Surface Pro 2: Review

Microsoft's update to its flagship tablet sees Intel's latest Haswell processor beef up its performance and massively improve battery life

Microsoft's Surface Pro 2 tablet - available from October 22nd in the US, UK and many other markets, and in early November in China - seems at first glance to be little different, if not identical, to the earlier Surface Pro launched in 2012.

Hardware
Indeed its casing is identical besides a subtle rebranding on the device's rear - gone is the Windows logo, in its place is the word ‘Surface'.

"Surface users are proud of their device and want to show the world what they're using," Microsoft told Computing as the review model was handed over.

The ports are the same (including USB 3.0, Mini Display Port and Micro SDXC card slot), the dimensions are the same (10.81 x 6.81 x 0.53 inches), and it still weighs about 2 pounds. Unlike its trimmed down sibling, the RT or plain Surface brand (without the ‘Pro' suffix), which took the opportunity to upgrade its front and rear facing cameras with the new iteration, the Pro's cameras also remain the same, both are technically HD at 720p.

For the record, the Surface 2 cameras are significantly higher spec, with a 3.5MP front camera, a 5PM on the rear.

Back to the Pro 2, and the screen too is unchanged from the original, but given that it was already a beautiful 10.6 inch display with a native 1920 x 1080p resolution boasting great viewing angles and some of the most vibrant colours we've seen on a tablet, that's hardly a problem.

What has changed externally is the much-maligned kickstand, which now has two positions rather than one. The original Pro was criticised for locking to one angle, which many users found next to unusable when typing on their laps. The second angle brought by the Surface Pro 2 offers a more oblique lock in addition, which brings both stability, and choice.

Moving to the guts of the new beast, the most important difference is the processor, which is now one of Intel's new Haswell chips, making it much less power hungry, and more adept at throwing complex graphics around the screen. Microsoft is claiming that the battery now offers 75 per cent more life.

While Computing couldn't quite match those figures, it certainly lasts a full eight-hour working day of email, web browsing and word processing, which is impressive. Subject it to HD movies with the screen brightness on full, and you might find it draining more quickly, but for general business use it hits the sweet spot of giving you a day of moving between meetings, or wandering a conference floor, without needing to flit between power sockets.

The Pro 2 comes in 64GB, 128GB, 256GB and 512GB models, with the first two offering 4GB of RAM, and the latter two boasting an impressive 8GB. Computing tested the basic 64GB version (which means 4GB of RAM), and felt that it was able to run and switch between several different apps smoothly, and at speed.

One complaint is that the OS (Windows 8.1 comes bundled with the Pro 2) really eats into the SSD capacity, with around 37GB available of the alleged 64GB on Computing's review model. This could quickly fill up on a corporate device which is likely to require the full MS Office suite at a minimum, and likely a few bespoke applications and a smattering of productivity and entertainment apps from the Windows Store too. While the capacity can be boosted with a MicroSD card (a 64GB card will set you back somewhere just shy of £40 at today's prices), many enterprises will prefer the 128GB model or above.

And speaking of entertainment, the Pro 2 features an Intel HD 4400 graphics card, which is perfectly adequate for most corporate use, but makes it slightly limited for CAD purposes, or top-end gaming. Having said that, it does support API collections such as DirectX 11.1, OpenCL 1.2 and OpenGL 4.0, and serious gamers and professional designers are unlikely to expect top end performance whilst sitting on a train.

Following the somewhat disappointing sales figures of the original Surface models (in the UK at least), Microsoft is pushing the latest versions with attractive bundles of software and storage offers, and a good selection of peripheral support.

Surface Pro 2: Review

Microsoft's update to its flagship tablet sees Intel's latest Haswell processor beef up its performance and massively improve battery life

Software & peripherals
On the software front, Microsoft is giving buyers a year of free Skype calls to landlines, and 200GB of free SkyDrive storage for two years, which goes some way to compensate for the low storage availability on the cheaper models.

But it's in the new peripherals that the enterprise case starts to get really strong. Besides the new and improved removable keyboards, which are easier to type on, more rigid, and even feature backlights for working in the dark, there is also a cover complete with extra battery (which will allegedly give the device a second full charge once plaugged in) in the works too.

Sure to be of interest to large corporates is the new docking station, which features a VGA adaptor, three USB 2.0 ports, one USB 3.0 port, audio in, audio out - and it will also charge the device while connected.

Microsoft will hope that this will make the Surface Pro the one-size device that fits all for many enterprise use cases - being a tablet on the move, a laptop when needed, and a desktop replacement back at the office.

We spent a few days working exclusively on the new Pro, both carting it around conferences, and using it in anger in the office, and found it to be perfectly suited to our needs (email, browsing, word processing, watching videos).

Benchmarks
There's no doubt that for basic tasks like web surfing, emailing, Word, Excel and Powerpoint use, the Surface Pro 2 is as fast and slick as you could possible hope. But what about more demanding tasks?

To find out, we installed two benchmarking programmes. The first, CPU Benchmark from PassMark scored 1936.1. While that's reasonably low, it was brought down by its 3D graphics capability - the memory, disc and processor all scored reasonably well for its price range - so unless you're a gamer or a graphics designer, this shouldn't affect you.

The second benchmark, designed to test high end graphics processing capability, was Catzilla. While, the programme crashed towards the end of the first test, it completed the second, producing a score of 1867.
The Samsung ATIV 9 laptop/netbook, which we tested at the same time, managed only 469.

Although all Surface models are essentially PCs (although the RT and ‘Surface 2' models run a stripped down version of Windows, which is unable to run full desktop applications), the custom graphics drivers and resolutions shipped with the Pro models cause various anomalies when attempting to run certain games - and this appears to have affected the Catzilla test on the first occasion. So be warned that some hours trawling enthusiast forums for workarounds may be needed if you're viewing this as a mobile gaming platform.

Price
Many people (CFOs especially) criticised the Surface Pro for its cost and weight. It is both pricier and heavier than an iPad, with even the basic 64GB model coming in at £719 (suggested retail price), including the stylus pen.

If you're looking for a basic tablet solution to roll out to a mobile workforce, then cheaper options, such as the Google Nexus 7 are probably more suitable. However, for a full mobile and desktop solution in one, it's hard to find a similar machine at any price bracket - the closest that we can find is Lenovo's Ideapad Yoga 11 - although that device has only 2GB of RAM and operates at a lower resolution.

Conclusions
Although little has changed externally, the Surface Pro 2 is a powerful, attractive bit of kit which will suit most enterprise needs. It's slick and powerful enough to comfortably run all but the most demanding business tools, and the improved kickstand, keyboards and new docking station, it has the potential to revolutionise the standard office endpoint.

Ultimately it's very much a case of horses for courses, but in Computing's opinion the Surface Pro 2 shouldn't be viewed as a heavier, more expensive iPad, but rather as a powerful and flexible convertible Ultrabook.