Microsoft's Surface Tablet:Summary: Surface Hardware and Software

Summary: Surface Windows RT  Hardware and Software by Mark Minasi



"The Surface hardware is an impressive tablet in many ways and a worthy competitor to the iPad. Surface's pathbreaking keyboard cover, numerous easy options for add-on storage, superior wireless networking and USB port will make iPad owners jealous, at least until they see that the Surface inexplicably lacks 3G or 4G, although honestly given no shortage of small, easily-portable, inexpensive hotspots, that may not be the dealbreaker that it seems at first glance. Having to buy overpriced cables for video and having to deal with a lame magnetic power connector are negatives but not significant ones."   "Windows RT is horribly lacking in available applications at the moment, but Microsoft includes Office 2013’s Word, PowerPoint and Excel in every copy of RT. RT Office is almost good enough to make up for the lack of apps, but it lacks Outlook. Instead, you get some weak contacts / email / calendar tools, and no syncing of your Outlook notes.  Many people will, however, overlook that annoyance because the Surface includes a version of Internet Explorer that lets you visit Flash sites, if puzzlingly not Silverlight sites.  Overall, I like the Surface quite a bit, but it hasn't entirely replaced my iPad yet — for now, they're cohabitating in my bag"   "The Surface's operating system software — Windows RT — is solid in a way that the iPad is not and surprisingly replete with drivers."     "The Surface turns out to be a visually pleasing, light and useful tablet, but with a cover that doubles as a quite functional keyboard and what may be the first touchpad that hasn’t raised my blood pressure. Why a touchpad?  As you'll read later, RT has two very different desktops, the "runs old Windows apps" Desktop and the "runs new tablet apps" Start Screen.  The Start Screen's great with big fat human fingers, but the old Desktop still needs you to click little check boxes, small text fields, and tiny "close" icons.  The 3G broadband hardware:  It ain’t there. Just Wi-Fi.  This is by far the biggest screwup hardware-wise in the Surface, no questions about it and maybe a fatal screwup..."   Wireless: Yeah, I’m bugged that there’s no 3G/4G. But the wireless is pretty good, I have to say. Recently I was just sitting in an airport restaurant and thought I might just indulge myself and get an Internet connection for the hour I’d be waiting (I hadn't gotten the hotspot yet), so I clicked the Settings charm and found several hotspots, but none more than a bar. Bummer, I thought, I bet the iPad would have done better, so I pulled it out, sat it next to the Surface, and …

Nothing.

It couldn’t see a single hotspot. I had seven on the Surface, zero on the iPad. Later, on the plane...  Surface saw five networks, the iPad saw two. When I got to my hotel, I tried again and the iPad saw two, the Surface saw nine. Nice antenna. (It’s a “MIMO” or something like that, and I have idea what that means, nor do I care, but I will certainly be looking for it in the future.)

Encryption:  RT also has Bitlocker, the drive encryption tool that makes it tougher for bad guys to extract data from a stolen or lost tablet.  Even better, it's on by default -- my C: is encrypted.  The iPad has nothing like that, but on the other hand the iPad has that wonderful free "find my iPad" feature.  I'd sooo like to see that for the Surface.

the Surface is "the writer’s tablet."



Mark Minasi