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Tell us about your Surface and Windows 8 experience

By on October 26, 2012 at 4:49pm in Mobile News

We had a brief chance to play with Microsoft’s brand new Surface tablet yesterday, and came away impressed by its excellent build quality, fascinating hybrid tendencies, and the fluidity with which you can move around the Windows 8 desktop. While the tablet runs Windows RT, an ARM-based variant of Microsoft’s brand new operating system, by and large the two are identical.

As you know, we were at Microsoft’s Pop-Up Store inside Toronto’s Eaton Centre this morning for the tablet’s launch, where at least 150 people were lined up to throw down at least $519+tax for the tablet. Considering this is not only a brand new mode of navigation for an operating system, but a brand new product from a company that is new to the PC hardware market, we’d love to hear your first impressions of Windows 8 and the Surface tablet.

If you haven’t obtained a Surface, or haven’t delved into Windows 8/RT just yet, do you plan to? This seems to be the first product from Microsoft in a long time that mainstream users are genuinely excited about. And while the dearth of apps is disappointing, there are some truly big names in the Windows Store, from Netflix to Tunein Radio to Wikipedia.

So, Surface is here, just in time to compete with the 4th generation iPad and the upcoming Nexus 10 tablet. We’re excited to see Microsoft step up and take control of its hardware future; the big question is, “are you going to partake?”

  • yannickwolfe

    I went to a store and tried a demo of some Touch Windows 8 PC.
    Was only for a few minutes but it worked flawlessly.

    • Dive

      My experience with the Surface is and will be non-existent.

      The Microsoft $720 option for a tablet with Keyboard is not attractive to me or my friends, all my peers are waiting for the Nexus 7 or the 10 which is close to the price of the iPad Mini.

      For $720 I can buy a $500 Laptop AND a $220 Nexus 7!

    • RIP HTC

      $720!!!!
      WTF!!!!!
      I could buy five PlayBooks for that price.

  • Damien

    Loving Windows 8 on my desktop and gaming laptop. Just took a while to get use to, and once you do, it is a fantastic os. Just takes a long time to get over the shock.

  • Nelson

    It is great on my crappy desktop with Intel Pentium D. It’s actually pretty fast!

  • BK

    Waiting for Windows 8 version thats coming out January.
    Got to try out the Surface RT version at eaton center (display model), the touch keyboard was pretty impressive, first push on it was awkward cuse its so flat and no feedback, but after 2-3 sentences and 1 misspell, I was earger to just buy the RT version since 3 months is so far away after seeing it.
    Cant wait till January!!

  • Mike

    I’m taking a wait-and-see approach to the Surface tab. It looks good, but I want more reviews to be available before deciding on what to do.
    I WAS gonna pick up a Asus TF300, but decided to hold off for either the Nexus 10 or Surface.

  • GTP20

    I managed to get $500 in Best Buy gift cards saved and of course the Surface Tablet is the first tablet ever not sold in retail stores (I’m extremely upset about this). So I can’t speak about the Surface, but Windows 8 on my laptop is amazing!

    It works so well and I think anyone that sits in front of it for an hour and figures out the changes from Windows 7 will love it and never look back.

    Well done Microsoft!

    • Crocography

      Ironic, I did the same thing and found out that it will be exclusive to Microsoft stores. I cannot believe it.

  • Iloveapple

    what is the point of this tablet
    all you need is the ipad4 or ipad mini

    • Johentie

      oh u mean the tablet with a 1.5 year old chip in it.. a crappy resolution.. and the same boring OS?

      PUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

      BTW u owe me a beer cause i just squirted it all outta my nose cause i laughed so hard!

