Microsoft's Surface Laptop With Windows 10 S Leaks Ahead of New York Unveil (hothardware.com) 74
MojoKid writes: Microsoft is holding an event in New York City tomorrow, the core theme of which is "Microsoft in Education." It's widely expected that the company will be unveiling a new Surface Laptop device running a Windows 10 Cloud version OS. As it turns out, images of a new Surface laptop leaked to the web tonight portray very much that type of product, though it's not necessarily a budget machine. For starters, it has a 13.5-inch PixelSense display with 3.4 million pixels, which appears to retain the 3:2 screen ratio that we've seen with previous Surface-branded products. Given that this is a laptop, there's no detachable keyboard here. The display is permanently attached to the base and features an Alcantara-covered keyboard deck (the same material used on the Surface Pro 4's optional Signature Type Cover). It also appears the Surface Laptop will be available in four colors: Platinum, Burgundy, Cobalt Blue and Graphite Gold. Other images of the machine show an SD slot, a single USB 3.0 port, mini DisplayPort and a headphone jack. Microsoft apparently hasn't equipped the machine with a USB-C port, unfortunately.
About time! (Score:1, Funny)
This bold assault on Apple's education market dominance will enable Microsoft to eventually control the mindshare of the crucial under 18 demographic. As the new blood matures and enters the workforce, Microsoft products like Windows and their many cloud-based services ll be uniquely situated to serve the next generation of technology professionals.
Wall Street will certainly reward this with higher share prices, and C-level execs will earn their well-deserved wealth. Kudos to Microsoft!
Linux (Score:2)
Does it already run Linux ?
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Re:Sounds like either USB-C is dead in the water.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'd hazard a guess it's more an issue that Type-C isn't anywhere near as common as Type-A yet when it comes to peripherals. This thing only has a single USB port (seriously?), and a single Type-A is going to be far more useful than a single Type-C. I have a laptop with A's and a C, but honestly haven't found a reason to buy a Type-C device bearing in mind I'd not be able to use a C device with my desktop machine without some sort of additional adapter.
Obviously the best solution would be one (preferably more than one) of each, but Microsoft apparently thinks a single port is sufficient.
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Re:Sounds like either USB-C is dead in the water.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Most early adopters of the USB-C port will replace their PC before connecting a single USB-C device. And no, dongles don't count.
This is especially true for iPhone owners since phones are by far the most common USB-C devices.
It was also true that at the beginning of USB, there was no reason to rush into buying a PC without PS/2 ports. They worked just fine for keyboard and mouse. There was no real advantage in having 4 USB ports over 2 USB and 2 PS/2.
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Yes and it was a good thing to replace PS/2. There was just no rush to change. Ports were color coded (green and purple) so it was easy to plug the keyboard in the correct port. A smooth transition over a few years is the best thing to do when replacing ports.
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This looks a little like a technology demonstrator. Look for a Surface Book 2 incorporating some of the design stuff inside this to come out.
I love my Surface Pro 3, and just want a swype-like keyboard to make it perfect. That's all ):
type c isnt popular because stupid manufacturers (Score:2, Insightful)
type c isnt popular because stupid manufacturers who only seem to put it on expensive slim machines and lose a currently more useful port for it.
And we can guess what the S stands for (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder if there is an argument to port Wine to UWP so it can revert some of the brain damage for people stuck with one of these devices.
Re:And we can guess what the S stands for (Score:4, Interesting)
being only able to run UWP ones and is therefore worse than fucking useless.
Yes and no. Windows RT suffered from being ARM and having no developers or software. The world has changed a lot since that abortion of an experiment with many people quite happy to work on online only programs reverting to the occasional app to do work.
I had a think about this recently, with Office 365 a thing now I couldn't come up with a single reason why a heavily locked down machine like this or a Chromebook couldn't be a primary work machine. There's just not that much most people actually do with their computers beyond consuming media, firing up word, or spending the entire day in a web browser.
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The problem with the Surface RT was not that it was ARM, but that Microsoft crippled the Office install. No Exchange connectivity at the start, and you can't use it for business use. The hardware was good, they just fumbled the software.
