The Surface Pro 3 seems an awesome device for students. Being able to read PDF textbooks, hand-write notes while using diagram/drawing tools, browse the internet, follow along with (and write on/annotate) lecture slides, word processing with a physical keyboard, writing on PDF practice exams, etc, all in a single device is extremely convenient.
Surface Pro 3 Review
41–50 of 77 posts
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#42I was jhust on an airplane trip and watced with some amusement my aisle-mate fumbling with a new surface pro. When first using it on his lap, the screen kept flopping around as the kickstand slid off his legs--he eventually used the back of the seat in front of him to prop it up a bit. Then when the tray came down, he clearly could not get a comfortable typing angle. At some point, he dispensed with the keyboad and u…
I was using a laptop on a plane one time and the person in front of me put their seat back without even turning around to see what was going on. It cracked the screen hinge, but luckily everything still worked. So now I'll never bring anything but a tablet on the plane.
You just have to be careful you don't wedge your screen up into where the tray table folds up into.
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#43Just got mine yesterday (typing on it for this post). There are some problems on it I wasn't expecting. - Drawing apps like Fresh Paint don't work sometimes when on split screen. By doesn't work, I mean it won't recognize the pen on start up. I would have to full screen the app, use the pen, then I can use the pen on split screen. - Apps aren't adjusted to split screens correctly. The resizing of the apps gets rid of…
Genuinely wondering, why Chrome? IE11 has a really awesome touch UX, in the metro version, IMO. Did you try it and dismiss it, or not even consider it given IE's track record?
Ecosystem traps people if I want to be cynical. I do everything on Chrome from personal to work, all my favorites/bookmarks are synced through all my hardware.
Even if there was a sync option for IE to Chrome accounts this is just extra effort. You put too many steps in front of me I'm just not gonna do it (yes, I'm lazy, but UX should consider the lazy).
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#44Just got mine yesterday (typing on it for this post). There are some problems on it I wasn't expecting. - Drawing apps like Fresh Paint don't work sometimes when on split screen. By doesn't work, I mean it won't recognize the pen on start up. I would have to full screen the app, use the pen, then I can use the pen on split screen. - Apps aren't adjusted to split screens correctly. The resizing of the apps gets rid of…
Try Firefox. I'm surprised almost no Surface Pro user recommends it, but I've found it very friendly with HiDPI and touch screen. Except for zoom, stepped reflow instead of continuous scale; although I like it like that).
I plan on dl'ing FireFox, mostly because Chrome doesn't support download helper extension (super helpful since machines run super hot streaming video).
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#45Just a note: I too have noticed that my trackpad (on my HP envy laptop) will sometimes lose 2-finger scrolling or any multitouch support, usually it's just in chrome but sometimes it'll be for eveything. I have a touchscreen as well so it's not as big a deal but often the only way I've found to fix the problem is to restart the machine.
I'm assuming its a driver problem possibly with symantic. I'm dreading calling HP support about it because the first 4 or five layers seem to be ignorant knowledge-base-only-readers. (They really are only about as effective as google. They'll recognize a keyword and use that as the basis for their response. No matter how insignificant that one word is.)
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#46The Surface Pro 3 seems an awesome device for students. Being able to read PDF textbooks, hand-write notes while using diagram/drawing tools, browse the internet, follow along with (and write on/annotate) lecture slides, word processing with a physical keyboard, writing on PDF practice exams, etc, all in a single device is extremely convenient.
I agree that a device which can do all these is an excellent choice for students. As an engineering student, I used all of the above versatility on my HP TX2510US, and dealt with the burns that the poor heat management gave me :-)
I haven't played with the SP3, but I'm sure there are a multitude of other options as well which are well-suited to student use.
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#47Just a note: I too have noticed that my trackpad (on my HP envy laptop) will sometimes lose 2-finger scrolling or any multitouch support, usually it's just in chrome but sometimes it'll be for eveything. I have a touchscreen as well so it's not as big a deal but often the only way I've found to fix the problem is to restart the machine. I'm assuming its a driver problem possibly with symantic. I'm dreading calling HP…
This happened on my Zenbook prime as well. You need to restart the synaptics driver, which was very annoying.
I got rid of it and just went with a Macbook Air. It's just better in so many ways.
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#48Just a note: I too have noticed that my trackpad (on my HP envy laptop) will sometimes lose 2-finger scrolling or any multitouch support, usually it's just in chrome but sometimes it'll be for eveything. I have a touchscreen as well so it's not as big a deal but often the only way I've found to fix the problem is to restart the machine. I'm assuming its a driver problem possibly with symantic. I'm dreading calling HP…
This happened on my Zenbook prime as well. You need to restart the synaptics driver, which was very annoying. I got rid of it and just went with a Macbook Air. It's just better in so many ways.
right except that my laptop costed ~$700 and had a dedicated graphics card and touchscreen while the macbook has nothing at that price point.
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#49The Surface Pro 3 seems an awesome device for students. Being able to read PDF textbooks, hand-write notes while using diagram/drawing tools, browse the internet, follow along with (and write on/annotate) lecture slides, word processing with a physical keyboard, writing on PDF practice exams, etc, all in a single device is extremely convenient.
I have been using the SP1 as a student for over a year now and love it. I print all PDF hand-outs to OneNote and annotate them with notes from class. Everything is indexed so I can search across 5 quarters worth of notes in an instant and access them from any device.
I'm in business school (don't hate :) ) so most of our content is in the form of HBS case studies and diagramming and drawing graphs/charts is pretty common.
I see a lot of people using Notability on iPads. If I could get a Wacom or NTrig active stylus on an iPad, that would be sweet, but alas, not possible.
Re: Surface Pro 3 Review
#50Just got mine yesterday (typing on it for this post). There are some problems on it I wasn't expecting. - Drawing apps like Fresh Paint don't work sometimes when on split screen. By doesn't work, I mean it won't recognize the pen on start up. I would have to full screen the app, use the pen, then I can use the pen on split screen. - Apps aren't adjusted to split screens correctly. The resizing of the apps gets rid of…
Looking at Microsoft's track record, if Apple could execute on a tablet stylus with their traditional level of excellence, they could kill! If I could have a combination of a small Macbook and an iPad mini which could also act like a decent "mini Graphire," this would be simply awesome! They could sell tons of these to the angsty teenage journalling set. It would also be a tremendous boon to designers and game and web developers.
It wouldn't be easy to do, however. As the hardware manufacturer and OS producer, they are in a unique position to be able to do it, however.