Gadgetory

surface pro 2 was probably the best tablet I've ever used since I'm more than just a tech journalist the power to use real high-end creative programs that have been around for decades has been very important now I've got a surface pro 3 and that brings a whole host of changes to Microsoft's line of tablets Microsoft's big point about the surface pro 3 is that it is a tablet that can replace your laptop for me that already happened in 2002 but for everyone else that remains to be seen this is Adam Liam from pocket I'll keep watching for our full review of the surface pro 3 we'll start with the Spence surface pro 3 is available in a greater range of configurations the previous surface Pro's hours as a fourth generation Core i5 4300 u 2.5 gigahertz Haswell processor 8 gigs of ram 256 gigs of storage and the battery life can generally last all day without having to plug in it's got an Intel HD 4400 GPU as well but the surface pro 3 is available in other configurations that offer even more horsepower if that's what you're looking for in terms of hardware the surface pro 3 steps things up considerably the weight and dimensions have changed significantly from previous surface pros at 292 millimeters by 2 a 1.3 millimeters by of 9.1 millimeters and only 800 grams the surface pro 3 is much thinner than previous generations it's lighter to the screen size is bigger at 12 inches with a gorgeous 2160 by 1440 pixels resolution and a nice paper like three by two aspect ratio of course also has full size USB 3 port microSD slot for storage expansion and said Jack Wi-Fi Bluetooth and a mini DisplayPort that can be daisy changed for multiple monitors front and rear cameras have been upgraded to 5 megapixels each as well but since this is a tablet you shouldn't be using those for anything other than video chats the new kickstand is a significant improvement instead of only one or two viewing angle positions the surface pro 3 is kickstand can be adjusted for almost any viewing angle the first angle flips out very easily so you can set it on a table very quickly but the hinge becomes much different when you bend it further define desired angle it's a great solution and frankly I'm very impressed with the engineering behind it one of my favorite parts of the new surface pro 3 is the new screen size the larger 12 inch screen and 3 by 2 aspiration make professional-grade desktop programs like those in the Adobe suite much easier to use there's a lot more vertical space available for all of those tools and control panels high resolution is great too so for some of the programs that don't yet support high DPI screens in those cases buttons are often way too small the screen mainly works best indoors though even with full brightness turned up outdoor viewing isn't so good Microsoft's had to make larger type covers for the new surface pro 3 due to the larger screen the new type covers are still sold separately so that you can choose the color you want or just not get one and used some other keyboard instead it still has the backlit keys and a nice soft material on the back but now there's a new trackpad because the keyboard is bigger Microsoft was able to make the trackpad 68 percent larger and it's also nice smooth plastic instead of the cloth like material the new keyboard has an extra folding area that can magnetically attached to the bottom bezel of the screen without this attached touching the screen can cause the tablet to wobble a bit if you have a steep angle on the kickstand and you're setting it on your lap attaching it makes the screen a lot more stable in that scenario the original surface pro and surface pro 2 both use an inexpensive version of Wacom Cintiq digitizer technology with the surface pro 3 mics to switch the stylist digitizer technology to an intrigue version the advantages including thinner screen less of a visual gap between the stylus tip and pointer display and better accuracy the surface pro 3 stylus only supports 256 levels of pressure sensitivity which is much less than stars far too but in real life the difference is not noticeable at all you still have plenty of control over variable brush strip with using the stylus in all of your high-end graphics programs now let's talk about the software the surface pro 3 comes with Windows 8.1 pro pre-installed this is the only touch friendly operating system out there that can run your professional-grade desktop PC programs that means you've got access to the largest computing ecosystem in the world more software than androids and apples app stores combined if you're an artist with Photoshop see brush illustrator manga studio etc you'll want to install the wind tap drivers from the intrigue website in order to enable pressure sensitivity in all of those programs after you do that it all works just as well as the Wacom tech and the previous surface pros the new drawing hardware is slightly more accurate to Windows 8.1 is great for fullscreen consumption applications as well you can snap up to four Metro apps side by side on the surface pro 3 screen and the interface is designed to make very efficient use of edge gestures swipe from the left edge to swap apps swipe from the right edge to exit important functions like settings printing or sharing some people may think that switching between the desktop environment and the new touch friendly modern interface is joined that's kind of true but it's no more jarring than opening the program like the Lightwave 3d and switching between that and Microsoft Word the surface pro 3 introduces one more extremely cool sound or function though if the new stylus has a proper Bluetooth connection to the tablet you can press the purple button on the end of the pen to launch one note even if the tablet is in sleep mode in our review unit this only works some of the time but we expect some software updates to come down the line and prove the reliability not everything on the surface pro 3 is an improvement though my biggest annoyance is that the capacitive start button is now in the right bezel when the tablet is held in landscape mode I've accidentally pressed it far too many times when using the stylus on the screen the other anoints is that the stylus uses three non-rechargeable batteries I've been using it for a week now and Oswell but I'm sure when those batteries die I will be very annoyed using the type cover keyboard on your lap in combination with the kickstand might feel awkward if you used to a bottom heavy laptop but this isn't a laptop use the handwriting recognition or touch screen keyboard instead there are plenty of other comfortable infant methods on this thing when you're running some CPU heavy functions or it's updating something in the background the surface pro 3 can get pretty hot on the back and once or twice we've had some major slowness when we're assuming from sleep mode those few negative issues seem very minor compared to all the others awesomeness in the surface pro 3 our final radiant is going to be in eight point eight out of ten the surface pro 3 loses a few points for having batteries in the stylist and an awkward start button in the bezel everything else makes the surface pro 3 the best tablet PC we've ever used the large screen and super thin body combined with the most powerful mobile computing hardware around make the new surface pro 3 practically irresistible that's it for now be sure to give this video a thumbs up and thanks for watching