Surface Laptop 2/3/4 Discussion Thread

AHH IT"S YOU!!!!!!!!! Lol. OK I'm going to have to cut and paste my childish tirade.

 

So here are my thoughts from another forum:


Morons, just absolute freakin morons. You guys all know I'm the local Microsoft fanboy, and even I'm shaking my head at Windows S. Jeez you would think they learned their lesson from Windows RT and the massive write down that incurred. And you're targeting that walled garden crap at students and teachers?!? Those are probably some of the most vulnerable consumers to needing x86 compatibility. Don't you get it MS? The reason the surface, surface pro and surface book were such great hits was because those consumers wanted a full OS. I'm not debating the merits of iOS/Android versus windows 10, that's a decision the consumer already made.

What amazes me is that MS is so close . Windows 10 is leaps and bounds a better OS than it was when WinRT was released, it's much more light weight and makes sense on a touch screen now. Not only that but MS is on the verge of announcing x86 compatibility on Snapdragon processors, giving them a truly low power but full Windows solution. But MS had the solution the whole time. The surface 3 had great battery life, and excellent performance. With how much Win10 has evolved a Surface 4 with a snapdragon CPU would be an instant hit I bet.

As for the laptop, it's decent enough but grossly overpriced for who they are competing with. Does it even have a touch screen? Hopefully it's not locked down and you can pay the extra money to put a full version of windows on there, but I'll bet you can get a much nicer full windows laptop for cheaper anyhow. Let's not even go to the app/ecosystem issue. I've long argued that windows can stand toe to toe with iOS and android in terms of apps available, but that's only including web apps and x86 programs. App market versus app market Microsoft is pitiful. Hell there aren't' even more than a handful of Edge extensions, Chrome crushes them in that regard. Years of MS neglecting windows mobile meant the app market continued to shrink until it's almost nothing, and now MS wants to tell all those cast aside developers that it suddenly loves them? Lol, yeah.

Lastly I'm very disappointed that loyal surface tablet/book consumers are being ignored. Come on, the SP4 came out 18 months ago and not even a peep on a refresh? Are we getting abandoned again? Will the next tablet be winRT, umm I mean WinS? Bleh... Can a mod please change my name to Nostradamus? I predicted RT would fail badly right when it was announced, I predict WinS will also fail badly.

 

And then after I had some time to calm down and research it:

OK had a chance to calm down and look closer at this laptop. In terms of hardware it's quite nice, really thin and svelte. If I was in the pre-tablet era when I still had a MacBook Air, I'd easily choose this over the Air. The resolution is 2256x1504 (not 1080p like the article states), and at 13.5 is a huge screen as laptops go. Personally I like a bit lower resolution as it helps with scaling elements and the UI, this one sounds like it might hit the sweet spot. It has a touchscreen and surface pen support, nice. I'm not denying that writing on the screen might be a bit goofy, having to hold the lid open, but hey at least we have options. I'm all for options, so maybe I use the pen occasionally to sign a PDF file or markup a webpage, at least the option is there. Touchscreen I know I'll get a lot of naysayers, but I firmly believe a touchscreen on a laptop is awesome and would never go back to something primitive without a touchscreen.

Kaby Lake, nice. Windows hello, awesome. No C-usb, hmm. 14.5 hours of battery with a full desktop Proc? Wow, color me impressed. WinS isn't as bad of a failure as WinRT as at least 32bit apps can be converted through the app store, but I still think it's a huge gap and a huge mistake on MS' part. I see there is a free upgrade to full windows *temporarily*, nice but not good enough, and many consumers won't even realize this, or won't want to go to the trouble. Bezels look very nice, nicer than my wife's XPS13 with it's infinity bezels, which in reality have one gigantic bezel on the bottom. I could see my wife loving the MS laptop.

