You might be inclined to call it an iMac clone, but that’s not entirely the case. Microsoft created its desktop, which shares some design lines with the iconic iMac, but it’s also an original Microsoft creation.
The Surface Studio has a 28-inch PixelSense display with touchscreen support. We’re looking at 3:2 aspect ratio, and a 12.5mm thin profile. Microsoft Panos Panay did say it’s the thinnest LCD monitor ever built. One interesting feature of the screen is the true scale. One inch on the screen is actually one inch in real life, which might make several tasks easier on the device. The monitor is even thinner than a MacBook and offers 13.5 million pixels. Or 63% more than a 4K TV. Powering the show is a GeForce 980M card, and you’ll find 32GB of RAM and a 2TB hybrid drive. The Surface Studio is made of aluminum and features a bunch of ports, including audio jack, SD card, mini DP, Ethernet and 4 USB 3.0 ports. A mic array is built into it so you can call up Cortana from anywhere inside the room. Just one cable comes out of the back to power the desktop, and the device has several accessories, including a keyboard and mouse, and a radial input “dial” with force feedback. The Surface Dial can be placed directly on the display, and it’ll produce a radial menu. The Surface Pen will also work with the Surface Studio. A zero-gravity hinge and custom-tuned springs will let you push around the display with relative ease, even if it weighs some 13 pounds. The Surface Studio will ship at some point this holiday, but you can expect shortages, at least at launch. The all-in-one is available for preorder starting today for $2,999, and it’ll be on display in Microsoft Stores.
macplusplus said: So, you'll be able to draw a 3D dino and show it to the kids in the middle of the living room thru their holo-thing. Great innovation indeed.
Make no mistake, Microsoft is going after the creative community hard. They think they can steal share from Apple here by getting creative pros frustrated by the slow pace of Mac hardware updates.
Question is how big and profitable this market segment is. Yes, we know the faithful creatives had their share in keeping Apple afloat. Now strategy could have changed. Take indicators such as MacPro ans the pro software suite. I am pretty convinced they could. They decided they don't want. No judgement involved. Just an observation.
its crazy that Microsoft seems more innovative than Apple right now.
They are willing to take more risks, be less cautious.
We all mock the Surface. But lets admit that Microsoft did have the right idea, even though the execution sucks.
I think it's about focus and strategy. You know, saying no to some ideas as well. They success/failure rate should be still very favorable compared to Alphabet and MS.
Apart from that we say that a blind chicken sometimes finds a grain, too
Also, if MS improving and deleted verübt some useful innovation as well, then good for them. Good for the rest as well as it spurs competition.
Procreate and Sketch Club, both terrific apps. I've drawn ever since I was a child, have illustrated professionally and there is no way for me to use either app using the Pencil in a natural way (resting one hand holding the Pencil on the drawing surface) without making stray marks or causing the canvas to skip or move while sketching or rendering. I don't use Pixelmator because I find it a completely half-assed version of Photoshop and when I need Photoshop functionality, I use a Mac.
Palm rejection works in Procreate exactly the way that you should expect. If you have both the Pencil and Touch set to 'Selected Tool' in preferences, then anything that the screen interprets as a point contact is going to potentially draw on the screen. The side of your hand resting on the screen? Won't be interpreted as a point. Your knuckle? Could be interpreted as a point. However, if you're really concerned about that part of it then you can just set Touch to 'Gestures Only' and it's never going interpret any type of random contact by your hand as drawing.
This Surface Studio looks pretty awesome. And it's not vaporware like the Courior was. Like I said, Microsoft is going after creative pros HARD. Surface studio folds down to become an angled work surface and has a dial that attaches and becomes an interactive tool. Ben Bajarin (not exactly an Apple hater) says Microsoft is making better trucks than Apple right now. Price starts at $2999 and ships this holiday season. That's another way Microsoft is going after Apple. They want to create the perception they're competing with Apple not cheap Windows OEMs.
I wonder if the dial capability could be better accomplished by:
tapping a menu, e.g. create dial
tapping an area of the screen for the dial
using touch in that area to manipulate the dial
I really like the concept, though.
I'd love to have an iMac like surface studio for Video Editing with FCP and drafting with SketchUP.
Or take the concept of drawing your world in MineCraft MineCraft and use Swift Playgrounds to [reverse engineer] generate the code to create that world!
If MS can deliver, I think that they have out-innovated Apple and created a new category!
Wish I could agree with you about the Pencil, but the palm rejection is still inadequate, especially in the better iPad illustration and paint apps.
Name them. Pixelmator and Procreate are right at the top and the palm rejection is perfect.
Procreate and Sketch Club, both terrific apps. I've drawn ever since I was a child, have illustrated professionally and there is no way for me to use either app using the Pencil in a natural way (resting one hand holding the Pencil on the drawing surface) without making stray marks or causing the canvas to skip or move while sketching or rendering. I don't use Pixelmator because I find it a completely half-assed version of Photoshop and when I need Photoshop functionality, I use a Mac.
