SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Microsoft has launched the Surface Studio, a 28-inch all-in-one PC reminiscent of the iMac but with touchscreen capabilities and other accessories for "content creators":
The thin aluminum 28-inch Surface Studio desktop PC that Microsoft trotted out here Wednesday isn't going to make it into most homes anytime soon. Not at $2,999 to start, and on up to $4,199 if you don't hold back on the specs. If you simply must have it, Studio goes on preorder today; it'll be available in limited quantities by the holidays. There's no question this innovative machine, which at that price is clearly aimed at business users and a more affluent subsegment of potential home buyers, is well worth paying attention to for the way it can leverage the "early 2017" arrival of Windows 10 Creators Update.
At first blush, the design brings to mind Apple's iMac, though the differences are apparent soon enough, and not just because Surface runs Windows 10 and Macs run macOS Sierra. For starters, you can push down on the Surface Studio and via its zero-gravity hinge, angle it at 20-degrees and effectively turn it into a drafting surface. When upright you'd likely use it for more typical Windows computing.
And since Surface Studio like other Surface computers uses a Windows 10 touch-display — Apple hasn't brought touchscreen capability to any of its Macs, and I'm not banking on that happening when it holds a press event for new Macs on Thursday — you can also draw or write directly on the screen using a special Surface Pen. It boasts 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity plus an eraser. Microsoft has also unveiled a hockey-puck shaped accessory called Surface Dial along with Surface Studio itself. You can rotate the puck to summon tools and zoom in on and manipulate objects on the screen; it takes advantage of a radial menu. You can directly place Surface Dial onto the the Surface Studio surface, or use it off the screen.
Also at Ars Technica, http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37787493, and PCWorld.
(Score: 2) by iamjacksusername on Saturday October 29 2016, @02:23PM
It is interesting that Ballmer is being vindicated in this respect. He was wrong about a lot of things and he had the wrong mindset for Microsoft but he absolutely understood the fundamentals of the existing business; he recognized that Apple was succeeding in the marketplace because they were the only ones innovating in the laptop / desktop space. Outside of Sony, none of Microsoft's partners were really interested in doing innovative things in design. And Sony never suceeded in building consumer mindshare in the US. Which is a shame - their hardware designs were a decade ahead. I configured a few UX series [notebookreview.com] for some pilots I knew. They loved them because ithey could install all of their maps and radio information and mount it in the cockpit. It was, more or less, the first tablet being used in a tablet capacity.
Surface was an opportunity for Microsoft to show partners that they could make an innovative product with Windows. It being Microsoft, it took 3 revisions on both the hardware (Surface Pro-->Surface Pro 2-->Surface Pro 3) and software side (Windows 8-->Windows 8.1-->Windows 10) to get it right. I think they have succeeded. This Surface Studio is showing that interesting things can still be done in the All-In-One space; additionally, by creating an All-In-One like this, Microsoft is building a market for applications which can take advantage of the formfactor. Microsoft historical problem on the "touch" front has always been that, until Windows 8, there was roughly 1 application that actually took advantage of the form factor. Outside of some very industry specific applications, OneNote was it. Thus, the Tablet PC market never went anywhere because there was not anything interesting you could do with it. It took Apple to make touch interfaces mainstream and left Microsoft far behind a market they tried to create 8 years previously.
Ballmer learned that lesson and so he created a hardware division so Microsoft could both create a touch software ecosystem for windows and also innovate for the future so Microsoft would not get left behind by another Apple. Ballmer at least understood that even if he was the wrong person to lead Microsoft.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 29 2016, @08:55PM
Sony never [succeeded] in building consumer mindshare in the US
I would have said it differently.
Sony shot itself in the foot with its criminal rootkit on its BMG products.
...and that rootkit only affected Windoze systems, so Sony shot their "partner" in the foot as well.
Their batteries|laptops catching fire didn't help their reputation either.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]