In each of the past three years, Microsoft has made the same bold claim: The Surface is the perfect replacement for your laptop and your tablet, a dreamy all-in-one miracle device.
But I've never agreed with Microsoft. Even though the Surface technically had a lot of laptop and tablet features, it didn't execute them particularly well. The track pad and keyboard felt cheap and unresponsive. There weren't great apps to use in tablet mode. And Windows 8 was a disaster.
The Surface always fell short of Microsoft's promises.
Until now.
On Tuesday, Microsoft unveiled the Surface Book, a laptop with a clever hinge that lets you detach the screen from the keyboard and use it as a tablet. This is the kind of computer I've been waiting for, something that can do it all without compromising design or usability.
It's light and powerful, has incredible battery life, and looks good to boot. I spent about 15 minutes playing around with a Surface Book after Microsoft's event in New York on Tuesday, and I can tell the company is on to something. This is the device Microsoft should have originally launched when it began making the Surface three years ago.
It's also a blow to Apple, which recently unveiled its own take on a Surface-like device with the iPad Pro. I used the iPad Pro briefly at Apple's launch event a few weeks ago, and I wasn't exactly blown away. It feels like a niche product whose appeal will mainly be to people like graphics artists. The keyboard cover wasn't that great either. It felt cheaply made and was difficult to type on, as with the original Surface.
The Surface Book feels much more refined. Though it's technically a laptop-tablet hybrid, it's the first in the category that doesn't feel like one. It's a laptop when you need it, or a big-screen tablet when you need it. There aren't any obvious compromises as there are with other Surfaces.
(By the way, Microsoft did announce another new Surface, the Surface Pro 4, which looks like an updated version of what we've seen before. I'm not into it.)
To be clear, these are only first impressions. Microsoft made some bold claims Tuesday, saying the Surface Book was 50% more powerful than the MacBook Pro. We'll have to wait and see about that.
But based on what I've seen so far, I think Microsoft has a potential hit coming soon.
