Microsoft Surface Book

By Xah Lee. Date: . Last updated: .

The Microsoft Surface Book series laptop came out in 2016.

Microsoft Surface Book 2017 02 28
Microsoft Surface Book

As of 2019-02, the different between the Surface Book and Surface Pro is that the Surface Book comes with a hard physical keyboard, detachable, and it has GPU for gaming, built inside the keyboard. (you need to have the keyboard attached to play games)

Otherwise, they are basically the same.

I thought the Surface Book is a higher version with fast CPU and more RAM memory, but actually not. It's just got GPU for gaming.

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Microsoft Surface Book Keyboard, 2016. [image source https://www.itunity.com/article/surface-book-unboxing-2725]

Keys like PrintScreen Home End PageUp PageDown Insert are merged with the function keys, accessed with holding Fn.

It retains the Delete โŒฆ as dedicated physical key.

There is one significant innovation: the number key row is positioned more to the right than traditional layout. Look at the keys 7 and u. Now, look at other laptops of these keys.

This innovation of Microsoft Surface Book keyboard is great, because the traditional keyboard number key row position is shifted too much to the left. It was that way inherited from mechanical typewriter's design, in order to keep the levers underneath evenly spaced.

[see Keyboard Design Flaws]