Microsoft Surface Pro Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on February 5, 2013 9:00 PM ESTTouch and Type Covers
Surface Pro features the same magnetic dock connector that Surface RT does. Unlike similar hybrid or convertible designs that came before it, Microsoft didn’t make the mistake of requiring a different set of docks for the Pro. All existing Touch and Type covers work perfectly with Surface Pro. Microsoft maintains that we will see other accessories that use this custom dock connector, even from third parties.
I already shared my thoughts on both covers in our Surface RT review so I won’t rehash all of that here. In short, the Touch Cover is probably one of the best tablet display covers I’ve ever used. It adds a marginal thickness (~3.3mm) to the tablet, but in exchange for the slight inconvenience you get a cover that you never have to remove and a keyboard that, albeit not perfect, is at least better than typing on a glass touchscreen.
The Type Cover is a bit thicker than the Touch Cover (~5mm) but you get real keys, which does wonders for improving the typing experience.
Both covers feature integrated trackpads, and neither is particularly great. Reaching out and touching the screen is a far better experience than trying to use the integrated trackpad for anything serious. Microsoft also offers a Surface styled wedge mouse, but I feel like having to carry around something else that’s not attached to Surface detracts from the whole tablet experience.
The more productivity focused nature of Surface Pro almost makes you want to use the Type Cover exclusively with the tablet though, whereas I felt the Touch Cover was the right pairing for Surface RT. You can obviously use either with Pro. As a writer I’m more likely to gravitate towards the Type Cover given its superior typing experience.
I’m beginning to wonder if there might be a fair amount of manufacturing variance between Touch Covers. If you remember back to my Surface RT review I mentioned that the Type Cover seemed to miss keystrokes. With my Surface Pro review unit Microsoft sent another Type Cover. This one seemed to miss fewer keystrokes than the original Type Cover I tested with. I originally surmised that missed keystrokes with the Type Cover might have been a performance issue, but with a full 17W Ivy Bridge under the hood of Surface Pro I don’t think that’s the case. Although Microsoft spent a great deal of time focusing on the build quality of Surface, I wonder if the same didn’t necessarily apply to the Type Cover.
Although the added thickness of the covers didn’t really bother me with Surface RT, I have to admit it did with Surface Pro. It’s all about perspective since the Surface Pro + Touch Cover is still thinner than most notebooks, but for a tablet it definitely doesn’t help Surface Pro feel any more svelte.
I wouldn’t give up either cover and I used Surface Pro with one attached at all times, this is just another plea for a thinner design - something I’m sure we’ll get with Surface 2.
This brings me to my next point, which is about the lack of any keyboard bundles with Surface Pro. Microsoft charges a hefty premium for both of its covers. Touch Cover will set you back $119 while Type Cover is $129. While I can logically justify the price tag of Surface Pro, you really need to add $120 - $130 on top of that because it doesn’t come with a physical keyboard of any type. Given the more content creation lean of Surface Pro, I’d like to see the $899 or $999 include a Type Cover. I understand that heavily eats into margins of a device that’s likely already pushing the limits given that it’s really at the forefront of a brand new tooling and manufacturing process for Microsoft, but it really has to be done. Perhaps once economies of scale kick in Microsoft might look into tossing in a free Type Cover.
Earlier I spoke about the issues with the kickstand while using Surface RT in your lap and how many of those same complaints apply to Surface Pro. The same is really true for the keyboard covers. While the kickstand + keyboard cover combination does a great job approximating a notebook when used on a desk, in your lap it’s a different story. The combination works, but it’s obviously not as rigid as a notebook. And you’re pretty much hopeless if you’re sitting in a funny position. Whereas you could cross your legs and still use a notebook in your lap, doing so with Surface Pro with kickstand and keyboard cover is far less manageable. And good luck trying to use Surface Pro as a notebook in your lap if both of your legs are crossed. The lack of rigidity in the connection between the keyboard and display combined with the fixed position kickstand can create some awkwardness. It’s all workable, but it becomes a lesser experience compared to a notebook. This is the Surface tradeoff.
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netmann - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
Nice review Anand! It seems there is a lot of interest on this device. If you still have the unit can you please do a quick tear-down of the unit with pictures showing the cooling fans, SSD, memory, etc?Wolfpup - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
Fantastic review!Random thought I've had about Surface since it was unveiled...doesn't a keyboard dock like what HP includes with their Envy x2 make more sense than these touch/type covers?
I mean I get that some people use covers anyway, and leave them on (I don't on my iPad 2), and so you're sort of getting a keyboard always there for "free" for those people.
But at least judging by pictures, the touch and even type covers appear to be terrible keyboards, and look really awkward. The kickstand is nifty, I guess, but HP's Envy x2 (and some others) are basically giving you a normal notebook keyboard you plug it into, and it becomes almost indistinguishable from a notebook. That gives you a better keyboard, unlimited angles to put the screen at, and also makes it easier to sit it on your lap and type, if need be.
I haven't used either type of device yet, but from pictures it sure seems like a dock like that would be preferable to a type cover/pad?
This really is an interesting product though...I thought Apple needed to do this 4 years ago, like in place of what the iPad turned out to be, I was hoping it would be a real OS X PC running on Atom with an optional touch interface-basically exactly what Windows 8 ended up being.
