Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Surface Duo Review: Double Trouble”.
A portion of this video is sponsored by Surfshark. For the first time in five years. Microsoft has a phone.. What do you mean? It’S, not a phone ( upbeat music, ) Yeah of the many things to understand about the all-glass Android-powered dual-screen device called the Surface Duo. The fact that it’s not meant to be a phone is the second most important one. I mean look, it has an earpiece and mic.
You can force it into that role of a smartphone., but it’s better to think of it as another device. You carry a pocket-friendly version of the Surface, you might be familiar with from the PC space. And just like those Surfaces, the Duo is more expensive than competing products., It’s more ambitious as well., And this is the most important thing to understand. You probably shouldn’t buy one in its first-generation. That shouldn’t come as a surprise..
Almost every first-generation product is a risky buy.. Just look at those foldables, I love. The first Galaxy Fold was rushed to market and got recalled.. The first Motorola Razr revival had enough compromises that even I held off buying one.. It’S only now that we’re seeing wave two of those products with the Razr 5G and Fold2, showing early signs of greatness, that we can look back and say “.
I sure, am glad. I didn’t write off that whole category just because the first attempts were shaky.”, So it is with the Surface Duo. And what’s interesting to me, is the things that I was most concerned about going into this review.
Those are the things that have been the least of my worries over my two weeks with the device. Battery life was the biggest surprise of the bunch given how insanely thin this thing is.. While I do need to charge it every night over two weeks of 16-hour days, it’s never died on me before midnight. Pocketability is another pleasant, surprise.
Yeah, it’s more comfortable in a cargo pocket, but it does fit in standard ones.. If you were a guy clothes anyway. And the other two potential showstoppers, I hear people talking about are almost totally solved by the use of a smartwatch.. I’M talking about the lack of a cover display for notifications., Even the most basic Wear OS watch will give you all the notifications, an external screen, would. And most of those watches will also let you tap to pay for your daily coffee..
What, if he’s, still pay the old fashioned way and prefer your wristwatches dumb? Well, you still probably don’t need an outside display as much as you think. See when you’re new to the Duo with the parallel to a Moleskin is so overriding so obvious. It’S easy to fall into the mental trap of thinking.
That’S the only way to close it., But instead try to think of it more like a spiral. Notebook. All you’ve got to do is fold it backwards and you’ve got a traditional slab-style Android device with a screen exposed all the time.. It’S wide yeah, but it’s also incredibly thin, not much thicker than an iPhone 11 Pro.. That’S what helps make it more pocketable than you might think and bellyaching about bezels, aside beautiful to boot., So okay, the Duo can be used as a big smartphone with an optional second display. Great.
Is that useful? The answer I’ve found is three different flavors of sometimes.. The first is what I use most often keeping an eye on a background task while doing something else. Like if I’m walking somewhere, I can catch up on Twitter, while keeping Google Maps up in full screen or track my inbound, Grubhub or Lyft driver., Or, if I’m In a particularly talkative group, chat, which I usually am, I can keep up with that conversation on the second screen, instead of getting constant out-of-context alerts on top of my main one., The second use case is literally doing two things at once.
Like curating a shot list Based on a script, I’ve written or logging into an app using two-factor, authentication. – And the third is what Microsoft calls spanning.. This is filling up both displays with a single app. Most of the time. This frankly sucks because Android doesn’t know the seam between the screens is there.. It just sees a big wide canvas like a tablet., As I discussed in the first episode of “ Into the Fold ,”. That seam in the middle is ultimately why I think foldables are the real future, But Microsoft, at least for this generation thinks differently and as such, it has optimized its own Office.
Suite for spanning., So Outlook is pretty cool.. You can put your mail list on one side, the full body of the email on the other., And this is huge. The multi-column support in the new Kindle app has made the Duo, my favorite $ 1,400 ebook. Seriously.
It’S great. Now credit where it’s due here. This isn’t a first-of-its-kind product. LG has offered second screens for its phones over the past few years in the form of somewhat clunky clip on cases., But by making the Duo’s double displays both permanent and pretty Microsoft sort of tricks you into using them more often.. So you find more situations where they come in handy.: A banking app and a calculator, a newsfeed and a transit ticket, a dinner menu and a calorie counter..
And since the concept originated on desktops, it translates well back to them too. If you’re willing to carry a keyboard and mouse, ideally more portable ones than mine. What a potent and productive mobile workstation this could be. Now I say, could be ( light music ), because in its current state the Duo hurts my productivity instead of helping it. Yeah.
Remember how I started off saying first-generation products are often bad. Well, that’s usually because they’re undercooked and the Duo is pretty raw. In the middle. Example, a couple of days ago, I forgot to charge my laptop, so it was almost dead.
