thanx_al

sconosciuto said:

I wish I could think of a reason to justify buying such a machine.

Unfortunately there are still a few Windows apps (not games) that will not run on ARM. I would love to ditch my Intel MBP and iMac and go all in on Apple silicon, but until recalcitrant app makers port to Apple silicon, or at least ARM, I have to keep my last gen MBP for a while.  

I was force fed one of these by my employer a couple of gens ago as a "free trial" when MS was trying to eat even more into our workplace. I found it incredibly slow and neither suited to be a tablet or a laptop. It went straight back after the trial period ended. At least with iPad Pro, it excels at being a tablet, regardless of whether or not you want it to be a laptop. Some people are able to get it to be both and that's fine, but at least iPad Pro excels in at least one dimension.

Does this update change anything for the Surface as a hybrid tablet/laptop device?

I don't even know if I care anymore since the Magic Keyboard has begun to change my opinion about iPad Pro being a laptop replacement (I was a solid "no and it doesn't matter because its such a great tablet" to "hey this might make it a laptop replacement for me". 

I don't know how the tech press keeps getting away with such ridiculous assertions but they do. It's like people who think we have a functional public health system. Our system is the most expensive with the least basic coverage system among any industrialized nation. Our spending is off-the-charts, highly unequal, and millions of people are just beginning to learn the enormous disaster that tying health insurance to a job represents. But you know, just like the tech press, people want to live in an alternative universe, facts be damned. 

I find it highly unlikely they would release a new product mere months later (same with the iPad Pro). First, has anyone noticed the 25 million or more people out of work? Probably not a good time to launch new products and an even worse time to launch multiple releases of the same product in the same year. Second, the supply chain must be close to breaking at this point. Third, shipping out of Asia is severely constrained. Fourth, back to first... people don't have jobs and money for this. Finally, it would piss off customers and make them wary of buying Apple products when they launch. I still remember how mad I was when Apple launched the iPad 4 a few months after the 3. Not impossible, but highly unlikely. 

What's a Microsoft?