Microsoft Surface vs iPad Pro?

[//ARCANUM]

my wife is looking at getting an iPad Pro 11" + keyboard + pencil for her work (production design in film), but it's quite pricey and I've noticed the surface pro 6 is on a pretty decent discount right now:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/surface-pro-6-type-cover/8vvgcgkpsws0

My question is how does it compare with the new iPad Pro in terms of power and functionality? We've been strictly iPad in the past so I'm not sure how powerful this is / what all it can pull off. Like, can she run photoshop on it? How much can it handle?

Appreciate any advice / tips. Thanks!

 

[Apath]

.

 

[Deleted member 4783]

The Surface Pro is an amazing productivity machine. The main advantage it has over iOS is its file management (because it's a full fledged desktop OS), ports, and others advantages that come with, again, a full fledged desktop OS.
The iPad Pro is a really nice machine capable of a lot on things. It'll soon have a full fledged Photoshop and I bet more full fledged apps will come.
But its main disadvantage is its port selection, its crappy file browser/manager and just 2 window multitask.

 

[//ARCANUM]

The Surface Pro is a laptop with the form factor of a tablet. The iPad Pro is an exceptionally powerful tablet, but a tablet none the less.

Power wise, I'd imagine the iPad Pro is technically more powerful but much more limited by iOS. I would look up what apps are available on iOS and determine if that covers all use cases for your wife. Also keep in mind that the iPad Pro does not have a true file system and cannot use external drives, save for an SD card to import pictures.

Click to shrink...

We're already pretty fluent in what the iPad can/can't do (and my wife is impressed by the new version of photoshop coming to iPad in 2019). Mainly just curious if she loads up creative cloud / photoshop on the surface - is it going to be usable? Or will it chug like if she were to try and run it on a netbook?

Thanks for the reply btw :)

Oh! And also - how is the pen for the surface versus the pencil on the iPad? She uses that a lot.

 

[Apath]

.

 

[Deleted member 7082]

Photoshop isn't coming to iOS until next year, but CSP is out now. It can handle fully featured apps, it's just a matter of developers going ahead and making them.

I enjoy drawing with a stylus more on the iPad Pro than I did on a Surface, but neither one is quite on the level of Wacom.

I also found the Surface Pro's screen more cramped in that there's not a lot of vertical room to draw when using it. The 12.9" IPP was a lot better in that regard.

 

[Deleted member 4783]

We're already pretty fluent in what the iPad can/can't do (and my wife is impressed by the new version of photoshop coming to iPad in 2019). Mainly just curious if she loads up creative cloud / photoshop on the surface - is it going to be usable? Or will it chug like if she were to try and run it on a netbook?

Thanks for the reply btw :)

Click to shrink...

The Pro doesn't have netbook specs... It has a quad core with HT in its base configuration, double the ram of the iPad pro (base model).

 

[Halo 2]

the ipad is way cooler but it seriously needs a desktop

 

[see5harp]

They aren't even comparable devices IMO. Surface Pro isn't really a great tablet device but I rarely ever need or want a tablet anymore.

 

[PeakPointMatrix]

Review what specific things your wife needs to do and investigate if it is possible to do them on an iPad. The other thing to be comfortable with is saving directly to cloud systems. I personally don't have issue with this, since having my work backed up on the cloud is essential, but I know others would rather save directly to the HD. iPad is set to recieve full Photoshop this year, however the date is unknown.

The surface is a full-fledged computer, so you know what you're getting there. I own some windows-touch computers and can't stand their touch interface however.

So basically Surface: better (but weaker) computer, iPad: better (limited but powerful) portable.

 

[Tetrinski]

My wife uses the surface for work (comic artist), including Photoshop, and she loves it. I'd pay more for the Surface than for the iPad, but if the iPad happens to be the more expensive one, then there's no doubt. The iPad is a much more limited device, you can do less things, and you do them worse.

 

[//ARCANUM]

Technically you get get 4 apps in multi-tasking by also using the hover multitasking (not sure what the actual name is) and having a video thumbnail playing in the corner. But yeah, only two can split the screen at a time.

The Surface Pen is much worse than the Apple Pencil from my experience. The Surface Pro 1 & 2 had a comparable stylus with the Wacom stylus, however since the Surface twitched to N-trig, I started experiences jitters and inaccuracies in my writing. On the other hand, the Apple Pencil has worked flawlessly for me.

Click to shrink...

Ah that's a bummer.

The Pro doesn't have netbook specs... It has a quad core with HT in its base configuration, double the ram of the iPad pro (base model).

Click to shrink...

Okay good to know! I'm gonna have to talk this out with her lol. iPad Pro just so damn expensive.

