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Is a Surface Pro 4 a good solution for my situation?

hughlle

Super Moderator
Staff member
Undoubtedly, I could have done the project a bit faster with the laptop but for me the SP4 was very satisfactory.

I think this sums it up perfectly.

The surface will never be good as X. But to compare it to X is to misunderstand the purpose of the surface. If it was meant to be some performance leader, it was meant to be a surface. Jack of all trades, master of none, but brilliant as a result.
 

Philtastic

Active Member
I read things about getting an i5 and then underclocking it, actually lengthening the battery life. Is that a valid approach?

Overall, though, it seems like the only reason to get an i5 in my situation is to double the RAM and storage space. Which takes me from €922 to €1449, a rather huge step for stuff I might need.
There's basically no need to underclock an Intel CPU since it automatically underclocks anyway. If you really need to ensure that you get a full 8-10 hours, you can tweak the power profile to never let it go beyond the lowest normally available clockspeed (~0.6 GHz).

I'd suggest that you go with the dual-core Core i5 mostly because you're used to a quad-core Core i7: it's often really hard to go backwards in terms of performance. To approximately quantify the power gap, using the early 2013 MacBook Pro specs found here (MacBook Pro "Core i7" 2.7 15" Early 2013 Specs (Retina Early 2013, ME665LL/A, MacBookPro10,1, A1398, 2673) @ EveryMac.com) and the synthetic CPU benchmarks here (Home - Geekbench Browser), the MacBook's Core i7-3740QM scores ~12,000 vs. the Core m3-6y30 ~4,600 in SP4s vs. the Core i5-6300U ~6,300 in SP4s. The MacBook uses a full-sized laptop processor while the Surface Pros use the lower energy ultrabook versions. Even with the Core i5, you'll have roughly half the power that you're used to with the MacBook.

For ~40% more performance, I would pay the < 10% increase in price to get the 128 GB, 4 GB RAM Core i5. Is the extra storage space necessary? Not really given the microSD slot. But seriously consider upgrading to a Core i5.
 
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FlatSurface

Member
Okay, since we're considering the i5... how well does it handle gaming with the 4GB RAM that it has on board?

It's not a primary need by any stretch of the imagination, but... thought I'd ask anyhow.

Also, I'm still open to alternatives. What about the Spectre x360 from HP? Looks nice and powerful, but I don't need powerful and you end up with a big fat tablet on your lap.

I could also just buy a separate tablet, but then I'd still have to lug my Macbook along when I actually have to get some work done... meh.

Stuck!
 
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Empyre

New Member
Okay, since we're considering the i5... how well does it handle gaming with the 4GB RAM that it has on board?

It's not a primary need by any stretch of the imagination, but... thought I'd ask anyhow.

Also, I'm still open to alternatives. What about the Spectre x360 from HP? Looks nice and powerful, but I don't need powerful and you end up with a big fat tablet on your lap.

I could also just buy a separate tablet, but then I'd still have to lug my Macbook along when I actually have to get some work done... meh.

Stuck!
Haven't tried gaming but it struggled from a RAM perspective using duOS that's the android emulator. Maxed out my RAM. But I would imagine if you have nothing else open, gaming would be fine. But also if you have an Xbox one, I haven't yet tried it but you can stream games directly to your surface on LAN. That's what I hear at least :) I am planning on trying it soon

Note: I have the i5/128/4GB
 

GreyFox7

Super Moderator
Staff member
Okay, since we're considering the i5... how well does it handle gaming with the 4GB RAM that it has on board?

It's not a primary need by any stretch of the imagination, but... thought I'd ask anyhow.

Also, I'm still open to alternatives. What about the Spectre x360 from HP? Looks nice and powerful, but I don't need powerful and you end up with a big fat tablet on your lap.

I could also just buy a separate tablet, but then I'd still have to lug my Macbook along when I actually have to get some work done... meh.

Stuck!
Tablet Alternatives: Lenovo miix 700, Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet X1, HP Spectre X2, HP Elite X2, Dell XPS 12. and there's a new one coming from Samsung... Tab Pro S ... or some such combination of "Omaha" random jargon salad ... and probably others I missed.
 

GreyFox7

Super Moderator
Staff member
@GreyFox7 : And do you have an opinion about said devices in comparison to the Surface Pro 4, taking my situation into account? ;)
Not much of one...

Although I'm considering an HP Spectre X2 from Best Buy for my own use. currently in the US Best Buy has the m3 4/128 model X2 on sale for $599. I hear if you're in Canada you are SOL, (its not available).

There are Reviews of most of these FWIW. I thought the reviews were niggling often comparing m3/5/7 to the Surface i5/7 when they should have done a true head to head against the Surface Pro 4 m3 and SP3 i3 which would have been much more valuable.

Note that on the Spectre X2 as with others you can get 8gb RAM and 256 storage as well as m5s or m7s for a very modest extra kick.
 

Philtastic

Active Member
Okay, since we're considering the i5... how well does it handle gaming with the 4GB RAM that it has on board?

