The Microsoft Surface Tablet Computer Science Essay

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Kendal Williams

The report will be about the Microsoft Surface tablet, and how it stacks up to the other top tablets on the market. I also will be looking at it specs, software, apps, and some of the hardware that is either on the market or will soon be on the market for the Surface.

The report I am doing is about Microsoft’s new tablet the Surface RT. In the report I will be going through the pros and con of using the Surface RT, I also will be comparing the Microsoft Surface RT to the other top tablets on the market, to be more specific I will compare it to what many people think is the best on tablet the market the iPad. I will give you a look at what the tablet offers as far as apps. I will tell you how the software is compared to the other tablets out. I will also look at what the people who were the first to inspect the Surface. First off I should say the Windows 8 that the laptops are running and the Windows RT (Runtime) that the Surface tablets will not be the same. The newer laptops will have full fledge version of the new Windows 8 operating system, while the Surface tablets will be running what looks to be a full version but is really a less productive operating system.. The main difference between the two is that Windows RT only runs on ARM-powered devices, while Windows 8 only runs on x86 devices. An additional difference between the 2 which is a positive for Windows RT is it comes with office preinstalled Windows 8 does not, although Windows 8 is compatible with previous windows programs and Windows RT is not.is preinstalled on the Surface RT will only run on x86 devices, powered by Intel or AMD chips and its battery will from 6 hours up to 8 hours. Windows RT will only run on ARM-powered devices, whose chips offer better battery life and lower prices, the battery could possibly have an all-day battery life (or 8-13 hours). Windows 8 has a full featured start screen and desktop mode, the RT has what looks like this but is not able to run third party programs. For the people looking for full featured use they should go with Windows 8, but if you want the basic needs like office Surface RT would work perfectly fine for you. Now I will go into what people thought were the goods about Surface tablet RT. The first that caught their eye was the way the Surface felt in hand, the way edges angle outwards from the back and the matte finish makes for a good feel. Microsoft made a casing out of a magnesium alloy, called VaporMg, it is more durable and scratch resistant than aluminum. The Surface RT also has a kickstand built on the back of it (pops out a 22 degree angle) which caught the guy’s eye also. The kickstand allows the Surface RT to stand up on just about any flat surface, a desk or table, the tablet also has a built in keyboard cover to go along with the kickstand. The Surfaces’ keyboard was big hit for some people, it pretty much is the same idea as the iPads keyboard in that it magnetically hinged to the tablet, the difference is that the Surface RT’s keyboards has key shapes on the inside, and a trackpad formed from slightly raised fuzzy material. Continuing with some more positives about the Surface RT is that it has the ports and jacks that I think the iPad needs at the prices their being sold at, a memory-card slot allowing for storage expansion, a video output jack and a full USB 2.0 jack, the reason I really do not want to spend that kind of money on one. Like the iPad the Surface RT also has two cameras one front facing and the other facing the rear. A few bad things about handling of the Surface RT is that it would a little awkward to handle with one hand being that its 16x9, making it a lot wider than it is tall, because of this using the on-screen keyboard can be a bit difficult. "Without a Touch Cover, the Surface RT feels incomplete in design and function. The problem here is that the Surface is basically a big laptop screen without the keyboard." From Don’t Call The New Microsoft Surface RT A Tablet, This Is A PC (Burns, 2012) with the touch screen locked on the Surface tablet it is 10 inches deep, making it larger than ultrabooks that more capable. Compared to full laptops this is very large, 10 inches deep is the same depth as a 15 inch MacBook Pro, the iPad only 7-inches deep with the Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard connected to it. People who use tablets while traveling will have a hard time because Surface with a Touch Cover barely fits on most airplane seat-back trays and are a no go on trays that pull out from an armrest because of its size. In addition to those flaws, the apps on the Surface RT are well below the other top tablets on the market. Surface RT can’t run any of the four million programs Windows regularly offers. Furthermore the Surface RT app store does not have half as many apps as the iPads app store (275,000), Surface RT only has as of now 3,500 apps in the United States, and many of the apps it does have are bare-bones or junky. Many of the more popular apps used on other tablets are not available on the Surface RT like Facebook, Instagram, Spotify, or Angry Birds. As a result of the Surface RT short supply of apps you want be able to download any other web browser other than Windows Explorer, which comes preinstalled, browsers like Google Chrome, Safari, and Mozilla Firefox are not available the Surface RTs app store, this is because Surface