Surface Pro: too late, not enough

in hardware on 2014-05-22 11:47 (#3MN)

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols has just published his review of the new Surface Pro 3 tablet by Microsoft. It's about an 800 word article, but it can be summed up with one word: "Meh." SJVN concludes, " Too little hardware, too late, for too much money . " From the article:

Microsoft would argue they're not going after the low-end market. Microsoft's avowed target audience are the people today who buy a MacBook Air and the iPad. Really? Microsoft thinks that the Surface Pro 3 is going to persuade the Apple faithful to move to Windows 8.1? Come on! If there's any tech audience that's more faithful to their brand than Apple true-believers, I don't know who they are - and I spend most of my time hanging out with the Linux crew. For that matter, it seems to me that Microsoft isn't that clear on their target audience. Microsoft Corporate Vice President of Surface Computing Panos Panay told Mary Jo Foley that they're still calling the Surface Pro 3 a tablet even though "tablets have not landed" and not really hitting the productivity sweet spot.

So what's the deal? Any Surface Pros in your future? Does Microsoft have a chance? Or is this just one more data point in the graph that shows Microsoft has jumped the shark ? Or heck, is the next version of the Surface Pro going to be the one that sweeps consumers off their feet? Grab your ipads and let us know ...

6 comments

Windows 8 Kills Another Product Line (Score: 1, Insightful)

by Anonymous Coward on 2014-05-22 13:14 (#1VF)

It's working its hardest to kill off Windows PCs, and phones, and now tablet hybrids.

Seriously, I'm using Win8 right now and I still hate it. First I thought that the pervasive ugliness was because I had installed ClassicShell and somehow Explorer had reverted to something basic.

But no, even on a virgin installation of Win8 all the windows are as primitive and ugly as possible. They resemble nothing so much as the Windows 1.x I played with years ago, squared corners with no style at all, as if someone were assigned to write a GUI using only Turtle Basic. Just ugly ugly design as far as the eye can see, and that's WITHOUT getting into the horror of the start screen.

Re: Windows 8 Kills Another Product Line (Score: 2, Interesting)

by zafiro17@pipedot.org on 2014-05-22 13:43 (#1VH)

I've never used Win 8.1, and am trying hard to keep it that way. But I thought people mostly agreed the tablet was the one form factor for which that terrible interface actually made sense?

Re: Windows 8 Kills Another Product Line (Score: 1)

by Anonymous Coward on 2014-05-22 13:49 (#1VK)

Nah, as far as I know people say it works well on Windows Phone, so-so on tablets, and somewhat usable on touchscreen laptops. Of course there are a few champions (shills?) who seem to love it.

FYI ClassicShell et al. don't really cure everything (ugly windows, random "charms" popups), so keep on avoiding it if you can.

Re: Windows 8 Kills Another Product Line (Score: 1, Informative)

by Anonymous Coward on 2014-05-22 15:53 (#1VQ)

I'm pretty sure you can turn of the charms, but they call it "active corners" or something else that isn't clear. It's been a while since I used it, though.

Windows Tablets/Phones are irrelevant. (Score: 1)

by entropy@pipedot.org on 2014-05-22 14:18 (#1VM)

It's a completely irrelevant product in the marketplace. Some people might know "that guy" that had a windows phone, then ditched it for something useful. The Microsoft marketing machine(which is amazing) spins it as "if you just give it a chance" or "a superior product that's unappreciated" and other such nonsense..but we all really know the truth: Phones/Tablets are either Android or Apple.

Even the formerly hard core Microsoft people I know think of MS tablets/phones/windows8 as a joke... And these are the folks that have been telling me everything Microsoft does is gold for years... Now they are installing Windows 7 professional(aka Windows XP v2) and can't come up with any defense for any of the windows 8 nonsense.

The only good thing I can say about windows 8.x is it's doing more to damage Microsoft's desktop monopoly than anything a competitor could ever do. As to using it? It's banned from every company I have exposure to so I likely won't have more than a token exposure to it for years to come.

SP3 (Score: 1)

by tempest@pipedot.org on 2014-05-22 14:30 (#1VN)

For a higher end device with 9 hours battery life it's interesting. Personally I can't think of any application needing an i7 that better done on a laptop. At this point (and I'm find this view increasingly common even among regular people) I only use Microsoft products if I have to.