A few weeks ago we were at the launch event of the new
Surface line , which allowed us to test the new Surface Pro , the new Surface
Laptop and the new Surface Studio directly at Microsoft.
While waiting to be able to talk to you in more detail about
the new Surface Pro, however, we want to give some space, before it's too late
to its predecessor, the Surface Pro 4 , which still defends itself very well
from its successors today.
Thanks to GeekCafé we had the opportunity to test the top
range version of the Surface Pro 4 series for about a month , in particular we
are talking about the i7 version with 512 GB of Hard Disk and 16 GB of Ram .
Aesthetically
The device comes with a very elegant and linear design ,
giving the device that premium feel that distinguishes it from the competition
in the same category.
The device comes with a very elegant and linear design,
giving the device that premium feel that distinguishes it from the competition
in the same category.
Featuring a magnesium body and the iconic Microsoft logo
with mirror effect, the tablet continues on the winning line of the Surface
line while maintaining the dimensions of the Surface Pro 3 with the iconic
kickstand reclining freely up to 150 ° with dimensions equal to 292.10 x
201.42mm but managing to decrease in thickness with its just 8.45mm.
The device, unlike its bigger brother, has a 12.3-inch
display with the classic aspect ratio of the Surface line of 3: 2 , excellent
for using the device in Tablet mode and to be used vertically with a resolution
equal to 2736 x 1824 .
However, this does not prevent the device from being able to
integrate a Full Size USB 3.0 port on
the right side of the device, along with the proprietary Surface connector for
charging and a mini display port , the Micro SD slot under the kickstand and
the standard jack port in. top left of the device.
Also present are the two front and rear cameras respectively
from 5 and 8 Megapixel that allow video capture in 1080p and login with facial
recognition through the front sensor compatible with Windows Hello .
The model we tested, unlike its version with m3 processor,
also has the ventilation inlets on the upper part of the body to allow the
device not to exceed the maximum temperatures, which leads us to talk about
performance.
The road test
Speaking of the device's performance, during our tests we
were really pleasantly surprised by the power of this relatively small device.
The convertible from Microsoft was able to perfectly replace
our main device in all our daily activities , from web browsing to the use of
the Office suite such as Word, Powerpoint or OneNote, for multimedia use such
as watching videos in streaming or music playback, to then move on to more
intensive activities such as photo editing and video editing that the device
managed without slowdowns or difficulties.
THE CONVERTIBLE FROM MICROSOFT WAS ABLE TO PERFECTLY REPLACE OUR MAIN
DEVICE IN ALL OUR DAILY ACTIVITIES.
This is clearly not possible to say about the gaming aspect.
If some old games could certainly run without problems on this device, thanks
to the advanced processor and the 16 GB of Ram, it is easy to understand that
this should not be considered as a device suitable for gaming, especially due
to the absence a dedicated GPU or a Thunderbolt USB Port that would have
allowed the use of a Station with external GPU to be used with the device.
Despite this, the device can cope with any other type of activity without
any problems.
We have not been able to determine exactly the temperatures
of the device, however to the touch after a use of a few hours, it is certainly
easy to notice an increase in temperatures in the area presumably occupied by
the processor , both in the back and in the front of the device, which which
could be a bit annoying if you are using the device with the pen or touch,
especially in the summer season.
As for the battery, the duration obviously varies according
to use, but on average we can come to the conclusion that this is not the
strong point of the device since during our tests it provided just over 3 hours
of autonomy during playback in video streaming, although it is importants to
note that the test was carried out with the brightness of the device set to
100%.
The duration is slightly better during other types of
lighter activities such as web-browsing or drafting documents in Word or
PowerPoint.
As a small curiosity, on the other hand, the charger
supplied with the device has a double USB port so it is possible to charge the
tablet and another device such as a smartphone via the same charger, which came
in handy during our travels.
And it is precise in this field that the device excels, the
portability it offers without having to sacrifice excessively the performance
which, especially as regards photo editing, video editing and note-taking
activities via OneNote, surprised us the most since they turned out to be quite
a lot. facilitated thanks to the use of the Surface Pen which makes the device
very intuitive and easy to use.
The defects of convertibles
The device, undoubtedly an excellent device, certainly falls
into a particular category, that of convertibles, not just a tablet, but not
even a laptop.
The first thing to note is the form factor , the device, as
already mentioned, has a diagonal of 12.3 inches, which is a bit unusual for
tablets, whose standard size stops about 10 inches, but it is a bit strange
also for laptops, more common starting from 13 inches.
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