  • Cody

    Edmonton, Canada pop-up store did not receive ANY Surfaces (save for the demo units). They were still “pre-selling” them, though – along with “Microsoft Complete”, their $99, 2 year accidental damage warranty. I bought one, to get the 1yr Xbox Music Pass, and the $50 apology gift card, but it’s still pretty frustrating waiting early in the AM to get this device, only to be told that UPS dropped the ball and that “Microsoft has loaded a Cessna in Redmond to bring some Surfaces ASAP”. I was the fourth person in line to get one here, but, even after paying, and 5 hours later, no one can give us a straight answer as to when we will actually get the device. Best I got was a shameful, “Optimistically, we may get them around closing time at West Edmonton Mall (which is 6pm – 3 hours from now)”.

    I mean, I love Microsoft, and I hate to say this, but that would never happen to Apple for their iPad launch. Why weren’t these devices in stores days ago?

    Hilarious, but still excited. I’ll be waiting by the phone, as they said they will personally courier the device to wherever I am in the city as soon as they get them in.

    • MattyMattMatt

      Actually, closing time is 9pm ;)

      There are things I like, but overall, modern ui is not amazing and counter intuitive often times. It does not make sense to hide controls for desktop users with large screens. The tiny phones or tablets, yes, but my 24 inch has the res and space to have that s**t not hide.

      Also, every single customer today could not open the modern ui again. Yeah, hiding stuff, not so great.

  • GreenLink

    i would if microsoft didn’t f**k up my order and lie to me by saying i would have my surface tablet today

  • John Lee

    The Dell XPS 10 is fairly close spec-wise compared to the Surface, and slightly cheaper.

    However I would not skate on the Dell though. :-)

  • COLONEL GUSTOV

    Tried it at Best Buy and love the new windows8 OS , great work Microsoft :) )

  • Keith

    I will probalby eventually end up with both a RT (grab and go) and a Pro (for the living room and work/gaming away from home). While I think I will probalby go for a top of the line Surface Pro I’m holdling out for a better RT. One that has the option of a cell plan, higher resolution, GPS, USB 3.0 and better camera. I’m hoping Nokia releases a killer RT with PureView.

    • Apple Sales Guy

      Keep dreaming.

    • Keith

      Hey AppleTrollGuy, what is in my post that you think is not going to happen? Elop reaffirmed last month that a WinRT tablet is on the way. I suspect it will be awesome but it is too bad they are late again.

  • ile2010

    I for one don’t care too much about a rear camera, nor GPS capabilities. I’d never use such a large device to take photos – it’s awkward and makes you look like a hipster. I wouldn’t navigatewith it because my smartphone can do that and it’s way less intrusive inside the cabin.

    I like it when companies make these omissions because we get the product for less, or we get a product with higher quality components.

    Not to say that you shouldn’t be entitled to have a tablet with these features if you really want them.

  • Geoff

    I’ve been using the preview since July on my media computer. I didn’t like it at first and was on the fence for about two weeks whether to got back to win7. After those two to four weeks I wanted up to it. I immediately bought one of those $40 upgrade licenses this morning, and am going to by three more for the rest of y machines when I get home. $40 is pretty sweet, and switching between metro and desktop mode is fine once you’re used to it. Plus $40 upgrades….

  • guy

    If I hadnt bought a transformer prime in feb/march (which im very happy with) I would have bought this. As a student there is no way I could justify two tablets. Besides its probably best to wait a year or so for RT to mature into a more fluid (ie highly responsive GUI without lag) via updates and more powerful hardware (A15 processors). An ~1080p screen and USB 3.0 would also be more standard with more competition.

    Id also love to see a digitizer pen on a RT tablet. OneNote is by far the most versatile and useful note taking app for students and professionals but a stylus or finger makes a poor writing utensil (yes i know its on the Pro but I want a lighter RT version with good battery life and a low price to complement a powerful computer).

  • Graeme

    Well I have been to both bestbuy stores in my area, and I am sorry to say neither of them have ANY windows 8 tablets, I even brought the cash with me to buy a samsung ativ smart pc pro.

    Windows 8 is what I’ve wanted since I bought my first toshiba notebook tablet r200 about 5 years go! and now I can’t get my hands on one.

    for me Launch FAILURE, cause now I’m waiting to buy it for $100 less state side (possibly on sale) on black friday.

