Microsoft Surface Book
Discussion
Recent? There only are two versions the original and the new performance base version. The main body is identical between the two. The performance base increases the weight and thickness (boo) but increases graphics performance (yay!), for desktop applications the increased graphics performance isn't noticeable.
Feedback wise the book is heavy and needs to be in slip case or the crap that accumulates in your bag will magically find its way into the screen/keyboard gap. Thicker than a MBP obviously.
Build quality is excellent, battery life good with general tasks I can manage a full day away from a power socket. If you have a use case for the pen and/or touchscreen it's a no brainer vs a MBP otherwise it's really a case of windows device or mac.
There are better non touch windows laptops HP in particular with the EliteBook G3 range and UHD/QHD screens.
Feedback wise the book is heavy and needs to be in slip case or the crap that accumulates in your bag will magically find its way into the screen/keyboard gap. Thicker than a MBP obviously.
Build quality is excellent, battery life good with general tasks I can manage a full day away from a power socket. If you have a use case for the pen and/or touchscreen it's a no brainer vs a MBP otherwise it's really a case of windows device or mac.
There are better non touch windows laptops HP in particular with the EliteBook G3 range and UHD/QHD screens.
I have a work-issued one - pre-preformance base, middling spec (i5/8GB/256GB), I think the lowest model that has the dGPU.
It works well as a laptop - fast, lovely screen, nice keyboard, pretty good battery. Hardly ever get fan noise under normal tasks. GPU is good enough for some lighter hotel-room gaming. BaseQi make a nice micro-SD adaptor that fits perfectly flush in the SD slot for some extra storage. I was given a Surface Dock for home that works well too.
What's not so good - a little on the heavy side, and a lot of that weight is in the screen. The screen doesn't go that far back, probably because it would tip over if it was any further. On the sofa on my legs, it can feel a bit "tippy" (although better than a Surface Pro with the kickstand). Headphone jack is at top-right of the screen which is a little annoying. When you detach the screen, it has no ports other than headphone and power, no USB. And (common to all high-res screens) when it's docked and I'm using a 1440p monitor you get weird scaling issues when you move things between screens.
I find I hardly ever detach the screen. Most of the battery is in the keyboard part so without it you struggle to get more than a couple of hours with just the screen - plus as there's no kickstand you have to hold it or keep it flat on the table. My wife has a SP3 and that's a much better device if you're planning to use the pen a lot (handwriting straight into Onenote for meetings, etc) or as an entertainment device - it fits well on a plane tray table for watching movies.
So if the pen/tablet bit appeals to you, I think the Pro is a much better device, and the current type covers actually aren't bad to type on. As a laptop it's fine but IMO there are better devices if you don't need touch.
It works well as a laptop - fast, lovely screen, nice keyboard, pretty good battery. Hardly ever get fan noise under normal tasks. GPU is good enough for some lighter hotel-room gaming. BaseQi make a nice micro-SD adaptor that fits perfectly flush in the SD slot for some extra storage. I was given a Surface Dock for home that works well too.
What's not so good - a little on the heavy side, and a lot of that weight is in the screen. The screen doesn't go that far back, probably because it would tip over if it was any further. On the sofa on my legs, it can feel a bit "tippy" (although better than a Surface Pro with the kickstand). Headphone jack is at top-right of the screen which is a little annoying. When you detach the screen, it has no ports other than headphone and power, no USB. And (common to all high-res screens) when it's docked and I'm using a 1440p monitor you get weird scaling issues when you move things between screens.
I find I hardly ever detach the screen. Most of the battery is in the keyboard part so without it you struggle to get more than a couple of hours with just the screen - plus as there's no kickstand you have to hold it or keep it flat on the table. My wife has a SP3 and that's a much better device if you're planning to use the pen a lot (handwriting straight into Onenote for meetings, etc) or as an entertainment device - it fits well on a plane tray table for watching movies.
So if the pen/tablet bit appeals to you, I think the Pro is a much better device, and the current type covers actually aren't bad to type on. As a laptop it's fine but IMO there are better devices if you don't need touch.
We had the Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book on trial at work a few months ago and I was really disappointed with the Surface Book - despite almost constant firmware updates it just didn't seem to work all that well. eg. Undock it from the keyboard and it would get confused whether to put the on-screen keyboard up or not etc. If it was just used as a laptop then it worked okay, but was quite heavy and unwieldy to hold and the trackpad was absolutely terrible. I felt the Dell Ultrabooks we currently use were far better resolved. Was also disappointed they don't have 4G capability as that would be useful for us.
I was far more impressed with the Surface Pro 4, it seemed to have all the niggles sorted and just worked nicely and the add-on keyboard was okay too (including the trackpad). Wouldn't mind one of those for home use.
If I had to have the extra graphics capability I'd wait for version 2 or 3 of the Book, otherwise I'd get the Surface Pro 4 (or new one when that comes out).
I was far more impressed with the Surface Pro 4, it seemed to have all the niggles sorted and just worked nicely and the add-on keyboard was okay too (including the trackpad). Wouldn't mind one of those for home use.
If I had to have the extra graphics capability I'd wait for version 2 or 3 of the Book, otherwise I'd get the Surface Pro 4 (or new one when that comes out).
Edited by darthdicky on Thursday 2nd March 22:32
I bought a surface book after owning a SP3 - I couldn't get on with the Surface Pro's flappy keyboard. The last straw was when I couldn't get it sat properly on a airplane table and it kept falling over.
The Surface Book is basically Microsoft's love letter to its own operating system. The keyboard is superb, battery life is excellent, and it's pretty fast for what 80% of the population do on it (facebook and office).
The Surface Book is basically Microsoft's love letter to its own operating system. The keyboard is superb, battery life is excellent, and it's pretty fast for what 80% of the population do on it (facebook and office).
devnull said:
I bought a surface book after owning a SP3 - I couldn't get on with the Surface Pro's flappy keyboard. The last straw was when I couldn't get it sat properly on a airplane table and it kept falling over.
The Surface Book is basically Microsoft's love letter to its own operating system. The keyboard is superb, battery life is excellent, and it's pretty fast for what 80% of the population do on it (facebook and office).
And then they designed it so that it looks and feels like it's made out of recycled egg boxes and, the biggest sin of all time in computerdom, such that the feckin lid doesn't sit flush with the base at the rear when closed. The Surface Book is basically Microsoft's love letter to its own operating system. The keyboard is superb, battery life is excellent, and it's pretty fast for what 80% of the population do on it (facebook and office).
Great for storing your biro in (though most owners will have a shirt pocket for that) or concealing the half sandwich you left for lunch but wanted to save for later. It looks like one of those safety hinges schools put on their doors to stop kids trapping their fingers in!
You don't even need a dose of OCD to realise that is the s
ttiest piece of design ever to be seen. Jony Ive must be breathing great sighs of relief in-between bouts of pissing his pants laughing, as if they'd sorted that hinge properly (and found some non-egg box materials) it would have seriously hurt Apple IMO as they are very good machines (if pricey - come on MS, Dell use nicer materials and can charge nearly half the amount. You can't have it both ways).Gassing Station | Computers, Gadgets & Stuff | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff