I've owned every version of the Surface Pro and used the Surface Book for around two weeks before returning it. I finally gave up on the Surface Pro 4 and switched to a 2009 Core 2 Duo Macbook Pro I picked up on eBay.
Surface
Pros: Beautiful hardware, touchscreen works decently, Windows 10 is generally a decent operating system. Keyboard is pretty neat.
Cons: Tremendously buggy software and hardware integration. The Surface Pro 4/Book dock was effectively useless until several firmware updates. Tons and tons of issues -- I had to warranty repair the Surface Pro 4 three times before giving up and selling it. Still plenty of hardware bugs. Scaling on Windows 10 isn't very good outside of most MS developed apps. Battery life is pretty terrible for what it should be. (Do not get an i7 version -- sucks down battery. i5 is better) Hard to do productivity work on the Pro 4 as I really prefer a standard 13 inch notebook minimum. The Book does solve this issue, but I never felt the need to pay the huge price premium for tablet mode. Video drivers for the Pro 4/Book were crashing when browsing for several months after launch. At the end of the day, taking notes in a notebook isn't quite as convenient but just works better than using the pen.
I love the potential the Surface line has, but that's just it, potential. Microsoft needs to focus 10x more on QA. If they control the hardware and software, the result needs to be as seamless as it usually is (or was) on Apple devices. I'd love to see a lower priced Surface Laptop without the screen gimmick for professionals.
Just a note from another user - I bought a book when they first came out and was disappointed in the poor battery management and some serious driver issues. I returned it.
Recently I had a chance to use one for a week and ended up buying it. My big issues were all fixed and it has been a great daily driver for the last month or so. The linux susbsystem has been very useful if you play within it s boundaries and I'm happy with it as a development machine.
Surface Pros: Beautiful hardware, touchscreen works decently, Windows 10 is generally a decent operating system. Keyboard is pretty neat.
Cons: Tremendously buggy software and hardware integration. The Surface Pro 4/Book dock was effectively useless until several firmware updates. Tons and tons of issues -- I had to warranty repair the Surface Pro 4 three times before giving up and selling it. Still plenty of hardware bugs. Scaling on Windows 10 isn't very good outside of most MS developed apps. Battery life is pretty terrible for what it should be. (Do not get an i7 version -- sucks down battery. i5 is better) Hard to do productivity work on the Pro 4 as I really prefer a standard 13 inch notebook minimum. The Book does solve this issue, but I never felt the need to pay the huge price premium for tablet mode. Video drivers for the Pro 4/Book were crashing when browsing for several months after launch. At the end of the day, taking notes in a notebook isn't quite as convenient but just works better than using the pen.
I love the potential the Surface line has, but that's just it, potential. Microsoft needs to focus 10x more on QA. If they control the hardware and software, the result needs to be as seamless as it usually is (or was) on Apple devices. I'd love to see a lower priced Surface Laptop without the screen gimmick for professionals.