Broadwell chips launching in Holiday 2014, will early adopters of SP3 be punished?

[jordanzhninja]

I've seen the awesomeness of Broadwell and I was wondering that early adopters may be punished by Microsoft refreshing the Surface Pro line to accomodate these new chips rather than Haswell, improving the battery life, weight and fan stuff.

I'm not sure if I should try to be an early adopter

 

[andrantos]

Don't early adopters always get punished?

 

[jordanzhninja]

Don't early adopters always get punished?

They sure did with Xbox One imo. Without Kinect it looks awesome

 

[Microsoftjunkie]

I doubt it, you can still benefit increased performance and battery life through updates, even though they will only go so far.

Ppl who will buy this is obviously satisfied with its power,battery, etc.

If ppl feel punished or get punished, those new chips should double everything. It's running an i3-i7 core processor. Anyone of those is more powerful than anything in any tablet. I'm definitely gonna buy the i3 for school and light development purposes.

I'm still amazed how thin it is with an i-core processor.

 

[Jas00555]

I can see it now....

"what?!?!?! I wanted 10 hours of battery life, not 9. That's it, I'm selling this and quitting Microsoft forever!"

 

[Reflexx]

Is it really "punished" if you willingly bought a device that you thought was worth the money you paid for it?

Tech moves fast.

Just because something nicer comes out later doesn't mean that the thing you bought is any less nice.

Imagine if you were teaching children about this. You gave them a game, and then a newer version of the game released 6 months later. When they complained, what would you tell them? Would you tell them that they got shafted or would you tell them that they had something nice and that they shouldn't be upset just because someone else has something nice that's newer?

 

[StevoPhilo]

How much of an improvement is Broadwell really going to be? I really want this SP3, but that was ONE of my hesitations.

 

[SeeVuPlay]

Do you feel this way about televisions as well?

 

[Zulfigar]

You can get stuck waiting for upgrades because the tech world is moving quickly to improve what is made. If people want to upgrade, or even buy a new unit, they can do so knowing that they have the latest and greatest out there, while saving up for whatever is next. If you're correct though about the Broadwell, then that might mean a new Surface Pro isn't going to be released for another year (why have 2 Pro's essentially running the same processor.) Let people upgrade now when they have everything saved up, the Pro 3 looks like a fantastic device, and let Microsoft, and any other tech giant, do what they do best, improve and add more features for the next round. Is it a handicap? Na. The Surface Pro 3 is still the best machine out there currently.

 

[blehblehbleh]

How much of an improvement is Broadwell really going to be? I really want this SP3, but that was ONE of my hesitations.

Depends on your needs ultimately, but for an machine application like this it could be 50/50. It's expected to provide around a 30% increase in performance regarding power consumption and it'll be paired with new 9 series chipsets which have already made their debut (kind of future proofing things down the road). Realistically 30% increase in power probably would amount to maybe an extra hour/hour and half or so of battery life? Depending on what you'll use a Surface Pro for that extra time is either negligible or could help in a pinch.

Ultimately you probably can't go wrong. By the time you upgrade to whatever next Surface there is Skylake and its related platforms will be out. Here's hoping for a Surface with a Thunderbolt port by that time.

 

[James8561]

punished for what?
Broadwell will have negligible performance difference compared to Haswell.
the wise waiters will only gain maybe 1 more hour of battery life?

 

[mparker]

It's expected to provide around a 30% increase in performance regarding power consumption and it'll be paired with new 9 series chipsets which have already made their debut (kind of future proofing things down the road).

We'll have to wait and see what the battery life of the Surface 3 is really like. If it's in the 9-10hr range, then I'm not sure what an additional 30% power improvement is really worth. Once the battery can get you through the entire day then it's going on the charger that night anyway, the extra battery life would only get you through your first meeting. I would expect most manufacturers to reduce the battery size to save weight while keeping that same 9-10hr battery life. This will shave valuable weight off the device but it's not going to save 30% of the machine's weight, maybe 10-15% instead.

Also I'm really skeptical about that 30% claim. Haswell was similarly hyped but resulted in more like 10-15% improvement IIRC (trying to find the anandtech review) - most of the rest of the improvements in battery life came by underclocking it (ex. Macbook Air) and motherboard improvements.

 

[Moiz Mian]

We'll have to wait and see what the battery life of the Surface 3 is really like. If it's in the 9-10hr range, then I'm not sure what an additional 30% power improvement is really worth. Once the battery can get you through the entire day then it's going on the charger that night anyway, the extra battery life would only get you through your first meeting. I would expect most manufacturers to reduce the battery size to save weight while keeping that same 9-10hr battery life. This will shave valuable weight off the device but it's not going to save 30% of the machine's weight, maybe 10-15% instead.

Also I'm really skeptical about that 30% claim. Haswell was similarly hyped but resulted in more like 10-15% improvement IIRC (trying to find the anandtech review) - most of the rest of the improvements in battery life came by underclocking it (ex. Macbook Air) and motherboard improvements.

I think Haswell was more like 50% improvement in battery life. i.e. Macbook Air 8 -> 12 hours. And Surface Pro 4.5 -> 7 hours. No one claimed that the performance of haswell was better. That wasn't the point of Haswell.(Except for GPU which was also about 50% better than ivybridge). I believe broadwell is the opposite. It will focus on performance this year, and battery life improvements will come next year.

 

[Great deal]

They sure did with Xbox One imo. Without Kinect it looks awesome

Not if you want the world to see you moonwalk and do the chicken dance

 

[Michael Alan Goff]

No, because they're likely throwing out a Surface Pro 4 next year.

 

[theefman]

I'm sceptical we will see Broadwell in an updated SP3 this year. They will be just about in the middle of rolling out the i7 and i3 then, seems the wrong time to do a refresh. In any case, early adopters of any new tech device have always run the risk of having their device outdated quickly but on the flip side they get to enjoy the cool devices sooner.

 

[mparker]

I think Haswell was more like 50% improvement in battery life. i.e. Macbook Air 8 -> 12 hours. And Surface Pro 4.5 -> 7 hours. No one claimed that the performance of haswell was better. That wasn't the point of Haswell.(Except for GPU which was also about 50% better than ivybridge). I believe broadwell is the opposite. It will focus on performance this year, and battery life improvements will come next year.

Haswell is both a bit faster and a bit better on battery. A large chunk of the battery gains that we are seeing with Haswell machines are because the OEM's are going with lower clock speeds to hit their battery goals (e.g. Macbook Air went from 1.8Ghz Ivy Bridge to 1.3 Ghz Haswell AnandTech | The 2013 MacBook Air Review (13-inch)), and some of it is coming from lower-power componentry on the motherboards, and some of it are improvements in the OS and device drivers. Which is why I think that waiting for Broadwell may not be such a good idea; there are so many ways of lowering power consumption that it's wrong to single out Broadwell as something worth waiting nearly a year for.

 

[James8561]

I'm personally waiting for Broadwell since i'll be spending a lot of money on Surface Pro 3 (I want the i7 version) and I'd rather buy it when it has the latest and greatest recently released. Haswell is old.

 

[anon(5383410)]

People were having the same conversation right before Haswell was released. They'll revisit it when ____well nears release.

 

[MCube74]

Here is a good article

Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 Could Age Quickly Due To Its Year-Old Processor - Forbes