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Windows 8 Pro Tablets: The Limitations of Switching from Laptops to Tablets



With more offices and schools opting for virtual attendance or hybrid schedules, a tablet can be a great alternative to a laptop with its portability, ease-of-use, and connectivity options. A good tablet is something that should have a long battery life, a respectable selection of apps and services, and have more functionality than just a screen to watch YouTube videos.




Windows 8 Pro Tablets : Not A Good Laptop Replacement




With an Android tablet of this size, you're most likely looking at it as a laptop replacement. That means you'll want to pick up the $349 Book Cover Keyboard. Once connected, you'll be able to use Samsung DeX on the S8 Ultra, effectively turning the tablet into an Android-powered 2-in-1 device with plenty of space for multitasking and using more than one app at a time.


That depends on what you want to use your tablet or laptop for. Digital artists tend to prefer tablets since they're easier to draw on with a stylus. Tablets are also great for photo editing and streaming movies if you get one with a large enough screen size. But if you want to do things like create spreadsheets, type in a word processing program, or do intensive 3D animation or modeling, you're better off with a laptop.


With Windows tablets running the gamut from low-power entertainment devices to potent tools for productivity, how do you know which one to buy if you plan to use your device for both types of tasks? As with conventional laptops, a lot comes down to the processor.


There's even a Windows tablet version of FaceID, the feature that lets you unlock your Apple iPhone or iPad Pro simply by looking at it. Called Windows Hello, it's also available on laptops and desktops, but it's most useful on tablets that don't have a keyboard handy to enter a complex, secure password.


Finally, what if you simply can't live without a real keyboard, but don't want the hassle of carrying a separate one around? Some convertible laptops have keyboards that fold around the back, so you can use them as traditional clamshell laptops, as tablets, or at any position in between. We've only included detachable Windows tablets here; to learn more about screen-rotating convertibles, read our roundup of the best 2-in-1 laptops.


Android folks have a wider set of options, but since Android apps aren't thriving on tablets as much as anyone would hope, this is a good time to consider all of your options. Yes the Galaxy Tab S6 has a fantastic screen and Android apps, but isn't Windows 10 a more capable platform? If you're nodding your head "yes," then the Surface Go 2 is the best tablet for you. That all being said, if you've got a big enough family, and you're all living in the Amazon Prime ecosystem, go for the Fire 7 if you're trying to fit to a budget, and the Fire HD 10 if you are tired of devices that don't have USB-C.


The iPad Air is certainly a fantastic tablet, but how well can it function as a laptop replacement? Our own Kelly Woo tried to use the iPad Air 4 for work while at the airport last year and found it lacking. But now there's a new iPad Air in town, and you might be wondering: Is this the iPad that will replace your laptop? Should it?


For the first time in a while, the comparison feels too close to call. The iPad Pro continues to improve as a laptop replacement, and the Surface Pro 8 now feels more like a proper tablet thanks to Windows 11, a new 120Hz screen, and slimmer bezels. However, Android apps are still waiting in the wings for a future update of Windows 11, leaving a a bit of an app gap for mobile use.


The Surface Pro offers the most seamless transition from a traditional laptop to a tablet, simply because it runs a laptop operating system and it's designed like one. The entry-level Surface Pro 7 is also a good budget option. If you want to run the exact same software and workflow as a laptop, the Surface Pro 7 will let you do just that.


But if you aren't tied to Windows, the iPad Pro is the better tablet, especially after a serious refresh in 2021 with a great redesign, a massive upgrade to internals, and a display that shines. While it may not offer the same laptop-replacement experience as a Surface Pro, it's a powerful device.


The Geekbench 5 CPU test told a similar tale with the Pro 8 easily outstripping both the Pro 7 and Pro X Surface tablets and the chipset even has performance enough to allow a little light gaming, the Metro Redux benchmark returning an average frame rate of 57fps at 1,920 x 1,080 (although only 22.3fps at the native resolution of 2,880 x 1,920). The GFXbench Car Chase benchmark also shows good performance at 1080p.


The idea of replacing your laptop with a tablet is not a new one. For workers lugging heavy laptop bags and businesses seeking to provide employees with flexible technology for working remotely, sleek powerful tablets hold a lot of appeal. But for a tablet to truly replace your PC, it has to tick a lot of boxes.


