Ask Paul: April 30 (Premium)

Happy Friday! I’m kicking off the weekend extra-early today because my wife and I are going on another short trip, this time to complete our Global Entry appointments since we’ll be traveling internationally again this year.

Android tablets

ErichK asks:

Hey Paul. Regarding tablets, one of the areas that iPad seems to have an advantage is in things like music production software. Stuff like that is obviously not important to everybody. Now, I have a coworker who owns a Samsung Galaxy Tab, and he seems very happy with it. Do you think it could be argued that, if really the main things you want to do are surf the web and watch YouTube, that an Android tablet might actually fit the bill, especially if you don’t want to pay the price premium for the Apple product? (Granted, the Galaxy Tab can get a little pricey too, but I think overall Android tablets are cheaper, especially if, God forbid, one even opts for the Amazon Fire.) Of course, iPad quality is superior to all the others, but on the other hand, in my experience, the Android tablets I’ve owned weren’t all that bad either in that department.

People often say that “[some product] works fine for my needs,” and that’s fine. And sure, if your needs are very basic, any device will probably be OK. One could make a case for a convertible Chromebook, too, I guess, and get some additional PC-like functionality.

But I feel like we’re forgetting or ignoring that the iPad isn’t all that expensive. A base 10.2-inch iPad costs $329, which is reasonable for the performance, capabilities, and quality. And that iPad is a much better product than any Android tablet with a similar price. So I’m not sure there’s a real premium being paid there. More to the point, sometimes you really do get what you pay for. I can’t imagine anyone regretting an iPad purchase. (He says, knowing that just writing that will of course trigger that exact testimonial.)

To be clear, I would very much prefer there to be some Android tablet that was a better value—or was just “better”—than the iPad. But I’ve never seen such a thing, not since the Nexus 7 anyway, and me using an iPad every day pretty much says it all: I’d never do that unless it was the best choice and it wasn’t even close.

All-In-One PCs

JF-NYC asks:

I like the look of the new iMac but want a touchscreen and Windows. Do you think Microsoft should make a cheaper version of the Surface Studio for this segment of the market?

Yes. Yes, I do. A Surface Studio Display would also be nice. Just a 3:2 display of any kind would be nice.

What’s my best option for an AIO that costs around $1,500?

I don’t have a lot of experience with recent AIO PCs. I did use some HP Envy AIOs, including one with a curved display, but they weren’t touchscreens. And I think touchscreens make more sense on a PC where you can change the angle of the display, as you can with Surface Studio. That’s not something I’d need or want, as I’m never going to write on the display or whatever. But if you’re looking for that kind of thing, your options are pretty limited. The 27-inch Lenovo Yoga A940 looks good, but it starts at $2200, and the components are a few generations behind. The Lenovo IdeaCentre AIO 3i is also interesting, and much more affordable ($750-ish and up) but with a smaller 24-inch display. Dell has some reasonably-priced ($500 and up) 24- and 27-inch Inspiron AIOs for consumers, but they seem to lack multitouch; but when I looked in the business store, there were touch-based options there for $620 and up (24-inch) and $840 and up (27-inch).

I’ve not used any of those, but maybe someone else has something to recommend.

Email. It had to be email

Finley asks:

I am not sure if there is an answer for this but I am in need of a centralized email client that is preferrable cross-platform (Win10/Web & Android). I have 4 work email accounts with 4 different service providers (of which only 1 is MS365) and would like to simplify or at least centralize them. I currently use the Outlook OWA web app for 1 account (along with the outlook app on Android), the other 3 are set up on my phone only using the Samsung email app. I use the android Gmail app for personal accounts. Is there an email client you would suggest that works across Web/Win 10 and phone? Note: I want to try and separate my personal and work email in different clients if possible so options besides Outlook and Gmail on Android.

