Surface Pro ships with only 23KB free or less than a single floppy!

[tone007]

Hoping this post was an Onion-style joke, though the article linked is quite a load.

My experience: purchased a Dell Windows 7 tablet from them for $199 the week before Christmas, 2GB of RAM and a 32GB SSD.  Upgraded it to Windows 8 for $15, installed Office 2010, VMware management tools and the "free" Adobe CS2 that came out a couple weeks ago, still have 7GB free and I didn't even blow away the restore partition yet. I've made it my only desktop computer at work by adding a $40 dock from eBay and a 20" LCD.  Today, I pulled it off of the dock and I'm currently sitting at a bar typing this message on it.

I don't know what I'd do with an additional 32GB of storage on it, as it's currently doing everything I need, though there is a nice SD card slot if I need a bunch of static data along with me.

[Heiroglyph]

I'm a fan of cloud storage for data.  Obviously for video or other large, high-speed data it's not workable though.

I use Google Drive a lot (I paid for extra storage) because I figure the odds of me losing data locally is way higher than Google losing it.

Also since I have multiple computers syncing to the account, I have it in multiple local locations without having to manually do back ups.

The other benefit is that all my data is available on any computer I'm using.  I can switch from a notebook to a home computer to my office and it's all just there and up to date.

A lot of people think cloud storage is just bad, but if used wisely it can be a huge workflow improvement.

That tablet is pretty ridiculously under spec'ed for that price though, cloud storage or not.

[pwermonger]

Seagate GoFlex Satellite. 500GB storage wirelessly accessible from Web, iOS, Android. And that 500GB is if you don't upgrade the drive in it (info available if you search Google). No need to pay the Apple fee for RAM to inflate their coffers more than they're already inflated. Look at the price difference between the models. How many 32GB SD cards can you get for what they charge to bump from 32 to 64G? 100 bucks extra charge to take a 16GB mini to 32 (and you know the only difference is the RAM the boards are all made the same)!!!!! 32GB class 10 SD can be had for 30 bucks.
 
Disgusting what people think they need to pay tablet manufacturers for.

[Hattig]

Nonsense. You don't need that much data space. For me 8 Gb would last a life time!

Tell me. What happens when you use up all that data and something happens to it like it gets stolen or run over by a bus? What a waste. That's the problem with these mobile devices. People put all their information on them without backing it all up. Why can't you just use computers like a normal person?

People have tens of gigabytes of music they want to take with them. Indeed the tablet is acting as a backup device for this purpose as well, instead of all the data being beholden to a single computer.

Other people want to watch TV shows, movies, etc, on the move. I see this frequently when commuting. These files are not small. And if purchased online, they're re-downloadable if you do lose them.

Then there are large apps (especially games).

8GB on a tablet would leave you gasping for storage before you had even started.

[SysAdmin]

MS is thinking about doing a Surface Pro Mini with only 2KB of free space to install your programs.

[yssing]

Those 8 gigs left on a 32 gig Window8 tablet are soon gone, just think of all the updates.

[ChuckT]

Those 8 gigs left on a 32 gig Window8 tablet are soon gone, just think of all the updates.

We have a new computer with Windows 8 and it is being forced upon everyone who gets a new computer.  They took away the Start button.  Now there are two screens to navigate which are the Tiles screen and the Desktop.  It takes longer to do anything because I'm always searching through a larger list of nonsense icons and that makes it sort of like noise.  There is too much going on which makes me lose my train of thought because it is like visual noise.  Don't get me wrong.  I started to like it and some things were made easier and there is a free app that adds the start button but it is too much visual noise for me and Windows will only get worse from here.

[gertsy]

Funny I think the surface RT is really cool & I've got an iPad and iPod touch.  I must be mad though 'cos a lot of the tech media say it's crap and they are always so cognisant of strategy and technology change.
IMO I can see more issues with the intel version cos everyone will expect it to be a tablet that can run all their x86 apps but why would you want too?  You think you do but you really don't. That's not what a tablet is about. Editing music on a DAW on a bus?  Don't think so.

hmmm

[Heiroglyph]

Funny I think the surface RT is really cool & I've got an iPad and iPod touch.  I must be mad though 'cos a lot of the tech media say it's crap and they are always so cognisant of strategy and technology change.
IMO I can see more issues with the intel version cos everyone will expect it to be a tablet that can run all their x86 apps but why would you want too?  You think you do but you really don't. That's not what a tablet is about. Editing music on a DAW on a bus?  Don't think so.

hmmm

I think a lot of the problem is how MS didn't commit to a tablet OS. (or a desktop OS for that matter)

When people have to resort to desktop mode they see a familiar Windows screen.  That makes most average users wonder why their good old apps don't work.

