea, but its sales suggest the opposite. After all, an iPad is a "touch interface with a smaller keyboard on the screen", right?

"you've got to take into account the types of gestures people are naturally accustomed to plus the size of touch targets" Were people accustomed to the iPod touch interface when they first used it? No, it was completely new and different at the time of its introduction but younger generations picked it up really quickly because it was intuitive. I still find older generations struggling to use the iPod/iPhone/iPad.

You're making too many assumptions with this post. Go out, give the Microsoft Surface Pro a try, an unbiased try, and then report on your findings. It's much more credible that way.

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#28

Post by nextparadigms »

jiggy2011 wrote: post #10

Device convergence seems like something that sounds great in theory, but based on my observations people seem to enjoy filling their lives with more gadgets rather than less especially when you have devices that can fit one specific use case very well. Example would be games consoles and the amazon kindle, in fact plenty of people will have 2 games consoles to play different kinds of games (e.g wii and xbox). I think…

I agree. Because of the "hybrid" theory, I also thought that's the future initially. But once I started using Windows 8, and thinking about the compromises you have to make with a "hybrid", I realized it's not the best of both worlds, but the worst of both worlds.

With a Surface RT you get no legacy app support, and it's slow. You get support for Atom ones, but they are still too slow for most legacy apps. And they are not very cheap either. At a time that even an iPad, the market leader in tablets, costs $330, these things are going for $600+ with a keyboard. They stand no chance.

As for Surface Pro, you get the speed of an ultrabook (more than a tablet, but less than a regular laptop, or a PC), but 4h of battery life, so not useful as a tablet, while only having a relatively tiny tablet screen, compared to a laptop, so I don't think you can be that productive on it. It's also too thick and heavy for a tablet.

I now think the future really is having a good, no compromises tablet, that should be very affordable, especially in the future. And a good, no compromises laptop with a large screen, that you can use for work, and you don't have to change every year, or even every 2 years.

Re: The Microsoft Surface Pro Proves That The PC Is Back

#30

Post by phren0logy »

InclinedPlane wrote: post #18

I think the aspirations behind the Surface Pro are solid, but everything I've read about the execution leads me to believe that it is a huge failure. That happens. Sometimes you try to push something too early or it requires many iterations to actually get right. I suspect it will take a lot of evolution for some frankensteinian relative of both mobile and desktop operating systems to be good enough to actually serve…

That's pretty much my reaction: Microsoft is being fairly radical, but not radical enough.

What Android, iOS, and OS X have demonstrated is that a lot of people can meet their computing needs without Windows. Microsoft's approach seems doomed to hold on to a huge but ever-shrinking slice of that pie.

Offering something dramatically different might (from my flawed understanding) demand removing some of the older elements of Windows that allow backward compatibility, but prevent deeper changes to how Windows works.

I'd love to see them put out a new-from-the-ground-up OS as a free beta, and get enough things right to generate a lot of buzz around it. They could release it with some limited emulation for Windows, just to ease the transition, the way Apple did with OS X. Of course, they don't have to do this, and anyone considering their new OS would be just as free to consider any OS at that point, but that seems to be happening anyway with mobile devices.

To sum up my rambling, they're an interesting company with a lot of smart people who seem to be shackled to old technology. If they don't move on, much of the world will move on without them, and that would be a shame.

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