QOTW: Apple iPad Air 2 or Microsoft Surface 3?

[Animus404]

If I was considering only one computing device to have in my home and the choice was limited to these two, then I would pick the Surface3.

However in reality I own many computing devices: a work laptop, a personal laptop, Surface2 with type cover, iPad Air2, an aging Desktop and a couple of smartphones.

So the tablet I carry depends; if its a work trip I take the Air2 as its slimmer and lighter and I have a bulky Lenovo laptop with me. If it's a personal trip then I only take the Surface2 as it's a good tablet and an adequate laptop, it will meet almost any need I have while on the road with the exception of compiling software.

[Brewster0101]

Of course stream home streaming woks great on windows tablets too.

+1 - number one reason the kids like our windows tablet over our Note 10. It will stream perfectly all music, videos and stuff from our network.

[abaxas]

All depends what you want.

Ipad - does a small subset of things very well
Surface - does everything but in a crappy form factor.

For most the ipad is the winner as it does what they want and requires next to no support from others.

[cheesemp]

Neither. None of them doing anything I want to do well (PC gaming). I do 99% of browsing and simple gaming on my phone and I see no value in tablet (my old Android tablet never gets used). Would rather spend the cash on a proper gaming laptop.

[crossy]

Where's the slew of Android options that are better than both of them?

Hmm, much as I like Android, that Surface makes a pretty compelling argument - especially if the 128GB model was cheaper and there was proper Ethernet, then I could easily replace my current works laptop with one.
Ideally I'd want dual booting and a proper keyboard (Bluetooth ones are a no-no for office use) dock - preferably one with a shedload of ports - like Asus used to do.

The Surface beats both Android an the iPad as it's a real PC with a proper operating system.

Erm no, Surface runs Windows => i.e. "collection of prospective bugs and bsods flying in loose formation".

No problem. I choose Surface 3. Most people cannot do their jobs with iPad, except such as presentations, entertainments, communications.

Not necessarily the case - I'm seeing a lot more BYOD applications - and you forget that an iPad can also be used as a dumb(ish) terminal into a Citrix farm that's running the "corporate" stack. There's also Office apps and decent email functionality.
iPad still appears to be THE thing to have if you're into music creation. Looking at guitar apps the other week and iOS outdoes Android about 20:1, and I'm not convinced that the Surface would be able to run the full-blown "desktop" versions.

Both are impressive machines in their own right, yet while the base specifications appear similar, there are unique perks to each device.

I'd agree with this, and to be honest I wouldn't refuse either if you offered a free one. If I was spending my own money though I'd be thinking dirt cheap laptop and a budget tablet instead - especially for Windows there's some budget tablets that make the iPad's look overpriced.

If I had to choose one or t'other then I'd chew my lip and ponder deeply but probably go for the Surface - the flexibility of it is appealing (possibility to Linux it when Microsoft get bored and drop it?) and Apple's "we know better than you do what you want to do" approach is off-putting. Plus every man and his dog (or kid) seems to have an iPad these days - the Surface is something a little different and therefore appealing.

Was in various PC Worlds at the weekend (buying a trio of Lenovo tablets) and I'm struck by how much like the Apple presentation the Surface one is becoming with the same "experience" areas in the larger stores. If I was Apple then I'd be a wee bitty concerned by this - especially as the "trendy" types that usually go Apple were clustered about the Surface demo models.

[preter_s]

What a stupid, no doubt fruit company influenced/sponsored comparison! For just about the same price, you get way more specs, 64GB vs a pathetic 16GB storage, expandable via micro-SD for unlimited storage. You get full blooded full size USB 3.0 to connect anything in the world from mice/keyboards to external harddisks (again for unlimited storage). It can be used as a full productivity laptop. It can connect to a second desktop monitor or HDTV with video out via Displayport.

Ecosystem my Fruit Ninja ass. With the Surface, you have 30 yrs worth of proper Windows ecosystem which is way more productive and useful at work, home & play.

Wake up u fools!

[Biscuit]

What a stupid, no doubt fruit company influenced/sponsored comparison! For just about the same price, you get way more specs, 64GB vs a pathetic 16GB storage, expandable via micro-SD for unlimited storage. You get full blooded full size USB 3.0 to connect anything in the world from mice/keyboards to external harddisks (again for unlimited storage). It can be used as a full productivity laptop. It can connect to a second desktop monitor or HDTV with video out via Displayport.

Ecosystem my Fruit Ninja ass. With the Surface, you have 30 yrs worth of proper Windows ecosystem which is way more productive and useful at work, home & play.

Wake up u fools!

With the exception of additonal storage, most people dont need any of these features. In fact the experience is made easier for them by not having these features. More expensive, yes, but easier.

[KeyboardDemon]

With the exception of additonal storage, most people dont need any of these features. In fact the experience is made easier for them by not having these features. More expensive, yes, but easier.

The thing that I have noticed when it comes to more technically minded people such as the members of Hexus community is that we often (I'm guilty of this too) think about what we want and then get that mixed up with what an end user might need. peter_s has made some excellent points in his post, but in doing so has completely overlooked that many customers don't want or need the excellent features that he highlighted.

From a personal point of view, yes, those are many of the reason why I prefer my Surface Pro 3 to my iPad, my wife on the other hand prefers the simplicity of the iPad most of the time but is equally comfortable catching up with her friends on Facebook using either platform.

[tepo]

No it isn't, it's a an overweight tablet wanna-be PC with a schizoid OS that doesn't do anything particularly well because it tried to be jack-of-all-trades.

