back to article Microsoft's Surface Pro 2017, unhinged: Luxury fondleslab that's good...

Microsoft waited almost two years to update its boutique computer, the Surface Pro. In the meantime the line expanded to include a detachable tablet (Surface Book), a desktop (Surface Studio) and a proper laptop (Surface, er, Laptop), while the cheaper, Atom-powered POS (Plain Old Surface) fell into the bin and wasn't rescued. …

  1. Steve K

    Happy Surface Pro 4 Owner here

    I can sort of understand the Pen not being included here. I have a Surface Pro 4 i5/128/4GB (bought personally) and it is well-made and very portable. I also bought the Type cover keyboard (actually got it "free" due to a £100 discount offer at the time) and cannot understand why this is not bundled.

    I have hardly ever used the stylus (or indeed the touch screen if I am honest) after the first week of having it - for my use-case it does not warrant the cost of buying it separately. YMMV of course as I am not a graphic designer or professional photographer. I thought that I would use it for handwriting meeting notes, but after trying it once, that has never happened....

    Resume from sleep can be problematic, that is probably the only gripe.

    I also avoided paying for the Surface Dock (£160?) by getting a Dell external monitor which has 5 USB ports on it which was not a million miles away from that price, and plugging everything in to that (including a USB to Gig Ethernet adapter).

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Happy Surface Pro 4 Owner here

      I too am a very happy SP4 owner, and I do a lot of handwriting meeting notes with a few clicks of the pen button.

      To be honest, it still surprises me how many Surfaces I see daily out in the wild.

      Personally don't have a need to upgrade to the SP, though I keep trying to justify the purchase of a Surface Studio for the office!

      1. AMBxx Silver badge

        Re: Happy Surface Pro 4 Owner here

        I was always in the category of 'cheap disposable laptop buyer'. Then I had the chance to buy a SP4 Pro for £500 + VAT.

        Now, I have to admit, I'd be tempted to pay full price. It really is a great piece of kit. Especially now Microsoft seem to have moved on from breaking wifi or sleep state with each update.

    2. An nonymous Cowerd
      Stop

      Re: statistics say 'watch-out'

      Or rather the US version of Which, have done some reliability crunching and have de-listed MS products as 'reliable'

      https://www.consumerreports.org/laptop-computers/microsoft-surface-laptops-and-tablets-not-recommended-by-consumer-reports/

      (they previously •were• recommended)

  2. WonkoTheSane

    Meh

    I'll stick with my Pixel C for tablet-y stuffs.

    10.2" screen at 2560x1800, a USB-C socket for both power & connectivity. It'll do.

  3. Tom 38

    Rather have a £500 Dell and an extra £1k/year to be honest.

  4. DJV Silver badge

    "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

    No shit, Sherlock!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

      It could also be because it's Microsoft.

      I like the concept, and we may get one or two for the office for UX testing, but I must admit that from a pure computing perspective we're now too spoiled by alternatives to change (plus it is quite nice not to have to worry about licensing mistakes and suffer the accompanying management overhead :) ).

      Nice hardware, though, looks like someone's done a good job.

      1. 1Rafayal

        Re: "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

        Why would you pay for a Surface Pro, if all you are going to do is carry out UX testing?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

          Why would you pay for a Surface Pro, if all you are going to do is carry out UX testing?

          Fair question. It is because part of our UX testing is actually letting users use it, and our users have high expectations - also helps with demos. Also, I know it's vogue to give helpdesk old crap to work with but we prefer our people to have the gear that customers are likely to have so they have a better familiarity with placement of controls etc. It's easier on Macs because they pretty much look the same from model to model, but the swipe strip that replaced the function keys has added a bit of spice to that.

          Our aim is to make our helpdesk shibboleet compliant, but without the need to mention it more than once as it should be part of a customer's record. We can do that because we're not in the volume business, which leaves a better operating margin (also because we're not shareholder owned so we don't need to squeeze every last penny out of a customer which IMHO is always to the detriment to the customer as well as the business).

          So, in short it's because we have the kind of customers who would probably buy one of these, it makes sense to have a few around.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

            At one point:

            "given the choice, 90 per cent of staff plumped for a Surface Pro and my only surprise is what were the other 10 per cent thinking?"