This is something I (re)evaluate every year or two, but I long ago moved to a single web client on the PC (Gmail, in my case, but Outlook.com would work just as well) and a single email app (Outlook, in my case, but Gmail and Google Calendar would be fine) on mobile. My most recent article on this topic, Email (Re)Consolidation (Premium), is from December 2020, but I previously wrote about my hunt for a new email client over a series of articles in 2018-2019 after Google killed Inbox (for example, this one).

We’re all going to come to our own conclusions on which client(s) and email management method(s) work best. But I don’t have any issue using Gmail (web) on desktop and Outlook on mobile. My accounts are all consolidated through my primary (Thurrott.com) email account, and I’ve configured the web client to send mail as if from any of the secondary accounts. I prefer this approach because it’s a one-time set-it-and-forget-it kind of thing: When I bring up Gmail on some new PC, everything is already configured exactly right.

Battery life

crunchyfrog asks:

I have always been intrigued with the Surface family of products but one thing that has always bothered me is how Microsoft comes up with its formula for calculating battery life claims.

Every PC maker does this differently, and I’ve seen companies like HP and Lenovo evolve their battery life claims beyond “streaming video on a loop over Wi-Fi,” either by providing multiple sets of battery life examples based on workloads or by moving towards something closer to normal real-world results. Apple is particularly good at the latter, in my experience.

I have seen on their site where they describe how they test but I cannot find a way to achieve those numbers and I do not know any reviewer that has been able to successfully eke out enough juice to reach those claims.

Looking at Surface Laptop 4 as an obvious recent example, I see that Microsoft claims battery life of up to 16.5 or 19 hours depending on the configuration. Kneejerk, those look like “streaming video on a loop over Wi-Fi” numbers to me. I used to perform that kind of test when I reviewed laptops, mostly because everyone was doing it, but those are not real-world tests and they don’t represent “real” battery life. When I see numbers like that, I think, the real-world battery life will be less than half that. And it usually is.

But if you look at the footnotes to the battery life claims, you can see how Microsoft claims to have measured battery life:

“Testing consisted of full battery discharge with a mixture of active use and modern standby. The active use portion consists of (1) a web browsing test accessing 8 popular websites over multiple open tabs, (2) a productivity test utilizing Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel[,] and Outlook, and (3) a portion of time with the device in use with idle applications. All settings were default except screen brightness was set to 150nits with Auto-Brightness disabled. Wi-Fi was connected to a network.”

And that is interesting. The only thing that Microsoft did to artificially bump up the results is to use a very dim screen brightness setting. But what did reviewers find? CNET says that the AMD 15-inch version has “solid battery life,” which it places at 11-12 hours. Engadget, reviewing the same configuration, saw an “an impressive 15 hours and 25 minutes.” TechRadar, falling back on the PCMark 10 benchmark, measured 13 hours and 20 minutes of battery life. Etc.

Those are all great numbers for a 15-inch laptop, frankly. That they fall short of Microsoft’s claims does not surprise me. That they are not half what Microsoft claims … well, that’s also a surprise. A nice surprise.

So how do they come up with their battery life claims; are their testing models flawed or are they just plain lying to the public?

Without seeing exactly what Microsoft did, I think we can explain the difference by understanding that it behooves Microsoft to make multiple tests until they get the best possible results; this lets them make that “up to x hours” claims. But reviewers just review the product and move on. So they’re seeing a slice in time. So I wouldn’t call what Microsoft does “lying,” but it is marketing. And it’s best-case. I mean, of course it is.

And not that I’ve figured this out—I haven’t—but when I review PCs, I use them over a long period of time in a variety of conditions and, ideally, when traveling. And I often see wildly different battery life over that time, depending on what I’m doing. That’s “real-world,” but it’s hard to quantify. We all use computers differently.

Store fees

matsan asks:

Why the sudden drop of Windows Store fees for PC games from 30% to 12%? Indication of lackluster sales? Don’t know much about how distribution of games works, but since no change for console games I guess that business is doing just fine.

Brad and I were speculating about that on today’s First Ring Daily. Long story short, this may be tied to Microsoft opening the Store up to more types of apps this year, something it’s been planning for over two years.

