Review: New Surface All-In-One Leaks As Microsoft Challenges Apple

This week has seen chatter of a new Surface device to come from Microsoft. The Surface All-In-One PC. Some believe this could be targeted at the living room and be a commercial version of PixelSense (such as Windows Central’s Daniel Rubino), others believe it’s going to be a more traditional computer (Aaron Lee and Steve Shen at Digitimes). My money would be on a new best-in-class desktop machine.

Why would Microsoft bring out another slice of hardware that competes with its manufacturing partners?

Microsoft Surface Book (image: Microsoft PR)

To answer that question, it’s probably better to think about Microsoft’s well-known products. They remain software based – Windows 10 and Office 365 being the two that people will immediately latch on to. Software requires hardware to run on, and Microsoft wants to have the best possible hardware to demonstrate its prowess with 1s and 0s.

Surface is the ‘dream machine’ brand of Microsoft. The current Surface devices are arguably the best implementation of Microsoft’s vision in mobile computing. Other manufacturers have excellent devices in these spaces, and also work in other spaces – there’s no Surface PC gaming device – and there is more than enough flexibility in the Windows 10 platform to allow for innovation and specialisation by manufacturers. The competition created by Surface is more a case of ‘you can do something more futuristic’ than ‘we can sell more units than you can’.

The Surface range also acts as a magnet – it gives consumers something tangible to focus their desires on. As a piece of software, Windows 10 is a touch ephemeral. The focus on cloud-based services is even harder to create an emotional connection over. That’s one of the biggest advantages that Surface offers Microsoft – it is a tangible expression of the full portfolio from the Company.

It also draws more direct comparisons with Apple. The Surface and Surface Pro devices compare favourably with the iPad and iPad Pro tablets, and the Surface Book will happily duke it out with the MacBook Pro.