            But then later:

            "Windows 10 is keyboard and mouse first, and touch second. It's just a really awful second, and even though Windows 10 has been on the market for two years now, it remains botched."

            And then goes on to give some examples of just how diabolical the user interface is (in touch mode).

            So maybe the 10% hated that, and the other 90% just wanted a lightweight standard laptop?

    2. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Unhappy

      Re: "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

      Actually, it's not JUST the price. It's the "Win-10-nic".

      1. Jonathan 27

        Re: "If you don't have a Surface Pro, I suspect the price is why"

        I doubt it, 99.9% of people don't have a problem with Windows 10. And don't bother replying saying how much you hate Windows 10, I'm fully aware that half the people who don't like Windows 10 are members here.

        P.S. Surface Pro is totally capable of running Linux, but you'd be crazy trying to run Windows 7 on it. The touchscreen support is terrible.

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

  5. MrT

    Surface Dial...

    Is this the one that works with the Dial on screen, like the Surface Studio? MrsT is an artist, and watching the MS videos demonstrating the Dial on the Studio was the first time in basically forever that she was genuinely interested in the way that tech worked...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Surface Dial...

      Yes, the Surface Dial works with the SP.

    2. Franco

      Re: Surface Dial...

      According to MS the Dial works with the Surface Book and Pro 4 as well as the Studio, so should work with this.

      https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/surface/accessories/surface-dial

      Not defending the prices, but I had a Pro V1, now have a Book and use a Pro V3 at work.They are very nice devices to use IME.

      1. MrT

        Re: Surface Dial...

        Thanks. I've seen the Dial working off-screen/on-desk with other Surface devices, but it was the on-screen use that particularly caught her eye. I've dug about a bit more and see that MS is saying "Studio and latest Pro" for the on-screen stuff, so I'll take that as a 'yes' for this 2017 one. It must only be a new addition because it's not that easy to track down in other reviews, which only mention Surface Studio.

        Cheers!

  6. djstardust

    If only ....

    They stopped pretending to be Apple and demanding their prices. That would be a start.

    1 - Bundle at least the keyboard FOC

    2 - Make it a realistic and affordable price instead of completely ripping people off for storage and processor upgrades

    3 - Put more ports in. Hardly difficult given all the space around the edges

    4 - Sort out the sleep issues that have been plaguing the Surface for years.

    5 - Stop completely overstating the battery life.

    Oh and .....

    6 - Stop pretending to be Apple and demanding their prices.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Stop pretending to be Apple and demanding their prices

      Way more than Apple could get away with charging!

    2. JDX Gold badge

      Re: If only ....

      If only you could buy Windows machines from companies other than the company making the OS at cheaper prices.

      Oh, wait.

    3. Mage Silver badge

      Re: If only ....

      Also fix the broken and too flat GUI, default services and stop slurping on an otherwise internally decent enough OS.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Thumb Up

        Re: If only ....

        "Also fix the broken and too flat GUI, default services and stop slurping on an otherwise internally decent enough OS."

        nice summary of what's wrong with Win-10-nic

  7. Paul Woodhouse

    Does it run Mint?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "Does it run Mint?"

      This for me is the problem. I defended Microsoft up to W7 pro since when it has all been downhill. OK, I am old and crochety but I can cope with Android and Chrome OS. I put Classic Shell on 10 and get by but it can still be a PITA as it semi-randomly swaps from flay webpage controls to W2000 snap-ins. dlls disappear and stop stuff working. If I had to replace my laptop I would maybe pay £500 to get W10. But north of £2000? 911 prices, 911 bodywork, air-cooled Beetle engine.

      1. hplasm
        Boffin

        Re: "Does it run Mint?"

        "911 prices, 911 bodywork, air-cooled Beetle engine."

        ITYM

        '911 prices, 911 bodywork, lame horse.'

        (Nothing wrong with the air-cooled Beetle engine- the 911 has a 6 cylinder version.)

  8. Tim Brown 1
    Mushroom

    Those TV ads

    Never mind the price, I wouldn't buy one simply because of those cringingly bad TV ads that have people gushing about how the Surface enables them to do stuff.

