Surface Book

WhiteMemento9

So they seem to have worked out most of the problems which plagued this device in the early months. I am thinking about taking the plunge on one.

The Surface book are still quite an eye watering price but it suits my needs perfectly. Does anyone have one? Would you buy again? The new refreshed Macbook line-up is due pretty soon so I may hold off to have a look at what they are offering.

I can't really afford to wait much longer though as I am in dire need of a decent laptop soon.

Aec77

I upgraded after 12 months using a Surface Pro 3 (i7, 8ram, 256ssd) to an SB (i7, 16ram, 512ssd) 3 months back and I really like it. I use it as my daily driver, at home for working, playing games, browsing the web, and at the office, connected to an external monitor for 3d work & game dev, note taking during meetings, etc. I travel a lot so need something light but powerful and versatile. The SB and SP devices both do this well.

I was mostly very happy with the SP3, except for the thermal throttling (thought a little USB fan pointed at the rear sorted this out). But after using the SB for a week or two, I realised I lean more towards needing a laptop more than a tablet. So for me the extra screen size, dedicated GPU, larger keyboard and bigger battery all make it that bit better, more enjoyable to use on a daily basis than the SP3.

It has some problems
- Flipping between tablet and laptop is slower, more cumbersome (due to having to detach the screen) compared with just flipping the Type Cover behind the SP3. So I can’t flip from typing to writing as effortlessly and thus don’t do so anywhere near as much as I did with the SP3.
- The lack of a kickstand means that it’s not so nice to draw on, you either have to hold the screen with one hand while writing with the other or flip the screen around (see previous point) and then you only have the one, almost flat angle.
- There are still some bugs with the screen or keyboard becoming unresponsive after detaching / reattaching but it doesn’t happen often, maybe one out of 20 times.

I wouldn’t go back and I really, really enjoy using the SB. Even though I would love to have the new Performance Base, I am glad I didn’t wait as I have really enjoyed the improvements from having using it these last 3 months or so.

But if you are more likely to lean towards note-taking and / or drawing, then I would seriously consider an SP4 instead. It’s almost as good (no throttling) but you’ll have a nicer drawing experience and over the long run, appreciate it more.

I wouldn’t recommend a version without the dedicated GPU and I am not sure I would buy one if I had to pay full price. My variant costs 2700 or so new but I got mine refurbished off of Ebay for 1600 (with 1 years MS warranty). And for that price I think it's decent value for money and powerful enough to last me another 2 years or so (by which time there should be an SB2 or 3 with the new 10xx series dedicated GPUs).

Hope that helps!

ablelocks

Aec77 wrote: »

My variant costs 2700 or so new but I got mine refurbished off of Ebay for 1600 (with 1 years MS warranty).

thanks AEC - what ebay store did you get the refurb from?

Aec77

It wasn't a store, just some chap who had a refurbished one he wanted to sell - he hadn't registered it so I was able to log into Microsoft and register it to my account.

Had a quick look just now: there's nothing going for that price at the moment. When I was looking, there were 2 or 3 in that range so maybe worth just keeping an eye out for a while?

But if you want one now and are willing to pay full price, I'd recommend one of the new models with the performance base.. (double the GPU performance..)