I bought mine at a Microsoft Store. So I have 30 days to return it. I think Chrome may have been the culprit. I disabled hardware acceleration. The fans still fly (not that I care about that), but the stuttering seems to be gone. So hopefully it was as simple as that. So now the only thing I'm worried about is WiFi. Hopefully they fix those issues in an update.
This has to go back...
- Thread starter liftbikerun
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I bought mine at a Microsoft Store. So I have 30 days to return it. I think Chrome may have been the culprit. I disabled hardware acceleration. The fans still fly (not that I care about that), but the stuttering seems to be gone. So hopefully it was as simple as that. So now the only thing I'm worried about is WiFi. Hopefully they fix those issues in an update.
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OP
liftbikerun
Member
That sucks - I feel pretty good about returning mine. When a revision 2 comes out and they've (possibly) worked out all the bugs, or the broadwell stuff, I'll spend my $1300 on something. It's just too much money to blow on something that doesn't work as it should.
I don't get it, people argue that we are using our tablets in a way they weren't intended.... I'm pretty sure Microsoft themselves markets this as a "Laptop Replacement" not simply a "Laptop Companion".... I don't know of too many laptops that can't play simple games as an afterthought without making the system all but entirely useless. Especially at this price point... It's not the fan noise that got me, it was the fact that to continue functioning, the SP3 has to throttle itself to a point that makes the unit all but entirely useless.
All those Critical Power issues you see, those are of big concern for the overall longevity of the device. Batteries are severely hampered in their life cycle by heat. System parts are as well.
I feel at peace with my decision to wait out the beta testing of this, I'm actually quite surprised the SP3 made it out of the dev stages under its current iteration. This is such an important release for MS and the Surface Line.... I feel like they really should have waited the 6 months until Broadwell was released in hopes it would give an entirely different usability experience.
They sell this as a replacement for computers that are multi-functional, not simply a spreadsheet or youtube video watching tool. I should be able to rip music, encode video, watch videos, play a few basic games, without the worry of my system having some "Critical (see above)" power issues.
I feel at some point, everyone is going to need to do something beyond the scope of what is "normal" or "every day", only to find out, it can't do it.
I don't get it, people argue that we are using our tablets in a way they weren't intended.... I'm pretty sure Microsoft themselves markets this as a "Laptop Replacement" not simply a "Laptop Companion".... I don't know of too many laptops that can't play simple games as an afterthought without making the system all but entirely useless. Especially at this price point... It's not the fan noise that got me, it was the fact that to continue functioning, the SP3 has to throttle itself to a point that makes the unit all but entirely useless.
All those Critical Power issues you see, those are of big concern for the overall longevity of the device. Batteries are severely hampered in their life cycle by heat. System parts are as well.
I feel at peace with my decision to wait out the beta testing of this, I'm actually quite surprised the SP3 made it out of the dev stages under its current iteration. This is such an important release for MS and the Surface Line.... I feel like they really should have waited the 6 months until Broadwell was released in hopes it would give an entirely different usability experience.
They sell this as a replacement for computers that are multi-functional, not simply a spreadsheet or youtube video watching tool. I should be able to rip music, encode video, watch videos, play a few basic games, without the worry of my system having some "Critical (see above)" power issues.
I feel at some point, everyone is going to need to do something beyond the scope of what is "normal" or "every day", only to find out, it can't do it.
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TechGod2014
Member
Replace a lap top yes, but it was clear that they were gunning for the MacBook air which might have the same issues when using it as a gaming PC. But in your case u have a jack up unit and should just simple replace it and see if the second unit has the same issues. Or just the wait and keep checking back to see if things improve.
Too funny. As I've said many times, I'm a hardcore gamer. Hardcore gamers spend thousands of dollars on games. Here is just a few of the games I have purchased. As a hardcore gamer, I have many, many more. This doesn't even include Steam and Origin which, hell yes, I have installed.
As a hardcore gamer, I can absolutely see the appeal in 'gaming' on a laptop. When on the road, I want to be able to bust out a few hours saving the world from zombies and aliens. Quite frankly, I think everyone on this forum should be thanking me for keeping the world safe from zombies and aliens. It's not easy work and takes many hours.
But, I digress.When any new laptop comes out, my first thought is 'will it play games?'. Then I check the specs to determine what it can and can't play. When I saw the specs on the Surface's, I knew immediately, as any hardcore gamer would, that it would not play games well regardless of it having an i5 processor. The GPU just simply can't play games at what I would consider acceptable frame rate. But, of course, I tried anyway. I installed Skyrim, Titanfall, and a few others. Skyrim was OK. Titanfall? Forget about it. At least not without much tweaking.
And that's the key. I would have tweak the Surface to see if I could make it play games. Tweaking means messing around with settings that could adversely affect the Surface. Why would I tweak a Surface device that I know was meant for business/casual use just to play games? All the benchmarking and running 10 videos at once are signs of what JNJ called 'enthusiasts' or maybe they are just hardcore gamers like myself. Folks who want the most from a device and are willing to tweak it past what it was meant to do. Been there, done that.
I long ago gave up on tweaking laptops to run high end games. If I truly wanted a gaming laptop, I can always buy an Asus, Alienware, or other laptop. No tweaking required. And they cost about as much as a Surface. But then, they are larger, heavier, and realistically only get about 1.5-2 hours battery time. Great for games, not so good for portability.
The Surface 3 is the right balance between work and casual gaming. If you don't tweak it or mess with it, it will work as intended in most cases. It's a beautiful, functional laptop replacement when used correctly.
My 2 cents.
I think the problem, is that people here that complain, won't be so mad if the previous Surface Pro's had the same issue. As it could have been attributed to technology limitation, in either the CPU producing too much heat for the size of device, or cooling technology.
However, the SP2 didn't, and share the same CPU model. Of course, when I say it didn't have this problem, it does have it, but it was closer to current ultrabooks, where you had to really push it to have it throttle on you. In most cases the CPU would just not engage turbo boost, making the system still responsive and usable. Beside that is the point of Turbo Boost technology, it is to give you bursts of performance when needed, not always run at this max speed.
However, the SP2 didn't, and share the same CPU model. Of course, when I say it didn't have this problem, it does have it, but it was closer to current ultrabooks, where you had to really push it to have it throttle on you. In most cases the CPU would just not engage turbo boost, making the system still responsive and usable. Beside that is the point of Turbo Boost technology, it is to give you bursts of performance when needed, not always run at this max speed.
