You can either blame ms for using a weak battery or intel for not coming up with a more energy efficient cpu.
the best laptop on battery life is like 6 1/2 hrs on a DELL XPS 14. And that's on the light test! It's going to take some time yet to reach the promised land of true portability. http://www.cnet.com.au/laptops-with-long-battery-life-2012-339334029.htm You can get 11 hrs on an IPAD MIni. But you can't watch full streaming quotes on that all day.
Considering MS was aware of the limitations and built its product around the Intel processor, imho the fault lies solely with MS. I was waiting patiently for the Surface to be available, however, after handling a Surface RT, I was greatly disappointed. The weight of the keyboard compared to screen felt awkward and non intuitive. Considering the battery limitations and my personal dislike of Win8, my enthusiasm has waned greatly. I Will most likely stick with an ultra portable and secondary tablet. I have also been attempting to migrate away from Apple and have been focusing mainly on Google products. Either a Samsung Galaxy or Nexus 7+ I don't see the MS Surface mainstream, or overtaking Samsung, Lenovo or Nexus Tablets... It was a nice idea, [surface] just falls short of my expectations. Eventually MS will R.I.P.
Maybe i live in a shell, but is anyone selling the Surface? Cripes I think I have seen 1 ad on tv. I don't see them at Best Buy; yes, I still like to walk in a store and get a feel for things, or anywhere else. Not anything new, but Ballmer has to go, and that would be 5 years ago.
I can add also as much as I don't buy the APPL story, they are getting the majority of support. A friend who is flying has his I Pad and has spent roughly another $500-1000 and has what in the past cost arlines and corporate flight departments a minimum of $10000, and more likely closer to $ 100,000.
your answer should be like this: I don't want the TSA to steal my ipad after being pat down for carrying an ipad <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/mw4JmMyYNMA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Surface is turning out to be the next Zune. Over priced, shorter battery life, lower screen res, fewer apps compared to iPad. Why would anyone buy it over an ipad? Because it has good keyboard support? 10 inch screen is too small for serious work on any laptop. So why would anyone want to do serious work on 10 inch tablet+keyboard which is no better than a 10 inch laptop.
The main problem is the missing third Zune - the one I would have bought. * Atom based. That is "Runs real windows" and "long battery life". * Preferably with replaceable battery. * Preferable with 3g. * Like the Pro, with a Pen. Pretty much like the Latitude 10 (trying to get 2 - one for me, one for my administrative lady). Noone needs "power" but running arbitrary software is great. If they would have made this one, I would have taken them. Now I try to nail down when we can actually GET another one - the Atom Tablets are in constant delivery delay
I believe there are win8 tablets with atom cpu that are for sale right now, the 12" samsung 500t, and 10" thinkpad tablet 2, both come with a stylus/pen. 500t is on sale at staples, thinkpad tablet 2 is on sale at newegg. I don't know if either has replaceable battery or 3G.
No replacable battery and - the Thinkpad 2 is NOT on sald - it is - well - you an pay it, but they wont deliver another 2 weeks. The Samsung has no replacable battery and in general.... well, let's say I prefer the Dell. Plus it is hard to get anyway where I am. The whole Atom tablet situation SUCKS.