• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Microsoft's Surface Book 2

B

brotkasten

Member
badb0y said:
As someone who has owned this device and was dissatisfied I would recommend the people wanting to purchase a SB2 to go into a local electronic store and actually test it out. In my experience it was an adequate laptop and tablet but didn't really do either of those things well.
Click to expand...

I don't think the massive issues with the first-gen had can be experienced while testing it in a store. Things like weight distribution, keyboard, touchpad and screen quality, sure. But the standby and detachment issues are things that show up over a longer period of time. Either way, I'd definitely not recommend it as a day-1 purchase no matter how glowing the reviews are.
 
N

Navidson REC

Member
uncleniccius said:
Wait sp5? I don't understand how MS products seem to have such little hype behind them on announcements. Apple really are the kings of hype building on this stuff.
Click to expand...

It's simply called the New Surface Pro.

Hype seemed decent though, but I'm pretty sure it was more than a month ago.
 
formasymphonic

formasymphonic

Member
TBiddy said:
With the latest 8th Gen Intel Core processors and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 and 1060 discrete graphics options, Surface Book 2 is up to five times more powerful than the original and is twice as powerful as the latest MacBook Pro. All this power and Surface Book 2 still provides all-day battery life – up to 17 hours of video playback. That’s 70% more than the latest MacBook Pro.
Click to expand...

Shots fired.

Also, what a weird and wonderful time to be alive in. Microsoft making faster and more beautiful laptops and AIOs than Apple.
Click to expand...

Anyone know which specific model of SB2 is twice as fast as a current MBP? And which specific MBP is it twice as fast as? Is it because the 8th gen has low voltage quad cores now, or is it something else?
 
H

Henrar

Member
TBiddy said:
Shots fired.

Also, what a weird and wonderful time to be alive in. Microsoft making faster and more beautiful laptops and AIOs than Apple.
Click to expand...

Laptops - yes, if we compare GPUs only (15 inch MBP has faster CPU than the ULV part in SB2). AIOs - well, Surface Studio is using dual core i7 and Maxwell GPU, so not really.
 
U

uncleniccius

Member
Fulminator said:
its just called surface pro (2017) now, so it's understandable to not have noticed
Click to expand...

Navidson REC said:
It's simply called the New Surface Pro.

Hype seemed decent though, but I'm pretty sure it was more than a month ago.
Click to expand...
I was looking because my girlfriend wants one and assumed it wasn't out. I generally follow tech news pretty closely(all the big sites on twitter etc) so am a little surprised - i caught wind of this straight away.

Applying for a role at Microsoft at the moment (though I haven't done much research yet) so probably good to know lol
 
L

lukeskymac

Member
Wollan said:
Why can't these 15" laptops never feature a numpad. Just wasted space on each side.
Click to expand...

Because it clashes with the touchpad. You either keep the touchpad in the center and have your wrist touch the middle of the touchpad while typing, or you align the touchpad with the "main block" of the keyboad and end up with an ugly, asymmetrical design.

If I needed a numpad so badly I'd just bring along a full size keyboard. Especially when the notebook's keyboard is low travel like the SB's and MBP's are.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
Dreams-Visions said:
Are we talking about this thing with a couple of MDP ports and some USB 3 ports?

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/d/microsoft-surface-dock/8qrh2npz0s0p/hpr1

With the 2.5 / 5 star ratings? Nah, that's not getting it done.

You might be right about it never supporting Thunderbolt 3; I don't know anything about MS' stance on it. What I do know is that their competitors in this price space and less have it, including products from:

Apple (obvious)
Asus
Razer
Alienware
Lenovo
HP

...and a few others that I can think of like MSI. They all have their pros and cons that I won't waste time on, but I don't have to instantly cross any of them off the list because of a lack of pro hardware support by design. It bothers me because I was briefly imagining this Surface replacing my MBP. I quickly had that notion dispelled upon reading the fine print. I generally have more confidence in MS as a brand than some of the others listed, so it would have been my #1 Windows laptop option if not for this.

It's fine for general use I'm sure. If your lifestyle generally revolves around Adobe products, MS Office and web browsing I'm sure it's good enough. But it lost a great deal of professional usage and longevity here. I would not be surprised to see a revision that updates the USB-C implementation at some point in the future. Ignore me, I'm just disappointed because it appears to be a lovely device and one that would have been on my very short list.
Click to expand...
TB3 is great to have as a checklist but practically, most people don't use it. Currently the most touted feature is the eGPU, but actual practice of it is not giving you GTX 1080 desktop experience on your laptop due to bandwidth limits of TB3 anyways.

You can use it for external monitors but so can none TB3 USB-C 3.1.
You can use it for external storage but most storage solutions barely take advantage of USB 3.1 unless you are crazy enough to waste a PCIe SSD for external storage.

