The Surface 3 Review
by Brett Howse on May 4, 2015 9:00 AM ESTWi-Fi Performance
For networking, the Surface 3 features the same Marvell AVASTAR 802.11ac network adapter as its big brother. I have seen a lot of the firmware updates for Surface Pro 3 over the last year being network related, so hopefully they have all of the bugs out of it by now. During my time with the Surface 3, I did not have any issues with it. It is a standard 2x2:2 setup, and the top of the Surface 3 has a plastic section to act as a RF window.
The average speed during our TCP test was just about 350 Mbps, which is not too bad but well off of the Broadcom devices, which can see over 500 Mbps.
Speakers
The Surface 3 features to forward facing speakers hidden in the display bezel. It makes for a nice look, and having the speakers facing you helps a lot with stereo and should help with the overall sound quality too.
The Surface 3 is not especially loud, and the frequency response is about what you would expect for a small device with no room for proper speakers. There is almost no sound below 150 Hz, and around 15 kHz the sound drops away. Maximum volume I observed while playing music was 76 dB(A).
Camera
This tablet has two cameras, with the rear camera being an auto-focus 8 MP unit, and the front facing camera is actually a decent camera as well, with 2304 x 1536 resolution shots. The one quirk with the front facing camera though is that it really works best when the kickstand is in the first position, and because this is not a laptop with an adjustable hinge, you will always be limited to where it points.
The rear camera though is surprisingly good, even in low light. I am still not a fan of using a tablet to take pictures, but if you have to, this one will please you.
It will work in a pinch, but I will stick to my smartphone when I can.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
265 Comments
View All Comments
SpartanJet - Monday, May 4, 2015 - link
I initially wasn't going to buy but if you purchase through the Microsoft store you can get a 10% .edu discount and also use the 5% Microsoft discount you get by texting. My total came out to be ~$675 which included the 4/128, Type cover, pen, and tax.RBFL - Monday, May 4, 2015 - link
Did you look at the Thinkpad 10, when Lenovo has one its sales you can get the 4/128 with a 'real' keyboard for about $550. Admittedly one gen behind this on atom but not bad and seems to aim at quite a similar usage.RafaelHerschel - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
I use MS Office plus iTunes and Kindle on a cheap Windows tablet from Acer with 2GB ram plus a 32GB ssd and everything runs just fine. I specifically wanted a 2GB tablet for testing purposes and I'm impressed how well it works.jabber - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
I think some folks haven't realised that you DON'T have to carry around all your software and data ALL the time. Some of us work pretty light. My work laptop has hardly any user data on it at all. It all goes up the cloud. Software wise it has Office 2013, Firefox/Chrome and a couple of other bits and bobs and that's it. All sits on around 25GB on a 120GB SSD. Folks are weighing themselves down far too much. Take a serious look at what you really need/use.RafaelHerschel - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
True. I had to make the transition as well. I used to fill up hard drives with clutter. I changed my attitude for a variety of reasons. One of those reasons is that wanted to work more efficient.On my desktop games take up space, but games can be removed and later re-installed from Steam or another similar service.
Michael Bay - Wednesday, May 6, 2015 - link
Have you ever used at least a baytrail tablet before spewing such nonsense?hans_ober - Monday, May 4, 2015 - link
The charge times are horrible. They should have added the Surface charging port + micro usb charge support (for emergencies). Or just used USB C.Doroga - Monday, May 4, 2015 - link
Would be a great thing to fix barrel distortion in product photos.Very easy to do it in full auto with modern software
duploxxx - Monday, May 4, 2015 - link
The GPU in the Surface 3 is really not enough to play most games, and even on our value settings, the Surface 3 is not a great experience for DOTA 2. The higher TDP of Core M lets it do ok in this test, but overall the Surface 3 is a long way back of even the Surface Pro 3 Core i3.poor Intel, 2015 and still not able to provide a gpu decent to play a game, guess what Intel look at the market, all kids use tablets these days to play games, none will ask for a x86 based one...unless they have stupid parents still just going for the jingle. but then again the market of mobile games is flood by ARM based games, way to late for mobile windows based things..
Jon Tseng - Tuesday, May 5, 2015 - link
Bay Trail runs Skyrim and Far Cry 3 fine. Cherry Trail with 4x the EUs should have no problem.I guess it comes down to your definition of "most games"...