Microsoft held a Windows and Surface event today, and among a number of announcements, the star of the show was the Surface Studio, a downright beautiful all-in-one designed entirely for creative professionals. The huge 28″ 4500×3000 3:2 aspect ration display with Adobe sRGB and DCI-P can be tilted downwards to turn the Studio into a huge drawing surface.
As the product video demonstrates, this is not a device for the average user, or even for every power user – every aspect of it seems to be designed specifically for designers, graphics artists, possibly video editors, and people of similar profession. I love the Surface Dial, which can be used both on the display and on a desk to control context-specific actions, like changing the colour output of your drawing tool or select thickness of the output, and countless other things.
It’s got a sxith generation Core i5 or i7, a GTX 965M 2GB (Core i5) or GTX 980M 4GB (Core i7) graphics chip, up to 32GB of RAM, and the usual array of ports and connections. This is clearly a niche device, and the price underlines that: the Surface Studio starts at a whopping $2999. Which is quite a lot, especially taking the video chip into account.
Penny Arcade’s artist Mike “Gabe” Krahulik has been using a Surface Studio for the past week, and posted his thoughts on his blog.
When I first saw the device months ago in that secret room at MS, they asked me what I thought. I said, “Well I have no idea if anyone else will want it, but you have made my dream computer.” I recognize that not everyone needs or wants a computer they can draw on. Some people do though and I will tell you that the Surface Studio is without a doubt the best digital drawing experience I have ever tried. I was trying to help Tycho understand why the Studio was so exciting. I spend 6 to 10 hours a day drawing digitally and I have for more than a decade. The Cintiq and the Surface, these are like my tools or my instruments. I am intimately familiar with how it feels to create things on these sorts of devices and the Studio honestly feels like a generational leap forward. If you are a digital artist and you are currently working on a Cintiq you have to go to a MS store and look at the Studio. I’ve always given you my honest take on this stuff and this time is no different even though I can’t think of anything bad to say. If you draw on computers the Surface Studio is something very special.
Following Twitter during the unveiling of the Surface Studio was an entirely surreal experience, with a ton of genuine excitement over the product – something I haven’t seen in a long, long time in this jaded industry. Specifically remarkable, though, was the response from the Apple and Mac/iOS developer and creative professional community – an endless stream of harsh jabs and words directed at Apple for so blatantly ignoring the creative professional community for years now, while Microsoft seems to be making a power play to win their hearts. It was quite the jarring experience.
The general consensus seems to be that Apple really needs to bring more to the table tomorrow than some updated internals and a SideShow ripoff to reconquer the hearts of the creative professionals it seemingly has abandoned.
Rather “whopping” price indeed, I am surprised the stratospheric price of this thing did not merit more mention than it got. This thing is EXPENSIVE!!
Apple’s decision to sit out the Skylake processor debacle was unprecedented, but ultimately the correct decision, considering all the problems associated with that ill-fated processor generation that other manufacturers, including Microsoft, had to deal with. I am hoping the new Kaby Lake processors were worth waiting for, we shall see tomorrow.
Edited 2016-10-26 21:40 UTC
A com[arable Cintiq – which is just a screen, not a whole computer! – is 2799.
So it’s not expensive in context.
I couldn’t agree more with this – this has 3 or 4 huge components that you don’t normally find in a unit like this – GTX 980, drawing surface on entire screen (VERY expensive), and a giant high def screen. The i7 is nothing to shake a stick at either.
I only wish they’d have gone with one generation newer GPU (I’m not sure it’s out yet, haven’t been paying attention), or maybe even a pair of them.
I have a feeling they are either still doing a custom PCB (like the surface book) or they are using something like MXM for the GPU… The problem is right now a custom board for the 1080 mobility series is rather large compared to the area used for a 900M series (see photo below – that is 2 of them but they are pretty damn big – about double the size of the 940M in the surface book). As for using an MXM slot, there is no MXM for the 1080 mobility series currently. Maybe someday, but not likely. Don’t know if this uses an MXM slot though, I would wager not.
Anyway, point being they spent probably a year or more designing this, the 980M was bleeding edge when they started and going any higher would probably require a rework of the PCB, or even a bigger case possibly. We will have to wait till the next version…
Man, this thing is nice though. I am very, very, impressed.
In professional terms this is easily affordable!
Lets say the designer works 8 hours a day for 40 weeks a year.
