Let's ignore the ludicrous price for now and consider the device itself.

If it has an achilles heel, it will be the fact that it is reliant on the x86 archictecture. Even the very lowest power sucking examples of x86 still use much, much more than ARM alternatives.

The bottom line is, if it has a fan in it, it will be a fail.

Nobody wants a tablet that runs hot and needs a whirring, buzzing fan to try and keep it from melting.

You may as well get an ultrabook that has a keyboard and can be put on a desk and avoid toasting your hands and arms while using it.

Not to mention needing a bigger, heavier, more expensive battery to keep it comparable with the competition.

not just a consumer toy.

At that price it's an executive toy.

good price

I for one was pretty shocked at the price, I was totally expecting the entry level unit to be around $1099 and higher up from there.

I suppose if you add the keyboard in it comes to ~$1024, which is closer to 1099.

Unlike most other folks I guess I view the Surface pro as a Ultrabook rather than a tablet. It runs a PC operating system, has an Intel processor, for the most part will be used with a keyboard.

Compare the specs/price of the Surface to that new Dell tablet/ultrabook that they have been pimping recently(that also is not yet shipping). The "XP12 Ultrabook" - Dell's price starts at $1199 with 4GB ram and 128G SSD.

The Surface is also a full 1.3 pounds lighter than the dell

Don't get me wrong I don't expect it to stem the onslaught of iPads, but I'd be sort of surprised if the Surface didn't do quite well against comparable devices from the likes of Dell/HP/etc.

I haven't noticed claims of battery life yet (nor do I see note of any on Dell's site for their thing)

I do think it's terrible that MS takes up so much of the space for their recovery partition and stuff, they should give the users the option to nuke that as part of the setup and reclaim that space. If they want to recover they can do so by say putting the recovery data on a SD card or hooking their tablet to their computer and running recovery software there (WebOS uses this method). It's not a big deal when you eat up a few gigs on a several hundred gig disk, but when it's as small as it is - they really should of thought that out better. Hopefully they fix it in the next iteration.

Not that bad

Many office workers have notebooks that spend most of the time in docking stations and they cost quite a bit more than this. They're seldom in use when not in their docking station except to check for e-mail or look something up on the interwebs or take notes at a meeting.

Something like this would probably be welcomed by a lot of people though I think the price will have to come down - even if the hardware is comparable to notebooks, tablets have got significantly lower price points.

I have to have one for a customer and I do resent carry > 2 kg around between docking stations. Have to see what the hardware is really like when it's available and, assuming I can get permission to use it on the network, then I might get one.

Battery life will make it or break it

If they can get decent battery life out of it (like 10-12 hours) I think they have a fighting chance. However, at those prices they are ogling the enterprise, and even if I had a very good reason to recommend these for my engineers and construction managers I would never get IT to support 8, so it would be a no-no. MAYBE if they could get 7 to work on it without a hassle I could get them to condone it, but otherwise it''ll be smallish laptops.

pricing.

you know what? i'm thinking about getting one of these (and know a few others who are also), and may get one IF(!) they don't just change the dollar sign for a pound sign and keep the numbers the same. like usual.

Tempted

If you look at the potential use case for such a device it's actually a tempting proposition. For the enterprise it can run the Cisco VPN client and act as a domain member meaning you get the full level of connectivity and security that you would expect from a laptop. A battery life of 6-7 hours would be fine for how long such a device is likely to be used away from a desk, and because it's powerful, when you get to your desk, you would be able to plug a full sized keyboard, mouse and monitor into it and keep using it as your main computer.

For the individual used to iPads and the like, it's perhaps not so useful. That said for £700ish for the 128GB model with a keyboard, I'd be awfully tempted.

Is it desirable?

Does it look the same as the cheapest ARM Win RT model to the untrained (or mildly trained) eye? If so, they're going to have a hard time persuading people to buy it. Let's face it, we all like to show off our expensive bling once we've convinced ourselves that we deserve it - for whatever reasons make sense to us.

If people are going to think you've got a cheap and nasty Surface when in fact you've blown a chunky wad on it, it's not going to be very rewarding.

"One can't help but note, however, that these displays are still a far cry from the latest iPad's 9.7-inch, 2048-by-1536 Retina display".

Oh come on... 1080p on a 10.6" screen is more than ridiculous anyway. Lets tan the battery and gpu with even more pixels for ZERO benefit! Methinks the reviewer may be a fanboi...

Think of it as...

...a 10.6", portable, touchscreen, light iMac. With a decent version of Office.

One thing: the cover should NOT be extra. If it were built in, and came with a mouse as well, then it'd suddenly be an awesome competitor to ultrabooks as well.