are all Surface books as unreliable as mine?

[Christopher Lindsay]

I just reset mine and applied the firmware update from yesterday and it seems to be working somewhat better so far.

 

[ctk4949]

I have 2 of the i7/16/512 and both are running well.

If yours is causing so much trouble why not exchange it for another one??

 

[Hardcore1973]

I have not had any issues since all the latest and greatest updates. I had one blue screen since getting my base model but it has not happened once.

 

[TwoZule]

I have the same configuration and this has been the worst customer experience I have ever had with a large corp!!!!

I have get about 5 hrs of battery life. Same problem with outlook just shuts down etc. as do chrome.
TrackPad issues - tap or double tap intermittently stops working.

I am trying so hard to keep this unit but dam, MS is just the worst!
It seems they have a new customer service setup for both Store and Support.
Level 1 reps that read from cards - Level 2 supervisor that can do nothing. Then dead end.
You cant move above that.
The rest of the company is isolated.

I was one of the ones they canceled my pre order because they charged my card early.
Made no less than 10 calls to the store. Each and every time I got a different story.
Finally gave up and was going to cancel the order. It showed up on my door the next morning.
Last I was told it would be here in a month.

Checked this site about battery issue. Recommended to update all drivers.
Went to support site and downloaded the mci file and it causes errors.
Called support - person reading from cards gets on my computer for an hour and half - no joy.
He gets disconnected and never calls back. So I call again. New person says no record of my 1st call and starts same reading off card.
Doing same thing as earlier. I stop and ask for supervisor. Supervisors answer is to reset whole computer back to start.
I told him that will not happen. I either get some decent tech support on this issue or the machine goes back.
The only level he can offer me it to take it to the local store where "they have a higher level of technical knowledge."
Really?? giggle

I can't believe MS released a product with this price tag that has this many issues and this high a failure rate.

Should I just give up and send the POS back or take a chance and take it to the store?

This is after I upgraded my old machine to 10 and it completely deleted my 30 something rules in outlook.
So I started from scratch. Not really feeling like I have any faith in MS to go through this again.
I have really been a MS fan up until this product!

Sorry for my long rant









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[EnemiesInTheEnd]

I don't think the Surface Book has a high failure rate. I think it just appears that way here.

 

[TwoZule]

I would have to respectfully disagree.
Normally you only hear from a very small fraction of users who have problems.

Between this and other forums and MS actually admitting to the many issues, one one could reasonably conclude that there is indeed a high failure rate. (personal experience aside)

 

[Christopher Lindsay]

I agree. No one should have to put up with this many problems. It's like it wasn't tested at all. So far after 2 hard resets (within 3 weeks of purchase) and a couple firmware updates my surface is running more stable. It's far from perfect but it's finally actually useable. Still got 3 BSOD yesterday just listening to music on YouTube, the screen randomly announces rotation is on, the screen randomly changes brightness even though auto brightness off, it still gets hot and the fans kick on when doing nothing (I've traced most of the issues with that down to Cortana running in the background) but it isn't completely broken like it was when I first started using it.

 

[lbp775]

Most if not all of these issues look to be driver, firmware or OS related. This is precisely the reason why I've decided to wait until they get all of the issues ironed out before I purchase.

 

[SurfTiger]

latest update fixed a lot of my issues

 

[Migi2015]

I don't think the Surface Book has a high failure rate. I think it just appears that way here.

If you just go in the Surface sub-reddit or here, you'd think SB is a total dud and failure. The proof will be in the revenue report that comes out in 3 weeks. MS will not break out SP/SB/S3 unit sales but give a total revenue number. At least that will give us an indication.

 

[Christopher Lindsay]

I'm still suffering from issue it seems. I'm curious as to why it's taking months to fix this product. Does Microsoft not realize how bad this is for PR?

 

[lewinr]

Just an update on my issues: much of my problem was connected to an issue in Outlook which caused it to crash constantly... as this issue appeared together with my new Surface Book, I assumed the problem was caused by the SB. In fact, I was able to solve the problem with Outlook and now it does not crash.

Other updates issued by MS via MS Update appear to have solved other issues with display drivers crashing.

That being said, I still have many small problems with the SB, for example the keyboard not working or the mouse-pointer disappearing when I re-connect the tablet to the base, the trackpad not being very reliable compared to my old Dell notebook, and many other minor issues. All of these nuisances just make using the SB a frustrating experience that is not consistent with the price tag. The product was obviously rushed to market to meet the Christmas season when it was (and still is) really not ready to compete with products from other vendors that have more hardware experience than MS.