  • tech

    Got to try it out at eaton. Loved the built quality. Magnet is so dam strong. That’s good I mean. And I hope they have enough stock cus they were making massive sales.

  • matt

    will get one.

  • 15ive

    Had chance to play with the Surface at the Eaton Centre today. In my opinion, its 100% better than the ipad. By this time next year MS will be King.

    • A

      Microsoft will only be king if they can convince enterprise to adopt to it, and since business will have to retrain all their employees , i don’t see that happening anytime soon, heck , they just started moving to windows 7 last year…

  • Coastr

    After learning that Bill Gates is supporting gentically modified foods in Africa, and owns in excess of 500,000 shares of Monsanto, I would give 5 cents or 5 minutes to Microsoft.

  • Clamdigger63

    Still waiting for mine to come. Took the day off especially. On different occasions, one ups truck and then later a FedEx truck pulled up outside the house. Both times it was or the house opposite. Talk about be having my bubble burst (twice).

    I also wanted to get a new Windows 8 PC. Everything I really liked isn’t out yet, only the low end stuff.
    Way to drop the ball.

  • X_X_X

    so f*****g awful
    not as good as my ipad one
    the ipad one
    u no its sad when a new tablet like this one is worse then the ipad one
    could be worse tho
    could be a playbook :O
    :)

  • Anthony

    I played with the release preview of Windows 8 for a little while and I loved it. This is a HUGE step forward for Windows. I love the new UI, the smoothness, and how fresh everything feels. I will definitely be purchasing two Surface RT tablets, one for myself and one for my wife.

  • Scazzz

    Installed Win8 at midnight, by 12:30 I was running flawlessly. Going from XP->8 was quick and easy, and kinda glad I got a clean install.

    Won’t be getting an RT because I need the real desktop functionality, but would have no qualms convincing others of getting it if they want an ipad like device.

  • TZM

    I will be picking one up, likely the Pro version though when it comes out.

  • Tom

    Installed it this morning and have been using it all day. I must say it took me a while to get used to using it with a mouse/trackpad, but it works pretty decently. Pretty fast and smooth so that’s always good. My only grip is that the metro interface doesn’t offer any real solution to file management, accessing documents and organizing my files still required to be on the desktop. So I’m still mostly using desktop, which means I often don’t use the new start screen.

    I briefly looked through the app store and the selection is quite depressing. I upgraded to see how the ecosystem is doing, but from what I can see, it doesn’t fare that well. I’m going to hold off my purchase of surface until later on when windows app store is more refined.

    • John Bennett

      Give the app store a bit of time. It’s still day “0″ :)

  • askldfjas

    how do you guys find windows 8 on a non-touch desktop computer? (using just a mouse and keyboard)?

    is the new start screen really a central part of the os? or do you just find yourself using it like windows 7, mostly on the desktop screen?

    • beyond

      when you log on you have no choice but to confront the start screen (but i heard there is an option to boot up to the last app you had running, like the desktop, i never tried that though)
      It works totally fine with the mouse and keyboard, in desktop mode running programs is exactly the same as Windows 7. However there are some annoyances, for example ‘apps’ take up the whole desktop screen but that is not how I usually view all my programs when using a large monitor. Take the weather app for instance, although you can move it to the side of your desktop, I find I wished I could reduce it further to the size of a widget. The actions to close apps or switch, are a little non intuitive with the mouse – i.e. its something you have to learn to do since there’s no obvious way to accomplish most tasks – there are no indications like buttons to tell you what to do)

  • John Bennett

    Pre-ordered a Surface RT on October 17: Originally slated for delivery by the 26th (hey, that’s today!). Then delayed until November 2. Then un-delayed back to somewhere between October 26 and October 31. It will arrive soon enough, and still save me the horrendous drive into downtown Toronto. Plus, Microsoft gave me a $50 coupon for my “trouble”. That was very nice of them.

