Customer Ratings & Reviews

I normally buy apple products when I need a new laptop but the reviews were good so I thought I would give Microsoft a shot. I purchased the surface book on 10/30/2015. Out of the box, I could not turn it on because there was no battery power (every apple product I've ever purchased was always at least partially charged when opened). So I plug it in and turn it on. The only page that displayed required a username and password. So I think, maybe there's a default log-in in the instruction manual. Nope, there isn't. A friend tells me that I may need a Microsoft account to access the laptop. This doesn't make any sense to me because it is a BRAND NEW laptop so why would there be a username and password set up on it. Also, I don't have a Microsoft account. Since I got the Geek Squad plan I called them first. Calling Geek Squad was totally useless. They didn't know how to fix it and advised me to try using my Microsoft account to log in. I thanked them and hung up. Next, I called Microsoft. Their support in the Philippines leaves much to be desired. First, he kept asking me to shut the computer down. That didn't help. Then he said that someone had already set up the computer and I needed to reset it. I asked how could a BRAND NEW COMPUTER already be set up? I did not buy an open box computer. The rep said it had to be BestBuy because Microsoft would not have done it. Ok, let's just fix it. I ask how long this will take and he tells me 20 minutes. Fifty minutes later I'm still on the line waiting for the computer to finish. The Microsoft rep asked if he could call me back in 20 minutes to see if it had finished and we hung up. I then called the BestBuy store I purchased it from to complain that someone had already setup my computer. The Microsoft Expert I spoke to said that BestBuy didn't do it, the device must have come from Microsoft like that. Maybe it was a test device that got shipped. Wow, no one wants to accept responsibility for this. He also told me that resetting the device could take up to 2 hours! The computer finally finished after 1 hour and 40 minutes. I was able to set up the system, without a Microsoft login, so I think everything should be ok, right? Wrong. Today I was using the laptop on the internet and all of a sudden, I'm not connected. I check my router, it's on. I check if I can connect through other devices, the iPhone and nexus 7 connect. So I call Microsoft again and got absolutely no where because they will not begin to help you unless you have a Microsoft account. This seems absolutely ridiculous to me. I gave them my name and phone number. The Surface Book was just released in the last week. Why do I have to set up an account for Wifi help with a $2000 device that I just purchased yesterday? I spent 15 minutes on the phone with Microsoft but they would not troubleshoot unless I went online and set up an account. I also tried to find a solution online but found no help. Strangely enough, after 30 minutes the wifi started working again. I have a feeling that the Surface Book is going back to the store.

If all you want is a laptop to check email and surf the web then Surface book is probably not for you. However, if you want an extremely lightweight and fast computer that can detach into a tablet and has amazing note taking ability then Surface Book is perfect. Surface Book is fast and powerful, but its real value comes from pairing it with Onenote and using the surface pen. I take extensive notes for school and write down calculus and physics problems in OneNote easier than using paper, type up word documents, hook up an external monitor and watch Netflix. Surface does it all with ease. And, Microsoft seems to have fixed most of the initial bugs that many people have noted. I purchased mine 6 months ago and noticed a few annoying things- mostly related to display drivers and power issues during sleep- but those seem to be cured now.

The most important aspect of buying a Surface Book is to realize it is a Version 1.0 product, and will therefore be full of bugs. You must be an Early Adopter to use a Surface Book. I have experienced varying levels of problems all related here, from buggy display driver to detach issues. The most annoying problems are random stops - you can literally be leaning back and talking to someone when 20 minutes into your conversation you'll BSOD and then go through the reboot. You definitely should create a Recovery USB stick for this machine, you're going to need it. I have not gone through a full reload as I figure many of the problems will come through software/firmware updates, like the November Threshold 2 release which fixed many things. There are still issues with Tablet detach and tablet rotation, disappearing features, and BSOD, so there will need to be several big releases coming. Not much unlike the release of Windows 95. My biggest concern for the non-early adopter will be the price tag vs. problem factor. It will not seem worth it, and scanning through the comments you can see the result. When the website asks me "Recommend to a friend?" I have to say meh. I like it, but I know it's going to have a lot of problems.

