Microsoft is Building a New Midrange Surface Clamshell PC With a 12.5-inch Display (windowscentral.com) 32
An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft has seen success with its budget friendly Surface Go tablet thanks to its $399 starting price, and it appears the company is hoping to further capitalize on that success with another price conscious Surface PC, this time in the form of a laptop. Codenamed Sparti, I'm told that Microsoft is working on a lightweight midrange clamshell PC designed with students in mind. According to my sources, Sparti has a 12.5-inch display with a 10th-generation Intel Core i5 processor, 4GB RAM, and 64GB storage in the entry-level model. It'll ship with Windows 10 in S mode and be priced somewhere between $500 and $600. I'm told that Sparti is being positioned as a more affordable Surface Laptop, similar to how Microsoft positions the Surface Go alongside the Surface Pro today.
Because the HP Stream was a resounding success? (Score:5, Insightful)
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I used to recommend Lenovo Thinkpads based on similar reasoning. I no longer do so to non-techie people. Sometimes they had flaky wifi, on one of them the screen packed in, on another the keyboard gave out, on another the webcam only worked intermittently. Now if you're happy sourcing spares on eBay and fitting them yourself, you can get great value from a refurb pro laptop. If you're not, however, refurbs can be more trouble than they're worth. I guess there's a reason they get dumped on eBay once they tur
Re: Because the HP Stream was a resounding success (Score:1)
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Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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No tablets or netbooks?
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'In the USofA, the word 'laptop' is also slang for a stripper/hooker.'
"I've never heard that, "
What do the whores on your lap call themselves then?
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"It's a laptop, a notebook or convertible."
A clamshell projects an odor to the mind, a bit fishy for my taste.
Re: Why call it a clamshell (Score:2)
I'd love a fried clam po'boy.
I always thought the original iBook was the only real "clamshell" in appearance, even though it lookes a bit like a toilet seat.
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It's a laptop, a notebook or convertible.
Remember the old colorful Ibook G3 laptops? They were described as clamshell because they were actually shaped like a clamshell [i.redd.it].
Unless this Surface is going to be like that, then I have no idea why the writer would describe it this way.
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4GB RAM? (Score:2, Insightful)
It's a dud. For around $500 you can get an Acer Aspire 5 with 8GB RAM, a better GPU, and a full fledged OS.
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I'd never buy Microsoft but I'd never buy Acer either. Acer keep costs low by compromising on build quality. All their stuff fails after a year or two. Acer are the Ikea of computing, only worse.
Buy a solidly built thing and it will last far longer and cause far less frustration.
Clamshell PC? (Score:3)
Does it comes from the ocean? Does it come with an oyster? What makes it different from a laptop? Did the marketing department bluescreen midway through describing this thing and everyone just forgot the names of things?
teeny tiny screens (Score:2)
hope the tech arrives for cheap screens of 17 inch or bigger. 10 inch is for young people
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I'm taking classes. You do know colleges saw record summer enrollments due to covid?
Still Copying Apple (Score:2, Troll)
Apple has a rumor it is bringing-out a 12" laptop, and a week later, here comes Microsoft with a 12.5" laptop!
But MS' is going to have crippled Windows 10 S; while, if true, the Apple 12" MacBook would have a full version of Big Sur (albeit Arm).
Too bad the MS version is likely to have 1/2 the battery life, and worse performance. ...and Windows 10 S.
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Windows 10 with a pen is actually rather good. I bought an old Toshiba Toughbook the other day, put Windows 10 on it and it's my new favorite laptop. You can't do that in Apple land, you have to take whatever Apple is spoonfeeding you this week, keyboards and all.
If Apple can switch to ARM so easily it just proves that nobody does any real work on Apples.
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Windows 10, underneath , is actually turning out to be a good OS. I'm still on Windows 7 for my desktop but after using it on the laptop for a few weeks I'm finding some stuff I like.
Yes, there's all the Cortana/Bing crap layer on top of the goodness, but:
a) It looks like Windows will become free (as in beer), so long as you accept the crud.
b) You can block bing.com in your hosts file (at the time of writing...)
The crud is no worse than selling your soul to apple of google, so... whatever.
c) The point I wa
Clamshell with 12,5" display (Score:2)
Re: Clamshell with 12,5" display (Score:2)
It's a netbook, but that's a dirty word.
S Mode (Score:2)
In other words, can only run the very few applications that are on the Windows Store.