Assume again their hourly output value is ^Alb80, take away from that a ^Alb35k wage
That works out about ^Alb93k profit for the business.
Near enough, each percentile improvement is worth ^Alb1k in profit. So if it can increase output by a mere 3% its “free” in just a single year! (and one would expect about a 3 year cycle)
With slightly longer winded maths, we upgraded our design team’s systems this week to new Mac Pros and high def screens. They came in at ^Alb4k each all told…
Adurbe,
Some businesses might have a big enough budget to regularly buy everyone expensive gear, but when the upgrades aren’t in the budget, it exposes some pretty interesting office dynamics. Here’s what I mean: it’s been my experience from numerous jobs that designers get better toys than those in IT, but why is that?
I appreciate that designers benefit from high performance, but I spend even more time on computers and a lousy one can/does hold back my productivity as much as a designer, so it doesn’t seem to be based on need. When I’ve complained about machines in the past, I’d be given another one from the “used” stock – in fact I’ve never gotten a new machine from any employer, ever.
I think it comes down to how administrators in many businesses view IT as a cost center, with the goal being minimization. On the other end, they might feel investing in product design/product placement has a more direct link to sales.
I know it’s just anecdotal, but I’m curious about other experiences, how many here work for companies that buy normal employees $4k machines? If so, I want to work there
Edited 2016-10-27 14:30 UTC
Where I work I do programming and IT support for the engineering staff. The engineering computers are about $3k each because these machines are running graphics intensive programs 10 hours a day 5 days a week all year round. And it costs money for when there machines are down.
If your full time job is creative enough to need that type of machine then that price is nothing. Especially considering it would cost a lot more to put together a workable system with separate digitizers and computer.
Rjay75,
It’s interesting that you work with graphics, I don’t really do much with that. I don’t necessarily need a high end machine to develop on, but it’s still frustrating when things run slowly, visual studio is probably the worst culprit over the years on a marginal machine.
Lowly programmers like me get a budget of around $2k for a laptop, every 2-3 years or so. $2.5k if you make a good case for it. The only people going much north of that are executives that basically get stuff like this as desktop jewelry
Edited 2016-10-27 19:43 UTC
Hire half one
Is that the delta, with your numbers?
galvanash,
That’s pretty good, I guess you guys didn’t also have desktops? Given a choice I’d prefer the desktop myself, laptops are too crammed for my tastes unless they are too large to be comfortably portable.
Also laptop performance is often compromised for lower power and lower heat. When I was doing SDR work someone had a new expensive macbook and it actually fared poorly compared to the older desktop I was using. When we dug in, the macbook would burst to 3.5GHz, but quickly degrade to 2GHz under load. My desktop was only 3.1GHz, but it had no problem sustaining it. I’ve gone entirely off topic again, just pretend we’re in the macbook pro article
Edited 2016-10-27 21:20 UTC
i work in mechanical engineering
it’s easy to spend that kind of money on a CAD-workstation
I have worked in many places that were similar. Even one that had an employee spent 4 hours a week manually clearing out files from a server rather than spend ^Alb100 on a new HDD which would have “resolved” the problem for 3 years..
In terms of your business, it might be as simple as a misunderstanding of the impact on productivity. If you go to your boss with hard numbers of how much your output will increase based on the expense, then they may well consider it. Our IT team gets i7 laptops, why? because the maths backs it up. Why don’t I have a Nvidia 1080? Because the maths dont
… when I regret that I am too POOR to afford something like that.
Good Lord, that thing is fucking BEAUTIFUL! I LOVE IT!
And color me surprised to see myself praising Microsoft so loudly but I don’t care. They fucking did it! <3<3
DeadFishMan,
The review wasn’t very thorough, but indeed it does look good on the surface and I wouldn’t mind having one to play around with
Alas, I don’t have money for expensive toys either and cost factors into everything we buy. Who else thinks this gear will probably get wasted on upper level corporate types with no imagination or creative initiative, just because they can?
Edited 2016-10-26 22:28 UTC
Amen!
Hohoooooh!
Puns aside, this does indeed look like a revelation!
Apple had already patented it in 2010, hehe
https://twitter.com/mluisbrown/status/791378274966441984
Remembering the long forgotten dials interface on workstations used for 3D CAD design :
http://ep.yimg.com/ay/iercomputer/ibm-6094-010-dials-input-device-4…
Thom, do you not see the irony ( and hypocrisy ) of your post? In one sentence condemning Apple advocates for dissing this product and in the next dissing Apple over a new feature.