    I only hope the people in those ads were paid a hell of a lot of money to make up for the shame.

    1. SpammFreeEmail

      Re: Those TV ads

      Never mind the ads, what about the number of US network programs with the SP popping up in product placement spots all over the show. I reckon NCIS:LA (Guilty pleasure) must have had half it's budget paid for by MS.

  9. Gotno iShit Wantno iShit

    and a proper laptop....

    Not by a country mile is the Surface Laptop a proper laptop. A proper laptop is; heavy, has removable batteries, has a replaceable hard drive, can have its memory upgraded, has a plethora of ports, snaps into dock with even more ports, has a keyboard you can type on all day, etcetera.

    1. Wilt McCracken

      Re: and a proper laptop....

      Thanks to Apple, and everyone's obsession with copying them, very few laptops these days actually have a keyboard you can type on at all. Dr Chiclet is gonna spend a long time roasting in hell...

    2. Al Black

      Re: and a proper laptop....

      My ASUS laptop has a touch screen, but I hardly ever use it except for blowing up photographs. Mouse and keyboard for almost everything.

      1. techdead

        Re: and a proper laptop....

        Guess that's why Apple didn't bother with this combo...

  10. knarf

    If only....

    They just rammed it eh... full of RAM and DISK, made it cheaper than a MAC and it would sell in buckets.

    I've a Surface Book i7 16gb 1tb.... yip I;'m mad, but the mac alternatives where not worth the cash

    But I can play Elite and Civ V/VI

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    'Peter Skillman (WebOS, Meego, HERE Maps)'

    Now I understand the UI troubles. That guy has no clues about proper UIs.

    At least the Metro UI was very well thought for touch-only devices, the enormous incredible mistake was to force it on keyboard and mouse setups too, which it couldn't handle (but just look at responsive design for web sites, same mistakes, huge controls touch first...)

    The actual one is a disaster under both use, with a lot of 'me too' badly borrowed ideas.

    UI must fully switch based on context.

  12. Lee D Silver badge

    Sees headline.

    Scrolls to price.

    Prices start near £1000.

    Closes tab.

    Sorry, guys, but I can get a Win10 Pro / Ubuntu handheld portable PC (in a Nintendo DS kind of form-factor) for a couple of hundred quid. Putting the same hardware behind a larger screen shouldn't cost three times as much before I even start matching the processing/RAM/storage capabilities.

    1. garetht t

      Skillz

      I'm impressed you were able to type & post that after closing the tab!

      1. Lee D Silver badge

        Re: Skillz

        Vivaldi - middle click on link to open in new tab. Always open comments and article, because often one is much better than the other.

  13. Mage Silver badge

    UI must fully switch based on context.

    Impossible in a way.

    The problem is that you need a different design of application for touch and Keyboard/Mouse.

    You see same problem on Android. It's nearly impossible to have a serious application just use touch. A wordprocessor or spreadsheet is nearly unusable on an Android Tablet, unless you add a mouse and keyboard.

    Touch is OK for a browsing and media consumption set of apps and widgets. Real applications with significant user input and need for "menus" need a keyboard / mouse GUI.

    Ironically the stupid ribbon GUI could be touch friendly but would take up far too much screen space. Even the standard Office Ribbon is too large. A stupid idea for a mouse/keyboard GUI.

    1. gv

      Re: UI must fully switch based on context.

      I have a touchscreen laptop. Number of times I've used this capability? Once, just to try it out.

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

      2. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: UI must fully switch based on context.

      "The problem is that you need a different design of application for touch and Keyboard/Mouse."

      In Windows, yes. Chromebooks manage with a single interface rather well.

      Last week I was asked by grandchildren to install a Lego application on a PC. It was over 400Mbytes. The problem was it had obviously been designed for an iPad and nothing at all had been done to make it PC-friendly. In fact it locked out everything else so when it needed BT access, it had to be closed completely to set up BT. It would have worked OK, I suspect, on Android but there didn't seem to be an Android version.

      Lego is now permanently off my present list for being too lazy to produce a proper Windows version, but the sheer unusability with KBM was a bit of an eye opener.

    3. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Devil

      Re: UI must fully switch based on context.

