Not going to lie, posts like these make me really want one for myself. I've toyed with using a tablet and keyboard combo and doing all my work as a networked thin-client but it is nowhere near the experience of working on a laptop.
Having a tablet form factor with the hardware to run everything locally and a physical keyboard is exactly what I am looking for. Sure there is the MacBook air which is an awesome device and has its advantages over the Surface 2, but to use it you need to be in a "deployed" state even if it is just on your lap. With a surface you can quickly check up on email or just relax and then deploy when necessary or convenient.
I think the only thing that still would bug me is the touchpad, I haven't used the new keyboard cover but I'm almost certain the touchpad experience is no where close to a MacBook, correct me if I'm wrong because I'd love to hear it. I feel carrying around a bluetooth/usb mouse with it everywhere is going to be required to get a comfortable production experience which would be a nuisance.
The touchpad is bad. On the Touch cover, it's that leather-like material that rubs up against the screen normally. On the Type cover, that part's fixed, but the whole thing is roughly the size of two US Quarters put together. The Surface really isn't big enough to have a properly-sized keyboard and touchpad attached.
If they hadn't wasted the top row of the keyboard on a bunch of charm buttons that absolutely aren't needed (they're all touch gestures you could do directly on the screen), and volume buttons (when the tablet has physical volume buttons inches away), they would've been able to almost double the surface area of the touchpad. I wish they had.
Its true that the touchpad on the touch cover isn't great, but on the other hand the _whole_device_ is a touchpad at the end of the day. For scrolling and zooming it quickly becomes very natural to touch the screen rather than the touchpad on the keybaord.
I agree, more space for the keyboard. Using a Trackpoint on a T400 was suboptimal, but very much improved from a standard windows touchpad and I would be happy settling with one on a Surface.
The touchpad is not just bad, it is unusable (I find). I'd rather slit my wrists than try... A laptop with a very poor keyboard and an unusably poor trackpad is not useful. I use mine only for OneNote with the stylus and have to keep carrying my Air for everything else.
Having a tablet form factor with the hardware to run everything locally and a physical keyboard is exactly what I am looking for. Sure there is the MacBook air which is an awesome device and has its advantages over the Surface 2, but to use it you need to be in a "deployed" state even if it is just on your lap. With a surface you can quickly check up on email or just relax and then deploy when necessary or convenient.
I think the only thing that still would bug me is the touchpad, I haven't used the new keyboard cover but I'm almost certain the touchpad experience is no where close to a MacBook, correct me if I'm wrong because I'd love to hear it. I feel carrying around a bluetooth/usb mouse with it everywhere is going to be required to get a comfortable production experience which would be a nuisance.