Gaucho,

User of the Surface Pro 3 here. Like you I am looking at moving to the surface book or wait for the an updated surface pro 4. I have been very happy with the 3. I travel a lot so appreciate the lighter weight. As a matter of fact it is the weight issue that is holding me back from going with the surface book.

MS is having an event on May 23rd where it is expected (according to online sources that I read) that any updates to the existing product line will be announced. From what I can gather there are no intentions to discontinue either the surface pro or surface book lines. the new laptop is aimed at the student segment and the product will compete with the Chromebook form factor.

I hope this helps.

I would concur with this. The screen is a little small for me on the Surface Pro 3, but that's part of my trade-off for light and portable. It may well be that when the laptop ban comes into place, I'll go back to a larger laptop as I won't be able to take the smaller one onboard anyway.

Which processor in the W520?

The Surface Book models are going to have somewhat similar performance to the dual core W520, but if you have the quad core W520, any of the ultrabook CPUs in the Surface book will be a disappointing step down.

If you want to stick with a quad core, have a look at the Dell XPS 15 9560 (or last-gen 9550, or the Precision M5520/M5510 which are the "business" versions of the same machine) or the HP Zbook Studio.

The Dell E5480 (and E5470) do also have quad core options available, but both are not much lighter/smaller or as-equipped with the higher end process, much cheaper than the XPS/Zbook (when new; as refurbs, they're hugely cheaper) and they are much less well-built.

The Dells, in particular, stuff a full 15" screen into an amazingly compact package.

Thanks for sharing your experience.... Im going to wait until the end of the month and see what the new lineup looks like and what the timetable is.

Cheers,
Gaucho100K

Not sure I need the full power of the Quad Core processing muscle, but you raise an important point regardless.... thanks !!

Just a question of whether your applications need it. The single-threaded performance will be a good bit better on the newer machine, but not by nearly enough to make up for the difference between 2 cores/4 threads vs. 4 cores/8 threads for most use.

One other thing about the Surface Book: the memory (like on most thin ultrabook-type laptops and hybrids) is soldered, and can't be upgraded. So make sure you get it with enough memory to last your expected life of the machine.

The SSD is removable/upgradeable in theory, but it's major surgery to get at it and I'd suggest it's pretty much only useful to get at it if the machine is otherwise bricked as a form of data recovery.

May find this interesting: https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Micr...Teardown/51972

Mind, pretty much any ultra-thin portable model will be similar. If you want upgradeability and reparability, you pretty much have to stick to the increasingly uncommon full-size business machines.

Excellent advice, thanks !!!

Very good points on the reparability as down here in EZE I dont think that MS has a proper hardware division so support and service for Surface Books will pretty much be zero.

I recently bought a SB, to replace my Ativ Book 9 or whatever it's called.

I love the keyboard (not a heavy Fn user as someone upthread) and screen.

It's a good bit heavier, and that's taking some getting used to..

I don't mind "the gap" at all.

However, some minor irritations:

a) the screen can only be angled back to about 90 degrees in laptop mode...I've only just realised that I've become used to about 100 degrees :)
b) the power brick: did MS really need to make it such a monster? What's the point of having a (relatively) light but powerful laptop when I have to lug that thing around?
c) having to buy new peripherals for connecting to screens, at the usual ripoff prices. The lack of a mini-HDMI is particularly irritating.

Overall, very much in the positive camp for now, but only had it a week or so...

tb

Any update on the new announcements for the Surface Book models....?

I just read an article published by techradar that seems to imply that there is a chance that MS will not bring out a Surface Book 2..... anybody else have the scoop about this...???

Thanks.

I use the Pro 4, and had the Pro 2 before that. My wife has a Surface 3, which is basically a Pro 2. We love them. Light, ultra portable, can use during all phases of flight. If I were a gamer, I'd probably want something else, but I'm not and it works really, really well.

Any updates on this...??

Thanks !!

Hmmm.... not too many Surface fans here on FT.....?

its both a laptop and a tablet. only reason i chose it for that was because it was microsoft direct. perhaps im just lazy for not comparison shopping.

because its both, one thing ive done is detach screen, rotate orientation, then re attach. not sure how many laptops offer that by default with their built in screen.

my computers are all apple. if apple made macOS tablet, i would not have bought surface book.

will be interesting to see if they do surface book 2, or if suface laptop (not tablet) replaces it.

Does anybody have the scoop on when MS plans to announce the new hardware it will be bringing out.....??