Microsoft Surface Studio 2: Microsoft Surface Studio 2 Enhances An Unmatched All-In-One

Improvements made by Microsoft at its two years Surface Studio – an all-in-one desktop with a large touch screen that can be tilted down like a desk – provides essential upgrades to the components that make it operational in 2018. But, given the price of the system, Microsoft could have gone further with the changes, so that you would have less impression of sacrificing flexibility to get the unbeatable monitor.

Do not get me wrong: Surface Studio 2 is by far the best desk available today for people who spend most of their day drawing, drawing, painting, coloring or engaging in an intense activity related to pressure. Although it does not support the 8,192 pressure levels or optional styli optimized for tasks such as airbrushing – high-end Wacom devices such as Cintiq Pro 32 to do – its use is just as simple and better than an old ordinary computer.

You can also use a iPad Pro – if you do not need to physically connect devices or run applications with full operating system – or follow the traditional route with similar color accuracy iMac and less sophisticated Wacom external tablet.

The new Studio takes advantage of a processor of the seventh generation of Intel Core i7-7820HQ, a more powerful graphics card integrated with the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 and switches from hybrid SSD / HDD slow storage to SSD NVMe fast. The display is clearer, the electronics controlling the states of the pixels is smaller, allowing for increased light emission. Since it offers roughly the same level of black as before, it results in an increase in contrast.

Microsoft still offers the older sixth-generation Core i7 studio configuration, 32GB RAM, and a 2TB hybrid hard drive at $ 4,200, the price for the mid-level configuration of Studio 2. same price, you opt for a slower solution. system with more storage and a faster system with 1 TB less.

The basic configuration at $ 2,500 includes a 1TB SSD and 16GB of RAM, the average configuration of $ 4,200 is upgraded to 32GB of RAM, and the $ 4,800 model increases that of an SSD of 2 TB. In Australia, these amount to $ 5,500, $ 6,600 and $ 7,499. Although Surface Studio 2 was announced in the UK, Microsoft has not provided pricing or availability for the system, but if the price follows the original price, it should start at around £ 3,550.

When you choose a configuration, you have to consider an important factor: according to Microsoft, this is not scalable. "System performance has been qualified and optimized for optimal performance and stability, and we do not support any upgrades." We did not open it to see if the SSD was now soldered on the logic board with the CPU and RAM (as they were in the old model) or if Microsoft simply chooses not to not allow upgrades. Either way, it's an important factor.

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This is very important because adding storage with external drives is not an option as convenient as it should be for a system of its category: Microsoft has replaced the Mini DisplayPort connector with USB -C, but the new connection does not support Thunderbolt data 3. transfer rates or daisy chaining. You may need to use the 2 TB model if you anticipate a need for fast local storage.

Where you see and feel the changes

The large 28 "3: 2 widescreen display still delivers outstanding color accuracy from the very small sRGB range off the D65 P3. It is now brighter than ever, able to achieve the peak luminance of 600 nits tested, versus about 430 nits for the original model. As I had little time to test the system, I did not perform a full battery of display tests, but a few quick tests on color accuracy, brightness, contrast, gamma, white point, etc. (with the Calman 2018 Display Display Software Display, a

and many snacks) showed that it fit the old model with a reasonable degree.

This means more than 99% coverage of the D65 P3 (bright color profile), DCI-P3, and sRGB color gamut and an average color error of 1.7 Delta E (the white / gray errors were a bit more high, between 2 and 3 Delta E). I've tried the previous model again for comparison purposes and the tolerances seemed slightly stricter, but the panels came from two different manufacturers: the old model used Samsung, the new Sharp, source of any discrepancy. The changes made to increase the brightness may have introduced some variations. (Microsoft has not responded to my request for clarification regarding panel sourcing.)