45G of OS and bloatware?!?  nice.

What I don't get is who upgrades so damn often. I have a Xoom. Had it for over a year. It's still workin' fine. I'm not gonna pay a bunch extra for a freakin' new tablet when mine's still up and runnin'.

In its defence, Microsoft has pointed out that the Surface Pro includes a USB 3.0 port for high-speed connectivity to external storage devices such as pen drives or hard disks, along with a free SkyDrive cloud storage account offering an additional 7GB of web-based storage.

Remarkable tablet, the Surface Pro.  Beautiful plumage!!

The Asus Tai Chi 128 only has 70G out of the 128 it's supposed to have due to OS, bloatware, and "recovery disk." It's called format and reinstall only what you need.

dahmers love zombie: In its defence, Microsoft has pointed out that the Surface Pro includes a USB 3.0 port for high-speed connectivity to external storage devices such as pen drives or hard disks, along with a free SkyDrive cloud storage account offering an additional 7GB of web-based storage.

Remarkable tablet, the Surface Pro.  Beautiful plumage!!

to be fair, it is one of the first to have a usb connection. let alone USB 3.0

It would be exactly as much storage as I paid for: a lot, but not enough to last forever. There is no difference between 80 GB and 100 GB. There is also no difference between a binary terabyte and a metric terabyte.

With the devices failing to reach the promised capacities - and Barrons claiming that Microsoft may have sold as few as 230,000 Surface RT tablets worldwide - the company may struggle to convince tablet fans to switch from their iPads or Android devices.


Well, there's also the fact that it is way overpriced.  Hell, you can buy a Win8 touchscreen laptop for cheaper.  I don't know what the heck MS is thinking.  Maybe they are hoping it will be picked up in the business world.

UberDave: With the devices failing to reach the promised capacities - and Barrons claiming that Microsoft may have sold as few as 230,000 Surface RT tablets worldwide - the company may struggle to convince tablet fans to switch from their iPads or Android devices.


Well, there's also the fact that it is way overpriced.  Hell, you can buy a Win8 touchscreen laptop for cheaper.  I don't know what the heck MS is thinking.  Maybe they are hoping it will be picked up in the business world.

I don't see any reason for the business world to pick it up.  You can get a hybrid laptop for less.  Get a 128GB Surface Pro with a TypeCover keyboard and you're well above $1100 for something that, for all intents and purposes, is a limited hybrid laptop.

Lsherm: UberDave: With the devices failing to reach the promised capacities - and Barrons claiming that Microsoft may have sold as few as 230,000 Surface RT tablets worldwide - the company may struggle to convince tablet fans to switch from their iPads or Android devices.


Well, there's also the fact that it is way overpriced.  Hell, you can buy a Win8 touchscreen laptop for cheaper.  I don't know what the heck MS is thinking.  Maybe they are hoping it will be picked up in the business world.

I don't see any reason for the business world to pick it up.  You can get a hybrid laptop for less.  Get a 128GB Surface Pro with a TypeCover keyboard and you're well above $1100 for something that, for all intents and purposes, is a limited hybrid laptop.


Pretty much.  I keep thinking they designed it per some industrial spec or something.  There was plenty of buzz around this thing just like the RT.  But when they announced the price which was well beyond competitor tablets, that "buzz" dropped off real quick.

If they don't change something fast, this thing will go the way of the Zune in 1/4 the time.  I'm guessing that they will sell no better than a similarly priced laptop/notebook and in about a year, they will lower the price but by then, it will be dying.  I hope I'm wrong.

Will it sync with my Zune?

doglover: What I don't get is who upgrades so damn often. I have a Xoom. Had it for over a year. It's still workin' fine. I'm not gonna pay a bunch extra for a freakin' new tablet when mine's still up and runnin'.

Exactly. My GF got me my Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 for Christmas. My friend saw me using it and asked what it was so I told him, he then proceeds to tell me I should get rid of it and get the new Note tablet.

I told him to kindly STFU.

Crudbucket: wambu: Will it sync with my Zune?

Yes, actually, it will. This runs the full version of Win 8, so you can install the Zune software on the tablet and sync.

And iTunes as well, so you can sync with an iPod, something an iPad WON'T actually do.

Since it seems to have a nice digitizer, when the price drops it might make a great tablet for digital art, since you can run the full versions of Photoshop and Illustrator without all the bulk and weight previous tablets had. It could be a godsend to artists and designers.

45GB for the OS is before the "updates".

Mikey1969: Same thing happened with my Nook. Bought it with 2 GB of "storage" space, and found out that of that 2 GB, only 250MB was available, because the rest was either the OS, or a dedicated, locked storage for only the books I downloaded from the B&N store. Nice to get access to 12% of the advertised space, isn't it?

It has a MicroSD slot. I store all my books and media on that.

35% fraud? That should be a hanging

madgonad: Win8 itself is only 20GB (I checked).

That means there is 20-25GB of additional BLOAT on Surface Pro besides the OS. Office 2013 only needs 3GB.

Well, they have to store an image of the OS + the bloatware if you need to reset the device, so I'd guess that takes up a good chunk of space.

The Crepes of Wrath: doglover: What I don't get is who upgrades so damn often. I have a Xoom. Had it for over a year. It's still workin' fine. I'm not gonna pay a bunch extra for a freakin' new tablet when mine's still up and runnin'.

Same here. I still have my first gen Nook Color (rooted, Cyanogen), and it's going strong. Don't see the need to buy another one just to get something newer.

In your case, going from a Nook color, to a Nook Tablet HD, the difference is huge.
Even at the same price point, going to a Nexus 7 is a big step up.
It's not so much the latest thing, it's you have a very underpowered tablet.

gingerjet: Mad_Radhu: Since it seems to have a nice digitizer, when the price drops it might make a great tablet for digital art, since you can run the full versions of Photoshop and Illustrator without all the bulk and weight previous tablets had. It could be a godsend to artists and designers

Ah.  No.  Windows RT versions of Photoshop and Illustrator do not exist.  And even if it did - I'm betting that performance wise - it would really suck.

As mentioned above, the Surface Pro that we are discussing has Win 8 Pro and an i5 processor, so it is functionally equivalent to a regular Windows computer. Aside from the relatively stingy amount of RAM on the tablet, it should run most content creation software well. Also, with a SSD, Photoshop having to go to the scratch disk might not really hurt performance as much as a regular hard drive.