When I got to the coffee shop to write this review., I thought well golden opportunity to put the productivity promise to the test by writing my script on the Duo right. Well, after just a few minutes, I got so frustrated with typos and input lag. I just couldn’t continue. I went home., I thought.
Maybe it’s SwiftKey., Maybe Microsoft’s keyboard is just slow., But then I installed it on my Razr 5G review device and nope it’s rock solid., So I factored in other bug, notes. I’D been taking alongside reviewers from Android Central Windows Central and about five other sites., Most of our Duos, often misinterpret a single tap as a long press. That’S annoying.! When you turn over the Duo, it’s accelerometers are supposed to tell it to flip screens, or at least give you the option to double-tap to do so., That’s kind of a crapshoot, every time. And daily.
It has issues fully registering swipes to get back home or to switch which screen you’re running an app on. And back at the keyboard. Even when I switch over to Gboard, which, by the way, only works well in portrait mode, because landscape buries the Space bar, the haptic response doesn’t quite keep up with my keystrokes.. It feels like an issue with how the display registers touches, or maybe it’s just optimization problems. I don’t know. And I also don’t know whether it’s fixable through software updates.
Microsoft, has promised some of those to enable things like double-tap to wake notification. Support in the peak view, and hopefully squashing the lingering bugs.. But as you know, you should never buy a product based on future promises., Only based on what it can deliver when you drop the cash. Speakers, samples, a few photos and solitaires still to come after a quick word from today’s sponsor.
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Now long term. Subscribers already know this, but for the newcomers among you, it’s important for me to say it.. I am not rooting for the Duo to fail..
I love strange new form factors.. I admire companies that take risks., And the last thing I wan na see in the smartphone world is another stolid slab., But there’s no way around it. In its current state. The Duo feels rushed. Using. It reminds me of how I felt using the Palm Pre when I bought it on launch day in 2009.
And I’m frankly, surprised Microsoft, put it out to reviewers like this, especially given the company’s history in mobile. As a Windows Phone fan. I still remember the pain of using 2015’s Lumia 950, which, to this day, stands as one of the worst product I’ve ever reviewed, because it was launched too soon with too little Polish. And the captain in “ Top Gun” said it best. Your family named ain’t. The best in the Navy., You need to be doing it better and cleaner than the other guy..
Now, what is it with you? Of course Surface is not Windows Phone., You might have forgotten, but back in 2012 Surface was a punchline best-known for a nearly billion dollar. Write down with news anchors for getting its name and using them as iPad stands. It was sad. To go from that to a successful product line that showcases some of the slickest hardware and computing that’s impressive., And it’s indicative of what Microsoft is capable of when it really wants to make something happen.. So if you’re hopeful, that Duo will eventually come into its own, there is precedent for it.. Android 11 should bring native UI improvements for dual-screen devices. And the hardware. I am smitten by how beautifully it realizes the dream of an Inspector Gadget-style computer book, condensed into a futuristic form that seems right at home in “ Westworld.”.
Every time I fold it shut, and here it’s magnets, … (, imitates click ) The two halves home. It somehow lends more satisfaction to whatever task I’ve just completed, especially when that task was a rousing game of windows solitaire. And the fact that I can use the Surface pen on either display and then stick it to the front cover.
Magnetically is almost delightful enough to make up for the pen not coming in the box and that magnetic attraction being accidental instead of intentional.. But if you’re gon na brute force a new category into existence, this kind of more than a phone less than a laptop specialty device. Well that takes both clarity of concept and excellence in execution..
I think the Duo has the former, but not the latter., And I also think that most folks will prefer a phone that can do most of what the Duo does, while also packing a camera that you don’t just have to put up with. With a price falling Between Samsung’s excellent Galaxy, Note, 20, Ultra and Galaxy Z, Fold2 and many more stumbles than grand slams where the software’s concerned, the Surface Duo is that weirdo I want to love but can only recommend to the hardest-core Microsoft fans. Come to think of it. That’S how I ended my Lumia 950 review. Too., Here’s hoping things go differently, this time, around. Folks, I’m gon na keep carrying the Duo alongside my other phones for the next few months and I’ll be tweeting and Instagramming as new updates. Come in.
Feel free to ask me about the Duo in those venues. Subscribed to the MrMobile on YouTube. So you don’t miss followup coverage and don’t just rely on my impressions. Check out the full reviews on both Android Central and Windows Central.. My friends at both sites were a huge help to me. As I wrote this script. Disclosure. This video was made possible by a Surface Duo, review sample provided by Microsoft., But MrMobile works for you, not the manufacturers.. Microsoft provided no compensation for this coverage and was given no copy approval rights or early preview of same.. That means they’re, seeing it for the first time right alongside you.
Until next time, thanks for watching. And like the New York highway, billboards say, COVID is still a risk., So mask up and stay safe. While you stay mobile, my friends .