Surface 3 Discussion Thread

I bought the Surface 3 because it can charge over USB. I can be out from morning until night on weekends, and I just need to carry a portable power bank along to charge the S3. Sure the charging will be slow over USB but at least it is being charged and will last me until I get home. I have been carrying a portable power bank to charge my Dell Venue 8 Pro on weekends when I'm out and this arrangement has served me very well.

 

Been playing with it for about an hour. First impressions: Exactly what I thought it was going to be. Also, strangely enough (not sure about this), it's running rather cool. Of course i'm not taxing it, but I don't in general anyway. Not sure if this will last though.

One thing, The Intel HD GCP will not install. Says it doesn't have what it takes. I guess that's that. I like those, and use it on the SP3 a lot.

Also, I just tried the Sp3 keyboard. It works . it's not the right size, but it's good ( I think).

Kind of funny.

I must say though, the impression I get is not one of compromise. More like it's something else; A different model, that's all.

 

So are you the first then? Congratz, if so =)

I'd expect it to be pretty cool. My 8 inch Atom plastic slate is under ordinary circumstances (in my use case). I'd expect a much larger metal device to be even cooler.

 

Mac, any first impressions regarding the stylus/inking? Interested to hear your thoughts as another SP3 user. For my part, following the varied experiences with in-store demos, I'll be holding my breath somewhat for a positive experience with the stylus.

Also interested to see how the 3rd stage of the kickstand translates for lap/couch use while typing -

 

Welcome to the approach over at Lenovo they have been taking for years. Bit them hard on the keester not offering a digitizer at all on the Thinkpad 8. It makes me wonder if they HAD offered an optional digitizer then these pages would not have oozed so much disdain for the device and the non-digitizer model would have faired better? Did we destroy the future of that device here?

 

I was one of those hopeful for a digitizer model of the TP8, couldn't have been more ready to throw cash at the device. That said, I think battery life was the dagger. I bought a TP10 as a result, it served its time well, and the newer/better/sexier replacement should be here in a few hours

 

I'd agree that a $450 price point with the pen separate would be just as good. I don't buy that anyone who was willing to spend $500 for the slate alone would have a problem spending $500 for the slate and pen even if they didn't want the pen. I don't know how true it is, but there are reports that some Microsoft Stores are giving the pen away for free to people who buy from the store anyway. So I really don't think it would have hurt them that much to include it from the beginning. I haven't done any cost analysis though, so this is just my guess of course.

 

For the folks who have already been to the MS store(at this point East and central time zone), did you notice what the bundles where?

 

got my unit... so far its nice I can tell the difference from my SP3... (for weight) just getting things set up etc...

 

Yea, I don't think anyone would complain if the pen was free. It certainly isn't free for MS though. Just because it might make sense to give away the pen in limited numbers for promotional purposes doesn't mean it makes sense to give it away forever.

In any case, I'm just saying that the quibbles on price read like arm chair quarterbacking to me... which I enjoy doing from time to time myself =P BUT, I think MS has more real and relevant data at hand to come to an informed guestimate on ideal pricing than we do (or at least most of us, the internet is a big group of people =P).

The pricing, as it is, seems reasonable to me. For all I know though cheaper pricing would yield better results, but it also wouldn't shock me if it went the other way (a little bit higher pricing would fare better). Honestly, I just don't know =P