Ask Paul: June 8 (Premium)

Happy sort-of summer, everyone. Here’s another set of good questions and me doing what I can with them.

Surface Hub 2

will asks:

I was watching the Surface Hub 2 video again and I noticed something that I missed before. At the 0:50 mark the person is able to login to the Hub and pull up her profile and timeline with what is assumed to be a fingerprint. My question is how is this possible? I understand how a fingerprint login works, but how is the Hub able to identify her and pull her timeline data via a device that does not store much locally?

You are correct that it will work like Windows 10 does today on PCs. And given that, it’s obvious that this isn’t the first time that this person has logged into this Surface Hub 2. If it was, that would have taken several minutes. (Also, the video is obviously a fake demo. But whatever.)

This capability is one of the biggest differences between the original Surface Hub, which was “user-less,” meaning that there were no local logins—and Surface Hub 2. When we were briefed about this device, many had questions about this behavior and what it meant for the OS. But Microsoft isn’t talking about that just yet. I suspect we’ll learn more at Ignite in September.

Laptop recommendation

KingNerdTheThird asks:

I need to get a laptop for school. At the moment I’m looking around and the ASUS ZenBook Flip S catches my eye but I’m not blown away. I love the Surface Laptop (especially the 3:2 screen) but I’m scared of the out of date internals to drop that cash on it. I like the XPS 13 but it doesn’t get to the specs I’d like. There are a lot of good laptops but the Surface Laptop is the one I’d get if it was updated… Do you think think it’s worth waiting until August or September to see if Microsoft does update their products?

I get the “which laptop should I buy” question a lot. It’s tough to answer this because we all have our own experiences, preferences, and needs.

And then for me, personally, there’s another issue: The crushing weight of responsibility I feel when it comes to recommending something expensive that people may actually buy. I know other reviewers don’t feel this—you can tell by the way they write and clearly barely use the products they review—but it’s very really for me.

For example. On paper, Surface Laptop and Surface Book 2 are devices no one should recommend: They’re overpriced, both lack Thunderbolt 3, and Surface Laptop still uses previous-generation dual-core Intel processors while the rest of the market has moved forward. But I personally love both products. And I would be happy to use either daily as my only PC. So I’m in kind of a weird spot where I need to consider others’ needs, and the future, but I still really like them myself.

Someone else recommended a very specific PC, the Huawei MateBook X Pro, which I’m now reviewing. And I can confirm this is a great choice. Is it “better” than a Surface, or an HP Spectre whatever, or a ThinkPad? Or the PC you mention? They all have their pros and cons, and I’m sure many would be happy with any of them.

Ultimately this is a heart and mind thing. That is, we can be all logical about this decision, which is good. But we need to address the emotional aspect of it as well, and I think that’s part of the decision-making process that many don’t address head-on even though it’s unavoidable.

So, you either need it now or you don’t. But if you were to buy, say, a Surface Laptop today and Microsoft updated it in x number of weeks or months, would that ruin the experience for you? If yes, then, yes, I’d wait. Surface has turned into this unknowable nightmare from a release cadence perspective, but I have a hard time believing that Microsoft will not update its lineup sometime this year.

I feel like this doesn’t help very much, sorry.

iOS vs. Android

dcdevito asks:

Paul, is there anything in iOS 12 that Apple showed at WWDC that will make you switch back to iOS on mobile?

No. In fact, the WWDC announcements combined with this growing awareness of my feelings about Android has triggered an interesting change. Which is that I really do prefer Android.

I’m working on an article called Embracing Android that addresses this. Without giving the whole thing away, I think the key part of it, so far, is this.

“If I were being honest with myself, I always sort of expected to bounce back and forth between Android and iOS, and that maybe some future iPhone release, or iOS release, would be good enough to make me want to switch back.

The iPhone X was excellent, but not good enough to pull me back into the hazy Cupertino fold. And iOS 12 looks solid, especially the much-needed performance improvements after the disaster of iOS 11. But not enough to make me overlook iOS’s ongoing limitations. And Android’s strengths.”

The part I haven’t written yet is that these things don’t exist in isolation. This isn’t really about just iOS vs. Android, it’s about the whole ecosystem around each. And I just very much prefer Google services over Apple, it’s not even close. I very much prefer Project Fi. And the camera in my Pixel 2 XL is superior to the one in the iPhone X. (If you don’t agree with that last one, I can add “for my needs” since I very much love the low-light stuff, and this is where Google excels.)

I assume I’ll finish this eventually. But the point is, no. Apple appears to be doing the right thing with iOS 12. But it’s not especially enticing to me.

Sets

hrlngrv asks:

The first RS5 Fast Ring Insider build (probably also skip ahead builds before 1803) allowed users to disable Sets through Settings in the Multitasking screen. Subsequent RS5 builds haven’t shown that option in Settings. Is Sets going to be a feature that’s always there with no way to disable it or use alternatives like Groupy?

This is an amazing question in the sense that I was literally just thinking about this.

Rafael has a tool called Mach 2 that can enable Sets for those Insiders who are not seeing this feature. (As you may recall, Microsoft is annoyingly doing A/B testing right now on Sets.) I assume that this tool could be used to disable Sets too. The command line to enable it is:

mach2 enable 13849566 -v 1 mach2 enable 10727725 -v 1

I will ask him about this. But there is no UI for toggling Sets today in the latest Insider Preview build. I agree that there should be, and I would be surprised if Microsoft didn’t add this to Settings before RS5 ships.

Four bloggers walk into a bar

StevenLayton asks:

Paul Thurrott, Mary Jo Foley, Brad Sams and Andrew Zarian walk into a bar. At the end of the night, which one is the most worse for wear? Who handles their alcohol the best?

This one is easy because it happens all the time.

Mary Jo and Andrew are both professionals and would either out-drink me or at least equal me and would appear the next morning fresh and ready to go. I find this irritating.

Brad would leave earlier than everyone else because he is somehow able to say no. And he, too, would appear the next morning fresh and ready to go. I also find this irritating.

I would be destroyed and would wake up the next morning with a vicious hangover that lasts until dinner. And I would greet whichever of these three I saw first with, “Just so we’re clear, I f#$%ing hate you.”

I’m a great friend.

WWDC keynote

spacecamel asks:

Apple’s Keynote seemed to drag on with little additional detail in places. Do you think they had to drop something at the last minute because it is not ready like the Homepod in previous years? Any guesses on what it could be?

I didn’t get the vibe that there was a last-minute removal of some big announcement. But I’m a bit surprised that they didn’t have a more obvious “one more thing” moment. Some have pointed to the iOS apps on macOS thing as that moment. But for that to have been done correctly, Tim Cook would have presented it when he walked on for the ending. It did feel anticlimactic.

Apple is often praised for its keynotes, but their pacing is all over the map, and that was true even back in the Steve Jobs days. I would have spent less time on some of the frivolous stuff (AR, emojis, Apple Watch) and would have announced hardware, especially Mac hardware. It’s so very needed. And so crushingly disappointing to fans that it’s not happening yet.

Groove on mobile

harmjr asks:

Do you think those of us who actual use Groove on Android app that they will break it from working or do you think after the expiration it will continue to work on those who still have the app?

According to Microsoft, it’s going to stop working.

“After December 1, 2018, the apps won’t work and should be uninstalled.”

Do you know of any other 3rd party apps out there that work with OneDrive?

I don’t, but as I wrote last week, your best choice is to upload that music to Google Play Music and use that instead. It’s free.