I have a surface pro 2 and an ipad air. The ipad is better for connecting to Bluetooth headphones without a fuss, reading comics, and having more tablet apps. The surface is much better at productive work, browsing, multitasking, and being a real computer (with mouse and windows applications) when you want one. If I had to choose one, I'd pick the surface for sure. For coding you'd want a surface with eclipse or visual studio, not some ipad app, right?