 

[Dush Ku]

That's so weird. I've read about others having their keyboard cut out, but it's never happened to me.
Is there a fit issue on yours? Does the screen not match up completely flush with the keyboard when connected?

 

[lewinr]

So after the last updates things were looking more reliable. (Except for continuing problems with the Surface Dock.)
Until today. My SB froze and rebooted (even without a BSOD).
Now the IR camera looks dead. It wont let me login using "windows hello" and if I try to setup ("improve") windows Hello, it just says "turning on camera..." forever.

I guess now I'll really need to send my SB back for replacement.

I really want to avoid spending loads of time re-installing everything on a new unit... can anybody recommend a good solution for a full system backup/restore that will cover everything? Can I use the Windows "Create a system image" functionality to do it without any holes?

 

[littlebib]

So after the last updates things were looking more reliable. (Except for continuing problems with the Surface Dock.)
Until today. My SB froze and rebooted (even without a BSOD).
Now the IR camera looks dead. It wont let me login using "windows hello" and if I try to setup ("improve") windows Hello, it just says "turning on camera..." forever.

I guess now I'll really need to send my SB back for replacement.

I really want to avoid spending loads of time re-installing everything on a new unit... can anybody recommend a good solution for a full system backup/restore that will cover everything? Can I use the Windows "Create a system image" functionality to do it without any holes?

This happened to me one time. A restart fixed it. Not a shutdown, but just a restart.

 

[ytrewq]

As to the OP: No, many people are not having the kinds of problems you are having. Take it to an MS store and let them resolve it.

As for whether the SB has an unusually high level of problems: There's no way to draw conclusions from the number of complainers on an internet forum. The total number of people on all these forums (whether they have problems or not) is a miniscule percentage of the pool of Surface Book owners. And since it is not a representative sample, it means nothing.

Clearly, some people have problems, and MS needs to make it right. Many of the problems have been fixed by updates. I see no reason why that won't continue. If you have problems and either can't wait for fixes or don't trust MS to fix, then return it and wait and see if MS fixes before you buy again. If you're like many of us who are happy overall with the experience, then enjoy it.

 

[Dratwister]

My answer is No
After weeks of using and after trips with it, the surface book serves me perfectly well. I captured many photos and process it with the surface on the way without any error.
Now I have kinda perfect trip kit with me whenever I need.

 

[spasell]

Anyone that has no issues with their SB should consider themselves fortunate. Also, I'd be curious on something. Those that do NOT have issues, when did you purchase your device? Was it 1 month after the SB was released or did you get it on release day? Two weeks? 2 months?

I got mine online from MS store, and have already replaced it twice.

Reading the many many blogs and forums elsewhere, and given Microsoft addressing consumers directly on their own forum, they know this issue isn't small.

 

[lewinr]

I went to an MS store but of course I did not have any problems which I believe are HW issues for the 20 minutes we were there. I didnt feel like sitting there for 2 hours detaching and re-attaching my screen waiting for a real fault, so I gave up. I also didnt bring my Lync phone with me so I coudnt show them the problem with the dock... next time I'll need to bring it with me (it means taking it with me on the airplane...)

I had some other software related issues which I decided to let them work on and I saw how they did it... check if updates are installed, check google for advice and try what they found there (which I already did), and then propose a factory reset... no thank you.

 

[Dratwister]

Anyone that has no issues with their SB should consider themselves fortunate. Also, I'd be curious on something. Those that do NOT have issues, when did you purchase your device? Was it 1 month after the SB was released or did you get it on release day? Two weeks? 2 months?

I got mine online from MS store, and have already replaced it twice.

Reading the many many blogs and forums elsewhere, and given Microsoft addressing consumers directly on their own forum, they know this issue isn't small.

I asked my sister to order it online from Microsoft Store on beginning of December, they shipped it on middle of December. I had to wait till this January to have it on hand. Since I'm not living in US, so I depened all checkings to my sister, she is just an ordinary mother without much knowledge about gadgets, combine with all the rants on forums, I have to admit I's kinda afraid and prepared my mind of sending it back (even thought about asking my sister to send it back and get a XPS 15 instead)

But yeah I'm a fortunate one. I don't know if it has anything to do with my procedures before using the device or not. But since my sister helped me to check the device, she had to log in with her account. So when I get the surface, I had to do a clean install and wipe out all data, then wait till all of updates are applied.