Because they don't have Apple's steadfast "do it great or nothing" attitude, MS will eventually give in and have hybrids that aren't good desktops and aren't good tablets either.

I expect them to get worse before they get better.

[gertsy]

...Because they don't have Apple's steadfast "do it great or nothing" attitude, ...

Its all relative to your opinion of what great is, telling consumers that's the way it is doesn't make it real. Unless you are a blind follower.  There are lots of holes and stuff that doesn't "join" up or isn't so great, but there are lots more good things. Learning listening and evolving is the important thing for tech companies not telling them that their product is perfect day 1 so it must be you. We must expect support and change.
Win8 and the start screen on touch is great. On a conventional PC the start screen and the browser running on it are not so great.  But there are some simple things that can be done to make it less frustrating. Rather than reverting to the conventional browser on the desktop.  I am confident these things will be fixed and made better.
Everybody thought  WB1.2 was great, but WB 1.3 was better.

[bloodline]

You think you do but you really don't. That's not what a tablet is about. Editing music on a DAW on a bus?  Don't think so.

hmmm

Check out Auria on the App Store!! It is super awesome

[gertsy]

Check out Auria on the App Store!! It is super awesome

Looks Superb and great value, But I can't really plug my electric guitar into my iPad while i'm on the bus. I'm being pedantic but you get my point.  I'm not about to throw my Sonar X1 and Dimension pro away and as a format to try ideas it's difficult to map.
Imagine being able to play instruments by humming riff lines into the ipad, that would be cool and a way to try ideas.
Still it'd  be cool if could plug my USB Fasttrack pro into the ipad.

[bloodline]

Looks Superb and great value, But I can't really plug my electric guitar into my iPad while i'm on the bus. I'm being pedantic but you get my point.  I'm not about to throw my Sonar X1 and Dimension pro away and as a format to try ideas it's difficult to map.

Oh, I see... I'm keyboards, so can use the iPad directly... But sill, it is nice to be able to mix and edit some music on the bus

Imagine being able to play instruments by humming riff lines into the ipad, that would be cool and a way to try ideas.

You'll want the "Voice Band" app

Still it'd  be cool if could plug my USB Fasttrack pro into the ipad.

Use the camera connection kit, that's how I use my USB audio interface and keyboards on my iPad...

[Heiroglyph]

Its all relative to your opinion of what great is, telling consumers that's the way it is doesn't make it real. Unless you are a blind follower.  There are lots of holes and stuff that doesn't "join" up or isn't so great, but there are lots more good things. Learning listening and evolving is the important thing for tech companies not telling them that their product is perfect day 1 so it must be you. We must expect support and change.

I actually don't own a single Apple product, but they have a reputation for doing what they think is best regardless of backlash and I can respect that with caveats.

There's a fine line between being a platform dictator and design by committee.

I think MS could move quite a bit closer to the platform dictator side and make products that at least seem like a cohesive, purposely built unit.  As it stands most of their products don't seem complete or focused, just good enough not to completely fail.

[Wilse]

Actually, I use my iPad Mini for software dev (C/Objective-C and JavaScript), and also for making music... The DAW software available is brilliant now!

Which DAW are you using on the mini? I might be coming into possession of one.

-EDIT-

Check out Auria on the App Store!! It is super awesome

Ignore me - should've read whole thread before posting.

[vidarh]

Nonsense. You don't need that much data space. For me 8 Gb would last a life time!

I have more music than that on my phone. Then comes videos, comics, games, books...

Tell me. What happens when you use up all that data and something happens to it like it gets stolen or run over by a bus? What a waste. That's the problem with these mobile devices. People put all their information on them without backing it all up.

Well, *I* don't put it there without backing it up, so *I* would just copy my data back from my home server onto a fresh SD-card and pop it in my replacement phone or tablet.

Why can't you just use computers like a normal person?

They *are* computers. Computers well over a thousand times more powerful than the first ones I grew up with.