Panos Panay and the Surface team chat on Reddit about the Surface Pro and its release
This afternoon, in the morning in the United States, Panos Panay, General Manager of Surface, and his team held a chat (Ask Me Anything or AMA) with the users of Reddit in which they talked about the Surface Pro and its upcoming release. The people of Microsoft have taken the opportunity to justify and defend some of the decisions made around their tablet and to drop some other detail that is worth commenting on."
One of the biggest controversies about the new Surface Pro, which had already suffered from the RT version of the tablet, revolves around the disk space available to the user.From the Surface team they assure that, although it was not an easy decision, they considered that 64GB would be enough to contain a complete Windows 8 with the necessary basic applications, including a Office 30-day trial; leaving enough space for the user to install a good number of applications and games. In addition, part of the occupied space corresponds to a system recovery image that we can always replicate on a USB, freeing up that disk space.
The other point where early reviews have been more critical of the Surface Pro is on battery life Since Microsoft have wanted to maintain the performance of the tablet, which we remember is an i5, without increasing its weight and thickness more than what was already necessary. That is why they have had to opt for a small battery. Although, with between 4 and 5 hours of duration, they believe they have found a good balance between performance, autonomy and mobility.
Asked about the possibility of a keyboard that adds extra battery, the Surface team has left this possibility in the air. Surface Pro comes with additional docking points on its base that could be used to connect new accessories to the device. Although they have directly denied that there are plans for a desktop dock, they have not been as adamant about a possible dock-keyboard with extra battery
During the round of questions, those from Microsoft have defended some of their choices: Displayport instead of HDMI, the use of ClearType, the screen resolution, etc. About the stylus that comes with the Surface Pro, it was designed with the typical notebook usage experience in mind. The goal was to get as close as possible to it, which is why it comes specially configured from the factory and is capable of detecting up to 1024 pressure levels.It also incorporates a clip and a magnetic zone that allow it to be attached to the tablet.
They have also reconfirmed that the USB port on the Surface Pro is a fully functional USB 3.0 Any peripheral that works on Windows will work on Surface. Continuing with the possibilities of Surface Pro as a substitute for our laptops, they ensure that there is complete freedom to access the BIOS settings, from where we can disable Secure Boot, so we won't have problems installing other operating systems on the tablet.
Surface Pro has not come to replace Surface RT At Microsoft they believe that both devices meet different needs and have different user profiles. People who expect something more than a consumer device from a tablet will look favorably on the Surface Pro. If they have taken three more months to release it, it is simply because they started working on it three months later.But once the Pro version is on the market they won't forget the Surface RT.
The most negative news that the AMA has left us is the confirmation that we will still have to wait to see the Surface Pro in our country. Asked when the Surface Pro will be available in Europe, the team behind it has said that they will share more information in the coming weeks and that, apart from the United States and Canada, where it will be available from February 9, the tablet will reach more markets in the coming months So, again, it looks like we will have to wait a bit.
More information | reddit