I've drawn professionally for many years and always use 'masking' pieces to protect large canvases from unwanted marks; I use ProCreate and the iPad Pro but rarely suffer serious palm rejection problems(maybe some occasional image jittering) but a friend does and he uses a cotton glove with all but the little finger and a thumb strap cut away, so he can still hold the Pencil with good feel and no other skin contact with the screen.
This Surface Studio looks pretty awesome. And it's not vaporware like the Courior was. Like I said, Microsoft is going after creative pros HARD. Surface studio folds down to become an angled work surface and has a dial that attaches and becomes an interactive tool. Ben Bajarin (not exactly an Apple hater) says Microsoft is making better trucks than Apple right now. Price starts at $2999 and ships this holiday season. That's another way Microsoft is going after Apple. They want to create the perception they're competing with Apple not cheap Windows OEMs
Looks like the screen is permanently connected to the base that houses the computer hardware. That's a potential drawback if MS is trying to compete with the large PC based Cintiq screens, since many creatives prefer to have those connected to swing-arms.
This Surface Studio looks pretty awesome. And it's not vaporware like the Courior was. Like I said, Microsoft is going after creative pros HARD. Surface studio folds down to become an angled work surface and has a dial that attaches and becomes an interactive tool. Ben Bajarin (not exactly an Apple hater) says Microsoft is making better trucks than Apple right now. Price starts at $2999 and ships this holiday season. That's another way Microsoft is going after Apple. They want to create the perception they're competing with Apple not cheap Windows OEMs.
I wonder if the dial capability could be better accomplished by:
tapping a menu, e.g. create dial
tapping an area of the screen for the dial
using touch in that area to manipulate the dial
I really like the concept, though.
I'd love to have an iMac like surface studio for Video Editing with FCP and drafting with SketchUP.
Or take the concept of drawing your world in MineCraft MineCraft and use Swift Playgrounds to [reverse engineer] generate the code to create that world!
If MS can deliver, I think that they have out-innovated Apple and created a new category!
This Surface Studio looks pretty awesome. And it's not vaporware like the Courior was. Like I said, Microsoft is going after creative pros HARD. Surface studio folds down to become an angled work surface and has a dial that attaches and becomes an interactive tool. Ben Bajarin (not exactly an Apple hater) says Microsoft is making better trucks than Apple right now. Price starts at $2999 and ships this holiday season. That's another way Microsoft is going after Apple. They want to create the perception they're competing with Apple not cheap Windows OEMs.
I wonder if the dial capability could be better accomplished by:
tapping a menu, e.g. create dial
tapping an area of the screen for the dial
using touch in that area to manipulate the dial
I really like the concept, though.
I'd love to have an iMac like surface studio for Video Editing with FCP and drafting with SketchUP.
Or take the concept of drawing your world in MineCraft MineCraft and use Swift Playgrounds to [reverse engineer] generate the code to create that world!
If MS can deliver, I think that they have out-innovated Apple and created a new category!
I think that MS will be very successful with these, but once OEM's build their own variants, I'm not seeing the value proposition. Funny that MS hasn't thrown in at all with TB; seems short sighted.
Me, I'm happy that Apple is pursuing ARM at full speed; iOS with some added API's would certainly fulfill the same space, albeit Apple would be hesitant to build such a large tablet.
You might be inclined to call it an iMac clone, but that’s not entirely the case. Microsoft created its desktop, which shares some design lines with the iconic iMac, but it’s also an original Microsoft creation.
The Surface Studio has a 28-inch PixelSense display with touchscreen support. We’re looking at 3:2 aspect ratio, and a 12.5mm thin profile. Microsoft Panos Panay did say it’s the thinnest LCD monitor ever built. One interesting feature of the screen is the true scale. One inch on the screen is actually one inch in real life, which might make several tasks easier on the device. The monitor is even thinner than a MacBook and offers 13.5 million pixels. Or 63% more than a 4K TV. Powering the show is a GeForce 980M card, and you’ll find 32GB of RAM and a 2TB hybrid drive. The Surface Studio is made of aluminum and features a bunch of ports, including audio jack, SD card, mini DP, Ethernet and 4 USB 3.0 ports. A mic array is built into it so you can call up Cortana from anywhere inside the room. Just one cable comes out of the back to power the desktop, and the device has several accessories, including a keyboard and mouse, and a radial input “dial” with force feedback. The Surface Dial can be placed directly on the display, and it’ll produce a radial menu. The Surface Pen will also work with the Surface Studio. A zero-gravity hinge and custom-tuned springs will let you push around the display with relative ease, even if it weighs some 13 pounds. The Surface Studio will ship at some point this holiday, but you can expect shortages, at least at launch. The all-in-one is available for preorder starting today for $2,999, and it’ll be on display in Microsoft Stores.