Visit MS's own Surface Forums to see the continuing and newly created issues (i.e., new issues created from MS's attempts to solve old issues) with this device. I am still waking up in the middle of the night to the sound of full blast cooling fans, still get hangs on merely trying to detach and reattach the tablet, and continually have to do a hard reset just to get the unit functioning. There are issues with detaching the tablet if you forget you're in an application that uses the keyboard-mounted GPU, similar if your using an SD card mounted resource (WHY is the SD card not in the tablet??), and with just general usability of the much-touted features like being able to use it as a folded back/reversed tablet. This is no way near the utility of a similarly priced MacBook Pro running a Windows emulator, which is what I gave up to run this not ready for prime time laptop. Yeah, the MacBook doesn't have the touch screen, but the touchpad is far more responsive and the overall 'only tries to be one thing, but is very good at that' design wins out over the Surface Book's obvious over-reach. I have worked with just about every Surface device out there, and the only one near this level of unsuitability was the Surface RT, which I knew was a gamble and which was the lower end of the price range, NOT the premium model. I should have stuck with the MacBook Pro or perhaps tried a Surface Pro 4. Once again, I'm left face-palming for having trusted a 1st edition of any kind of computer hardware being amenable to practical use.

I believe the good reviews AND the bad reviews. A long story short. After four (4) trips to Best Buy and currently I'm on my third computer, I finally am satisfied. Two computers did not work out of the box. Even the Geek Squad was unsure why they did not work. One example is the touch screen did not work. Frustrating! However, the third computer works great. The customer service at Best Buy was terrible. The young, poorly trained staff who work at Best Buy seem to be more interested in trying to argue with the customer than try to assist. Some of the staff act like the customer is an inconvenience in their lives. In summary, bad experience with two Surface Books and the Best Buy staff. I wasted hours of my time. Good experience with my third computer.

bought the i7 256gb with GPU model. Froze 3 times out of the box while doing NOTHING. Seems the i7 line has bugs - either software or hardware - yet to be determined by Microsoft. The hinge, while it looks futuristic is a waste of space. It does nothing more than a normal notebook hinge would have done. AS a matter of fact, the hinge is a nuisance because you cannot close the surface book all the way - when shut, there's a .75" gap between the keyboard and the screen at the hinge end. Further, you cannot undock the tablet from the keyboard when there is less than ~10% battery life left. This is a terrible design flaw. This unit is starting out just like the original surface did - on a rocky path. Hopefully round 2 or round 3 of the surface book resolves these design flaws and makes us a product we will all love.

The surface is an incredible laptop. Great battery life, amazing screen, great touch screen features. I have had no issues with it in my first 30 days of using it. As a tablet it is a little wide as I was used to the ipad mini, but it is a great device

MS has nailed it with the Surface Book 2-in-1!! yea there's always going to be apple fans, but when you need to stick with windows, be it comfort level, or application dependency, nothing comes close to the surface book 2 in 1. The pen is phenomenal, it feels like you're writing on a pad! Core i7 handles anything you give it with ease, windows 10 is just makes everything so much faster!

I don't take time to write reviews, but this thing is a game changer. I experienced zero bugs after I did all the updates right away. I think Microsoft fixed many of the issues people were having through recent updates. I have done office work, video editing and gaming and this beauty handles all well. I even had Fallout 4 running smoothly on this machine. Overall I love that I chose this product. The fact that the i7 model was $500 off when I walked into BestBuy didn't hurt either.

