Microsoft’s announcement of its own brand tablet stirred up quite a buzz in the tech world. The software giant’s chief executive Steve Ballmer touted Surface, Microsoft’s new tablet, with his powerful presentation on Monday.
Apparently targeted Apple’s new iPad, Microsoft finally entered the fastest growing sector of computer markets. To compete with iPad that has dominated the tablet market, the 37-year-old venerable software company presents a dynamic line of symbolically thinner and comparably fascinating machine.
While some details are yet to be unveiled, a simple comparison of Surface and iPad has been available. Here we will compare the two on the key component all tablets have to deal with.
Screen and Display
The two models of Microsoft Surface all come as 10.6 inch ClearType Display, which is bigger than the 9.7 inch display on all versions of iPad. However, the Surface Pro’s full HD display means a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, or 208 pixels per inch. This is less than the new iPod’s famous Retina display which boasts 256 pixels per inch.
At a thickness of 9.3 mm, the Surface RT version is slightly thinner than the new iPad (9.4mm) but thicker than the 8.8 mm iPad 2.
Processor and Operating System
Surface pro features a quad-core Intel Core i5 processor while the latest iPad has a 1GHz dual-core Apple A5X processor.
As the software giant’s upcoming Windows 8 operating system is highly competitive to Apple’s Mac OS X Mountain Lion, there is analysis and debating of the two main competitors in desktop and notebook computer markets. Now the Microsoft Surface Pro will boast the Windows 8 pro operating system while the iPad will only run the mobile operating system iOS 6.It seems that Window 8 will be an advantage to Surface Pro but we’ll have to see the practical experience when both the two operating systems are available.
Keyboard and Cover
Microsoft shows a revolutionary design in the Surface’s cover. The cover smartly serves as a keyboard which is tactile multi-touch and uses a stylus. This feature of Surface is described as a “forward step of human-computer interface”. As Microsoft claims that the touch typing on the cover is twice as effective as typing on a screen, clearly it is a feature that Apple cannot compete with.