It's not a primary need by any stretch of the imagination, but... thought I'd ask anyhow.

Also, I'm still open to alternatives. What about the Spectre x360 from HP? Looks nice and powerful, but I don't need powerful and you end up with a big fat tablet on your lap.

I could also just buy a separate tablet, but then I'd still have to lug my Macbook along when I actually have to get some work done... meh.

Stuck!
The Core i5 on its own is great for most games. The 4 GB RAM should not be a limiting factor for any game that would run well on the integrated GPU.

At this point, tablet-based full Windows PCs are still a very new field that's really developing. Usually, there's a point of diminishing returns where you get less performance for your money but, in this field, paying more will get you substantial upgrades at almost all price points for almost all use cases which is why we have problems recommending a definitive "best value" tablet. It really is a matter of what you're willing to spend. To put this into perspective, according to the benchmarks on Geekbench, the Core i5-6300U in the SP4 is about as fast as the desktop 2014 Pentium G3258, a budget CPU slower than a Core i3 that no one here would ever recommend unless you really had a shoestring budget. Getting an SP4 with a Core i7 will still lead to noticeably smoother performance even with low-level tasks like just booting up, viewing webpages, working spreadsheets, and scrolling through pdf files.

In terms of other tablets, all of them use the Core m-series where even the Core m7 doesn't match the speed of the Core i5 but are all about the same price. For example, the HP Spectre x2 with a Core m7, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD (the only other Spectre x2 model found at Best Buy over the basic Core m3 Spectre x2: HP - Spectre x2 2-in-1 12" Touch-Screen Laptop - Wi-Fi + 4G LTE - Intel Core m7 - 8GB Memory - 256GB Solid State Drive - Natural Silver) costs $1150 + $50 for the Wacom pen = $1200 which is $130 cheaper than the $1330 that the SP4 Core i5 costs with the same specs... except that you get a faster CPU and a hugely better screen (Spectre does have LTE, however). Lenovo's Miix 700 is apparently a disappointment which launched with zero fanfare. The m7 version with 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD costs $1100 and doesn't include the pen which I can't even find online.

Where other tablets have an advantage is their pricing of the low-end m3 models which are significantly cheaper than the Surface Pro 4's m3. The HP Spectre x2 Core m3 (4 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD, 1920x1280) is $600 +$50 pen = $650 and the Lenovo Miix 700 Core m3 (4 GB RAM, 64 GB SSD, 2160x1440) is $750 versus the basic SP4 (Core m3, 4 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD, 2736x1824) at $930.

So, basically, you need to ask yourself if you would be satisfied with a desktop 2014 Celeron G1840 level of performance (GeekBench score ~4000) with the Core m3 CPU. You also need to figure out how much you're willing to spend at max and then find the best deal around that price.
 
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FlatSurface

Member
Thanks for that indepth post, Philtastic.

Would I be satisfied with that level of performance you mentioned? I care about (in a random order):
  1. Smooth performance when performing every day tasks. If an i7 (even when 4 years old) is a big factor in that, I will likely care if performance is (a lot) less on an M3. But only if everyday tasks like browsing, booting, etc take significantly longer.
  2. Mobility.
  3. A tablet mode.
  4. Battery life in said tablet mode.
However, you own a SP4. What made you take the leap?
 

Philtastic

Active Member
Thanks for that indepth post, Philtastic.

Would I be satisfied with that level of performance you mentioned? I care about (in a random order):
  1. Smooth performance when performing every day tasks. If an i7 (even when 4 years old) is a big factor in that, I will likely care if performance is (a lot) less on an M3. But only if everyday tasks like browsing, booting, etc take significantly longer.
  2. Mobility.
  3. A tablet mode.
  4. Battery life in said tablet mode.
However, you own a SP4. What made you take the leap?
Let me put it this way: there are people satisfied with the performance they have on their phones while other people aren't satisfied unless they have the bleeding edge. Whether you will be satisfied is purely a subjective question that revolves a lot around what you have experienced before. Compared to my Core i5-4690K desktop (Geekbench score ~12,000 at stock clocks) with a 960 GB SanDisk Extreme Pro SSD, the Surface Pro 4 Core i5-6300U often feels a bit sluggish: opening a new tab in Chrome takes a few seconds longer, rendering a movie takes almost twice as long, Powerpoint isn't as smooth, scrolling pdfs isn't as smooth and sometimes takes a few seconds to fully render pages in large pdfs (one of the most annoying things).

However, I bought the SP4 as a mobile work and light gaming platform because I'd had enough of lugging around a 4+ lb laptop so I had realistic expectations going into this first with the SP2 and now the SP4. Many of my comments will pertain not just to the SP4 but about why I got a hybrid tablet-laptop. Mobility of the SP4 is incredible: it's thin and light, so it slips right into my messenger bag and off I go. Tablet mode is much better on the SP4 than the SP2 due to being lighter and having the 3:2 screen ratio which makes it more usable in portrait orientation. The larger screen makes it feel more like you're viewing or drawing something on a sheet of paper compared to smaller tablets. I was also interested in getting into drawing so the stylus was a big plus. It's also very useful for taking notes at meetings and seminars in tablet mode instead of having a big laptop sitting on my lap and having the keyboard sounds tapping away. Obvious benefits to being a tablet when I just want to surf the web in bed or on the couch where I can use the stylus for sites that have either very small or pointer hover elements. Being able to remove the keyboard to watch a movie while I eat is also a cool bonus.