I still think it's overpriced. Not that the hardware isn't worth it, it's just that they are positioning it as a low cost student laptop and not a MacBook killer per se. If it had full windows on it, I could see the i7/8gb/256gb option being worth the $999, but at the $1599 for a WinRT, erm umm WinS laptop? Not so much. So overall I still predict it will fail, or at least Windows S will still fail. The laptop might survive as a niche product for those of use who like beautiful, luxurious Microsoft products and know how to install full windows onto it.

 

Re: starlight/ Agreed. Why omit something that many of your customers want? It bad business hiding in the guise of 'focused' product development. It's like running a hot dog stand that focuses on customers who don't want a bun. The customers who don't want a bun can /just not eat the bun/ yeah?

 

I think this is where MS made the mistake. Everyone is saying "WTF $1599 for Windows Suck" as opposed to "Nice, $1649 for a sleek WinPro Surface Laptop". Just bad marketing. Why not list the Win Pro pricing, and offer it at a discount if bought with WinS? In that sense I agree with your initial MORONS freakout.

 

Yeah, I think it's safe to say that noone around this forum isn't disappointed....

I still think Windows 10 S is dumb, but when I read that Chromebooks are a big thing in the US education market (not on this side of the pond), I can to a small degree understand Microsoft from a business perspective. Not that I like it, but if they get kids aka the future generations accustomed to yet another walled garden like the Windows Store eco-system, maybe there is a chance (let's hope not) that this will be somewhat of a success for them in the long run.
I do hope W10S tanks as hard as RT, because a success would only make the Windows eco-system as a whole worse in the future for everyone.

I think putting W10S on the Surface laptop is simply to have a big marketing vehicle for W10S. 90+ percent of the buyers will probably upgrade anyway at some date, but I estimate quite the success of a Surface laptop because of MS new-found cool-ness in many consumer's minds thanks to the Surface brand. This way they can make people and the media get accustomed to W10S which probably wouldn't happen the same way if it were just on mostly uninteresting budget devices. And if even a smallish percentage stays with W10S, it is beneficial for MS.
They are basically trying to make the un-cool W10S cool by association with a cool-ish Surface Laptop.

Back to the device:
- No USB-C sucks and is just inexplainably stupid. They really should have switched the miniDP port to USB-C with DP Alt Mode or TB3.
- No card reader! Another dumb thing. I guess we have to thank the youngsters for only using smartphone cameras instead of actual cameras nowadays.
- Yet another 3:2 screen in a somewhat other form factor. Great, but when will other OEMs finally follow? That was my hope with the Surface Book but it didn't happen expect for a few low-powered products from minor Chinese vendors. We need to get rid of that 16:9-cancer that came with the success of HDTVs!
- Prices: Charging an arm and a leg for the upgrades or top-version is basically what every vendor with enough market potential is trying nowadays. Trying to make premium/luxurious the new normal. Unfortunately there are also way too many consumers who fall for that instead of doing some critical thinking before opening their wallets.

 

I don't see it that way. Win10S is simply an additional offering that runs UWP apps and approved x86 apps, for people that value long battery life, security, fast boot times, and easy install/update/uninstall. How is this a bad thing? I'd be tempted to get my folks a Surface Laptop with Win10S right now if they didn't "need" to run Word Perfect 5.1.

 

I think Acer has the right idea. https://www.engadget.com/2017/05/02/the-travelmate-spin-b1-is-acer-s-first-windows-10-s-laptop/ Not Microsoft. If you're going to push a low cost version of your OS, why not just go with a low cost notebook as well, instead of putting the OS on a $1k base priced notebook. And, those fuzzy keys. I don't think I like them either. I would far more readily buy my mom an Acer B118 W/S notebook than the new Surface (and not just because i'm a cheap son).

 

I'm guessing MS is trying its hardest to not step on its partner's toes.

 

Do you really need a whole "new" OS when you can simply select "install only store apps" from the apps settings in Windows 10 now? Buy a regular laptop, flip the switch, you get Windows 10 S. So what's the point apart from getting lemmings to pay to "upgrade" later?

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