TB3 is one of those things that everyone thinks they want, but will not end up using at current time.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
Henrar said:
Laptops - yes, if we compare GPUs only (15 inch MBP has faster CPU than the ULV part in SB2). AIOs - well, Surface Studio is using dual core i7 and Maxwell GPU, so not really.
Click to expand...

Surface Studio is using 45W quad core i7. Where the hell did you get dual core from?
 
S

Skel1ingt0n

I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
Nvidia’s GPUs have to be appreciated by so many manufacturers. It’s a drop-in part, but their performance vs wattage is just so far beyond previous GPUs that it makes every small form factor PC laptop that much more exciting.

If two years ago I had shown you games like Overwatch, R6 Siege, Forza 7, Tomb Raider, running at 60fps/1080p on this kind of hardware, I think anyone would have been blown away.
 
F

FinKL

Member
Hmm, wifey wants a gaming laptop, but I told her next year's Volta will be it!

I thought this was interesting on the 15"
"Xbox Wireless : YES"

Built in Wireless Xbox Controller support
 
S

Skel1ingt0n

I can't *believe* these lazy developers keep making file sizes so damn large. Btw, how does technology work?
FinKL said:
Hmm, wifey wants a gaming laptop, but I told her next year's Volta will be it!

I thought this was interesting on the 15"
"Xbox Wireless : YES"

Built in Wireless Xbox Controller support
Click to expand...

Yep - also really awesome.
 
L

lukeskymac

Member
Shogmaster said:
TB3 is great to have as a checklist but practically, most people don't use it. Currently the most touted feature is the eGPU, but actual practice of it is not giving you GTX 1080 desktop experience on your laptop due to bandwidth limits of TB3 anyways.
Click to expand...

That's a very strange thing to say. Even with the bandwidth bottleneck you're still getting far more performance than with notebook dGPUs.
 
P

Pooya

Member
N7 MRP Weasel said:
So can someone just quickly explain the difference between

Thunderbolt and USB type C type C 3.1 etc etc please
Click to expand...

Thunderbolt 3.0 or USB-C 3.1 that support it, physically have semi direct access to CPU lanes with a special controller, this allows you to plug in a device and have it communicate with the CPU just as you would with a PCI Express slot on the mainboard. You have much greater bandwidth here, allows you to run external GPUs, very fast external storage or drive extremely high resolution displays. Mac pros can run like 5k screens with their dual channel tb3 ports while windows machines typically need two cables to run the same screen.

The port here is just regular USB port that has a different shape than full sized and it doesn't physically support direct CPU access. Everything goes through USB host controller and the limited features it enables. This is generally limited to limited external display support or charging on top of USB Mass storage and serial connection. I'm not sure if this can even output 4k60Hz, depends on what they did.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
N7 MRP Weasel said:
So can someone just quickly explain the difference between

Thunderbolt and USB type C type C 3.1 etc etc please
Click to expand...

USB type C is a physical connection standard and both USB 3.1 and Thunderbolt 3 uses it.

USB 3.1 is internal chipset that allows fast bandwdith (10 gigabits per second or 1.25GB/s).

Thunderbolt 3 is also an internal chipset that allows superfast bandwidth (40 gigabits per second or 5GB/s)
 
S

SCULLIBUNDO

Banned
!!!!!!

15" motherfucker!

I absolutely love that MS listen to what we want. I'm still in love with my Book i7, but would give my left nut for the 15".
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
giga said:
Isn’t one of the main appeals of an AIO is to look nice? That thing is a disaster. Surface Studio and iMac gets that right.
Click to expand...

Tastes vary. Lenovo has very capable industrial designers They made the Y910 look like that because it appeals to that demographic.
 
Classicblunder

Classicblunder

Member
I'm glad they went to 15 inch. I actually want 18 inch and the GPU integrated in the tablet. OLED screen too. Still waiting then
for Samsung to do it.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
Henrar said:
Not Microsoft-made one - I answered to a post comparing Microsoft computers to Apple ones, not others. I know there are more powerful AIOs running Windows than iMacs - including insane ones like the one with GeForce Titan XP.
Click to expand...

I don't know why one would narrow the AIO comparison to only MS and Apple. Such a weird artificial constraint IMO. As a consumer, we can buy from more than just Apple and MS.
 
G

Guess Who

Banned
15” and quad-core options definitely make this more interesting of a machine than before. I am extremely skeptical of that 17 hour battery life claim, though. I need to see some independent tests before I believe that.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
Guess Who said:
15” and quad-core options definitely make this more interesting of a machine than before. I am extremely skeptical of that 17 hour battery life claim, though. I need to see some independent tests before I believe that.
Click to expand...