 

[Yerffej]

Any Surface pen I've tried in PS feels a good bit worse (lag) compared to my Apple Pencil and I'm still running my 2015 iPad pro.

 

[Enzom21]

I say wait until you know what iOS 13 will look like. The one thing holding the iPad back is the OS. If Apple finally decides to branch off from iOS with the iPad and make a tabletOS that's a hybrid of macOS/iOS then it will be worth it.

 

[marrec]

New iPad Pro is a better overall device but isn't an actual laptop so it depends on what she expects out of it.

It sounds like she'd get more use out of the iPad tbh

iOS12 already added a lot of functionality to the iPad and with the addition of full featured Photoshop in 2019 it's getting closer and closer to a proper laptop style device.

 

[StudioTan]

For actual work the Surface is the better choice IMO. It's a full computer so everything will run on it. I use my SP4 with Photoshop all the time and the newest version has smoothing for brush strokes built in which eliminates any jitter issues.

At the worst you could get it from somewhere with a good return policy if she doesn't like it.

 

[Deleted member 4783]

I say wait until you know what iOS 13 will look like. The one thing holding the iPad back is the OS. If Apple finally decides to branch off from iOS with the iPad and make a tabletOS that's a hybrid of macOS/iOS then it will be worth it.

Click to shrink...

that and ram amount. Bigger apps will requiere MORE ram, and no amount of "optimization" will help there.

 

[//ARCANUM]

I say wait until you know what iOS 13 will look like. The one thing holding the iPad back is the OS. If Apple finally decides to branch off from iOS with the iPad and make a tabletOS that's a hybrid of macOS/iOS then it will be worth it.

Click to shrink...

She needs this soon (gonna be a xmas gift), so we can't wait for iOS 13 unfortunately (which will probably be fall 2019).

Lots of split opinions in here! :) I appreciate all the feedback. We'll probably head to a microsoft store near us to try it out.

 

[Deleted member 4783]

She needs this soon (gonna be a xmas gift), so we can't wait for iOS 13 unfortunately (which will probably be fall 2019).

Lots of split opinions in here! :) I appreciate all the feedback. We'll probably head to a microsoft store near us to try it out.

Click to shrink...

that's the best you can do, actually. Hope you get what's best for your wife.

 

[Owarifin]

Go with a Surface Book 2 with that 1060 GPU.

 

[see5harp]

What about using iOS even remotely feels like it's getting closer to using a full featured OS? It's like the people using these things don't actually use a computer at work.

 

[pepe_silvia]

She needs this soon (gonna be a xmas gift), so we can't wait for iOS 13 unfortunately (which will probably be fall 2019).

Lots of split opinions in here! :) I appreciate all the feedback. We'll probably head to a microsoft store near us to try it out.

Click to shrink...

Curious if you've chosen a device yet?

 

[Pikelet]

What about using iOS even remotely feels like it's getting closer to using a full featured OS? It's like the people using these things don't actually use a computer at work.

Click to shrink...

It's unquestionable that iOS is getting closer to a full-featured OS over the past few years.

- Addition of a Smart keyboard
- Inbuilt Files app to manage files on the cloud
- More productivity-based apps being released such as CSP, and a full version of Photoshop coming out next year.

I work on a windows PC all day, have a gaming PC that I built at home, and I also own a few iPad iterations. I am increasingly finding that my iPad pro can do the jobs that previously required a PC, which is good because I find the iPad to be a nice device to use.

 

[//ARCANUM]

Curious if you've chosen a device yet?

Click to shrink...

Yeah! We got her a surface pro 6 with keyboard cover, pen, and an arc mouse all for about $1000 on Black Friday discount. She's very happy and loves it. I appreciate all the feedback in this thread!

(We ended up going to Microsoft store and apple store and she played with both and decided she liked the surface more.)

 

[pepe_silvia]

Yeah! We got her a surface pro 6 with keyboard cover, pen, and an arc mouse all for about $1000 on Black Friday discount. She's very happy and loves it. I appreciate all the feedback in this thread!

(We ended up going to Microsoft store and apple store and she played with both and decided she liked the surface more.)

Click to shrink...

Awesome to hear. Was curious how someone with her use case thought the two compared. Cool to see Microsoft making innovative hardware.

 

[//ARCANUM]

Awesome to hear. Was curious how someone with her use case thought the two compared. Cool to see Microsoft making innovative hardware.

Click to shrink...

Yeah she thought the Apple Pencil was slightly better, but ultimately that just was not worth it vs having a fully functional OS on the surface.

 

[dock]

I got my replacement Surface Pro 6 i5 8GB back from Microsoft, and my new desk setup is taking shape nicely. I'm typing this on the 4k screen right now, and using the Surface Dock to drive the whole thing. This is my main PC setup these days.



