Should I return my SP4?

[hajensen]

After having my SP3 for two years without any problem at all, my main reason to update to SP4 was only to continue my lovestory with the Surface Pro...
But after ordering and receiving the SP4 i7 256GB 16MG I have had continous problems, such as:
- Display driver crashing
- Battery drain
- Fan running too much
- Machine and fan does not stop when in sleep mode
- Touch-driver crashes
- PC freezes and has to be restarted through a hard reset..
- Blue screen (first time I have a good old blue-screen since Vista)
- Bleeding screen
- Update problem (I get update errors which cannot be fixed (support sent my SF4 drivers from juli 2015...)

The question is: Is this mainly driver errors and Win10 errors due to the fact that SP4 is a New machine With New Technology etc., or is my machine a "monday"-machine which should be replaced? Or should I go back to my SP3 and wait for the next SP5...

I am aware of the Skylake processor issue.

Hope to receive some experiences from you!

Kind regards, Henrik

 

[Cosmyc]

After having my SP3 for two years without any problem at all, my main reason to update to SP4 was only to continue my lovestory with the Surface Pro...
But after ordering and receiving the SP4 i7 256GB 16MG I have had continous problems, such as:
- Display driver crashing
- Battery drain
- Fan running too much
- Machine and fan does not stop when in sleep mode
- Touch-driver crashes
- PC freezes and has to be restarted through a hard reset..
- Blue screen (first time I have a good old blue-screen since Vista)
- Bleeding screen
- Update problem (I get update errors which cannot be fixed (support sent my SF4 drivers from juli 2015...)

The question is: Is this mainly driver errors and Win10 errors due to the fact that SP4 is a New machine With New Technology etc., or is my machine a "monday"-machine which should be replaced? Or should I go back to my SP3 and wait for the next SP5...

I am aware of the Skylake processor issue.

Hope to receive some experiences from you!

Kind regards, Henrik

It's due to early software and not faulty hardware, the same it's happening with Surface Book and Lumia 950/XL.

 

[Poirots Progeny]

It's a combination of hardware, software and drivers - there are issues and this has been widely reported. Of course, anecdotally, you have people saying they have one and it works fine. I purchased 15 for my hedge fund and ALL have gone back. The problems are they're and, personally, I don't have time to wait for people to pull their fingers out. We're fielding sp3s and, aside from screen bleed, everything is perfect. We're not using windows 10. Ultimately the choice is yours but I won't buy something and keep it if it isn't doing what I want. Good luck.

 

[zkyevolved]

It's a combination of hardware, software and drivers - there are issues and this has been widely reported. Of course, anecdotally, you have people saying they have one and it works fine. I purchased 15 for my hedge fund and ALL have gone back. The problems are they're and, personally, I don't have time to wait for people to pull their fingers out. We're fielding sp3s and, aside from screen bleed, everything is perfect. We're not using windows 10. Ultimately the choice is yours but I won't buy something and keep it if it isn't doing what I want. Good luck.

NEVER buy a device with FUTURE promise. If it isn't working for you NOW, return it. If it's working for you now, then keep it, it'll only get better. But you should never buy a device with the promise that it'll get better :-\... It probably will get better... but still, don't keep a device that doesn't work for you out of the box...

 

[hajensen]

What worries me the most is the daily freeze-restarts and the fact that the Device does not receive updates anymore, so that future fixes for driver HW etc. don't fix the problems...
Henrik

 

[yeewiz]

return it, you're having too many problems. my SP4 is completely stable compared to yours. I'll admit to having to re-connect my Wi-Fi just about every time I wake the SP4 from hibernate, but operationally, mine is stable.

 

[hajensen]

Thanks for Your input.

One question; could there be something special with the i7 16MB 256MB model? I see another thread here with the same issues and the same model... Is the processor so new that the highest performance CPUs are not stable yet? Should I change for the i5 and also save a lot of Money

Henrik

 

[yeewiz]

I forgot to mention, my SP4 is i5/8/256. I wouldn't expect the i7, in itself, to be as unstable as yours. I'm not specifically following i7 threads, but it doesn't appear to me that i7's are systemically bad. Personally, if I had the i7, and I needed i7 performance, I'd return it and get another i7. If the replacement is unstable too, then you'll have your answer

 

[Poirots Progeny]

I have many i7 skylake devices and they don't exhibit the issues the sp4 is exhibiting. Seems intermittent and device specific.

 

[zkyevolved]

I have many i7 skylake devices and they don't exhibit the issues the sp4 is exhibiting. Seems intermittent and device specific.

That's funny. I follow other forums and devices, and Dell and HP with Skylake CPUs have mostly the same issues as the SP4... Funny, huh?

 

[right_mr1]

I got the same model as the gentleman who created this thread. You may need a clean install of windows (read on here that an install from a USB flash drive might be preferred )

When I first bought mine in mid December it was like an oversized paperweight. It had a lot of issues with the screen going black and the device becoming unresponsive for example. This was partly during the first sets of windows updares I changed the power settings so the device isn't put in hibernate mode and also if the device doesn't wake up properly from sleep mode then windows + p fixes that issue.

I had one random day of blue screen issues on YouTube using edge browser one evening. The problem has never recurred since.

