The new speed demon in town

At the end of the day I found it difficult to recommend Surface RT because I knew faster hardware was less than a year away. Surface Pro is an easier recommendation simply because you don’t have to wait for the Windows ecosystem to mature, you can already run all of your existing PC apps on the platform and it’s competitive with other Ultrabooks in terms of performance. If you’re shopping for an Ultrabook today and want that tablet experience as well, Surface Pro really is the best and only choice on the market. If however you do a lot of typing in your lap and in weird positions, a conventional notebook is better suited for you. The same goes for if you’re considering a tablet for reasons like all-day battery life or having something that’s super thin and light. Surface Pro is probably the best foot forward towards converging those two usage models, but it’s not perfect for everyone yet.

Click to expand...

AnandTech - Microsoft Surface Pro Review

When you lead with your chin, expect the obvious.

You might get into a lot of weird positions Ray but I'm more of a conventional type of guy, and I'm sure there are plenty of people like me. Battery life, better than the Air and lighter.

Just one more thing Ray, if the Surface Pro isn't ready for the big time yet, what does that say about my iPads at less than one tenth of the speed.

I expect that there are very, very, few people that are like you. But I'll leave that for another day and allow things to develop. This is going to be fun.

A year from now, we'll know for sure. Runaway success, or dismal failure.... or somewhere in between...???

Time will tell.

My fearless prediction....a notch or two above "dismal failure"...., but far from "runaway success"...

BillWindows said:

Battery life, better than the Air and lighter.

Click to expand...

Well, the air has been around since 2008. The Surface pro is only 0.3lbs lighter (2lbs versus 2.3lbs for the 11.6" MBA), but the Surface Pro doesn't have a keyboard either at that weight. So, on the weight front, I don't see this really being a factor. As far as battery life goes, gotta wait to see what real people get from it once it comes out. People that I know with MBA's get 4-5 hours on their MBA's. And this is right in line with Surface Pro.

BillWindows said:

Just one more thing Ray, if the Surface Pro isn't ready for the big time yet, what does that say about my iPads at less than one tenth of the speed.

Click to expand...

Tablets running tablet type apps don't need that kind of speed. I've never heard anybody complain about the speed and performance of their iPad. The Surface Pro is trying to be a full PC in a tablet form factor, so obviously it needs a lot more horsepower.


With respect to typing positions, I've never found a tablet with an attached keyboard to offer the same ease of typing experience as a laptop. Tablets tend to be top heavy, or glass heavy on the tablet side and the keyboards tend to be very light. This is 100% the opposite from a laptop where the base that you are typing on is the heavy portion. I expect to be more comfortable typing on a laptop than the Surface Pro.