Tuesday, October 6th 2015

Microsoft Announces the Surface Book

Microsoft announced its very first laptop, the Surface Book. It's Microsoft's imagining of the Surface with the strengths of a proper laptop. Microsoft claims at weight-by-weight, this is the most powerful 13-inch class laptop ever made. What sets it apart from other performance laptops in its class is that it's a convertible. You can detach the top half from the bottom, and use it like a large Surface tablet; or you could dock it with its base in either direction, and get the advantage of a proper mechanical keyboard, a multi-touch trackpad, additional battery (up to 12 hours), and additional connections.

The two halves join at a curious looking spinal joint, and an electric muscle joint that senses when you're trying to detach the two halves, and makes the process effortless. When it senses that you aren't trying to take them apart, it lends enough grip to let you lift both halves by holding one of them. The top half features a 13.5-inch display with a high-precision multi-touch touchscreen that's primed for Microsoft Pen (a smart stylus with 1024 pressure levels and high drawing resolution); with 267 ppi display resolution. Both halves are made out of milled aluminium, and are about 7.5 mm thick, each. Most of the hardware is located in the top half, while most of the battery is located in the bottom one. Microsoft has taken advantage of modern connectivity such as 4G LTE, 802.11 ac WLAN, USB 3.0 type-C, SDXC, and more.
What makes this the most powerful notebook is what's under the hood - a 6th generation Intel Core i7 "Skylake" processor, discrete NVIDIA GeForce GTX "Maxwell" graphics with dedicated GDDR5 memory, 16 GB of DDR4 memory, and 1 TB of storage. It comes pre-loaded with Windows 10, Office 2016, and a the Windows Store app ecosystem. Pricing of the Surface Book starts at US $1,499.

Image Credit: Engadget
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34 Comments on Microsoft Announces the Surface Book

#26
Uplink10
I must be one of the few poeple who would want maximum resolution to be 1080p for a laptop this size, that is also the reason I would not buy it. Same as I would not buy 1080p 5" smartphone.
Posted on Reply
#27
Solidstate89
Dronecomparison



13.5 inches and 3000x2000 resolution? Yeah right
Yeah right what? That's the fucking resolution. The SP3/4 and the Surface Book are 3:2 aspect ratio displays.
Posted on Reply
#28
Drone
Solidstate89Yeah right what? That's the fucking resolution. The SP3/4 and the Surface Book are 3:2 aspect ratio displays.
Hello captain obvious.
Posted on Reply
#29
Slizzo
DroneHello captain obvious.
Have you actually USED a Surface Pro? The resolution is largely a non-issue on those devices even though it's "so high". Windows scales pretty well (8.1 and better with 10) at that resolution to be perfectly usable.
Posted on Reply
#30
Solidstate89
DroneHello captain obvious.
You're not saying anything. Have you word of the word "context?" Maybe you should try using it, because saying "yeah, right" about a machine's resolution and display size is meaningless and vague.
Posted on Reply
#31
Drone
Solidstate89You're not saying anything. Have you word of the word "context?" Maybe you should try using it, because saying "yeah, right" about a machine's resolution and display size is meaningless and vague.
I mean I knew that it's 3:2 (3000x2000, it's pretty obvious, isn't it?) I was sarcastic because I used surface products for a while and didn't like that unusual ratio.
Posted on Reply
#32
Slizzo
DroneI mean I knew that it's 3:2 (3000x2000, it's pretty obvious, isn't it?) I was sarcastic because I used surface products for a while and didn't like that unusual ratio.
Surface Pro and Surface Pro 2 felt unnatural with their 16:9 screens. Pro3 and Pro4/Book with 3:2 feel much better.
Posted on Reply
#33
ShurikN
16:9 is useless most of the time for a tablet.
Posted on Reply
#34
Prima.Vera
ShurikN16:9 is useless most of the time for a tablet.
That's your opinion only. I personally would like more 16:9 good tablets because I mostly use those to watch movies / TV shows / play some casual games when I'm on the train, plane, etc
Posted on Reply
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