Today I had a Photoshoot with a model and took 268 images on my D800 (36mp DSLR). The lossless-compressed RAW files from the D800 are approximately 40MB each in size. I decided to give the my Surface pro 3 (i7 with 8GB RAM 256GB HDD) a very difficult task to do.
I started up Lightroom 5, and started an import from the SD card, via a USB 3 hub, but I used a standard card reader which is probably USB 2.0. I decided to keyword each of the entries on import, copy them to the SSD, and also asked Lightroom to render both 1:1 preview AND smart previews for each of the files. This is a task which is VERY intensive and even takes quite a long time for my desktop PC to run.
I ran the Surface on battery for the whole test. The Surface was showing 83% battery life. I also plugged my Colormunki in to the hub and asked the Surface to measure the ambient light and rebuild the display profile based on it. This was at the same time as the device was copying the files onto the drive not much CPU activity and the device was completely cold. The import was started at 6:30pm.
After the import had finished at about 6:40pm, Lightroom showed two progress bars for “Rendering Smart Previews” and “Rendering 1:1 previews”. The CPU activity ramped straight up to 100% and stayed there. It started at about 2.7Ghz, and then after a minute or two (when the fans spun right up) dropped to 2.3 Ghz but stayed there or just above, it didn't get lower.
At 6:55 the rendering of the smart preview finished and the processor activity dropped to around 50% but the speed appeared to increase back to a max of about 2.83Ghz, though the activity varied in a cyclical fashion while it rendered each preview.
At 7:29pm the Surface completed the task, soon after the fan switched off (or at least became inaudible). At this stage the battery was now as 39% after 40 minutes of intensive processor and fan activity. During which the screen was on ( I needed to keep interacting with it to prevent it turning off, which also stopped the program running). All this time Task Manager was running and I was regularly using the Surface pen to clip the task manager screen and write notes in one note. I did reduce the display brightness right down to the lowest setting while it was running the task in Lightroom. I did bring it back up to about 40% while I wrote this in MS Word.
It took my Surface Pro 3 i7 with 8GB RAM 1 hour to import and render 1:1 and Smart Previews for 268 approximately 40mb, D800 RAW files (lossless compressed), during which time it used 4GB RAM consistently throughout the process and stayed at a stable CPU speed of at least 2.3Ghz and used approximately 34% of the battery. The back of the device did get hot, but as soon as the task was finished, quickly cooled down and the fan went off.
I am very impressed with the performance, it probably would not be necessary to render 1:1 previews for everything on import, and possibly it might be better to separate the tasks, however the Surface has proved it is up to the task even with very high resolution and large files. Incidentally the high resolution of the screen shows these files off VERY well..!
I started up Lightroom 5, and started an import from the SD card, via a USB 3 hub, but I used a standard card reader which is probably USB 2.0. I decided to keyword each of the entries on import, copy them to the SSD, and also asked Lightroom to render both 1:1 preview AND smart previews for each of the files. This is a task which is VERY intensive and even takes quite a long time for my desktop PC to run.
I ran the Surface on battery for the whole test. The Surface was showing 83% battery life. I also plugged my Colormunki in to the hub and asked the Surface to measure the ambient light and rebuild the display profile based on it. This was at the same time as the device was copying the files onto the drive not much CPU activity and the device was completely cold. The import was started at 6:30pm.
After the import had finished at about 6:40pm, Lightroom showed two progress bars for “Rendering Smart Previews” and “Rendering 1:1 previews”. The CPU activity ramped straight up to 100% and stayed there. It started at about 2.7Ghz, and then after a minute or two (when the fans spun right up) dropped to 2.3 Ghz but stayed there or just above, it didn't get lower.
At 6:55 the rendering of the smart preview finished and the processor activity dropped to around 50% but the speed appeared to increase back to a max of about 2.83Ghz, though the activity varied in a cyclical fashion while it rendered each preview.
At 7:29pm the Surface completed the task, soon after the fan switched off (or at least became inaudible). At this stage the battery was now as 39% after 40 minutes of intensive processor and fan activity. During which the screen was on ( I needed to keep interacting with it to prevent it turning off, which also stopped the program running). All this time Task Manager was running and I was regularly using the Surface pen to clip the task manager screen and write notes in one note. I did reduce the display brightness right down to the lowest setting while it was running the task in Lightroom. I did bring it back up to about 40% while I wrote this in MS Word.
It took my Surface Pro 3 i7 with 8GB RAM 1 hour to import and render 1:1 and Smart Previews for 268 approximately 40mb, D800 RAW files (lossless compressed), during which time it used 4GB RAM consistently throughout the process and stayed at a stable CPU speed of at least 2.3Ghz and used approximately 34% of the battery. The back of the device did get hot, but as soon as the task was finished, quickly cooled down and the fan went off.
I am very impressed with the performance, it probably would not be necessary to render 1:1 previews for everything on import, and possibly it might be better to separate the tasks, however the Surface has proved it is up to the task even with very high resolution and large files. Incidentally the high resolution of the screen shows these files off VERY well..!
This is precisely the type of info that I longed for prior to purchasing my i7,256gb. Actually, it's good to know even now as I have not had a chance to fully put my SP3 through the paces in all of the Adobe programs. Cheers and hope you continue to enjoy your device! 
