I would consider getting a micro USB Y Cable, plug the power end of the cable into the USB Port on the Power Adapter and the data into the port on the Surface....
So...has the SP3 replaced your laptop?
- Thread starter Nursedad
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As much as I do agree with this approach, I do feel it's untenable in many situations. Most Y adapters are rather short on the end where you'd need to plug into the SP3 power brick, so you'd need to be within arms length of a plug to make it happen without purchasing yet another cable which hammers home the craziness one might feel having to do this. Is it doable? Sure... Is it convenient or does it "fit in" with the general theme of the SP3? I'm afraid I'd lean towards no, no it does not. I wish it wasn't so crazy expensive for real cloud VMware service, or I'd do just that and say to heck with running a VM locally ever.
It works, but would be much more useful if it there were readily available Y-Cable with the extra power connection at least as long as the mag connector cable from the power brick. It can be pulled off with a Male to Female USB extension, but it's not "elegant" IMHO. Azure IaaS is a fine service, but some need a bit... more (I'd be one) like nested hypervisor support and more. I'm down with the general notion of just moving it to the cloud though...
With each generation of SP3 providing gradually less juice to the onboard USB port, it'd be nice if MS just included such a Y-Cable with the machine. I'm not saying they HAVE to, just that it sure would be nice if they did.
With each generation of SP3 providing gradually less juice to the onboard USB port, it'd be nice if MS just included such a Y-Cable with the machine. I'm not saying they HAVE to, just that it sure would be nice if they did.
malberttoo
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the tip Jeff! Just ordered this 6ft. one to have in my bag with the Surface.
http://amzn.com/B00439567Q
This is actually quite common on Ultrabooks and Tablets, as the market demands battery life so the devices are typically tuned towards power savings. Broadwell Core M reference designs are going even further removing all Full Power/Size Ports...I have 1 that connects to micro USB and 1 that connects to mini USB. Not perfect but it works.
Is there any reason MS couldn't raise the power output of the USB back up so we don't have to resort to this? A nice suggestion for the SP4.
tuchas
Active Member
I saw this one on Amazon - it looks small enough and can be used as self powered as well as bus powered. Do you think this would work?
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00ICZL3KG/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Look like it would be ideal for your use case....
Actually, yes it has. I have a brand new 2014 Razer Blade Pro, but the one game I play [FFXI] runs BETTER on the SP3 (For some reason, i CANNOT force the game to run on the nvidia card)
Outside of that and Hearthstone, it's all I'm playing, and it's a lot more convenient to reach for and I can dock it to my 27" cinema display [RBP only has HDMI]
So. . . yea. It's the perfect combination of personal media consumption device and mobile workstation. It does everything I need a mobile desktop environment to perform.
For everything else, there's Mr. Desktop >
How is Hearthstone running for you, on the undocked surface pro 3? I've got a i5 8GB RAM model, and when it was in full-screen, full resolution the device got crazy hot really fast.
I haven't tried it on lower settings yet -- you experiencing the same?
