Topic: Microsoft Surface Pro/Windows RT Review

[ober]

I'm gonna go ahead and rate this fucker up front just to get it out of the way:

2/10

Cons:
1) Setup was painful.  Too many questions, too many options, so much marketing BS and a human verification question that a) HOW THE FUCK IS A NON-HUMAN SETTING UP A TABLET? and b) YOU CANNOT PROVIDE THE ANSWER TO THE HUMAN VERIFICATION QUESTION IN LANDSCAPE MODE... YOU LITERALLY CANNOT.  You have to switch the orientation to see the field with the keyboard up.

2) The keyboard rarely appears when you need it to.  Most of the time when you click in a place to type you still have to go search for the keyboard and open it to type.

3) I searched for 20 minutes for the sounds settings in the control panel to turn off the damn key clicking noise.  I finally gave up and searched the web.  There was ANOTHER way to get to DIFFERENT settings that allowed me to turn that stupid shit off.  YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE 2 FUCKING SPOTS FOR SETTINGS YOU GODDAMN DIPSHITS!

4) I can't install SHIT on this motherfucker.  Stuck with IE, couldn't install another browser, couldn't find the handful of apps I have on my iPad that I wanted on here.

5) Everything takes for goddamn-ever.  Starting it for the first time AFTER the debacle noted above STILL took like 5-6 minutes for it to 'setup' the tablet.  Then I made the mistake of doing a windows update... 18 updates and 1.5 hours later (and it was in startup mode 90% of that time), it was finally done and usable again.

6) The touchscreen itself seems to be off.  Like I click on something and it shows me where I supposedly clicked and it wasn't where I actually clicked so I find myself clicking 2 or 3 times to hit something.

7) The screen is not very sharp.  Maybe half as crisp as the iPad.

8) Not very snappy.  It seemed sluggish at times.

9) Is there an option to not force me enter my password everytime it times out?

10) The power connector.  WHAT THE FUCK is this thing??

I'll stop there.  And that's only after playing with it for 30-45 min.


Pros:

1) I like the weather app.

That is all.


NOTE: This was not a personal purchase.  My boss told me to go buy an iPad and a Surface to go to a trade show next week.  Apparently I'm supposed to keep them 'safe' at my house when not in use, so they're basically mine, but I would not have bought this piece of shit otherwise.

The other one I got was an iPad 4, but I've already reviewed that.

[Jake]

well that is a fucking bummer I was hoping to get this eventually.... thanks for the review ober.

[Mike]

Is that the weird ass looking thing that is constantly being pimped on TV shows?

[Betazep]

We got several in at work.  They are sitting in drawers now. 

[ober]

well that is a fucking bummer I was hoping to get this eventually.... thanks for the review ober.

Save yourself the pain.  Get an iPad/Android.

[Perspective]

Damn, they actually looked really nice. I liked the live tiles idea and I liked the keyboard/cover. Sucks for MS, they've made so many missteps lately I'm not sure how long that bankroll of theirs will hold them up.

[ober]

I'm at soccer practice and talked to my old neighbor. He has a windows 8 tablet and said he has nothing bad to say about it but it is a high end model and in talking to him it seems like there are many differences between windows RT and Windows 8.

So I guess if you are willing to spend more you can buy a better experience?

[KnuckleBuckett]

Yes.  I have been keeping my ear to the ground on the MS tablets.  The cheap one (RT) is a POS and the high end Pro is pretty great except some folks don't like how it lap mounts.  Oh and the nicer keyboard is worth the upgrade.  That said everyone seems to think it should have come with the keyboard for free.  Not sure why, I don't think the Galaxy or iPad do. 

Also like most laptops and tablets everyone wants better battery life.  The Pro compares loosely with an ultrabook for battery time.

Considering this is their first try at the market MS performed better than I had expected.

IMO the non-ARM laptop and tablet world is in for a big change as Intel's Haswell line launches and matures. 

[kermi3]

Just read about Haswell for the first time today.  Seems like it'll be an interesting step

[ober]

Ok, so my problem then comes down to... if you want a fucking laptop, get a laptop.  A full windows 8 'tablet' with a keyboard is nothing more than a laptop with a touch screen.... and those have been out for a while.  And even the guy I talked to last night said that while it's great in a pinch, he can only really work on it for about an hour before he's itching to get back to bigger screens and a normal machine.

So I guess my point is, if you need that much power in a tablet, just call it what it is.  It's an ultrabook or a convertible laptop.  It's not a tablet.  Or saying it another way, iPad and MS Surface Windows 8 are different classes of devices, IMHO.  Maybe they should not be compared.

[KnuckleBuckett]

But it is a tablet.  Albeit a thick-ish one it is a tablet.

It is touch capable, does not require external input devices, and in a small form factor.  Computing power is through the roof versus any other tablet, but still way more tablet than ultrabook.

Don't ya think?

[ober]

It seems like everyone that I know that wants one wants a keyboard with it.  And they want to be able to do pretty much everything you can do with a normal PC.  Those 2 things take it out of the realm of a tablet for me.  To me, a tablet is more or less a consumption device with some basic productivity apps.  I don't expect my tablet to do EVERYTHING my desktop/laptop can do.  I wouldn't want to work strictly on it because the screen is too small and it cannot function like a full computer.  I think most people buying a MS Surface are expecting a full PC experience, which removes it from the tablet genre, IMO.

[KnuckleBuckett]

That is silly.  It is more powerful than its competitors so you change the rules of engagement for just the MS device?  Not buying that logic yet.