I know these will get massively better even later this year with Haswell (or heck, Tegra 4), but I'm still so tempted both by Surface Pro and that Envy x2... (wish that used AMD's Z60 instead of Atom though). Hmm...an additional battery in a keyboard dock could double Surface Pro's battery life too...
And yeah, to me it seems like this ought to come with a type cover. I can understand and accept the price-this is an actual PC running hardware that runs circles around an iPad that's only marginally cheaper-but somehow it just seems like these things should be including keyboards.
TidalWaveOne - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
"f 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."There is at least one other device for that ultrabook/tablet experience... the Dell XPS 12. I have one on order... there are also more, like the Lenovo Yoga.
Death666Angel - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
Different designs in my opinion. The Dell has the burden of always carrying around that keyboard, which means you have a 1.5kg tablet. The CPU, RAM and storage options look pretty good on that. But it lacks a digitizer which might or might not be a huge deal for you. Same thing with the Yoga. Very big (13.3"), low-ish resolution (900p), always a keyboard attatched, no active digitizer. Again, these things might be important enough to make the devices pretty much distinct categories. Or you just want "laptop-ish, touch screen, Core CPU" then they are all comparable. :DThe closest things to the Surface Pro in my mind are:
- Lenovo Helix: 11.6", 1080p, keyboard dock, active digitizer, 3G
- Samsung Ativ PC Pro: 11.6", 1080p, keyboard dock without battery, active digitizer, 3G
With the Lenovo being my dream device, because of the battery built into the keyboard dock mostly. But the dock design is fairly cool, too. :D
travelster - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
Almost two years ago I picked up an ASUS EP121 10 inch Tablet. It came with an i5 processor and Windows 7. I now have Windows 8 on it. Win 7 and 8 runs extremely well, as does Word, MS Project, VMWare, RDP, and all other apps I can run on Windows desktops and laptops. I.e. The Surface Pro's grand vision of a full-service Windows tablet was old news even before long it was released!Glenn Rogers
DBGallery Product Manager
sn_85 - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
After playing around with this at the Microsoft Store today I came away feel like it was a mixed bag. I feel the build quality is really impressive and I have no qualms about the unusual nature of it's kickstand and keyboard covers. It just feels like a wonderfully solid design that takes on a more business like approach with it's VaporMg and straight line design. Honestly I just wish it came in the form factor of the Surface RT because what a difference a half pound and 3.5mm can really make. The thick form factor and weight just make it much more cumbersome to hold and I wouldn't see myself holding this thing in one for two long at all. Before anyone calls me a weight weenie you really just have to hold it in person and compare the Pro the RT before make a statement, it's a pretty significant difference. I hope the next iteration takes on a diet and comes closer to the form factor of the Surface RT because it still retains the impressive build quality without all the thickness and weight.Battery of course is another area of concern. If this thing got closer to 6-7 hours like some of the longer lasting Ultrabooks it would be a real winner IMO.
The price I feel is fine but the keyboard covers need to be included in the price. I know it's a unique design but there is no reason for MSFT to be nickel and diming here, especially in the case of the Pro. Fact is anyone looking at this device will buy either one of the Touch or Typecovers but to just spend another $120-$130 on it is excessive.
Ultimately I think this device is what most reviews say, you can see the tremendous potential and it is impressive in it's own right. It just misses on a few key things that keep it from being a product that is universally recommended as opposed to what it is right now where you need to know what you're getting into. I feel just like Anand on this, the Surface Pro 2 is simply going to be an awesome product. One that I'd buy on launch day. That being said I still might get this Surface Pro until that time comes.
sirnumbskull@gmail.com - Friday, February 8, 2013 - link
Can you verify whether or not the Surface Pro has Widi support?Kornfeld - Friday, February 8, 2013 - link
WiDi is an Intel technology that requires, among other things, supported Intel WiFi adapters. Since Surface Pro uses a Marvell WiFi adapter, it cannot possibly use WiDi.The real question is whether it will support Miracast which is the larger spec being adopted by the WiFi alliance. I'm not sure if that specific adapter supports Miracast. I found this press release, but I'm not sure about the part numbers: http://www.marvell.com/company/news/pressDetail.do...
The bigger problem with Miracast right now is that there doesn't seem to be any connection software available for Windows. So, I'm sitting around with a Yoga that has a Miracast supported WiFi adapter and I have the latest Netgear device that supports WiDi and Miracast, but no application that can be used to connect to the device.
toyotabedzrock - Friday, February 8, 2013 - link
Looking at the pictures it becomes apparent that they did not pay enough attention to small details. The random 5 pin connector looks ripe for problems. And sticks out like a soar thumb.The display resolution is too low on both models. And there is no excuse for the small batteries.
It seems as if the execs at these PC companies eyes are failing them if they have not noticed these things.
redSn0w - Friday, February 8, 2013 - link
Just wondering if Microsoft could have gotten better battery life by using a Core i3 or even some pentium/celeron derivative. The way i see it, the 3 main drawbacks are the price, battery life and thickness/weight of device. So, maybe using one of the aforementioned processors for the first generation product would have helped. And, they could have moved to Core i5 when Haswell started shipping.I seriously doubt that any power user could replace their notebook/desktop with a Surface pro unless you could dock it to a bigger screen and a proper keyboard. As for the regular users i don't think too many of them would even be interested in a product like this when an iPad works for them.
Anyways, i'm still going to go check it out tomorrow but most likely i'll wait for the next generation product (if it's ever released).