Surface 3 - New direction, higher prices and crappy i3

[Duce]

Don't tell the masses the truth, they hate that!  

Yes, you can turn Metro off entirely, people.  Easy peasy, a couple clicks.  I don't begrudge anyone disliking W8, but the witch hunt stuff is just hysterical.

YOU CAN OPT TO NEVER SEE "METRO" AT ALL AGAIN ONCE YOU DEFAULT TO DESKTOP MODE.  

[Duce]

Believe what you like, John.  I'm telling you I use W8 daily and I don't hit Metro at all, and it didn't take rocket science to set that up.  I use Windows 8 in entirely "desktop" mode.

I'm not here to convert anyone.  In fact, I'd be the LAST guy on earth to recommend that anyone go out and upgrade from 7 to 8 on their own dime, especially if that person has zero need to anything "Metro" style.  What I am saying is 8.1 can be a perfectly usable desktop OS that's actually faster and as stable as Windows 7, that's all, and you don't need to see the Metro stuff if you don't want to.  or you can, or you can mix and match Metro and the Desktop.  Up to you.

However, if you buy a new PC with 8 installed, you can indeed run it in a desktop UI form and never see the tablet style UI.  You can, John, lol.  I do it every single day, as do many, many others.  This is not pulling rabbits out of hats, it's a simple config option in 8.1 u1.

http://images2.tinkertry.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Windows-8.1-running-Windows-8.1-VM-with-8TB-disk.png

Looks pretty much to be a standard Windows style desktop to me in that particular screenie, doesn't it?  There's no magic or smoke and mirrors needed to get an experience like that in the least.

[Duce]

Not sure what you're missing, John.  I'm telling you, as tons of others will - they use Windows 8.1 u1 without ever getting "thrown" back into the Metro UI at all.

I use 8.1 for hours per day and _never_ see Metro in the least unless I actually want to, which I do not.  It did not take a dozen add on programs or anything add on wise to achieve this.  

There are 1000 "how to" guides on how to do exactly this, John.  It requires no IT certs to do so - the only remotely technical thing I've ever had to do is disable Charms with a regedit tweak, no different than how I used to turn off the annoying Balloon Tips on XP.  Other than that, the only thing I had to do to ease my usage case was make a desktop icon for shutdown/reboot, but that was purely preferential.

5 minutes of tweaking for a vastly superior File Explorer, twice as fast boot times, and just as stable?  Pretty simple.

[Duce]

He was referring to the Surface 3, John.  Which is actually getting quite positive hands on reviews.

[Duce]

The idea that the expansions available on iPad is even remotely comparable to a full fledged Windows portable machine like the surface is insane.  I've tried them all on Apple devices, from things like the HyperDrive to the Mophie devices for the iPhone.  All are a kludge and are inelegant at best.  

It's comparing apples and oranges.  While the iPad has some expansion capabilities, it's still a gimped experience consisting of using gaudy dongles.  It's primarily a consumption device and was never intended to even step foot in the same market as the Surface.  Comparing iMovie, iPhoto or GarageBand on iPad to Photoshop, Premier, Vegas, or Ableton, Audition or the like, it's not even a comparison.  Even the free Windows apps blow the "i programs" on the iPad out of the water, even something like Audacity vs. GarageBand for iPad.

Surface has HDMI, SD built in, among other things.  Surface can run the full versions of any Windows software, be it Photoshop, CAD programs, anything - all with 100% built in support for the very good pressure sensitive stylus that's built in.  The two devices can't even be sanely compared usage case wise, and I say that as someone who's owned pretty much every version of the iPad thus far and I use my Mini daily.

[Duce]

Had the same issues with Android and SD cards, unfortunately.  If/when they ever get it working like it should - seamless storage between the onboard and card, I'll likely switch to Android entirely.

Well, it does work, but it's highly dependent on the app as well.  Winamp for example, works just fine with SD cards.  Fire it up and your media is there right away, ready to play.

VLC though, it sits there churning every single time I fire it up on my Android devices rescanning the SD card for media, and that takes far too long with a 64 GB card stacked full of media.