Buy Surface Book 2 15
With Surface Book in View Mode, fold the display down so you have a horizontal surface to write on. Use touch or Surface Pen to draw or take notes, just like on paper. And if you want a truly immersive creative experience, add Surface Dial.
buy surface book 2 15
The big deal here with the Core i7 processor is it is the brand-new 8th generation version that goes from a dual-core to quad-core. Up until now, only more massive laptops with 45W processors were quad-core, but now Ultrabooks with 15W motherboards can get double the cores and threads. That matters less for running a web browser or Windows Store apps and more for CPU-intensive applications like CAD, video and photo rendering, 3D model makers, or crunching large amounts of data in Excel or engineering applications.
For 2017, the fulcrum hinge, which expands the base of the laptop when opened, has not changed from its predecessor. There is still the iconic "gap" when the Surface Book is closed giving the device its book-like shape. However, the muscle wire mechanism that releases the tablet from the base and the tabs that hold it secure have been rebuilt and simplified internally. The release is now much quieter when engaging, and the larger tabs reduced any screen wobble when using it as a laptop. The display can also be opened one-handed and is easy to do with the massive front notch.
While there are straight up gaming laptops with higher benchmark scores the Surface Book 2 15 leads the class of full, non-Ultrabook laptops for this size. In fact, it competes with and even beats the Razer Blade 14 with a 45W quad-core i7 processor and the same GTX 1060 GPU for processor tests.
We finally have the successor. After a troubled launch in late 2015 of the original Surface Book, Microsoft seemed to drag their feet when it came to updating what was one of the most interesting notebooks released in the last couple of years. The original Surface Book launched with some serious power management concerns, which were eventually sorted out, but then the company just left the model relatively untouched, except for a mid-generation update with a stronger GPU.
Microsoft have been striving to present a stark alternative to Apple's coffee-shop-ubiquitous Macbook line for a while now. In the past, their Surface range of (mostly) hybrid laptops/tablets have hardly been gaming machines, but that's now changed with current range-topper, the shockingly expensive Surface Book 2. Its industrial edges and muted silver tones mean it announces itself as all business in the streets, but the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 tucked inside its detachable keyboard base makes a case for more than casual gaming in the sheets.
The Surface Book range is different to (most) of the rest of the Surface range, as these are first and foremost proper, and high-end, laptops, very much intended to be a respectable Windows alternative to Apple's ooh-look-at-me Macbook Pros. They retain the Surface party trick of switching to tablet mode when you wrench the keyboard away, but it's a full, solid base rather than a thin flap, held by electromagnets onto a thick, compressing hinge that either oozes industrial chic or looks like a bunch of marshmallows squeezed together depending on where you're coming from.
The stark metal (magnesium, specifically - very light though easily damaged) lines and oddball clamshell profile of the Surface Book 2 thus appealed deeply, though in practice it looks slightly more, well, boring than I'd hoped. The metal doesn't gleam, and the boxiness doesn't quite manage the aspirational quality of a Macbook. It's certainly good-looking, especially in the desperately dull and plasticky world of laptops, but if you put it and Apple's rival on a table, most people will gravitate towards the latter. The side holes at its rear, where its powerful hinge-claw cannot flatten any further, will also divide responses between a striking design flourish and it looking like an unsightly, dust-collecting gap.
Clearly, as well as straight-up profit, Microsoft want to come across as premium as top-end Macbook Pros. This is a dramatically better-specced and more versatile device than anything Apple have to offer at present, but 'Microsoft' and 'Windows' imply something very different to many people than 'Apple' and 'Mac' do. Those stereotypes and loyalties have to be defeated before, rather than after, sky-high prices are matched.
This is a helluva machine, for both work and gaming, and I'm very glad to own one. However, I won't feel so glad if and when Microsoft knock 500 off the price to make it more appealing to the Macbook-tempted, and to compensate for the absent Thunderbolt and power drain issue.
What does g sync ready means?Can you use g sync with the SB2 and an external g sync monitor? And in that case through which port (because the port needs to be directly link to the Gpu right?) ? Do I need the surface dock to do so?