The thing that's most surprising is that even the Surface Pro 4 with 4GB RAM can run the 4k screen. It's not very fast but it doesn't complain!

This monitor also has a USBC socket, so I tried a friend's Surface Book in it. Works really well, but the Surface Dock is a bit nicer thanks to the magnets.

 

[THEVOID]

Depends if you want a tablet more or a laptop. Ipad is a superior tablet and Surface is a superior laptop.

I adore my surface, but I find zero need for a tablet since my phone is huge.

 

[jjreamPop]

I got my replacement Surface Pro 6 i5 8GB back from Microsoft, and my new desk setup is taking shape nicely. I'm typing this on the 4k screen right now, and using the Surface Dock to drive the whole thing. This is my main PC setup these days.



The thing that's most surprising is that even the Surface Pro 4 with 4GB RAM can run the 4k screen. It's not very fast but it doesn't complain!

This monitor also has a USBC socket, so I tried a friend's Surface Book in it. Works really well, but the Surface Dock is a bit nicer thanks to the magnets.

Click to shrink...

:U.... 8U....

This is exactly the setup I wanted for my place as I don't have a ton of desk space. Except, I was going to get the Cintiq 16 instead of a normal monitor down the line. I was worried about how the SP6 would behave and was waffling on getting the Pro(or Book) and Cintiq or a desktop + monitor + Cintiq and losing the portability. Think I'll just go for the Surface Pro for not and build up whatever else I need.

Nice artwork btw :D.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Depends if you want a tablet more or a laptop. Ipad is a superior tablet and Surface is a superior laptop.

I adore my surface, but I find zero need for a tablet since my phone is huge.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, this. My only addition is this: if I wanted a laptop, I'd just buy a better laptop. Surface is a bad tablet and a decent laptop. iPad is an amazing tablet that may, or may not be able to do the work you need it to.

I have a 2018 MacBook Pro for coding, everything else I do on the iPad.

 

[Doc Holliday]

If you're wife needs something for drawing/painting and she doesn't use 3d for her work, I recommend an Ipad Pro over an surface Pro. I'ts just built for that drawing, as soon it wakes up you're ready to start drawing with seconds. The Pencil feels great, especially after adding a anti glare screen. I don't miss my cintiq at all for that kind of work. Get procreate or Clip Studio and you're set.

There are a quiet a few pro's doing full comics and illustrations on their ipads these days.

How ever if she uses stuff like zbrush or a traditional 3d app as a base for her work, get a windows table or tablet. Ipad pro 3d apps are still not that great.

 

[crazy monkey]

Surface pro is way more versatile and useful.

 

[Deleted member 7082]

I've owned both, and the iPad Pro is for me much more enjoyable to use for drawing and painting. The Surface Pro felt really cramped in terms of vertical space, and doing anything in portrait mode is awful.

The iPad Pro doesn't run full Photoshop (and the version coming wont really be that) but it does run full Clip Studio Paint, Affinity, and other perfectly capable art programs. Procreate is still my go-to until I need some more advanced editing tools, because the experience is so much more relaxed and suited for touch.

I've also been using Astropad Studio (turns iPad into a pen display for mac) with a wired connection and lag is virtually non-existent (2ms iirc). If you use macOS, that's a fantastic solution to have a quasi-Cintiq.

I would say a matte screen protector is mandatory for a good drawing feel. I never had one for my Surface Pro 3 so that might also color my impression of it.

I would only recommend the Surface if:
-She's married to Photoshop or other desktop-exclusive programs
-This is for general work, with less focus on art exclusively (iPad can be equally effective for many)
-Having the option of mouse or trackpad is important.


EDIT: Also I think the newest iPad Pro with its Smart Keyboard is more lapable than a Surface Pro w/keyboard. I hated using my SP+keyboard in my lap.

 

[EN1GMA]

iPad Pro is the best tablet on the market but its true power is still held back by iOS (even if things have gotten better recently).

 

[dock]

I'm very fond of the Surface Pro 6 but I agree that the iPad Pro is definitely the better tablet experience. She should get that.

The pen is better, and most importantly it works great while used on a lap.

 

[gamma]

The train has left the station guys. Read the thread.

 

[WillyFive]

The Surface does way more than an iPad, but the few things both it and the iPad can do, the iPad usually does it far better.

 

[Scullibundo]

I work in production and own an iPad Pro and a Surface Book.

In terms of ease and compatibility of taking your work across different creative suites, and just in terms of not feeling like you're tricking the machine into doing what you need to to, I would go the Surface over the iPad any day of the week.

The Surface pen works GREAT and the simple feature of having the back of the pen function as an eraser is goddamn invaluable and something I don't understand Apple not doing.

But in terms of how close the stylus feels to a real life pencil to paper, the Apple Pencil can't be beat.