When real works needs to get done, I can just snap on the keyboard and away I go. All my files are available to me at all times and consolidated on one device. Due to the stylus, you can even get some good non-typing work done in tablet mode, such as arranging images in Powerpoint and adding titles, making graphs and light cell editing in Excel, marking up pdfs with the pen for future editing when you've got the keyboard attached, Photoshop editing. Basically, it's a device that let's you be productive at any time without having to go fetch your work laptop since you were enjoying a movie on your tablet but got an email saying that they needed you to edit something. Instead, you just pause the movie, download the file from your email, edit with your stylus (I've found the writing recognition to be pretty good), send it off, and back to your movie.

For those reasons, I got the Surface Pro 2 and then 4. In my experience, the battery life of the SP4 is fine. I regularly get 5-8 hours depending on what I'm doing. You can basically ensure that you get 7-9 hours by enabling the power saver mode with two taps (tap on the battery icon then tap power saver mode). There are still a few bugs with the SP4 but, having now read a bit about the other tablets, they have a lot of their own problems. For example, here's Cnet's review of the HP Spectre x2: HP Spectre x2 review: A Surface clone that's actually a better deal. The biggest thing that I took away from the review is that, although the review ends on a positive note, the Spectre x2 feels cheaper in many ways. Note the screen comparison picture where the Spectre's screen has a huge bevel and is really dull compared to the brilliant SP4 screen (you can especially see the difference in the video. I found a better screen analysis at Ultrabook Review that also demonstrates that it has pretty bad colour accuracy: HP Spectre X2 review - gets the looks and the performance, but...), the problems with using the U-shaped stand, needing to carry around a dongle just to use USB devices since it only has USB-C (way too early to only have USB-C ports), and the 15-25% slower CPU. If you like the stylus, there's also no secure place to put it on the Spectre.

In my opinion, among tablet-laptop hybrids, Microsoft still has far and away the best take on it but it does come with a steeper price which I believe to be justified due to the extra features you get. I don't think I'll ever go back to the large and bulky laptops and there's no point to me in getting an ultrabook since they basically cost just as much while using the same hardware without the versatility that a detachable keyboard and stylus give you. I also find it just as easy to type on the Surface keyboard on my lap as a laptop so the 'lapability' of traditional laptops isn't an advantage to me.

Concerning whether you should go with a Core m3 or Core i5, given what you've said, you'd probably be fine with a Core m3 BUT I'd still recommend the Surface Pro 4 over the much cheaper alternatives purely for that godly screen which is both pretty bright and has excellent colour accuracy (here's Anandtech's SP4 review: The Microsoft Surface Pro 4 Review: Raising The Bar). This is a device that you're going to use all day, every day, and the screen is how you will view all of your content. If there's something to splurge on, I'd splurge on a wicked good screen, and that's what the SP4 has. Another aspect not really touched on is that the SP4 has an insanely fast PCI 3.0 NVMe SSD rather than standard SATA. This results in sequential read/writes that are about 2-3x faster than the SSD in the Spectre x2 (numbers found in both the Anandtech SP4 review and the Spectre Ultrabook Review review), which means that you'll rarely encounter long waits when you load programs or write files due to an SSD bottleneck. The speaker placement on the SP4 is also a lot better than other tablets: they face forward out of the screen rather than pointing out from the sides (I always find that I have to cup the side speakers to hear them properly).

If I've convinced you that you should get the SP4 Core m3 over cheaper alternatives, then I would recommend getting the Core i5, 4 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD because it's only $100 more which is a 15% increase in price for a 40% faster system: much better value while still affordable. This whole post is a lot longer than I originally envisioned but it's basically the long form of what most of us say here: the Surface Pro 4 is the best tablet-laptop hybrid available and the Core i5 is the best balance of performance and price.

Edit: I just read more of the Ultrabook Review HP Spectre x2 review, and its operating temperature tops out at 95 degrees Celcius while playing a game!!! Cannot recommend at all! Holy crap!
 
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FlatSurface

Member
@Philtastic : I really appreciate that long reply. I have to say you've got me pretty much convinced: our use cases sound alike.

You haven't had any problems with the fan noise on the i5? I attend meetings and I also want to use that thing in bed... I really don't want to have it wooshing while I'm browsing.
 

Philtastic

Active Member
@Philtastic : I really appreciate that long reply. I have to say you've got me pretty much convinced: our use cases sound alike.

You haven't had any problems with the fan noise on the i5? I attend meetings and I also want to use that thing in bed... I really don't want to have it wooshing while I'm browsing.
The fan will never come on unless you do video encoding or play a demanding video game. I just streamed a 10 min Youtube video, and the fan didn't come on.
 
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