I bought a surface book i7, for replace my lenovo computer, it looks very nice new features and the pen fantastic, but, but when i set up and start using 1 hour the keyboard got stuck and never could disattached from the tablet, they replaced for a "BRAND NEW", but it was worse, no power batterie and when I turned on showed me an existing user not the set up, I deleted all the information and restart the setup, but the surface has a previos user and set up; and THE PEN NEVER WORKS. they offer me "ANOTHER BRAND NEW SURFACE" but not thanks 2 defective computers is not normal; it needs much much more to compete with another brands (apple).

First let me start by saying I tried to publish my negative review on the Microsoft website itself, but it was rejected: MS says…“Our staff has read your review and values your contribution even though it did not meet all our website guidelines. Thanks for sharing, and we hope to publish next time! A quick Google search reviled there are a lot of negative reviews that were rejected by the Microsoft Surface team. No wonder they have a 4.5 star rating on their website. None the less, here is my story on my TWO surface Books: My "1st" Surface Book was an i7, dGPU, 8GB, which upon arrival, had 4 open tickets by late evening. 1) It boots repeatedly to the BIOS like screen (boot sources, etc.). There was no way to exit as it would just keep rebooting to the same screen. 2) The computer randomly freezes and the only recovery is a hard power off losing all my work. 3) It will randomly leave the screen on and running when the lid is closed killing the battery and heating the computer. 4) Won't power on sometimes; go figure. After hitting the power button and also by holding it down for thirty seconds, would not power up. Then, letting it sit for a few hours, it would start normally. It also ran at 104 degrees or more just surfing the internet at 50% brightness on battery. I returned in on the second day of ownership back to MS. I purchased a second one from Best Buy the same day I returned the previous one to MS. I really wanted it to work for me as it is a great design. However, the Best Buy (BB) one was returned the next day also. It would also randomly freeze, 3 times in one day before lunch. A hard reset was the only recovery mode resulting in the loss of my data that was in progress. It also would not run my external 3TB Western Digital "MY Passport" hard drive. It is strange that it will run on my wife's Dell laptop and my Alienware lap top. However, the SB would only copy off the drive, but not back onto it. It would freeze at 1% and never progress. I went to BB to try it on the floor model. It did not work there either, but did work on other laptops on the display floor, and it did work on the BB Geek Squad desktop computer as well. If I cannot access my work on a portable drive (media mostly), this laptop want-to-be, is a complete failure. Sorry MS, trouble shoot on your time, not mine. If you go out and look, there are hundreds of threads on this thing freezing and not working in many numerous ways. Don't be swayed to buy without a lot of research.

Some Pros: Cool concept. Extremely light. Pen and tablet option is fun and useful. Cons: buggy. Restarts a lot without prompt. Have to hard reboot it at times because the screen stays dark when you come out of idle or sleep. And it doesn't have a nice opening balance. For example: you can't just lift the screen to open. You have to pry it from the sides for the screen to unlock magnetism. Overall: I bought it and didn't take it back considering how expensive it is. Future iterations of this will probably be amazing if they fix the glaring issues.

Let me start off by saying that I love the Surface Book. I truly do. It's an amazing design and I enjoyed it thoroughly when I had it. The problem was the graphics driver would fail every 5-20 minutes, I would get random "blue screens of death" (even on release day without installing any new software). I could go on, but that's the short version. I have now owned two since release day. Both of them have had defective integrated graphics cards. I first went to Microsoft support who took remote control and uninstalled/reinstalled my graphics driver, which did not help. Then I went to the store I purchased this from, where I spent 2 hours with customer service at my local store while they called every single store within a 50 mile radius, and none of them had any replacements in stock. They could not even order a replacement for me because Microsoft has temporarily suspended future orders. That should tell you something. Turns out, the reason that every single store was out of stock of this particular model is because literally EVERY UNIT that sold had come back defective. Every single one of them. I do not waste my time writing reviews unless it's important. Please wait on buying this until they get the hardware issues worked out! I still love the Surface Book, I honestly do. But save yourself the trouble and get something else; or just wait a bit until this gets fixed.

its a great 2-in-1. I recommend this two everybody. it is pricing but its worth it. APPLE IS WAY BETTER :)

Couldn't imagine being any happier with this product. Read the reviews and then purchased the product. It has live up to all my expectations and then some. Would totally recommend this product to everyone.