    Supply and distribution issues are par for the course in this game: I don’t fault Microsoft, given the incredible logistics required to launch so many things at once, and the unknown/unknowable demand for the Surface.

    I’ve been using Windows 8′s various incarnations (developer, consumer, RTM) since January-ish in a dual-boot scenario, but have moved to it full time over the last couple of weeks. It was a bit disorienting at first, but I think Microsoft has it right: Maintain backwards compatibility for those that really need it, but bake in a much more coherent and understandable interface for the next billion or so customers.

  • Dillion

    I am in BestBuy, with Windows 8.

    What a great user experience! Wanted to try it out before I downloaded it and am very pleased. Tomorrow when I get home it’ll be first thing I do – after backing everything up!

  • ~peters

    Windows 8 Pro for my laptop Experience – Terrible. Prior to the install stage there are a few apps that need to be manually uninstalled because they are not compatible with Windows 8. So, ok I uninstall them in the control panel. Now it still says I need to manually uninstall these few conflicting app. Hit a road block. Because I cannot proceed to install Windows 8 withinout taking off the few non-supported apps. But way I can’t proceed. Hmm….sounds a tyipcal goofy Windows initiative. It so easy to be unimpressed by Microsoft nowadays.

  • theworldiam

    I fondled the Surface today. It’s beautiful, fast and responsive. I’ve got mixed feelings about the “Playbookish square edges” though, as all other tabs have that rounded, smooth sides feel in your hands. Oh well, I can get used to it.
    $519 includes 32GB (~20GB usable), SD slot for even more storage, a protective cover acting as a keyboard, and Word, Excel, Outlook 2013?! That’s an insanely “low” price compared to other tabs that are not as immediately productive right out of the box. Hey, if it can run Adobe Reader, I’m all set for working!
    I’ve drooled over a functional tablet that can replace my 6+lbs. laptop for so long that it seems that I can’t wait any longer for the Intel version!
    Everyone’s first product iteration always seems to have “gotchas”. I have to say, this one’s looking real good and ready to go though!

    • chris c.

      I think you meant $619 for the 32GB version with black keyboard cover.

  • synstr

    I have had many devices. Have had an iPad, and got the playbook last year on sale. I decided to take the dive and grab surface at Eaton centre today.. I have to say this is one of the first products that I have not minded paying for. Went home, popped the sd card out of my camera and loaded the pictures onto surface. My wife was really impressed and said she can finally get rid of our her laptop. I don’t care who you are this device kills iPad! Office and having the option to see files and folders is worth all the apps in the world! Windows 8 is great to!

  • Vish

    Bought 2 from the Oakridge Center in Vancouver. Two words – Freaking Amazing. Also got the $99 Xbox music card as I was in the first 100 waiting in line!
    Well done Microsoft – this is a great product.

    BTW, walked past the Apple Store in the mall and they had the empty lines…looks like the backlash has begun.

  • ebleyes

    I bought Windows 8 for $42 and it took less than an hour to download it and run it. Every thing went smoothly and I didn’t take a long time to get used to the disappearance of the start button. I don’t like the metro style start screen, but the only time I see it is when I start the computer.

  • shaggyskunk

    I’ve got to say, I’m liking win8! It took a little time to figure out where some things were, and how to get them, BUT I think it’s def. a great move on MS’s part! I’m running it on a 15′ New series 9 Samsung – the upgrade cost for me was about $15 + tax
    It is much faster than win7 and even though I don’t have a touch screen on this laptop – I can do everything with a swipe of the touchpad…:-D
    $cr3w the isheep

  • Nick

    Can’t believe how much I enjoy Windows 8 on my pc….Honestly it is a bit of a shock when you start using it (where is my damn start button!!!!…..oh) but literally 15 minutes later I was astounded by how smooth and responsive the OS is…Well done Microsoft

  • Andrew

    All I have to say is s**t just got real! Went to Eaton’s Centre yesterday to play with the surface abd bought it for my gf. She is in love. Windows 8, windows rt, and surface are game changers no doubt about it.