The battery life is pretty poor admittedly. Only got 4 hours on a full charge yesterday which is diabolical. Chrome and Firefox performance is poor.
The fan late at night can be a bit annoying but its far from loud.

But I'm weighing that up against the pros.
Super fast boot speeds
Incredible device performance
Never experienced a slow down
Phenomenal screen
Lovely type cover and very portable too
Super smooth and fast browsing on Microsoft edge - 100ms or less on sunspider and I have a super fast Internet connection at home so websites load in a second or less a lot of the time. Can easily play midrange games.

I've had to get over the poor battery life and crap chrome performance but it is a device that impresses me enough to definitely keep it. I'll just have to adapt by keeping it close to a power source most of the time that's all

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[decider]

I just purchased two more i5, 256. I have not had any issues so far. Battery life has been good for me. I get up to 6 hours. I will b receiving the two just purchased this Friday Jan 15.

 

[onysi]

Yes return your PS4 and get an Xbox one. Why is this even a hard decision.

 

[zkyevolved]

I just purchased two more i5, 256. I have not had any issues so far. Battery life has been good for me. I get up to 6 hours. I will b receiving the two just purchased this Friday Jan 15.

How many SP4s do you need!? Please tell me that they're not all for you!?! haha. 3 (at least from your description) SP4 for 1 person is a little overkill! haha.

 

[decider]

How many SP4s do you need!? Please tell me that they're not all for you!?! haha. 3 (at least from your description) SP4 for 1 person is a little overkill! haha.

Well one for my wife and the second for my sister. And yeah two would be two too may for just me. I came from a SP1 (i5, 256) and it still works great but the SP4 experience thus far being all good causes me to lay that one to the side. The screen is what catches my attention on the SP4. My SP1 will now probably become a paper weight, unless I can sell it, I am hoping for $300.

 

[zkyevolved]

Well one for my wife and the second for my sister. And yeah two would be two too may for just me. I came from a SP1 (i5, 256) and it still works great but the SP4 experience thus far being all good causes me to lay that one to the side. The screen is what catches my attention on the SP4. My SP1 will now probably become a paper weight, unless I can sell it, I am hoping for $300.

I gave it to my mom (surface pro 2) . It's still a solid performer. Hooked it up to a monitor and got her a hub for the usb devices. Done. New PC!

 

[Poirots Progeny]

That's funny. I follow other forums and devices, and Dell and HP with Skylake CPUs have mostly the same issues as the SP4... Funny, huh?

I disagree - admittedly windows 10 isn't stable, but our skylake xps 15s (10) and xps13s (5) all have fresh nvme pciessds with windows 8.1 Enterprise installed, so that's less of an issue.

The bios and driver set is more mature, we swap out the rubbish broadcom wireless chips for Intel and that sorts that out (wireless on the sp4 is an issue and it's all the fault of broadcom, though that actually varies by territory).

Re the cpu specifically, well the quad core parts are not an issue - not just in the 15s but we're using desktops as well. With the ultrabook u parts (dual core, 4x hyperthreading) again no issues re stability. Devices being unstable don't necessarily mean cpu issues. Again this is only my experience, but I've spoken with other hedge funds in our building and no one is complaining - and our machines are mission critical and generally are used hard - hence the expense. We also have business sla's though, for now, no issue.

That's just my experience, I'm aware people are having issues but I personally think it's a whole host of issues.

 

[anon(5327127)]

After having my SP3 for two years without any problem at all, my main reason to update to SP4 was only to continue my lovestory with the Surface Pro...
But after ordering and receiving the SP4 i7 256GB 16MG I have had continous problems, such as:
- Display driver crashing
- Battery drain
- Fan running too much
- Machine and fan does not stop when in sleep mode
- Touch-driver crashes
- PC freezes and has to be restarted through a hard reset..
- Blue screen (first time I have a good old blue-screen since Vista)
- Bleeding screen
- Update problem (I get update errors which cannot be fixed (support sent my SF4 drivers from juli 2015...)

The question is: Is this mainly driver errors and Win10 errors due to the fact that SP4 is a New machine With New Technology etc., or is my machine a "monday"-machine which should be replaced? Or should I go back to my SP3 and wait for the next SP5...

I am aware of the Skylake processor issue.

Hope to receive some experiences from you!

Kind regards, Henrik

Your posts seems like you've just collated the current issues together to write a slam post. Just return the device. Please be aware that new devices DO have issues... take the Apple iPad pro as that ALSO has issues.

 

[Grimmric]

I recommend that you try to do a full install of windows 10.
I had some problem, did a new install and now those problem are gone.
It will not help with al your problem i guess, but it is worth a try

 

[decider]

Well I will get my two new SP4 (256, 8) today, earlier delivery than expected. So far I cannot complain about my love and affinity for my new SP4s. With these two that will make three. The one I currently have an using I am getting at least six hours of battery, no BSODs, no video driver crashing at all. To be fair though my first SP4 did BSOD on initial startup but after all the setup and updates were done, no more problems. I am sure sometime in the future I will make windows mad and I will get a failure of sometime. However, I always look for predictability of what may be a real issue. Computers do fail on occasion and it should be expected.