I pondered a Surface as my next purchase, Consumer Reports says its a problem.. Any Surface users out there?
http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/10/tec...dex.html?iid=ob_homepage_deskrecommended_pool
This is just one of the more glaring examples of CR reporting methodology troubles. They are voluntary surveys completed only by CR subscribers. A self-selection of a self-selection makes for horrendously skewed data. Microsoft has had many problems with some models of the surface with horrendous return rates (most recently SP4), I think most have been fixed in firmware, but sometimes it takes months and many attempts.
I have a surface and at lenovo laptop. They both have some advantages, but if I only had one, the laptop is the clear winner (cheaper, faster, easier to use, longer battery life, probably more durable, larger batteries available, battery replaceable, more than 1 usb port, etc.). A friend uses the surface as his primary computer and is quite happy, so opinions vary.
The surface is nice in meetings as a laptop standing up is isolating and typing is distracting. The surface basically cannot be used on your lap with the keyboard, it requires a decent sized flat desk to set it up as all of the weight is high and balanced on the leg. The pen and keyboard aren't included with many surface models and cost as much as a cheap laptop if you buy them new.
Battery life on the surface is abysmal compared to a laptop (or conventional tablet). It has to stay on the charger as it self-discharges at an alarming rate (completely dead in less than a week). I've never tried using it for a long time in a stretch as I use it as a supplemental device (primarily meetings and pdf markup) so I don't know how long it lasts under use.
Avoid any Windows RT surface (or any other device) like the plague.
EDIT:
So many internal server error 500 messages. I had to cut and paste this in one sentence at a time.