*** The Official Microsoft Surface Thread ***

They are both "rigid" but one is slimmer, but he explained hwo you could rest your fingers over the keys and you wouldnt be punching in random stuff, you have to deliberatly push them to ket a key stroke.
The thicker one has bigger keeys, seems to have a longer travel in the keystroke, but is looking a bit thicker.
 
Jono8 said:
£800!? No chance. Well, i certainly wouldnt buy one!
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It'd be priced the same as a premium Ultrabook or Macbook Air so that sounds about right.

Of course it's not for everyone. I'm sure Dell, HP, Asus etc will have cheaper x86 based tablets available.
 
Seems I could be in the minority with how it looks. I think it's pretty poor. Almost exactly what an Apple fan would assume it looks like before seeing it, square and grey. The flip out stand looks like it's just asking to be smashed off or bent too.

That said, it's the functionality many of us have asked for in the tablet format. I'l still in all likelihood end up buying a Pro.
 
So is it pretty likely that Microsoft have the 17W TDP i5s inside the pro? Or perhaps they've underclocked/undervolted it further?
 
anyon said:
So is it pretty likely that Microsoft have the 17W TDP i5s inside the pro? Or perhaps they've underclocked/undervolted it further?
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They just said it was a "generation 3 22nm Ivybridge core i5 with a GPU offering double the 3D throughput of the current i5"
 
forumID said:
Seems I could be in the minority with how it looks. I think it's pretty poor. Almost exactly what an Apple fan would assume it looks like before seeing it, square and grey. The flip out stand looks like it's just asking to be smashed off or bent too.

That said, it's the functionality many of us have asked for in the tablet format. I'l still in all likelihood end up buying a Pro.
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Hmm lets see, iPad, square, *check*....Aluminium brushed grey...*check*
and if you are going to try and "smash" anything about a tablet, yoru gonna break the tablet, hingese on these things are about the LAST thing your able to break on them, i fyou mange to smash it off, im thinking you have yourself a busted tablet and the stand is the least of yrou concerns.
 
bam0 said:
Looks like MS have completely missed the point of tablets and stuffed a PC into a tablet form factor instead. Oh well, pricing will probably decide how well they do. I wonder if people will be able to hack Android on to the RT one.
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No they haven't, this is what the Tablet PC would have evolved to if Apple didn't turn the name to mean a Fisher-Price toy.

I can see these taking off at work, we experimented with Tablet convertible laptops but they were too clunky to use, including my one, only a handful are still being used. iPads didn't have the functionality required outside of web based applications (and lack of flash limited this further, no encryption on Android stopped us trialling them).
 
bam0 said:
Looks like MS have completely missed the point of tablets and stuffed a PC into a tablet form factor instead. Oh well, pricing will probably decide how well they do. I wonder if people will be able to hack Android on to the RT one.
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Looks like someone missed the "Pro" bit in that tablet.

The RT version is built to compete against the current iOS and Android tablets on both spec, size, functionality and (presumably) price. The Pro version is designed to compete against not much really.

Think of the Pro as short for "Producer" as well as professional. For people who need a full power machine and would normally buy a laptop rather than a mobile OS tablet to do their work (say photo editing on the go, word processing and business). The Pro is designed for them, a small but important market.

It could also be a precursor to true all in one devices that will hopefully be becoming more common. One that is portable enough to use as a tablet while on the move but also powerful enough (and with a mouse optimised OS) to be used plugged into a monitor as a "desktop" replacement (like many current laptops, especially in the business world.

I doubt the Pro will sell in huge amounts, especially at the price (i'm expecting £900+ - it is an ultrabook in a smaller chassis*) but it will appeal to a lot of people, especially business.

* Take a look at the "true" "ultrabooks" like the Asus UX21 and 31, Samsung series 9 and Macbook air and see what they sell at. - Oddly most of them don't actually call themselves ultrabooks, it seems to be becoming relegated to the bunch of laptops that didn't actually fit the original specifications...:p
 
Amazing :D.

I see in the not so far future people using tablets to cover the tasks of almost all computing. I can see tablets connecting to a dock at work which would connect it to the screen keyboard and mouse, then when you get home you have a similar dock. These tablets could also take higher end GPU for us gamers.
 
Nah, no need for a higher end GPU, it would get to hot and battery life would be rubbish. The higher end GPU would be built into the dock so you could use it at home when you wanted (see Sony Z series).
 
cu3ed said:
Hmm lets see, iPad, square, *check*....Aluminium brushed grey...*check*
and if you are going to try and "smash" anything about a tablet, yoru gonna break the tablet, hingese on these things are about the LAST thing your able to break on them, i fyou mange to smash it off, im thinking you have yourself a busted tablet and the stand is the least of yrou concerns.
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Don't take my description so literally, I'm sure you could fathom what I meant just by looking at the two devices side by side. The surface just looks like a blocky incredibly dull bit of kit. It looks too serious, too business. Like an IBM laptop next to a Macbook Pro. (I'm not an Apple fan before you jump to that one, I just can't appreciate the aesthetics, unless in real life it turns out to be a different kettle of fish)

Why are you so sure the stand hinges will be the last thing to break? On the contrary they look quite clearly to be the very first things that will break :confused: One of a tablets strong points is the fact they're often very solid bits of kit with no movable parts, less to go wrong and ideal to throw about when travelling. Of course I'm not going to TRY and smash it, just that tablets in their current guise suffer all sorts of accidental drops and falls that I don't believe that stand often will. Unless it's very good at collapsing itself.
 
If Microsoft were to take a similar approach to how they got the XBOX series up there in terms of market penetration then I think this could be a huge success. Namely, sell the hardware at a loss to undercut rivals and get volume to the market. This is needed if ultimately the Metro "market" is to be a success as many developers simply won't bother if the potential volume isn't there to sell there apps into.

At Ultrabook prices the Pro will be a niche product at best.

At iPad prices MS are going to struggle if the quality and quantity of available apps isn't anywhere close.
 
I am very interested in these, depending on price. If its been correctly, ill be replacing my iPad with one.
 
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