This is even more of a knock to Microsoft but the overheating during sleep issue can affect any windows laptop made in the last 5 or so years. The cause is nothing surface specific, it’s Microsoft enforcing “Modern standby” and blocking S3/S4 sleep states in windows. My best understanding is that some bug causes the system to stay awake after one of the periodic wake ups to check for updates/notifications that happen in modern standby.

> One of the Surface things split into two parts, the screen (containing the actual computer) and the keyboard. There was something weird about connecting and disconnecting those parts, some motorized docking/undocking mechanism, that caused problems.

Yep, that's the Surface Book (original). I've got one, and mine still works! Somehow.

That detach mechanism is insane. As far as I've been able to put together (I haven't done a patent search or anything, just heard bits from people who'd know), there's no motor involved... it's way weirder. I believe the thing actually heats up a nitinol shape-memory alloy latch in the base so it detaches from the tablet piece. That heating is why it takes a couple seconds. But then reattachment is instant, so it's just something clicking in to place. And you can't reattach immediately, because the base has to cool down (just a few seconds, short enough that you never notice unless you're deliberately messing with it). Black magic!

I'm not 100% sure of any of the above, except the use of nitinol somewhere. That's right, the weirdest piece of the conjecture is the only one I've got hard confirmation of. Like I said, black magic.

The bottom half of Surface Laptop(with the bending snake hinge) is a not-the-Thunderbolt dock. It has an optional GPU and fan in addition to what's obviously in it. So you're attaching battery at different SOC, and PCIe device, and keyboard and such, all at once, when the thing appears. No surprise that such a thing is not so reliable.

Windows 8.1 and a Surface Pro 2, touch first with the start screen completely replacing the desktop outside storing files, was fantastic. It felt new and functional in the world of ungainly non Apple tablets, could do everything a regular laptop could, and boast solid touch support and features. It was a phenomenal device for me in college for notes given I had my own wireless keyboard for long typing sessions. Given the rush for digital text books, PDF or terrible, its form factor and flexibility made sense.

But I completely understand why it didn't meet market expectations and the 8/8.1 UI fell off a cliff. If you weren't willing tyo overhaul how you interacted with a Windows device and use it as designed, or needed something that was better at any given feature the surface tablet presented, it was not the right option.

I would love an option for the 8.1 style start screen on Windows 11, at least for a touch screen laptop. It really worked for me and how I used a computer at that point in time. I have an 8.1 install iso hanging around in case it comes up.

the split thing got updates that juat made it unable to be removed except while the device is restarting

but also, it was really easy to accidentally lock the screen while removing it, at which point youd put it back on to get the password filled in again

that and if the battery got low, youd be stuck with it in the wrong configuration, so the screen would get scratched

>>Then Microsoft had the episode where some of their Surface hardware would not reliably stay in sleep mode and cooked itself while being transported in a bag

To be fair, I've had exactly this with a Dell, MSI and a Razer laptop in the last few years. The only way I can reliably get it to stop waking up while asleep(and never going back to sleep) is disable sleep entirely and use hibernation instead. It's insane that such a basic functionality seems to be broken across a whole range of hardware.