And the colours...... it looks like it fell out a kinder suprise

[crossy]

What a stupid, no doubt fruit company influenced/sponsored comparison!

Not sure I agree - checking the PC World price and the equivalent spec iPad is about the same ballpark as the Surface3 (note not the Pro version), £419 v's £479.

For just about the same price, you get way more specs, 64GB vs a pathetic 16GB storage,

No, you're wrong, see above. I even put in the links so you can check the comparison for yourself.

expandable via micro-SD for unlimited storage.

Quite true, and I'm a big believer in this - although I'd strongly argue "unlimited storage". Heck, I won't buy a phone that doesn't have a uSD slot. However, the usual way (and I've checked with other people) is that you slap in a card then forget about it - haven't found anyone yet who habitually swaps cards.

You get full blooded full size USB 3.0 to connect anything in the world from mice/keyboards to external harddisks (again for unlimited storage).

You do remember that a tablet is supposed to be a portable device - throw it in a rucksack and go? While I'd be the first to admit that what you're saying is correct, (oh and my Android tablet does that list too - and it was cheaper than both iPad and Surface3), would you really want to be lugging that list of gear? If so, then I'd humbly suggest that you'd be far better off with proper laptop - and 64GB iPad money will buy you a pretty reasonable one.

It can be used as a full productivity laptop. It can connect to a second desktop monitor or HDTV with video out via Displayport.

It can be used in place of a laptop, but imho if you need laptop "productivity" then a tablet is still a poor substitute for a proper laptop. Assuming you go for the Surface3Pro to get maximum productivity then that cost would get you a very good laptop, which would be even more "productive".
By the way, does the basic Surface3 do that second screen trick? I was sure I'd read something that it didn't do multiscreen (properly?).

Ecosystem my Fruit Ninja ass. With the Surface, you have 30 yrs worth of proper Windows ecosystem which is way more productive and useful at work, home & play.

You've missed the point (and this is evidenced by your earlier comments) - you're looking at the Surface3/iPad as a laptop (or even desktop) replacement. They can be stretched to do that - and I'll agree with you in a heartbeat that the Surface3 is stretched less in doing that "ultra laptop" role. No, a tablet is a different device, and I'll argue that Apple were so successful because they pitched it right.

Only an idiot would say that Windows doesn't have a unassailable pedigree behind it, but the vast majority of those apps/infrastructure were designed for conventional three-box setups (mouse, keyboard and monitor). And yes, they can (for the most part) be shoehorned into working on a device where mouse/keyboard/monitor are combined), but you end up with that dog-in-a-dress called MUI.

On the other hand, the iPad apps were ALL designed for the hardware setup they're running on. And yes, Microsoft has a massive advantage in that they can leverage those conventional desktop apps and get them "tabletised".

By the way, I'm not an iPad fan - with the exception of the ability to run a few iOS-specific guitar apps I really have no desire to own one.

With the exception of additonal storage, most people dont need any of these features. In fact the experience is made easier for them by not having these features. More expensive, yes, but easier.

Quite true - your typical "silver surfer" or "coffee shop browser" doesn't want the hassle of waiting for updates, anti-virus, etc. They want a sub-10s boot up time and a fast performing OS that's been designed for the form factor.

[Psycownage]

Depends whose infrastructure you want to buy into. Microsoft are late to the game, and are only apparantly offering the one GUI.

Apple sell a product which works seamlessly with its other products, and is probably less untrustworthy than Google or MS. So if you can afford it, buy Apple. If you can't, go Android or surface. If you aren't bothered about integration, then Google offers the best cross platform collaborative tools with Google docs. If you need to interact with exchange, then it will be MS surface.

Basically look at the functionality requirements and choose the platform that most closely meets them within your budget.

+1, There is no one product that is better for every person. I fall into the not requiring a tablet category, my XPS 13 is all the mobile computing I need and if I upgrade it will probably be to the new XPS 13

[crossy]

Apple sell a product which works seamlessly with its other products, and is probably less untrustworthy than Google or MS. So if you can afford it, buy Apple. If you can't, go Android or surface. If you aren't bothered about integration, then Google offers the best cross platform collaborative tools with Google docs. If you need to interact with exchange, then it will be MS surface.

Someone else quoted your post and it got me thinking. Has anyone looked closely at what Microsoft's doing these days with their cross-platform stuff? I had a look at the "Office for Android" collection and I'm ashamed to say that's it's pretty darned impressive. All the components work pretty well and OneDrive is very competitive - good enough that I've stopped using Dropbox as my phone photo backup store, and switched to OneDrive. Okay, some may say "why not Google Drive?", but I still don't trust GD to not unilaterally upload all my photos for public viewing.

Actually Word/Excel's speed and ease of use are such that I really can't see me using Google Docs apart from a few limited cases. Heck, the Office365 £80/year for a family then becomes justifiably good value for money, (5 copies on desktop/phone/tablet with a 1TB of cloud each).

The downside for Microsoft though is that their Android tools might actually be good enough to remove any "need" for me to go to a Surface. In which case the answer to the QOTW in question is "neither - Android plus Microsoft tools".

Basically look at the functionality requirements and choose the platform that most closely meets them within your budget.

Sage words indeed. And I'll add "and don't be mislead into thinking the non-tablet setups are no longer relevant". Or as a colleague put it "Choose the combination of form factors and platforms that suit you, and tell all the "experts" giving you their opinions to beggar off".