PS. You didn’t even bother dissing with any semblance of reason as SideShow was largely a display technology while that Apple strip is basically a keyboard with a programable key display
PPS. If anything this is a ripoff of the original Razer Blade Pro and it’s programable game pad but that’s sort of stretching it.
Where does he say Apple advocates are dissing this product??? What he said was Apple advocates were dissing Apple for not making this product…
Edited 2016-10-27 02:44 UTC
What? I did none of the sort?
He’s a full on troll now. Every post related to Microsoft, Google, or Apple is trolling in some way, and he’s called out for it in every thread. Perhaps he’s watching the latest season of South Park. The Danish are going to get him.
I like the work Microsoft is doing with the surface. The ergonomics of desktop touch devices all sort of suck – I own one and literally never touch the screen – and this solves the issue really nicely.
I also really like the hockey puck thing. I have one of these – https://griffintechnology.com/us/powermate-bluetooth – which is similar but I do think the ability to have it interact with the screen makes it that much more useful.
Overall great looking device and I am happy Microsoft is moving the PC industry in a good direction.
Edited 2016-10-26 23:47 UTC
But who else felt the product video’s cover of “Pure Imagination” was creepily sterile, much like the backdrop of the video, and pretty much every “designer” product and product ad out there?
Do designers have a secret inner life of being mini-dictators, wishing everything was under complete control, in the most hermetically sealed environment possible? Where the only difference between their sterile spaces and comparative ones elsewhere is padded walls?
The product is innovative and looks cool though.
Eh, it can’t be any worse than that time Apple dropped their pants & dumped a steaming load onto The Pixies’ legacy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6Ve2mgjgmY
Oh, whoops, wrong link… I meant:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFXwyi85gMA
Anyone who can spend hours arguing the merit of Green compared to Green must have a little of the control freak in there
Mind you, my wall is painted “Bavarian hops” so maybe I have a little of it too…
Did anyone else notice that this thing is perfect for running Linux on? Intel Components and an NVIDIA GTX 980. The whole surface device has Linux support…. Now if the bootloader can be unlocked it’s perfect.
Isn’t AMD surpassing nVidia in the matter of linux graphics driver support at the moment and isn’t Intel being increasingly harder to properly drive under Linux nowadays? It seems that maybe three years ago you were right, but right now: alas, not so much anymore.
And I say this with a sad face, because what is left for Linux people? Almost nothing! You will have to look very carefully what hardware you buy if you plan to (properly) run Linux on it.
Edited 2016-10-27 07:50 UTC
I was just wondering if it could support non-Windows OSes. I am the Haiku-OS fan but my beef with newer computers is how hard they make it to run any non-Windows OSes.
Earl C Pottinger,
That’s certainly one of microsoft’s goals, but they have to walk a very careful legal line. For microsoft’s purposes, making alternative operating systems difficult to use might be just as good as making it impossible, without the consequences of antitrust actions. My latest computer was definitely harder to boot linux on. As the Lenovo debacle demonstrated, most manufacturers don’t really care about the viability of our niche.
Repulsive to use that song. It is a song i sang to my children and grandchildren. I know it is owned by someone and they want to make a buck… We all saw it in the movies in 1971 and it should be protected from this type of exploitation. If i knew, i would have sung some non-copyrighted musc to my children growing up. However, all is not lost i will inform my grandkids to use public domain and NOT use this or any other song, however great it might be to educate their kids.
And kids are kids, let them do the lyrics, and associate freely. It will probably not be the best written song but at least you will remember it in your older years.
I’ve been using Apple hardware for like 5+ years now almost exclusively. I like their stuff. Alot.
But wow… If tomorrows product announcements from Apple are what everyone is expecting and they don’t have any tricks up their sleeve, Microsoft has seriously stolen their thunder and then some. This thing is insanely nice.
Apple better have a helluva “one more thing” moment tomorrow or else Microsoft is going to get all the buzz this time around.
Just watched the Apple Event… The new Macbook Pro, while certainly a nice product, doesn’t engender anywhere near the level of lust the Surface Studio does.