      Stupid UI indeed. "One Windows" is TOTAL FAIL. Even assuming that the UI switches to "touch friendly" when you detach the screen, it's not enough for MOST of the things people want a laptop computer for [vs a fondleslab].

      And we know who (at Micro-shaft) to blame for the UI (my thanks for a comment in an earlier article that clued me in)

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julie_Larson-Green

      [I hear she _INVENTED_ the 2D FLATSO "the Metro" schhhtuff - Sinofsky only IMPLEMENTED it, and then took the fall, but then it never went away, because, THAT person]

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: UI must fully switch based on context.

      Exactly. Application needs to change UI based on context. It's not impossible for any good designed application where the UI and the logic are fully decoupled. It's more or less what MS is trying with UWP, but the attempt to make it automatic will fail.

      The application designer will need to understand what features are to be offered in each mode, and how. In touch mode the need to use bigger UI elements on smaller screens will inevitably mean some features won't be available. On the other hand, on larger screens and keyboard/mouse input will mean large elements becomes ugly, waste space, and more complex features can be made available.

      One size doesn't fit all.

  14. Howard Hanek

    An Unexplained Dichotomy

    I look at the Surface Pro and understand it's benefits yet this little voice in the back of my mind whispers 'Nokia, Nokia, Nokia, Nokia, Nokia, Nokia, .......Can anyone explain why that is? I vaguely remember in the dark ages of eons past something called a Windows Phone..........

  15. TVU Silver badge

    The Unhinged Surface Pro 2017

    "In Windows 10 Metro/Modern functions are sucked into a menu which is invisible unless you exit Tablet Mode. So fundamentals like saving your song are invisible. Switch back to Desktop Mode and if you're lucky you'll spot the menu squirrelled away".

    In other words, Windows 10 is an unhappy kludge that's still in beta mode. Why on earth can't they have two separate and switchable tablet and desktop modes that both function competently? More development work required...

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Malware Magnet

    That's alot of money for a malware magnet...

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    TL;DR

    Pros: Hardware.

    Cons: Price, Windows, Microsoft.

  18. Cederic Silver badge

    Price is why I own one. Half the price of the Surface Book, which with its detachable keyboard is like a Surface Pro but faster, better and more practical.

    I want a Surface Book. I own a Surface Pro. Apple iToy owners around me are jealous - and that's even with Windows sodding 10.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    90% deliberately chooses a tiny screen?

    Ugh, that would keep me away from choosing this even if it cost only $100 and was best in class in every other way (which it is not)

    1. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Devil

      Re: 90% deliberately chooses a tiny 10.8" screen?

      old eyes need something larger to focus on, yeah

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: 90% deliberately chooses a tiny 10.8" screen?

        Age has nothing to do with it - do you see 25 year olds buying 15" monitors for desktops (for those who have desktops) or 32" TVs? Are smartphones with 3.5" displays making a comeback? People want bigger displays, the only reason to choose a tiny display for a laptop is if you think an extra couple pounds of weight from a laptop with a larger display is a problem.

        Maybe I could generalize equally well with "weak people need lighter laptops" :)

  20. Zane

    Did I miss something?

    Do I get it right:

    - nice hardware

    - too expensive

    - missing/bad interfaces

    - not extendable

    - lousy UI

    - lousy battery life time

    - apps do not work properly

    Do I need to know more?

    /Zane

  21. AMCMO

    Get an iPad Pro, proper touch UI that works, and a plethora of great productivity apps, word, excel, pages, numbers, Scrivener, photo..... the list goes on, and they work better than the apps available for Surface.

    Then of course you have a processor that has better graphics performance than i7, as fast in some processing benchmarks, and truly decent battery performance.

    Was at local airport next to a guy with Surface Pro who complained about blue screen and failing to wake.

    Final point, who designed that fugly kludge of a hinge?

  22. John Jennings

    Surface pro 4 here (i7/8GB) = couldnt be happier, tbh. I did find (I had to 'test' one for our SMT) that the i5 was almost always adequate.

    Most of SMT (and myself) ditched desktops for the older 'slide in' docks, with a beefy PSU for charging phones etc off the USB.