Pretty damn impressive! I bet this drives some MS Store traffic!
I'm inclined to agree. I definitely want to see and test one in person. If Microsoft manages to out innovate Apple on this front, I will seriously evaluate where my computer money goes next.
macplusplus said: So, you'll be able to draw a 3D dino and show it to the kids in the middle of the living room thru their holo-thing. Great innovation indeed.
Make no mistake, Microsoft is going after the creative community hard. They think they can steal share from Apple here by getting creative pros frustrated by the slow pace of Mac hardware updates.
The only market share they can get for that stupid thing is the one for the holo-avatar bodies for sale in Microsoft Store, onto which you'll stamp your head to holo-chat with your beloved one...
Wish I could agree with you about the Pencil, but the palm rejection is still inadequate, especially in the better iPad illustration and paint apps.
Name them. Pixelmator and Procreate are right at the top and the palm rejection is perfect.
Procreate and Sketch Club, both terrific apps. I've drawn ever since I was a child, have illustrated professionally and there is no way for me to use either app using the Pencil in a natural way (resting one hand holding the Pencil on the drawing surface) without making stray marks or causing the canvas to skip or move while sketching or rendering. I don't use Pixelmator because I find it a completely half-assed version of Photoshop and when I need Photoshop functionality, I use a Mac.
I've drawn professionally for many years and always use 'masking' pieces to protect large canvases from unwanted marks; I use ProCreate and the iPad Pro but rarely suffer serious palm rejection problems(maybe some occasional image jittering) but a friend does and he uses a cotton glove with all but the little finger and a thumb strap cut away, so he can still hold the Pencil with good feel and no other skin contact with the screen.
Yep. The cotton glove with several fingers trimmed off was the best solution I found also to combat the palm rejection inaccuracies.
Why can't Apple users ever compliment innovation from any company other than Apple. Granted this isn't innovation per say but it's a game changer for sure. I can just imagine how teachers, presenters, students, team leads, product managers, etc. can benefit from 3D in Paint and PowerPoint. It when it comes to VR/AR we are still in the early stages of it and the only way that it can get better is making products, selling them and, getting feedback on them for the next generation of it. If all tech companies were to never take risks then we'd never get innovation.
its crazy that Microsoft seems more innovative than Apple right now.
They are willing to take more risks, be less cautious.
We all mock the Surface. But lets admit that Microsoft did have the right idea, even though the execution sucks.
Go sit in the corner. So you want Apple to be just like Samsung and Microsoft, throwing shit at the wall and waiting to see what sticks? Yeah, that always works doesn’t it.
If Apple took more risks and got things wrong, sog35 would complain about it.
Why can't Apple users ever compliment innovation from any company other than Apple. Granted this isn't innovation per say but it's a game changer for sure. I can just imagine how teachers, presenters, students, team leads, product managers, etc. can benefit from 3D in Paint and PowerPoint. It when it comes to VR/AR we are still in the early stages of it and the only way that it can get better is making products, selling them and, getting feedback on them for the next generation of it. If all tech companies were to never take risks then we'd never get innovation.
I think the Surface Studio is a cool product. It's too expensive for your average consumer, but it is targeted at professionals not hobbyists. Price out a comparable cintiq and a decent enough PC to drive it and you're in the same ballpark.
Plenty of questions up in the air still, like how well it works in the real world etc. But as a concept and design I think it's good.
Apple just needs to be Apple. The problem with the approach of Google and MSFT is that eventually they become unfocused. Steve Jobs and now Apple have always preferred to do a few things very well than be unfocused.
Check back in a few years. This is not a mainstream product.
Comments
Pretty damn impressive! I bet this drives some MS Store traffic!
Apart from that we say that a blind chicken sometimes finds a grain, too
Also, if MS improving and deleted verübt some useful innovation as well, then good for them. Good for the rest as well as it spurs competition.
I really like the concept, though.
I'd love to have an iMac like surface studio for Video Editing with FCP and drafting with SketchUP.
Or take the concept of drawing your world in MineCraft MineCraft and use Swift Playgrounds to [reverse engineer] generate the code to create that world!
If MS can deliver, I think that they have out-innovated Apple and created a new category!
Looks like the screen is permanently connected to the base that houses the computer hardware. That's a potential drawback if MS is trying to compete with the large PC based Cintiq screens, since many creatives prefer to have those connected to swing-arms.
Me, I'm happy that Apple is pursuing ARM at full speed; iOS with some added API's would certainly fulfill the same space, albeit Apple would be hesitant to build such a large tablet.
Plenty of questions up in the air still, like how well it works in the real world etc. But as a concept and design I think it's good.
Check back in a few years. This is not a mainstream product.