Surface Studio is Microsoft’s draw-on desktop for creatives
Even if you're one of those 'two-handed creatives'
I don’t even have a laptop PC, let alone a desktop PC.
That, Sir, is because you create very little of any worth. And that which you do create can be ably contained, and regrettably shared, through a humble smartphone. But other folks, whom Microsoft likes to call Creators, do important and creative things. And they need the power of a proper PC.
The majority of Creators manage with a laptop. A minority use a laptop with a touchscreen, perhaps with a stylus, or even a peripheral Wacom-style graphics tablet. But a new niche, a super-creative supergroup, will want Studio, Microsoft’s new fancy-pants draw-on desktop.
What a lot of hyphens.
No need to call them names. Studio is an iMac-shaped Windows 10 desktop except that the gubbins – Core i5 or i7, Nvidia GTX980M, 32GB RAM, 2TB hybrid storage drive – are in the stand, rather than the screen. Looked at from one direction, that screen is very thin. Come round the front and it’s huge! Specifically, 28in, with 13.5 million pixels and a PPI of 192. The design of the stand is such that you can fold the screen down, lean on it, draw on it and stick your Dial on it.
Stick my what on it?
Your Surface Dial. It’s a twiddly, clicky, rotary thing. You can use it alongside your keyboard and mouse as a volume or zoom control, or you can whap it on the screen and use it for all sorts of contextual tomfoolery, such as changing brush sizes or colours as you draw with the other hand. It looks (a) marvellous but (b) like the kind of thing that needs an awful lot of setting up to make sure it does the thing you want it to do.
I’ll go for “(a) marvellous”, please. Will it work with my phone?
It certainly won’t. Though Surface, Surface Pro, Surface Book owners, good news! The Dial’s aforementioned alongside functions will work with your devices, just not the on-screen stuff. And there are more glad tidings for you Surface fans: a new levelled-up Surface Book i7. Guess what processor it has? And better graphics, and 30% more battery life. 16 hours! You lucky fishes.
Who are you talking to?
Sorry, got some of our Surface laptop bros in another window. Yes, the Studio. Should you wish to jump from your phone-based lifestyle straight to two-handed Dial-and-stylus, tongue-out-the-side-of-your-mouth, leaning-on-the-screen creativity, you can pre-order now. Prices from US$3000, depending on spec. Once UK prices and availability have been ‘created’, we’ll do a update.
Fraser Macdonald
consulting editor 
