Microsoft Studio
 

MS just announced their new iMac-like desktop alternative, and boy does it look brilliant (coming from someone who owns the 27" Apple iMac).

Hopefully UK pricing will be decent, really would want to try one out in the stores before biting the bullet.

Decent set of announcements today from MS, was really hoping they would have an alternative to the Bands, which they recently discontinued.

It looks nice, but way too expensive.

Imac-style all in ones are one of those ideas that are downright stupid for general use.

A separate desktop (even a mini-one that can mount to the back of the monitor!) and a monitor is way better.

Instead, you get a combination that:
A) both halves die if one half does
B) will probably be obsolete way sooner than the monitor will be
C) often costs more than a comparable pair of devices
D) You can use the monitor with more than one device (typically at once, switchable from the front)

In fairness, the Surface Studio goes beyond that, because it's pen and touch enabled and has the very interesting hinge... it's real competitor is something like a Wacom Cintiq and a separate PC. Price-wise, compared to the Cintiq, it's pretty competitive in the lower configurationa although the upgrades get way spendy. And the lack of bulk to the design is really nice.

The down side is that all the other disadvantages of an all-in-one still apply, it's probably not easily upgradeable or separately repairable, and even the top-end configuration is going to be a little limited for some engineering users.

For a narrow range of professionals for whom the pen and touch combination with the form factor is really useful for this jobs, that thing looks incredible (it might get my team's UX designer off of her Mac + Cintiq combination!) but if you weren't already in the market for something like the Cintiq, you're not the market.

One advantage of the built-ins for something like this: because the CPU (etc) goes obsolete, in 4-5 years you'll be able to get one of these for light duty graphic design work for a song.

I don't mind the iMac all-in-one styling for some purposes. My biggest gripe is repairability / upgradability.

When it takes 1-2 hours to swap out a hard drive, some engineer needs to be whipped with a Cat5 of 9 Tails: https://i.imgur.com/Vf4QdLtl.jpg

I'd love to see someone come up with a standard that would allow you to mount a mini-style computer to the back of the monitor WITHOUT having a rat's nest of cables going all over the place. There's no reason they couldn't come up with a connector on the back of the monitor which could provide power, video signal, USB, etc. that the mini-PC could attach to. You could still even use the VESA-mount holes for backwards compatibility with older monitors.

Such a standard exists now; it's relatively new and not widely adopted, but both standard USB-C 3.1 (which includes Displayport-over-USB-C) and Thunderbolt 3.0-over-USB-C can do exactly that (although you don't get native Ethernet as far as I know; in the thunderbolt case, you can use a full-speed PCIe ethernet chip on the PCIe part of thunderbolt, and USB 3 ethernet isn't too bad.)

For that matter, in theory Displayport (1.2) can do everything except power, although it's embarassing how long the spec for USB-over-displayport has been around for how few monitors support it. I thought there was a USB-over-HDMI spec, but I can't find it. There's even an ethernet-over-HDMI spec (not supported for Displayport) although I'm not aware of anyone supporting it.)

I've got a USB-C 3.1 dock (with displayport-over-USB-C) for my work laptop, and the only reason I have a second cord (HDMI) plugged in is that the Linux drivers for my laptop don't support displayport daisy chaining and the spliter in the dock won't do two 2K monitors. Daisy chained in Windows, they both work.

USB-C seems to be what the industry is converging on, and I think in a couple of years you'll be able to get a mini desktop that does exactly that. Whether you'll be able to get a monitor with (in essence) a built in dock for it to connect to... that's anybody's guess.

That also said, if you use a VESA mount and get short (1'-2' or 500CM) wires, two short wires for HDMI and USB* plus an external power brick aren't too bad...

[* assuming a real monitor with a hub built in... or just use wireless everything and either BT or a logitech unifying receiver.]

Intel developed the OPS form-factor for that but it is just too expensive to implement, just about any all-in-one PC including the iMac would be more economical.

I can see the appeal for people who use a digitizer.

The 5k iMac has more resolution. It would be interesting to see the color gamut compared to the Studio.

Neither the Studio nor the current iMac has USB 3.1 ports. That should change for the iMac.

The CPU and GPU in the Studio are not state of the art.

The price of entry of the Studio is $2999 while the 5K iMac starts at $1799. But who knows, Apple could raise the price by 20% as they did with the new MacBook Pro.