Microsoft Surface Touch Cover splits within days, exposing wire; early users complain

“Some early users of the Touch Cover of Microsoft’s Surface tablet say one of the edges splits to expose a wire just days after they starting using it,” Charles Arthur reports for The Guardian.

“A number of users on the Surface Forums site have reported the problem, which has also been experienced by Tom Warren, a writer on The Verge website and Matthew Baxter-Reynolds, a Windows developer,” Arthur reports. “The defect is identical in each case: the cover, which has an integral keyboard, begins to split at its seam where the device attaches magnetically to the main computer.”

“It’s unclear whether the problems that people have encountered are due to a faulty batch or are a subtle problem that will become more apparent as more people use it for longer- but the fact that users in the US and the UK have reported the problem suggests that it is not isolated to a single manufacturing batch,” Arthur reports. “Microsoft is expected to sell millions of the devices, though it has given no preliminary or forecast sales figures.”

MacDailyNews Take: By whom? Who expects Microsoft to sell millions of the devices? Well, ’tis true that two million units would be “millions,” but that would equal a total failure, so, yeah, “millions of devices” sounds great, but it’s really a failed product. Zune. Kin. Microsoft needs to sell tens of millions just to grab a mere toehold in the iPad market and hundreds of millions to change the iPad market into a tablet market.

Arthur reports, “The split seems to caused by mechanical stress on the cover. One poster on the Surface Forums spot commented: ‘I believe the seam can loosen easily if it’s bent back and you let the Surface rest on your lap (for example, when you’re reclining and reading something)…’ As another user suggested, that suggests the cover is failing in its job as a lid for a device that is designed to be used as both a tablet and a laptop computer.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Microsoft. We make garbage with a kickstand. Plus, we’re run by a clown. You can be a clown, too, if you waste your hard-earned money on our half-assed, ill-considered crap.

Excusing the reviewers, who are paid to suffer with garbage products, how morbidly stupid do you have to be to choose Microsoft in 2012, much less pay to be an early adopter of any Microsoft product?

[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “RastaMouse” for the heads up.]

Related articles:
Slate reviews Microsoft’s Surface tablet: Too slow, mercilessly buggy; why is it so bad? – November 6, 2012
Microsoft’s bloated Windows RT eats 16GB of Surface tablet – November 5, 2012
InfoWorld reviews Microsoft Surface RT: A disappointment; you’re better off with Apple’s iPad – October 31, 2012
Acer delays Windows RT tablets; adopts ‘wait and see’ approach after poor Surface RT reviews – October 30, 2012
Gizmodo reviews Microsoft Surface RT: Do not buy; inferior to Apple’s iPad; the worst of both worlds – October 25, 2012
The Verge reviews Microsoft Surface RT tablet: ‘The whole thing is honestly perplexing; who is this for?’ – October 24, 2012
Analyst: Microsoft’s Surface RT tablet priced too high, could be the next Zune – October 18, 2012
Dvorak: ‘Microsoft’s Surface tablet isn’t the Apple iPad, so it shouldn’t be priced like one’ – October 18, 2012
Microsoft inexplicably claims Surface RT tablet lower resolution screen beats iPad with Retina display – October 17, 2012
Microsoft Surface RT tablet Wi-Fi-only; 32GB for $599 with, $499 without keyboard, $699 for 64GB – October 16, 2012
Microsoft airs first TV ad for Surface tablet (with video) – October 15, 2012
Apple’s ‘iPad mini’ to obliterate Microsoft’s Windows 8, Surface RT tablet launches – October 13, 2012
Acer CEO to Microsoft: ‘Think twice’ about Surface tablets – August 7, 2012
Microsoft Surface tablet pricing leaked; US$1,000 for ‘cheapest’ Windows RT model – July 26, 2012
Ballmer: Uh, yeah, ‘Surface is just a design point,’ you know – July 10, 2012
Microsoft’s Buffoon, er… Ballmer throws down gauntlet against Apple – July 10, 2012
Microsoft reportedly dumps ‘VaporMg’ chassis, will use ‘VaporMg’ only as ‘surface treatment’ – July 9, 2012
Microsoft’s downfall: Inside the executive e-mails and cannibalistic culture that fueled Microsoft’s lost decade – July 7, 2012
HP said to dump Microsoft over Surface; to cozy up to Google Android for tablet efforts – July 2, 2012
Bad news for Microsoft’s iPad killer? – July 2, 2012
Dear Microsoft, Steve Balmer and Bill Gates: What is up with your obsession with keyboards? – June 28, 2012
Jason Schwarz: Top 10 reasons why Microsoft’s Surface is DOA – June 22, 2012
Why I love Microsoft’s vaporware Surface tablet – June 22, 2012
Microsoft’s Surface tablet said to be Wi-Fi only at launch; no 4G, no 3G, no 2G, not even 1G – June 22, 2012
Microsoft outsources Surface assembly to Pegatron; prices above $799 for Windows 8, above $599 for Windows RT expected – June 21, 2012
Acer founder: Microsoft will quit making tablets soon – June 21, 2012
Devastating video shows Microsoft’s Surface event aping Steve Jobs’ iPad unveiling (with video) – June 20, 2012
Thanks to Apple, Microsoft is doomed in the era of mobile computing – June 20, 2012
Why wouldn’t Microsoft let anyone touch its Surface tablets’ keyboard cover? – June 20, 2012
The cost of Microsoft’s Surface tablets – June 20, 2012
Apple’s revolutionary iPad vs. Microsoft’s anti-tablet ‘Surface’ – June 20, 2012
Microsoft’s Surface tablets provokes ‘sense of betrayal’ among Windows PC assemblers – June 20, 2012
Fox News: Copier Microsoft is doomed to fail with Surface tablet – June 19, 2012
Microsoft’s Surface tablet destined to be as successful as the Zune – June 19, 2012
Surface: Why Microsoft’s big mystery turns out to be a big mistake – June 19, 2012
Microsoft’s Suicide, er… ‘Surface’ – June 19, 2012
ZDNet Sr. Tech Editor Perlow: Microsoft’s Surface has catastrophe written all over it – June 19, 2012
Microsoft previews own ‘Surface’ tablet – June 18, 2012
Microsoft touts ‘major’ June 18 event said to showcase Windows RT tablets – June 15, 2012
ZDNet’s Kingsley-Hughes: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is an awful, horrible, painful design disaster – June 8, 2012
Analyst meets with big computer maker, finds ‘general lack of enthusiasm’ for Windows 8 – June 8, 2012
Dvorak: Windows 8 an unmitigated disaster; unusable and annoying; it makes your teeth itch – June 3, 2012
The Guardian: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is confusing as hell; an appalling user experience – March 5, 2012
More good news for Apple: Microsoft previews Windows 8 (with video) – June 1, 2011

