By Stephen Pate – Microsoft’s almost simultaneous release of the Surface Studio with the Surface Dial accessory makes Apple’s new MacBook Pro look like ancient technology. Windows 10 Creators Update and the Surface Studio with the Surface Dial is an aspirational product that has no competitors in the market.
Apple added a larger Force Touch pad and Touch Bar just above the keyboard. That’s simply a tiny improvement lost in the dust to Microsoft’s new Surface Dial accessory that creates a live work surface with Windows 10 Creators Update and all its new features.
Artists, architects, engineers and anyone who draws will love having one creative and powerful work surface not the current model of three different surfaces – keyboard, WACOM tablet and screen. The 28″ screen of the Surface Studio is all those work surfaces in one.
People who aren’t professional artists will want the $2,999 Surface Studio f they have any creative desires. I felt that immediately and wanted to discover how the Surface Dial would work with music recording and editing.
Apple is offering a tiny strip of programmable touch keys above the keyboard. That’s a nice improvement but not revolutionary.
Microsoft Windows 10 Creators Update, coming early 2017, goes every further. You can draw, paint, design in 3D and move those creations to a 3D world – a printer, HoloLens or Virtual Reality. All Windows 10 users get the Creators Update free.
Here’s a brief summary of how it works from CNET.
Watch the TechRADAR video of the new MacBook Pro. There are tiny incremental improvements but nothing that changes the way you work. The MacBook Pro’s only advantage is portability but Microsoft offers that with the Surface Book or Surface Pro 4 which will also support the Surface Dial, 3D graphics and a single work surface.
Surface Studio is available from the Microsoft Store on a pre-order basis for delivery in mid-December 2016. For a limited time until December 1, 2016 , a free Surface Dial (regularly $99) will ship with the Surface Studio
.
The 13″ MacBook Pro without Touch Bar ships today and the 13″ and 15″ MacBook Pro’s with Touch Bar are available for pre-order shipping in 2-3 weeks. International deliveries may differ.
For more features of the Surface Studio
and Windows 10 Creators Update, check out this video.
For more details see TechRadar’s coverage of the Microsoft Surface Studio and Apple MacBook Pro.
Correction – the story originally misnamed the Dial as the Surface Wheel.
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