Surface Book 3 Discussion Thread (May 2020)

Yes... I saw your situation in the S Go 2 thread.... that stinks... Hope they sort it out for you.

Edit: Got my tracking.. should be here tomorrow

 

For posterity:

 

Hey there, everyone. Long time lurker, first time poster. This place has helped with a lot of decisions in the past.


Question:

I was wondering: are there any sorts of kickstands out there for the Surface Book line?


Context:

I'm an animator/storyboard artist. I currently own a refurbished base model HP ZBook X2. I love the thing to bits, but it has it's burps and hiccups.
2 months ago I bought a Surface Pro 7 from Best Buy. I was able to do a client's entire animated project from start to finish on it without much trouble (NTrig ain't perfect, but it ain't bad either). However I ended up returning it. Personal reasons as well as the screen size being a bit too small for my taste.
With Surface Book 3 coming out this past week, I wanted to give it another shot. I bought it the 15" and ended up returning it a couple days later.

The Problem:
I think the Book 3 is a super awesome device. Drawing honestly feels nice (though adding a matte screen protector might make it even better), the 15 inch real estate is soooo spacious. And the 3:2 aspect ratio is absolutely perfect. But the entire experience becomes tainted when there's no way to support the thing in View Mode or Studio Mode. In view mode, the screen just closes under the force of your hand. And Studio mode just provides a single, flat, impractical angle. I really want something to support it upright like the Pro kickstand. Not a bulky extra piece of machinery like a drawing tablet stand. I'd like something that could potentially just be attached to it at all times and that I can use in my lap, like the Pro or my Zbook. I might be asking for something totally impractical, but it's worth a shot.

So is there any way to support the Book like the image below? I suppose my endgame is essentially a huge Surface Pro with good battery life, heh. Any help is much appreciated!

 

<<...are there any sorts of kickstands out there for the Surface Book line?..>>

@Vobox : See the post by @cbutters about 3 pages above (posted 20 May). Perhaps you and he could collaborate on something...

 

UAG who makes a lot of "rugged" cases for iPads and even the go, showed case for the tablet portion of the Surface Book 2 both in 13 and 15 inch versions, but to my knowledge they never actually released them.

I think the gate on that was that you couldn't use them with the keyboard base without removing the case. It might be worthwhile to ping them about as the Book 2 and Book 3 are for all intents and purposes identical physically.

 

<<...I think the gate on that was that you couldn't use them with the keyboard base without removing the case...>>

However, a simple kickstand attachment for the back of the clipboard that does not interfere with the keyboard attachment would be straightforward to design and implement. The unspoken "problem" is the assumption that the design must be more than just be a kickstand; that it also has to provide protection for the edges and corners, etc. In my business, we call that "requirements creep," the seemingly irresistible urge to add features that go way beyond the customer's initial request which, in this case, is simply: "It would be nice to have a kickstand."

 

Yeah, without someone usually me to say "do we really need that?" several of our devices could have ended up like this...

 

I still want that car

 

Yep, that exactly. All I want is a simple kickstand haha.
The closest thing I've ever found were these things called SnapStands (pic below) for Book 1 and 2 (so I assume they would work for 3). They seem to be pretty much exactly what I want, but I've never actually seen them on sale in the months I've checked on it.
The only other things close that I've seen are 2 leather cases on Amazon that have reviews saying they cause overheating.

 

Those look neat and reasonably simple to copy for 3D printing them yourself.