    We found that our return rate was actually significantly lower thus the cost was less (not ideal) of a factor - staff take more care of them. Most common return is still dropping them ! To date my organisation has about 700 surfaces 3's & 4's of about 5000 portables in the field .

    Chromebooks/pixels didnt cut it with our users. Ipads/Ipad pros were popular, but were not taken up when the choice was either/or (IE staff wanted to keep their desktops for real work)...

    The Dell talets were complete fail, with their craptastic keyboard connections (several field test ones broke within 2 months)

    .

    HP ones we not bad, but very much second.

  23. clintos

    Pro 3 still as good

    Surface pro 3. had it from the start of the 3 launch. love it. Would not change it for the latest, do not feel the urge to spend needlessly, good res, good sound, pen works. it is still a good all rounder.

    personally, i do not think the 4 or 2017 could do any better.

  24. kitekrazy

    I can't move away from roll your own desktops

    I could upgrade two machines to some nice hardware for what these cost.

    As for not having Thunderbolt.....who cares? There's nothing affordable about Thunderbolt. I don't think it will last very long.

  25. James-K

    My SurfASS Pro 4 is terrible

    I would never purchase another Surface, or any other Microsoft device for that matter. I was really looking forward to getting my Surface Pro 4 when I ordered it last year. I was coming from an overpriced, but rock-solid Macbook Pro. I wish I could get on with it, but it's just such a pain.

    My experience of the thing is one of anger and frustration. I've had 2 RMA's now and they've all been as bad as each other. Had problems with external monitors flickering on and off when using the dock (on various firmware levels), dock failures, dock not connecting, screen not rotating, fans going on and off every second all day long (only on some days), not resuming from sleep, apps crashing, sluggishness and many other niggles. The surface has definitely caused me many moments of embarassment in meetings and presentations when the thing starts to misbehave.

    It's a shame, as the form factor is great and it's ultra portable and a pleasure to use when it works. I found using it on my lap a bit awkward to start with, bu you get used to it. I'm not sure if I've just had a bad batch or what, but it's definitely want to made me move back to a Mac or a nice form factor device running Linux for my daily work. I think if you get a good one, I can imagine being very happy with it, but for me it just hasn't worked out.

    Just realised that quickly turned into a big cry baby moan, sorry about that :)

  26. mrmond

    "In Windows 10 Metro/Modern functions are sucked into a menu which is invisible unless you exit Tablet Mode. So fundamentals like saving your song are invisible. Switch back to Desktop Mode and if you're lucky you'll spot the menu squirrelled away"

    Have you tried swiping down from the top edge of the screen to bring the menu up?

    Works for me in Music Maker Jam & other apps.

  27. Updraft102

    "So Windows 10 is keyboard and mouse first, and touch second. It's just a really awful second, and even though Windows 10 has been on the market for two years now, it remains botched."

    And even with that being true, it's still crap on keyboard and mouse systems too. Microsoft has only succeeded in making an OS that sucks equally on multiple platforms. If they make it more touch-friendly, it's Windows 8, which was soundly rejected on regular PCs; if they make it more mouse friendly, it's Windows 7, which is worse than 10 with touch (which is one reason it remains the gold standard for PC user interface design).

    It simply isn't a good idea. Superficially, it seems like it would be; a large tablet looks enough like a laptop display that it's tempting to think of it actually being one on a part-time basis, with software seamlessly bridging the gap, but it's an illusion that goes away when you actually try to create the OS in question (or the device, for that matter... a convertible tablet is very top-heavy, with the added weight of the touchscreen and the electronics in the screen rather than in the base, which is built to be as thin as possible for portability). That's not to say that such a device can't be useful... just that it's not as good at being a laptop as a genuine laptop.

    Windows 10 is about as good an example as it is possible to imagine in terms of demonstrating the difficulties in trying to fit one UI to different devices with different input regimes. If there is a way to do it reasonably well, it could only be including two complete, redundant UIs, but while that would accomplish Microsoft's goal AND please users of dedicated mobile and dedicated traditional devices, it doesn't seem so "gee whiz" cool. It's inelegant to simply include two complete UIs; it's too easy, like it's cheating. It's the equivalent of a web site having a fully-formed desktop version and a fully-formed mobile version and serving them up based on useragent, which is currently considered bad practice.