As others have said, I too had high hopes for these machines. I have been waiting to buy one for months. I am sadly disappointed in what ive experienced. In summary, here is my experience so far; On 11/20/2015 I purchased an i7 256g version. All seemed normal until I had enough contrast on the screen to notice the top was flickering. After 2 days of having it, I had to take it back to BestBuy, where it ended up being replaced. Once I had the replacement, out of the box it would not boot up even after charging for over an hour, prompting a call to Microsoft support. After a hour and a half if finally booted up. The next day in class, the keyboard was deciding when it wanted to work. At first, I figured I had not docked it properly, but the problem continued, and got worse. The machine would not recognize the halves as connected and will not disconnect, it will not charge, and the keyboard still didnt work. So now 2 days after getting a replacement, I am calling Microsoft support for a second time about the replacement. After and hour and half on the phone, the representative had me install an update. The update was taking too long so the rep asked if she could call back in 15mins to check the status. I was never call back!!! After the update, the pen stopped working and the touch screen soon followed. The next morning (Thanksgiving), I am on the phone with support again, with a $2500 paperweight! I again had to go through all of the same steps with another Microsoft representative, with no change! The representative's EXPERT opinion after 2 hours "I think it might be broken". Im glad I wasted 2 hours away from my family for that crazy theory. I have since responded to an email from Microsoft support asking if my problem was resolved.... Ill leave that colorful email for another time. In conclusion, Ive gone through 2 machines with 6 different issues. I will be returning this one too!! The ball is now in court BestBuy!! These products are CLEARLY defective, and should be pulled until Microsoft wants to deliver a product worth $2500+.

From the start it would not boot up, It finally let me in to set it up. Then after the screen would flicker and had a hard time to get it to turn off. when it would not charge the battery i returned it. I went and purchased a apple mac book air vary happy, Good try but for that much money to meany problems.

Essentially the same experience as others here. Preordered, arrived sealed, battery dead on arrival, charged and booted to a login screen (not setup screen). Had to call support, reset windows and took 2 hrs. Disk is full for some reason because the restore was corrupt. Finished updating windows. Trackpad is very buggy after firmware update. Windows unstable on a gen 1 micorosft hardware. Do not purchase. Poor support and poor customer service from microsoft. Bestbuy was great and returned.

Its nice physically BUT...I bought this computer recently, I took it home excited about it because I had was told at the store that it was "the next big thing". I didn't perform any research on it until after I bought it and all the reviews said it had bugs and would freeze, I thought, well what are the odds that they're all the same? Boy was I wrong. YES I'm guessing they are all buggy because mine had a lot of bugs from the start. It would not show the mouse pointer on the screen no matter how much I moved around the trackpad. Other times it would show the mouse but it would be blinking on the corner but unable to move to the point that I had to shut the computer off to get it to work fine again. The computer itself froze on me twice in a matter of 4days of me having it at home and I got messages saying something like "Graphics card not active" then two seconds later "Graphic card active" and it would do this constantly. I liked the screen and that it detached but thats about it. All the bugs changed my mind about it so it just didn't work for me, I returned it and moved on to the other "next best thing", the Dell XPS.

The hardware on this device is spectacular. The build quality feels solid, the keyboard, screen, and stylus are beautiful at what they should do. However, as a flagship device the Surfacebook launched with sever firmware and driver issues. The device would randomly hang and the Intel display driver would crash. Paired with the Microsoft dock it would randomly disconnect and reconnect itself over and over. The device simply isn't ready to be used by any business user until these items are worked out. At this price tag, they really should have made sure stability was solid before releasing. In a few more months I'm sure it will be a great product.