Laptops might be the primary office companion for some, but tablets offer a new world of features for those looking to tackle productivity outside the office. The Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 allows you to replace your laptop with a tablet, so you can enjoy a lightweight, portable solution with the processing power to move you through your day. With office-friendly features like Multi-Active Window mode, Samsung DeX, S Pen and integrated 5G cellular connectivity, you can work productively from anywhere.


iPads have long been able to connect to keyboards, but this year Apple upped the ante. The Magic Keyboard the company launched in May for the iPad Pro features not only a keyboard (duh), but also a trackpad. Starting at $299 -- yes, for just the keyboard add-on -- it's not cheap. But it helps make the iPad Pro a legitimate laptop replacement, in most ways, at least. The iPad Pro starts at $799.


The two machines have different goals. The iPad Pro is more of an ultraportable device you can carry with you everywhere you go, and that finally works as a full-time laptop replacement, while the Surface Book shoots at being a portable desktop replacement or even a tabletized gaming PC.


I'm more excited about the future of the iPad, and have high hopes about iPadOS turning the iPad Pro into a device that can be recommended to all professionals. But this is why I say my love is irrational: It's still more of a complement to a laptop rather than a replacement.


People buy Surface tablets or laptops because they use it for on the go projects or sticky situations where you need to go out and still go on with your work, and having a portable device you can carry anytime and anywhere is convenient. That is where these recommendations on the top go in, all of them are portable enough for you to carry anywhere and some even have powerful specs that could beat full pledged laptops in the market.


While we'll leave our thoughts on the Pro 3's so-called "lapability" for our upcoming laptop version of this review, there's a lot to like about the slate's abilities as a tablet. There may be some sore spots when it comes to using software with the touchscreen, but this is honestly the first tablet that we're comfortable calling a true laptop replacement. Though many have searched far and wide for this goldilocks sweet-spot of form and function, this is the device that gets it just about right.


If we're forced to pick nits with the Surface Pro 3, the tablet side of things is where we'd do it. While it is incredibly thin and light for a laptop, it's slightly heavier and thicker than most of the tablets it'll be competing with. If you're used to doing everything with an iPad Air, for example, the Pro 3 is going to feel heavy. That's largely because of the processor it packs, but also because of the (relatively) enormous 12-inch screen.


Another area where the Surface Pro 3 really sets itself apart from other tablets is the ability to use a wide range of peripherals. Again, we'll address things like the incoming docking station in our laptop review, but the inclusion of a full USB 3.0 port and a 4K-ready Mini DisplayPort for driving an external display puts the Surface Pro 3 on another level compared to most tablets. Simply the fact that you can hook up an external HDD without wonky workarounds makes the Pro 3 one of the best media consumption tablets on the market. And that's before we even discuss the excellent Surface Pen, which is included by default and makes jotting down quick reminders and notes incredibly easy.


Last but not least, the Surface Pro can also make use of the excellent Type cover. Though the new Type cover will set you back an additional $129.99, it's a superb investment for those times when you need to sit down and write something longer than a quick e-mail. It has a much larger touchpad that feels as good as just about any current Windows 8 laptop and we were easily able to hit 40+ WPM with its keys right out of the box. If you are picking up the Surface Pro 3 as a do-it-all device, it should be considered standard equipment.


If you've ever gone shopping for a tablet, you may have noticed that there isn't all that much different from one to the next. There can be big differences if you just look at a spec sheet, but in the tablet space that rarely translate to improved performance. Now that the category has caught up with the low end of laptops, we're starting to see a sort of leveling-off of competition, where most tablets easily clear the "good enough" hurdle. There's only so much performance you need to play Angry Birds. While that may be true of conventional tablets, the Surface Pro 3 changes the equation.


A device with 8 gigabytes of RAM, an Intel Core processor (the Pro 3 comes in i3, i5, i7 models), 256 gigabytes of solid-state drive space, along with even a pedestrian laptop graphics chip is completely overpowered in comparison to most tablets. Though we don't account for benchmark scores between tablets, the Surface Pro 3 absolutely wrecks everything else by an enormous margin. In fact, we tested the Surface Pro 3 as a laptop as well, and the i5 model scored within the top 10% of all laptops (as of May 22, 2014). And that's the middle-of-the-road review unit option: What hope does a tablet have in comparison? For most mobile apps, it's like using a chainsaw to cut butter. 2ff7e9595c


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