But the other way to look at this is that those with minority positions in a market need to do more than the market leaders to be successful. I think about this with OnePlus, for example, which makes terrific phones but has less mindshare than Apple and Samsung and needs to sell its products for less to attract new customers.

In the app store space, one might argue that a store that has not been successful cannot just do what the market leaders are doing—charging the industry-standard 30/15 percent fee structure—but must instead offer developers incentives. And much lower fees are an obvious and perhaps necessary step.

I’m wondering if Microsoft will announce at Build that this new fee structure is for all apps, and not just games.

iPad Pro M1

peterc asks:

Hi Paul, I’m curious about the iPad Pro refresh with an M1 chip and upgraded internals. I use a 2020 11” iPad Pro and have found it to be a device I use constantly alongside my main windows desktop during the “day” and as a companion device in the evening alongside the TV or as the main media streaming device depending on what else is happening around the family etc. It’s noticeable how it’s “eating” into my daily screen time cross both work and play usage. The introduction of the M1 chip, ram and storage raises the issue of exactly what apps and software this new iPad Pro, and iPad os is looking to run going forward, and how much further it will “eat into” people’s daily work flow. What do you think?

From what I can tell, the primary differences between an Ax-based iPad Pro and the new M1-based iPad Pro models are their Thunderbolt support, which is important for creative professionals especially, and the extra RAM (which Apple had never advertised with iPads before), which should benefit any power users or, over time, all users since it will help with longevity. But I think you’re onto the primary, if vague, benefit of this switch: As the iPad Pro becomes more capable, it’s possible for more users to use it for more tasks, and it takes up a bigger chunk of the daily workflow. Surely, the endgame here is to make it possible for more and more users to use only an iPad Pro, or at least use it as their primary device.

This seems odd to me, and probably to anyone outside of Apple. I look at this and think, why not just put Mac apps on iPad Pro? Why not just add touchscreens to Macs? Because Apple sees these things as separate products with their own unique strengths, I guess. But the push to make M1 and future Apple Silicon chipsets in some ways makes even more sense now that we know these chips will not only be used in Macs. Over time, I expect—and I suspect that Apple expects— the iPad to be the bigger product, by volume, than the Mac. But both can coexist and evolve using similar underpinnings.

The big thing to watch in this space is the growth of professional graphics and video apps on iPad Pro going forward.

Club TWiT

helix2301 asks:

What do you think about club twit? Will you be doing any events or be joining the discord?

Having gone down the premium route previously, I completely understand what they’re doing and why, and I like what they’ve come up with. (I recommend that they offer discounts on 3-, 6-, and/or 12-month subscriptions, but I bet that happens over time.) I also understand the challenges. But overall, it looks both solid and smart, and I bet it’s successful.

I did join Discord for Club TWiT, and we’ve already started using it on the podcast to take viewer questions during the show. This is actually pretty exciting. Mary Jo and I had always wanted to do regular Q&A during the show, but it wasn’t really feasible with the previous setup we were using. Suddenly, it’s very possible, and I think it will get more sophisticate as we get more used to it.

Xbox Elite Controller

jblanks69 asks:

Is the Xbox Elite Controller Series 2 worth the money?

I purchased the first-generation Elite controller and based on that experience, I decided not to get the new version. This is probably more about me than about the controller, which is of incredible quality. But I abuse these things, and even the Elite controller eventually became unusable. Knowing I’m going to ruin the thing, I’m OK just using the normal controller, and I really like the small changes, some inspired by the Elite controllers, that Microsoft made the most recent version.

But should you buy one? That’s the type of question I think both Brad and I would answer the same way: You’ll know if you should buy one. If you’re questioning it, you probably shouldn’t. The Elite controller speaks most strongly to two types of gamers, I think. Literal professionals who compete in tournaments to make money, and those who play particular types of games—racing games, in particular, and soon, I bet, Microsoft Flight Simulator—where the customizable paddles and other controller bits can really make a big difference. I just flounder around in Call of Duty, and I just don’t get any benefit from it.