Real life usage will be more like 8~10 hours without going full throttle on the 1060.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
lukeskymac said:
That's a very strange thing to say. Even with the bandwidth bottleneck you're still getting far more performance than with notebook dGPUs.
Click to expand...

Where do you want to go from having a GTX 1060 internally? 1070 or 1080 will be bottlenecked by the 5GB/s bandwidth of the TB3 and will not perform to their peak anyways.
 
N

N7 MRP Weasel

Banned
miladesn said:
Thunderbolt 3.0 or USB-C 3.1 that support it, physically have semi direct access to CPU lanes with a special controller, this allows you to plug in a device and have it communicate with the CPU just as you would with a PCI Express slot on the mainboard. You have much greater bandwidth here, allows you to run external GPUs, very fast external storage or drive extremely high resolution displays. Mac pros can run like 5k screens with their dual channel tb3 ports while windows machines typically need two cables to run the same screen.

The port here is just regular USB port that has a different shape than full sized and it doesn't physically support direct CPU access. Everything goes through USB host controller and the limited features it enables. This is generally limited to limited external display support or charging on top of USB Mass storage and serial connection. I'm not sure if this can even output 4k60Hz, depends on what they did.
Click to expand...

Ok so its just a port allowing more access because o alot of phones and devices now use this style, for the most part
 
N

N7 MRP Weasel

Banned
Shogmaster said:
USB type C is a physical connection standard and both USB 3.1 and Thunderbolt 3 uses it.

USB 3.1 is internal chipset that allows fast bandwdith (10 gigabits per second or 1.25GB/s).

Thunderbolt 3 is also an internal chipset that allows superfast bandwidth (40 gigabits per second or 5GB/s)
Click to expand...

Wait so it is somewhat faster when transferring data across lets say a phone or external hard drive?
 
G

Guess Who

Banned
Shogmaster said:
Where do you want to go from having a GTX 1060 internally? 1070 or 1080 will be bottlenecked by the 5GB/s bandwidth of the TB3 and will not perform to their peak anyways.
Click to expand...

A 1080 over TB3 will still perform substantially better at most things than a 1060 internally. The performance hit from TB3 is generally around ~15% compared to internal PCIe (assuming you are using an external monitor as well).
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
N7 MRP Weasel said:
Wait so it is somewhat faster when transferring data across lets say a phone or external hard drive?
Click to expand...

Most external hard drives top out at 100MB/s transfer speeds. Even USB 3.0 (half the speed of USB 3.1) is more than enough for that. Even if you own an expensive external SSD from Samsung (~400MB/s), you are still amply covered by USB 3.0.

Even the fastest phones don't have internal storage faster than Samsung external SSD right now. iPhones come close, but the lightening port isn't TB3 compliant so it's rather moot. Most phones only give you USB 2.0 connection through their ports anyways.
 
S

Shogmaster

Member
Guess Who said:
A 1080 over TB3 will still perform substantially better at most things than a 1060 internally. The performance hit from TB3 is generally around ~15% compared to internal PCIe (assuming you are using an external monitor as well).
Click to expand...

Sure if you are using an external monitor. But then if you are using external and a giant eGPU box along with it, might as well go with a uATX ot ITX dekstop instead of using TB3 eGPU solution on your laptop.

If you are looping in that 1080 via TB3 to laptop's internal monitor, you are robbing even more bandwidth for the GPU and might as well just use the built in 1060.
 
G

Guess Who

Banned
Shogmaster said:
Sure if you are using an external monitor. But then if you are using external and a giant eGPU box along with it, might as well go with a uATX dekstop instead of using TB3 eGPU solution on your laptop.

If you are looping in that 1080 via TB3 to laptop's internal monitor, you are robbing even more bandwidth for the GPU and might as well just use the built in 1060.
Click to expand...

There is no shortage of reasons why having an eGPU box and an external monitor might be a useful use case for many people. Tons of people want to have one machine they can take with them and just dock to an external monitor when needed - now you can also get more GPU power when you dock, too. (And eGPU boxes are still smaller than a uATX tower.)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Microsoft will soon allow users to uninstall Edge and Bing, but only in the EU
Business
6
838
Kilau replied
Should Microsoft's Rumored Gaming Focus Laptop be branded "Surface" or "Xbox"?
Opinion Hardware
39
2K
Thebonehead replied
Xbox Black Friday starts on November 17
News Hype Platform 2 3
121
7K
Leonidas replied
Microsoft Will Pay You $15,000 If You Get Bing AI to Go Off the Rails
21
2K
PSYGN replied
Leak shows Microsoft is launching the first Surface gaming Laptop (i7, 32GB Ram, RTX 3070Ti, 1440p, 165hz, 16in display)
2
64
4K
Spukc replied
Top Bottom