Used to be new Apple products made me desperately want to spend money I don’t have. I have a Macbook 12 inch, but I really don’t see any compelling reason to upgrade to the new Pro at all. Its basically the same thing with more ports (one works for me – even without it being Thunderbolt) and a slightly larger screen. Sure its faster, better screen, etc., but what I have performs well enough for me. As for the touch strip thing-a-ma-bob – it just seems gimmicky. Not terribly impressed by it. If I bought one I would probably buy the version without it – I like having a real ESC key…
The Surface Studio? I have absolutely no need for it, don’t even know what I would use one for, but I’m just about willing to sell a kidney to get one.
Anybody need a kidney?
The line between art and design is being blurred more each day. I can see this format device quickly becoming the tool of choice for desk based technical designers as well as the artists it seems to initially target.
It looks perfectly suited to the new haptic, AR and VR interfaces on the various solid modeling CAD packages touted by the likes of AutoCAD, Solidworks and ANSYS. Nothing like designing your new tapware then picking it up of the display to have a play with!
As such I can envisage the next generation of devices already, which will be more powerful, more expensive and the preferred option for those in additive prototyping. So many of them want more than just the generic technical solution.
But it might be a very clever move by MS to start the pitch at the artist level community which is traditionally Mac based, and despite often being heavily funded by public grants, they sufficiently affluent enough to afford it. Mummies design blog just got a new must have tool!
Maybe they would make some progress if they gave free ones to schools like Apple does, but those artists are still the people that install rootkits because the website pop-up told them too.
So, let’s see… Apple gets rid of ports and the escape key, and Microsoft creates an all-in-one that it looks like a fair number of people might actually want. And I bet it has an escape key.
Oh, and now you can run bash and several linux things on top of Windows, so Unix command line on a terminal when you need it.
When it’s time to get a new machine, I wonder how many will get an old Mac or a new Windows machine instead of a new Mac.
This looks like a nice product for a niche of users. What I wonder is if it adds that much compared to other existing solutions.
I mean, Cintiq devices already cover that use case and they can be VESA mounted, AFAIK. So in fact, this AiO provides an integrated solution that may involve quite a lot of constraints. The ports are in the base, meaning that it is unlikely you will be able to VESA mount this. Even if it was possible, it doesn’t make much sense to buy this to VESA mount it anyways. I would bet that there are VESA mounts much more flexible adapted to the use case this aims to. It is also a solution that isn’t that much adapted to multi-monitor setups.
Bear in mind I am not the target for this kind of computer. I use my computers to program, so all I really want is a monitor that is standing and a good keyboard. For me touch in the desktop is beyond useless, and I’ve been using multiple displays for a long while. This computer is not for me, at all.
I do use an iMac, and one of the things I dislike about it is the lack of flexibility of its stand. No rotation, no way to change height. In that sense I much prefer the secondary DELL display I use with it. Note that in that sense the Surface also looks terrible, as in the demo it looks like the tilt and height are linked…
When I first saw it I thought “it looks so nice”, but the more I think about it the more problems I see. IMO, Microsoft for sure has taken hints from Apple design here, one of them being the often criticized “form over function” factor.
PD: I do recognize I may have a bias against Microsoft, but everyone has their biases, right?
There is some narrative at TheVerge About Confrontation with Apple. Seems to me that MS People [with Nadella venia] is about working at Berners-Lee philosophy, where every actor is producer-consumer.
Open Copyright has to leave pampers behind. Or We will back at the same Catch 22.
When my sister was in art college learning to be an animator, the campus was almost completely apple computers. She was really looking forward to the apple tablet.
When it came out, it was just a giant iphone. Sure, it did good in the general market, but artists who were using macs were expecting something they could use and were disappointed. By the time the Microsoft surface came out (and was everything she wanted the ipad to be) she was working full time at a studio that solely used Microsoft windows (which is now true for nearly every studio in Vancouver).
I think I’m going to save up for one of these and buy it for her when it comes out, I bet she’ll love it.
Edited 2016-10-27 18:13 UTC
“The general consensus seems to be that Apple really needs to bring more to the table tomorrow…”
Well… Obvious is now that different agendas bring differing priorities.
The graphic design community may complain about Apple, but there seems to be not a whole lot of stomach for jumping ship to Microsoft.
We’re forced to support macs in our marketing department because they supposedly can’t do their jobs without them.
People do mistake familiarity with intuitiveness.