    The buzzword (or phrase) now is "responsive design," which means the site would dynamically configure itself for whatever device the person is using without useragent sniffing to serve up one of two pre-formed sites, but instead by simply querying the screen resolution and other characteristics of the user's device and using that to dynamically configure the site. (Whether that actually works any better than Windows 10 is a completely separate question... I for one get very annoyed by the giant, content-sparse sites I see on my desktop PC more and more these days). For MS to eschew all of that trendiness and just cheap out by including two full UIs... well, that's just not cool, and MS is all about following trends and thinking outside of the box and shifting paradigms and other, more current examples of meaningless corporate-speak (chief among such terms being "the cloud").

    Apple figured it out without having to try it first; Mark Shuttleworth figured it out after having tried it. Now we wait for GNOME and Microsoft to see what is increasingly obvious.

  28. sabba

    Why would I potentially spend close on 3 grand for a portable computer and then have to fork out more for a pen and a keyboard? In theory it looks like a very appealing device, even allowing for the fact it's running Windows, but it's not practical at those prices. Personally I think the iPad Pro is over priced but compared to this it starts to look positively cheap. Think I will stick with my Macbook Air and a low end iPad for now.

  29. Philippe

    Consumer Reports has just pulled the buy recommendation for Microsoft products

    Looks like the reliability isn't there after 2 years.

    Maybe this has to do with CR testing methodology but it looks like anything microsoft is being pulled.

    "Consumer Reports is removing its “recommended” designation from four Microsoft laptops and cannot recommend any other Microsoft laptops or tablets because of poor predicted reliability in comparison with most other brands."

    I can only comment on the Sufracebook Pro, which we tested here. We had to return two of them after a few weeks. They're pretty rubbish. The Surface tablets however seem to be holding on but it has only been about 6 months.

  30. Greywolf40

    We have a Surface 4 Pro, it's our travel computer, handy to have a desktop computer in the carry-on. :-) Would like the newer Surface, but not until the promise of LTE/SIM card is fulfilled. IMO the price/quality ratio of the Surface compres favourably with its competition, including Apple products

  31. Milton

    Aren't there more satisfying ways of stuffing banknotes into a toilet?

    Even if I accept that MS are finally capable of producing a Surface that can be trusted to work properly for more than a month at a time, why on Earth would I spend so much money on one when I could get way more bang for my buck at any price point you name?

    If I absolutely *must* spend so much on a Shiny Thing, then I'll simply buy Apple, won't I? Admittedly that's lousy value for money too, but at least it'll work for longer and won't spy on me every second of every day.

    Are you buying a computing device for productivity? Or jewelry—designed for just one thing: to show how much money you were prepared to waste?

  32. thekswenson

    Sleep of Death

    So, did microsoft take care of the sleep of death issues that have plagued SP4 users for the last three years?

    My problems with SoD were just finally resolved with an update last month, after a year of having a laptop that doesn't sleep for more than 20 minutes without crashing.

    The update seems to have made my camera unstable. Microsoft are a bunch of clowns.

    They've managed to ruin this outstanding piece of hardware.

  33. thekswenson

    Using the surface tablet as paper.

    Nobody seems to mention just how nice this thing is for taking notes and marking up documents.

    For those of you who work conceptually, and aren't just banging away on the keyboard all day, this is the biggest reason to like the surface.

    My handwriting on the surface is completely natural. It has changed the way I work since I can easily mark corrections on texts, as well as correspond using figures. A picture is often worth a thousand words.

    It's a shame that microsoft is incompetent at software development. There is no excuse for the release of a system this buggy on their own hardware.

    My Ubuntu installation is now nicer than windows 10, but unfortunately has the MAJOR drawback of not being able to sleep due to the stupid "connected standby" invention (that Microsoft can't even get their software right with).

  34. thekswenson

    "the strange smoothed fabric" on the keyboard

    It looks like you haven't figured out what the "the strange smoothed fabric" on the keyboard is for yet...

    remove it and turn it over. Put it on the stupidly shiny screen and move it around.

    Notice that there are no more fingerprints.

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