Surface Pro Spec

[Hard-Drive]

To cut a long story short, I want a device for running Zwift (cycling app with a smart trainer) with the ability to display on a large TV, and as a "do it all" device I think a Surface Pro 6 would be ideal for me.

The rwquired Zwift specs are as follows:

Decent:

OS - Microsoft® Windows 8 64bit or higher, or macOS® 10.11 or higher
CPU - Intel® Core™ i5 or AMD Athlon™
GPU - 2GB Radeon™ R9 200 series, or NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX 650

Better:

OS - Microsoft® Windows 10 64bit or higher, or macOS® 10.13 or higher
CPU - Intel® Core™ i7 or AMD Ryzen™
GPU - 2GB Radeon™ R9 290 series, or NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX 970

The Surface Pro 6 has:

OS - Windows 10 Home
CPU - Intel Core i5
GPU - Intel UHD Graphics 620

Cost is £800. I already have a Surface Dock 2. Does that hit the specs (it's the GPU I'm unsure of).

Of course, if I could get a standard laptop that hits those specs for 50% or so of the price, I would look at that instead, and also buy an iPad for tablet duties.

Thanks in advance!

[random_username]

If you look at:

https://zwiftalizer.com/benchmarks

Put in Intel 620 as a search term and it should show you the stats for all the submitted systems with that graphics card. There's a few with Core i5s listed - one of those should be a reasonably close match to the Surface CPU.

In general it looks like it will run it OK at 720p, 1080p may be a push. This is in 'basic' detail mode.

You can see some of the differences in graphics here:

https://zwiftinsider.com/zwift-pc-guide/#jp-carous...

But the main this is it's just eye candy, it doesn't affect the rest of the game/training in any way.

There are some breakdowns of the different capabilities which may be of interest at:

https://blog.zwiftalizer.com/post/buyersguide-2019...

[Hard-Drive]

Appreciate the reply...thank you!

I keep going round in circles here...it's a minefield!

Question...if I bought a new iPad Air, and a genuine Apple Lightning to HDMI adaptor, with a quality HDMI cable plugged into a 4 year old LG 49" TV, will that work?

There seem to be all kinds of issues reported running Zwift on an iPhone with a non-genuine adaptor, but just looking for reassurance that it would all work with an iPad. If so, I might go back down that route...the reason I'd jumped ship to a Surface was primarily the HDMI interface. Any thoughts?

Thanks!

[random_username]

It looks like it will work, but the ipad has a different aspect ratio to the TV, so it may be letterboxed. They may have worked round this or you may be able to use the TV to stretch to fit...

Probably the cheapest/easiest way to get started is the 4K appletv as per the other thread... £150 and it will run it perfectly with the least hassle..

[Hard-Drive]

random_username said:

It looks like it will work, but the ipad has a different aspect ratio to the TV, so it may be letterboxed. They may have worked round this or you may be able to use the TV to stretch to fit...

Probably the cheapest/easiest way to get started is the 4K appletv as per the other thread... £150 and it will run it perfectly with the least hassle..

Gah...I'd want an Air 256Gb (looking at usage on my iPhone 11) with cellular too (so I can use it with marine navigation apps). Add the USB C adaptor and a case and I'm looking at a grand. With earliest delivery of mid December!

So yes, thanks for the suggestion...Apple TV on it's way arriving tomorrow. Cheers!