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Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
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RT/Cloud/S is designed to compete with ChromeOS, not Ubuntu.
You can install arbitrary software on a Chromebook.
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I installed Photoshop on my Chromebook. Works great!
If you insist on being obtuse, you're going to have to hide behind anonymity forever.
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Son, you're forgetting yourself.
I know precisely who and where I am. Can you remember?
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RT/Cloud/S is designed to compete with ChromeOS, not Ubuntu.
You can install arbitrary software on a Chromebook.
A chromebook with Linux on it sings pretty darn well. Nothing like a whole boot sequence in 6 seconds. The other software runs nicely as well.
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Huh? chromebooks are insanely powerful here because they are absolutely virus proof. not even the executives can bork these things. The other aspect is the all the time connectivity via LTE and the google cloud sync of all data. Fred in sales lost another "laptop"? hand him another one, charge his paycheck $350 and he is back running as if nothing happened in less than 10 minutes.
Locking it down is the bottom 10% of the desired feature set.
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We are doing this at work with Windows 7 and a plethora of management tools.
- Redirect My Documents and Favorites to remote drive? Check.
- Pre- login VPN signon to reconnect remote drives? Check.
- Roaming profiles and virtually instant recovery on a new machine? Check.
- Data loss prevention at multiple levels? Check. (Does Chrome OS offer this, such as disabling all removable storage, preventing specific data from transmission, and file-level encryption in addition to drive-level encryption?)
Not perfect, bu
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Chromebooks are selling not just because they're locked down, but because an admin can easily centrally create and manage user accounts, and users can log into any Chromebook and have access to the right features.
Chromebooks are also wildly cheap. I have a bottom of the line Acer Chromebook that I bought for the luLz when they came out. ~ 4-5 years. It's still going strong, and it's still fast for what it is.
I have my good stuff at home, and use this out at breakfast and on travel because I don't have to worry about it.
Wonder what the price point is on the Surface product? Better be damn low to compete with the Chromebooks. And it better be damned reliable as well. Microsoft's track record in that area is defini
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Full blown Windows 10 already runs in the spec of Windows 10 S devices. There are literally $150 laptops out there running Windows 10 32-bit from devices with 2GB RAM and 32GB storage.
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Yeah, this is disturbing. It's as if Intel was asked to leave this alone so long as there was no civilian exploit found.
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Isn't that by design? (Score:2, Insightful)
From the title:
> "Microsoft's Surface Laptop With Windows 10 S Leaks"
Isn't that a feature of Windows 10 anyway? Or perhaps the surprise here is that one Microsoft product is working as intended?
Screen resolution? (Score:4, Interesting)
3.4 Mpixel with 3:2 is something like 1500x2250. Remains to be seen (no pun intended).
As for only Universal Apps (BTW called just "Windows Apps" last time I checked, but I might be wrong as they are changing them periodically, remember Metro apps, W8-style, Modern Style, etc. ?) they (or were rumors?) said desktop apps could be installed, just that not "enabled" by default. It does look to be the normal Wintel ultrabook (of which we do have plenty).
It all depends on pricing and what's the quality overall, the screen, the keyboard (again the CLOTH keyboard?!) and so on.
Re:Screen resolution? (Score:4, Funny)
I was about to ask for someone to convert the number of pixels to a usable quantity like Libraries of Congress, but I guess resolution will suffice.
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said desktop apps could be installed, just that not "enabled" by default
That is certainly true in the current insider builds, but that may have no relevance what so ever for the final copy.
Leaked (Score:1)
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Surfaces are selling well.
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Leaks? What leaks? (Score:2)
images of a new Surface laptop leaked to the web tonight portray
How exactly do all these "products-to-be" leak? They always "leak." What leaks exactly?
I have come to the conclusion that it's all part of an orchestrated campaign, for lack of a better way to explain it.
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I dunno... One time Windows 8 leaked all over my computer, and I had to reformat the disk and install Debian.
Burgundy? (Score:1)
Linux? (Score:1)
If I'm reading this correctly... (Score:4, Funny)
As it is a laptop - not only is there no detachable keyboard, but also the display is permanently attached to the base.
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Who'd buy an expensive laptop to run Windows 10 S? (Score:2)