Originally Posted by
Microwave
Do any FlyerTalkers out there actually have a Surface Pro 3 and are using it regularly? I'm keen to order one when I'm next in the USA, but really want to hear what regular travellers think of it. While reviews can be quite helpful, the frame of reference isn't always useful to me; in other words, I don't care how much better it is than the Surface Pro 2, or even whether it's good against a MacBook Air. I do care what a regular traveller thinks of it, as that fits my demographic better.
In case it matters, my intended use pattern is to have two docks, one at work and one at home, and the unit will spend roughly 75% of its life in one of those docks. When not, I'll be going to/from client meetings, where portability is very useful and most of what I'm doing is delivering presentations or taking notes. At the moment I go on all work trips with my MacBook Pro and iPad Air, and my goal with the Surface Pro 3 would be to be able to do all my MacBook stuff on it (MS Office content creation, email, web browsing, note taking, light games like Civ 5 and Sim City) and do all my iPad stuff on it (Media consumption with VLC or Plex both online and offline, time waster touch games like sudoku or Mahjong solitaire, email, web browsing).
I got an i5 last week. Don't use my laptop any more, I had a Lenovo with USB docking station and now plug the Surface into that for work. It's docked about 80% of the time. I use it in tablet mode when traveling. A little heavier than the RT, but screen is better and speakers much louder.
Keyboard is fine but takes a bit of getting used to. I haven't used the pen much yet but am planning to try to avoid taking paper notes in meetings when I return from vacation.
I've been traveling mostly with my Lenovo carbon plus a Dell Venue Pro tablet. I definitely see me only taking the surface for work trips now. Battery life is better than the carbon and the power brick much smaller.