Microsoft Surface tablets

My vaio tap 11 with ntrig pen before Microsoft bought ntrig also have that issue, very rare tho.

I only experience it once.

 

Can you elaborate on the difference?

 

I'm not an expert, but the i7 model uses the hardware capabilities in quite a different way. It doesn't use the "timed" PL2, but it does reprogram PL1 dynamically based on the chasis temp reading (not sure on the details of the curve). It also allows up to 25W TDP if thermals allow. In sustained use I've found it stabilizes around 18W or so on my machine when hot... not sure how much variation there is between machines there.

All three Surface Pro models have very different power management, spanning the range from fanless on the m3 model to dynamic 15-25W TDP on the i7 with active cooling.

 

Undervolting the SP4 CPU and IGP gets a bit more sustained performance. Throttlestop is the least intrusive way to go. I also run Rivatuner Statistics Server to limit framerate to 30 fps.

It really needs a second fan and bigger battery. Maybe just big ugly heatsink fins molded into the casing.

 

I really hate the timed tdp.

My vaio tap 11 use it and it's bloody annoying. It always throttle down, even when I run it with open case and blast it with big fan.

 

The Surface Pro 4 is soooo crap! What a lousy experience! Hello face recognition randomly failed (one attempt, didn't try again, immediately prompted to use PIN) so I logged in with my PIN. Then went to improve face recognition which worked once. Tried it again and got a blank window. Go to log out and back in again and the Start menu doesn't work - the start button doesn't bring up anything. Restart the machine, log in, and audio out of the headphone socket doesn't work where it worked two minutes earlier. Unplug headphones and audio through the speakers doesn't work! Audio settings shows audio going to the headphone device but nothing sounds.

Only MS can make an OS that breaks doing absolutely nothing. On their own hardware!

 

Uh oh. You're going to be answering to eastmen soon.

 

The thing I really can't understand with Windows is drivers. MS's own advice in many issues is to reinstall the driver. What the hell happens to the software such that the drivers stop working and reinstalling them fixes it?!

 

bit of a sorry state of affairs, sorry to hear that man. There's a reason why I still continue to use Mac. Though that latest MacBook pro is an atrocity.

 

I think you need a Chromebook or MacBook. Lol But seriously I think you have a lemon. I would not expect that kind of grief with Win10 much less a Microsoft-branded device. I would return it if you can or sell/trade for another one. I wouldn't think you'd have the same experience.

Tommy McClain

 

Why would this one be a lemon? The hardware is identical (in theory) to any replacement. What I do need to do is a factory reset and start-again-from-scratch, but that means a bit of time I need to set aside so I keep putting it off.

 

If you've been using computers as long as I think you have, you should know by now that hardware has it's own set of issues. Sometimes you just need to try another. I've seen it happen time & time again. Don't be surprised if after a factory reset it still gives you problems.

Tommy McClain

 

I've been using a SP4 for a year now and I don't remember any of those problems being even slightly recurrent and some of them never happened to me at all.
Non-responsive start menu button as well as screen rotation not working unfortunately happens often when windows wants to restart because of an update.

I think you may be using an unit that is in the middle of updating the whole OS. Unfortunately, Windows requires each system to apply each update incrementally which is really stupid.
Once all updates are done , you either have a pretty reliable PC in your hands or a defective unit.


The device is very reliable IMO. I use it less often, mostly as a tablet, but by wife uses it as her everyday PC and she's a big fan of it.
In the future, we're definitely going to keep using Surface Pros or at least close competitors in the same form factor.

 

Windows 10 has this annoying bug where often when resuming from sleep in tablet mode app windows are just slightly smaller than screen size. To fix you need to go desktop mode and click minimize -» maximize and tablet mode again! Other than that SP4 generally works well, even windows Hello.

Also disabling automatic updates through group policy editor is a godsend.

 

@Shifty Geezer are you sure you are you? and not me, hacking into your account, and posting as you? O_O

hey i got that all the time! glad its not due to God of Cats messing around with me.

 

Absolute worst tablets I ever had the displeasure of using:
At university I would often try to start my surface, to find out that it didn't really actually go into standby.. I would have about an hour of battery life left and as such I could not use it to take notes during the second half of a lecture.
Even with windows 10 there were often super blurry, upscaled windows95-style dialog windows that would pop up.
It was super unreliable and I was SOOOOOOOOOO happy once the touch screen didn't respond for the 4th time and needed repairs, as I got my money back 100%!!
In the end I used a Surface Pro for almost 2 years.. I feel bad for people who actually pay money to use it.

 

That was with the original model? Things have vastly improved since then.

 

It was the pro 2. A MS representative on the phone told me " just power it off, it boots really fast!"..
All surfaces have standby bugs though.
Xbox is amazing, but the surface line, at least to me, is total crap.

 

My understanding is that Surface tablets didn't really come onto their own until SP3.

if rumors are true, a refresh will be announced soon---March???

 

It having an ARM processor would be interesting.