Do you program with the Surface Pro?

[contributorM]

Going to purchase a laptop that's dedicated to web surfing and development. Do any of you own a Surface Pro and program with that? If so, are there any pros/cons you've found whilst using that? Would a laptop just be better in the long run?

 

[xboxonthego3]

Hmmm... well I can't quite answer your question. But I programmed on my Samsung Smart Ativ Tablet 500t. It has an atom I used it for a C# programming class. So I was doing simple stuff. One thing I found myself using a lot though was a Bluetooth mouse. The stylus is useful. But it is still difficult to beat the speed and accuracy of a mouse in my opinion. I would imagine the i5 in the surface pro would be able to handle some development. My brother has one but he doesn't program. Sorry I couldn't completely answer your question!

 

[berty6294]

Hmmm... well I can't quite answer your question. But I programmed on my Samsung Smart Ativ Tablet 500t. It has an atom I used it for a C# programming class. So I was doing simple stuff. One thing I found myself using a lot though was a Bluetooth mouse. The stylus is useful. But it is still difficult to beat the speed and accuracy of a mouse in my opinion. I would imagine the i5 in the surface pro would be able to handle some development. My brother has one but he doesn't program. Sorry I couldn't completely answer your question!

Power wise, it'll be just fine! It's an ultrabook, it basically is a laptop.

Now as far as size, I have a Surface RT and I actually use that to program at school through TeamViewer. It's not the best thing in the world but it works very well. If you do plan on doing a lot of programming, I'd suggest hooking up to an external monitor and using a mouse! (Type cover does just fine for typing by the trackpad is a bit goofy)

 

[contributorM]

Thanks so far. It's either the Surface Pro or the Yoga Pad.

Decisions, decisions.

 

[ag1986]

Personally, I feel that a proper laptop (a Macbook Air in my case) is far far superior for coding than any tablet solution (however hybrids like the Yoga are an exception).

Both the Type and Touch covers are inferior to a real keyboard if you plan to do anything more than bang out fifty lines or so. Considering that the Surface is not significantly superior in any parameter (battery life, cost, computing power, portability) to an Ultrabook, I cannot justify using one for coding.

 

[contributorM]

Personally, I feel that a proper laptop (a Macbook Air in my case) is far far superior for coding than any tablet solution (however hybrids like the Yoga are an exception).

Both the Type and Touch covers are inferior to a real keyboard if you plan to do anything more than bang out fifty lines or so. Considering that the Surface is not significantly superior in any parameter (battery life, cost, computing power, portability) to an Ultrabook, I cannot justify using one for coding.

This does make a lot of sense. But coding, Netflix, blogging is all that would be done. Still soo many options lol.

 

[danialgoodwin]

I know three people who use the Surface Pro as their primary development device. It works. They use the type cover (definitely don't choose the touch cover!) and a mouse when they have the space.

Some considerations to keep in mind if you choose the Surface Pro or another small screen device.

• The text will be tiny
• You won't be able to see much code at once. So, develop good coding practices and you'll be fine

And, that's about it for the cons. If you get comfortable using Alt+Tab (and other keyboard shortcuts) to switch between windows, then you are set with any laptop.

But, on a personal note, I prefer large screens (currently 16" laptop) and cheaper devices to code on. It is helpful for me to see more at once and especially when designing graphics.