    What I find astounding about the Surface besides the build quality is that even after 4 hrs of video playing on the machine…it still feels cool as a cucumber to the touch. That’s simply amazing.

  • epgomez

    cant wait for the surface pro..

  • tim

    In line at the Edmonton pop-up store. Slowest lineup I have ever seen. Every customer spends 5 min at the til. Clearly they have not done thus before…

    • tim

      One point of sale machine…nice work Microsoft.

  • Jonah

    I love Windows 8 but ran into a bug on my Dell XPS14z. The OS hangs for about a minute just before the login screen; flickers in and out once and sits there.

    I went on the Dell driver website and update my BIOS, as suggested. Still no luck.

    Other than the slow boot up I love it!

  • Crocography

    Used it for about an hour today at the Eaton’s Centre. It is clearly an amazing device. The screen although lower resolution than my iPad, actually looks better. (Seriously people do an A-B comparison of the two devices, the Surface actually looks better.) I was shocked. The keyboard and device work flawlessly together and the gesture support on screen was silky smooth. I came away completely impressed. Now I am wondering what to do. If I actually bought it, I probably won’t be using my iPad anymore because Surface can actually take in my files (there is a file browser built it). I will think about it for a week or so, but I truly think my iPad days are numbered. (the best part about getting rid of my iPad 2012 model is that I can finally ditch iTunes – what an immensly crappy piece of software that is).

    Anyway, the Surface does impress, now I just have to get $600 together.

  • Moose

    I didn’t get the Surface as there is no way to buy one retail here in Calgary. I did however pick up the Asus RT tablet. Probably the best tablet I have ever had a chance to work with. The OS and interface are very slick and impressively responsive. I bought it because I believe that windows 8 and more specifically windows RT are a better alternative to iOS ecosystem. It may be the first true and equal alternative. The only thing holding it back is the app ecosystem but that will change as more people realize the advantages of the system.

  • PewZ

    I went to Futureshop and asked if they had the Surface in stock, the guy looked at me like I’m from another planet, then I asked if he had the Samsung Ativ Smart PC, he said: ”Yes, of course, follow-me” and showed me a Galaxy Tab 8.9.

    I simply walked away and ordered one online.

    Sad story is sad :(

  • Graeme

    I don’t understand why my previous comment about not being able to buy any Windows 8 tablets at bestbuy was so disliked, but it’s only the truth, I have gone back in and asked them about it Saturday, and they don’t have a clue when they are getting them in.

    On a side note I bought the Windows 8 Pro, in what looks like a full version (which is what I wanted) the curious thing is I think it is actually the upgrade… which is crap because no where in any of the advertisements or on the packaging can I find where it states that this is an upgrade… on the Microsoft site they say they are setting a similar looking package as an upgrade, but that is not at all obvious when looking at the software package itself.

    I was actually doing an upgrade from windows 7 on my computer, (wanted full version for future computer). The upgrade process worked flawlessly (almost) every major program that I have installed transferred perfect. most importantly visual studio and some controls I purchased years ago that I can no longer install because I didn’t continue with my subscription. ( I was pretty worried about them )

    Windows 8 is great overall IE10 has some bugs it’s a little choppy when scrolling certain sites (like mobilesyrup.com) very strange, but very small annoyance.

    Having sticky corners on multiple monitors works great, not usage issues for middle of the two monitor charms bar operation. although sticky corner when trying to change desktop application from one monitor to another is annoying.

    it should be turned off when dragging a window in desktop mode seeing a*s you can’t pull up the menu when dragging a windows anyway. I am sure it will get fixed.

    Overall great windows 8 upgrade experience.

  • Swizzlerz

    Ive been using windows 8 since December. however the app selection has been poor to this point I do enjoy the basic touch improvements.

    atm. I await the shipping of my surface. I wanted to make sure I got one as I am limited on Fridays with work and couldn’t race to Edmonton to pick one up.

    Cant wait to get mine…