49 Comments

  1. I had read that some reviewers (not sure if they actually had one to review) found the Surface ‘exciting’. Now these reviewers can add “electrifying” to their descriptions. Or that users will “get a charge out of typing..”. Or that the Surface will “zap the competition … and the user!” Love it.

    1. That is correct. The first 16GB is the bloated always freezing and crashing Windows 8 OS. Without a lot of apps to take up storage room, no one really needs any of the first 16 GB.

      The Windows viruses and malware will fill the balance of the Surface device storage. Isn’t that why they went with Windows again?

  2. That’s SUCH a shame. . .

    Surface is a cool idea on paper, but in reality? Not so much. It’s ALL in the execution, and MS has never executed their (sometimes great) ideas well, so it’s all for naught.

    1. “MS has never executed their (sometimes great) ideas well,”

      NOT THEIR IDEAS, their Stolen or hostile purchased ideas, they usually take the stolen ones and turn them around which makes them backwards (go to start to stop the computer, etc,,,,)

  3. $69 for a beautiful apple bluetooth wireless keyboard to work with iPad
    or
    $120 or $130 for the plastic surface keyboard that breaks after 3 days of use.

    MS is in big trouble.

    1. I’ll give you another 36 hours until the case splits and you’re desperately trying to cover up the fact that what you’ve actually bought is an overpriced piece of plastic garbage.

  4. hilarious that Apple competitors/naysayers mock Apple’s perfectionist engineering prowess for materials & finishing touches.

    want a perfectionist reason as to why such german-style engineering is a must?!:
    Cheap plastics suck!
    Buy Apple (& AAPL).

    lest you prefer to be frustrated & jump out of Windows or fiddle instead of be productive in peace.

    Peace!

  5. I love how MS solution to not having a presence in the tablet market is to make a tablet then make a cover that forces the user to use it like a laptop, and charge them more than the price of a windoze laptop.

  6. “…you let the Surface rest on your lap (for example, when you’re reclining and reading something…”

    There’s the problem. The Surface is meant for work and serious business, not a recreational item. Stop relaxing, put the Surface on your desk so you can work hard. MS isn’t going to make money on recreational items.

Reader Feedback

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.