Microsoft's Surface Hub 2S Starts at $8,999, Ships in June

The Surface Hub, Microsoft's digital whiteboard designed for conferences and meetings, received a hardware refresh today. From a report: At a press event at Steelcase's swanky New York City hub, the Redmond, Washington company detailed the improved Surface Hub 2S, which boasts a touchscreen that's higher in resolution than the original, plus a 4K front camera that supports video calling, an enhanced 8-microphone far-field microphone array, and other improvements. Surface 2S will ship in June, starting at $8,999 and going up to nearly $12,000. (That's the same base price as the original Surface Hub 2.) A larger version -- the Surface Hub 2S 85-inch -- will also be available at an as-yet-unrevealed price, and stands and wall mounts from Steelcase will be sold separately for $1,449.99 and $249, respectively.

Surface Table

[Luthair]

I've always been disappointed that they stopped producing the original Surface tables, ever since I saw the MIT demo [youtube.com] of D&D on one it always seemed like they'd be used for very cool stuff if they were available on the used market.

Re:Surface Table

[jellomizer]

A lot of demo's products while look cool and are seen favorably never make it to the market because there is the issue of getting critical mass from it.
While I am sure some people would pay 8k for a D&D table, I doubt it will be enough to justify the build and marketing for it. But also there is a lot of Science Fiction Computer UI while many technically possible, are just impractical in real life. For example the Transparent Display It looks good in the movies, but it is so the Camera Man can see the Actors head and the data they are looking at the same time. In real life you are going to be sure you place that display in the right spot, otherwise you background is going to clash with what you are trying to read.

You can probably just mount your Surface Hub horizontally on a table if you want that specialist configuration.

Re:

[badboy_tw2002]

No time like the present to get started! You seem very sure of yourself, let me know when I can order one!

Re:

[Luthair]

I looked earlier and there seem to be quite a few tables on alibaba (mostly android) but sadly none are available on aliexpress. Even if there were as an individual you'd need to write the software that went viral to spark a community unfortunately.

Re:

[Luthair]

That is why I specified "available on the used market", obviously the original retail price ($11k) was far out of a reasonable range of individuals :)

I have heard that they had some success in some restaurants or casinos. In an alternate reality where this were popular in commercial settings and we saw successive generations then tinkerers might be able to pick these up on ebay.

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[darkain]

The Surface Table actually did make it to market though. The Sheraton Hotel in Downtown Seattle had a couple in their lobby years ago. If I was in the area, I'd stop by just to play around with the tables.

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[jacks smirking reven]

Surface table was cool but once large multi-touch systems became somewhat easy to buy and make there wasnt really a need for it. As i recall that table used a slick but complicated optical system for touch, now you can do it easy with a PCAP or IR based touch frame. You can buy them for any LCD and put it on a table and get the same effect.

This company makes some really nice ones.

https://ideum.com/ [ideum.com]

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[Locke2005]

The target market for Surface Hub is businesses that can afford $10K-$20K for a fancy videoconferencing setup in their conference rooms. The target market for Surface Table is... douchebags that can afford to spend $10K to impress friend they invite to parties? That's not really a big enough market to justify the ongoing support costs, is it?

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[Locke2005]

Aren't most of those also bought by content-production businesses?

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[Luthair]

Try again. The tables were also sold to businesses (hotels, restaurants, casinos) but Microsoft gave some to MIT and other schools to see what people would do with them. If the tech had been more successful then as these businesses upgraded there would have been a trickle down cycle on the used market and tinkerers could have gotten their hands on them and done cool shit. (which is what I said in my post).

Someone Please Reboot the Whiteboard

[Anonymous Coward]

Nine grand to take notes. AI isn't he danger, managers are.

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[jellomizer]

It is the customers who pay for it. Businesses especially in areas that are customer facing. Will spend a lot of money on mostly useless luxury items. That Gold Plated Logo that is 5 feet wide, on a wall with expensive fabric wall paper, Plush leather chairs, in a solid wood conference table. All to tell the customers that they are a company that is successful, and is setup to offer long term service, and isn't a fly by night operation.

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[gravewax]

most Slashdot readers have zero idea about the requirements of working in a large enterprise. They can't comprehend that even at 10k these are actually relatively cheaper for a video conference room.

Re:Someone Please Reboot the Whiteboard

[PPH]

Oblig. Dilbert [dilbert.com]

Re: All those business cases

[Type44Q]

I used to game on huge Mitsubishi MegaView CRT's that I found on eBay for pennies on the dollar. Wait ~12 years and you might just get your chance.

Re: All those business cases

[Type44Q]

Can't even make an "orange idiot" joke without pissing off some wannabe "conservative" who's apparently determined to act just like an intellectually-underequipped and oversensitive liberal.

What's an objective independent to do except tell 'em all to suck a dick. ;)

Am I reading it wrong?

[MisterMoney]

Unless I'm misreading the article (and there's every possibility I am), the $9K price tag is for a 50.5 inch version and the 85 inch version doesn't actually have a price point yet.

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[PPH]

get back to eating cheetos and masturbating

Don't forget that 4K front camera.

Has anyone used these?

[doubledown00]

Are they worth the investment? Or perhaps wait for something that can do 3D space like a hologram projector? Or perhaps enhanced reality glasses?

Re:

[jacks smirking reven]

It's nice if you actually use all the features, but if you end up just using it as a big display, then you really just overpaid. Its nice that it's all in one with a PC, cameras and speakers rather than a hodge-podge of equipment, but in my experience people who want "The Surface" really want that particular one for the prestige since they are hard to get rather then the many many equivalent corporate collaboration systems out there.

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[Kaenneth]

No; Surface/Pixelsense uses a different type of screen; instead of just R/G/B output pixels, it has an IR sensor integrated into each pixel. The screen requires it's own production line, circuitry, cables, etc.

So not just a huge screen with detection tacked on, it's a limited production run of huge electronically unique screens just for Microsoft.