RT requires apps be coded for ARM processors rather than x86/x64 chips that have powered Windows computers since Windows 3.1. Internet Explorer runs very slowly on the tablet, seeing that it runs a very limited version of Windows 8. Also the Surface RT is strictly a Wi-Fi operated tablet because there are no options for 3G or 4G wireless connectivity. My final downside for using Surface RT is for the people who plan on using Surface RT on a business network; this would be a negative because the Surface RT at this time does not support Active Directory. In the next couple of sentences I will look at the Surface RT as a whole compared some of its main competitor the iPad. In terms of pricing I would say that the Surface RT is the winner hear, the price of the Surface RT with a touch cover is $399, the price with a cover is the same as 64GB iPad. When it comes to the screens the screen of the Surface RT is nearly an inch bigger at 10.6 inches (diagonally) than the iPad 4s screen is at 9.7 inches. However the Surface RT tablet may have a larger size screen than the iPad 4, its screen resolution is much lower than that of its main competitor. Following this further the iPad 4 convincingly wins in the area of screen resolution against the Surface, the Surface's 148ppi ClearType HD screen (resolution of 1366 x 768) is very good screen and will be more than effective at normal viewing distances and your everyday tablet uses, but compared to the iPad 4s Retina Display with 264ppi (screen resolution of 2048x1536) it is pretty out of its league. Now I will compare the processors of the Surface RTs tablets to that of the iPad 4 the newest release of the iPad from Apple Corp. The processor of the iPad 4 is very powerful, features an upgraded A6X chip that set a new tablet record of 1769 using Geekbench 2 (the iPad 3 only did 750). The processor of the Surface tablets aren’t bad (they have a quad-core 1.3GHz NVIDIA Tegra 3, with 2 GB of RAM), its performance; animations are smooth and it handle some of the more demanding tasks like pinch zooming in Internet Explorer and Bing Maps very well, but it does have its delays here and there, notably when trying to open some of its apps. Now, I will be comparing the tablets camera telling which is better. Both tablets have pretty good cameras on them but the iPad 4 and any of the other generations of the iPad would have an edge over the Surface RT tablet because of the superior rear facing camera. Both the iPad 4 and the Surface RT tablet have great front face cameras with each having 720p video recording with their front cameras. As I stated previously the iPad 4 separate’s its self from the Surface RT with its superior rear facing camera, the iPad 4 has a 1080p HD rear-facing camera, while the Surface RT tablet rear facing camera is the same as its front facing camera at 720p. Next I will be comparing the tablets connectivity. This is one of the main downsides all of the generations of the iPad, the iPad is missing a full size USB. Apple has been reluctant to add a full size USB for some time, when Apple finally decided to go away from its standard 30-pin connectors with the Apple Lighting connector people were upset, but not because the connector was/is a bad, but for one it was not a full sized USB, and two because people with previous Apple cables and/or docks equipment was now redundant unless they were to buy an adapter that costs $40. In turn Surface RT tablets have all the physical connections that iPad users wishes the iPad would have, Surface RT tablets offers full-size USB connectivity, a microSD card slot and a HD video out port. In terms of physical connections Surface RT tablets clearly take the cake over the iPad 4. The Surface RT tablets may have the advantage in the physical connections department, but when it comes to acquiring a wireless connection the iPad 4 is the clear winner. Although Both tablets offer pretty standard Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.0 technology, the iPad 4 offers 3G and 4G connectivity something the Surface RT tablets do not offer. Next I will be comparing the software of the two tablets. As I stated previously in my report the Surface RT is not close to the iPad when it comes to apps, also stated previously the Surface RT only has as of now 3,500 apps in the United States, many of which are buggy. Although the Surface RT does not have the apps compared to the iPad it does have a version of Windows 8 that is capable of getting work done with. Another thing is the Surface RT comes with some security features that the iPad does not, they include hardware-based secure boot that checks that the system hasn't been tampered with, and trusted boot that fires up anti-malware before anything else (this security module can act as a smartcard for authentication), the Surface RT also has full disk encryption, the iPad has disk encryption but lacks the secure boot features the Surface RT has. Finally the last things I will be comparing between these tablets are their battery. The battery life for iPad is good definitely more reliable than the Surface RTs battery with 10 hours of guaranteed life before it goes out on you. On the other hand the Surface RT is advertised as stated before a battery that could last all-day/24 hours or 8-13 hours. These are some of the main differences between these two tablets, the two that many of the experts consider the two top notch tablets on the market.

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