Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Surface Neo first look: Microsoft’s dual-screen prototype”.
Back in 2009, all of the hype was around Microsoft’s super secret dual-screen device that was codenamed Courier.. Now Courier never came to be, but 10 years later it looks like Courier might be. Coming back to life in the form of a new device called Surface Neo. ( electronic music ) Surface Neo is a part of a bunch of new dual-screen and even foldable devices that are gon na be coming at the end of 2020., And essentially it puts two Nine-Inch displays together inside what looks like a Moleskine Journal., So the original Surface concept that launched now seven years ago, the Surface RT, was turning a tablet into a laptop., And these new dual-screen devices take that way further with a smaller-package device that kinda morphs into all These different modes., We got an early look at a pre-production prototype here, but I wasn’t allowed to interact with the software freely and I could only really touch a device that wasn’t powered on.. But I did get to see its many modes.
There’s a reading mode, which is basically like a book where the screens are side-by-side, together. And then there’s a laptop mode and yeah. That feels like a laptop too.. You can slot it down, put a hardware keyboard on top or use the software keyboard, that’s included. And then there’s like presentation mode or you can just flip the whole screen around and just use it as a regular tablet.. We’Ve seen devices that have done this in the past. We’ve seen it a lot with Windows 8.. We saw it in Lenovo’s Yoga Book as well..
The real key element here is that Microsoft has stepped up the software game. And it’s running Windows 10X on these devices.. So 10X isn’t a completely new version of Windows or anything like that..
It’S not like Windows, RT from the past that restricted everything down and didn’t run. Your favorite apps. 10X will run everything and it’s running on an Intel Processor inside these devices as well.
So that means your traditional desktop apps everything will work., But the ones that will really shine are gon na, be the ones that highly optimize these dual-screen devices.. Now Microsoft is obviously working with Office and that’s gon na be one of the first ones.. So you’ll have your slide on the left, perhaps. And a slide deck on the right., But really it’s gon na take software developers to create apps that are really highly optimized for these dual-display devices to kind of make it make sense.. So one of the really interesting ways that Microsoft is sort of separating this Windows 10X from standard regular Windows 10, is something called the Wonder Bar. Now.
This is like a small sort of touch panel, basically like Apple’s Touch Bar that appears above the keyboard, whether that’s software or hardware., And it’ll basically give you access to things like emojis and GIFs. When you reply to emails. And you’ll even be able to take things like YouTube, videos or Netflix videos and just sort of like pin them above your keyboard. Other than that, it kind of looks like Windows 10.. The Start menu has changed, though it sort of basically is an app launcher, and it shows you all your recently used apps rather than the Live Tiles. You can snap apps side-by-side..
It will intelligently open apps like say you’re in your mail. You click link, it’ll, open a browser, but it’ll be on the other display, so it won’t take over what you’re looking at.. Unlike other Surface devices, there’s no trackpad on the Neo’s keyboard., But you’ll be able to find a trackpad on the display, either below or above. Where you placed this keyboard., The keyboard can be stowed magnetically to the back of the Neo, and it will flip into place and attach with magnets to the display.. It looks like a neat party trick..
The Surface Neo also includes Microsoft’s new Surface Slim Pen. That will be available on the Surface Pro X2.. It attaches to the back of the Neo and charges and it’s a lot flatter than current Surface Pens..
So that’s kind of everything we know about these devices so far., But there’s so much. We don’t know. Like we. Don’T know the specs, we don’t know pricing, we don’t even really know exact availability. Microsoft’s, essentially saying that these devices will launch in holiday 2020. So we’re still a year out from these being real., And it makes you wonder why are they even showing and talking about these devices right now And personally, I think they probably don’t want these to leak, so they’re gon na announce it now and have their own Story around it. And then there’s the key thing of they need other hardware vendors to create these too, and they need software developers to create the apps that run on this..
So there’s a bunch of stuff that they need to get going and out there in the public before these are even available in like a year’s time. And above all else, competition is really high.. We’Ve see Huawei, Samsung and others create these foldable phones that turn into tablets and all right.
Microsoft is doing something slightly different. It’S doing tablets into laptops., But it’s still a bunch of Android competition and we don’t really know where these foldable and dual-screen devices are gon na land.. I am super excited about dual-screen and foldable devices., And the Surface Neo hardware is probably the sleekest of the bunch of dual-screen devices that we’ve seen so far., But there’s one thing, and that is software is king.. Microsoft still has a year left to perfect the software and they need to convince app developers to really create these apps to make this device shine.. So if you’re, an app developer or you’re just super hyped about these dual-screen and foldable devices, I wan na know which one you prefer. A smartphone that turns into a tablet or a tablet that turns into a laptop Drop a comment below and let me know why.
.