We've reviewed every great 2-in-1 you can buy, including Chromebooks, convertibles, and powerful 15-inch versions. The overall best 2-in-1 at the moment is the Microsoft Surface Pro 8, with its fantastic keyboard that's as easy to remove as it is to type on, plus its 120Hz display and haptic-enabled pen. It's almost as good a laptop as it is a tablet, which is what makes it the best overall 2-in-1. test
Doing so and pushing the display down enables a nice raised writing surface on the display, perfect for Surface Pen and note-taking. (Less perfect: Surface Pen is not included in the price of Surface Book 2. If you need this peripheral, you will need to budget an additional $100.) This usage mode is also useful for those cramped airline seat situations. By attaching the clipboard backward, you get a large tablet that can use all of its battery power.
Seems only MSFT is willing to make Windows laptops/tablets with 3:2 screens. I guess they don't sell enough to budge OEMs from the 16:9 rut. It'd be nice to have more choices in 3:2 than Surface devices and Google Pixelbooks. It'd be especially nice to have any choices with 3:2 screens and NOT Surface[and HP]-type keyboard layouts.
In reply to RobertJasiek:Yea, read the very first paragraph in my first reply. I disagree that your use case is common for pro machines. A Surface Laptop, or a MacBook air, meets all your needs and then some. You don't need the extra power of the Surface Book, or a MacBook pro. The latter are better served with a 16:10 screen for the type of work they potentially serve. I stand by my argument. The graphics design aspect is better served by a surface pro, and Microsoft should just build a performance base for that and redesign the surface book you be a dedicated pro machine with a 45w cpu and dedicated graphics with better, custom parts which no other oem is willing to do for some reason, but are more happy you charge you MacBook and surface pro prices using off the shelf components.
In reply to lilmoe:16:10 is superior . . .It's certainly superior to 16:9.The problem from my perspective is lack of choice, and other than some Macbooks, 16:10 isn't an option.Picky: many say wider aspect ratios are better for productivity because it's possible to show 2 windows side by side. Split in half horizontally, 16:9 gives 2 nearly square 8:9 panes, 16:10 gives 2 8:10 panes, and 3:2 gives 2 3:4 panes. FWIW, 3:4 falls between the aspect ratios of US letter and A4 paper. For what I do, that's better.Immobile desktop PCs can be customized. Laptops are much harder to customize, especially for ultrabooks designed to be as thin as possible. Then there's cost. I understand OEMs' reasons for 16:9 only, I just don't like it.
Great write up!I've been using the original surface book at work for the last 2 years. The stability problems (surfacegate) on that device are legendary in my office. However, once they got their firmware issues sorted out, it's been super solid ever since. I prefer typing on it more than any other device.It sounds like SB2 brings all the things I love about the original along with better specs and zero stability issues. Still, for nearly $3000, I can't understand why/how USB-C with thunderbolt 3 did not make it to this device!
If I needed a notebook with that much performance, these aspects would still prevent me from buying Surface Book 2:tiny arrow keys (example of a solution: make the right shift key a bit shorter, move the menu key right of the arrow keys),
no version with matte display,
terrible repairability,
non-removeable battery,
non-standard battery format (Where is the initiative for an industry standard format of batteries in mobile devices?!),
ultra-expensive battery replacement,
missing promise of battery replacement service for 7+ years,
Windows 10 telemetry.
Thunderbolt 3 would be nice to have but I understand that Microsoft has not been able yet to figure out all related hardware and driver reliability issues. The Intel CPU bugs are another consideration. Furthermore, I am not happy with the limited low-end configuation choices. 7th generation CPU, really?!
In reply to paul-thurrott:In the mid 90s, I had something similar to ThinkPads. Nowadays, I hone my patience and wait for the hybrid of Windows-tablet / detachable, ebook reader, iPad and desktop monitor / display put on a stand. It can be a single mobile device or a composition of display with attached or wirelessly linked computing card / stick / smartphone. The technology has been ripe for some 2 years now. I just need to wait for the first such quality product(s) meeting my essential criteria (incl. silence).I do not want to throw lots of money on some half-baked device now knowing that within a few years the (almost) perfect device(s) might appear. Why should it not appear? Desktops reached perfection after their infancy years. I expect mobile devices to also reach perfection after overcoming the current wild west years, whose major characterisation is to take as much money as possible from the impatient endconsumers until everybody knows what lasting quality is. 041b061a72