The $800 Surface Killer #Helpful Post

 Hey guys, this is Austin.

Put the Eve V side-by-side with the Microsoft Surface Pro

and you'll see that they look pretty similar.

A quick glance at the Eve site makes the comparison obvious.

But take a closer look

and you'll see that this is a really interesting device.

The second you open the box you'll see the names

of a thousand people who contributed to the design

of the Eve V.

The idea was that this was a crowd designed device.

Eve originally reached out to me over a year ago

asking if I wanted to take a look at the V

and in the meantime

a lot of the specs have legitimately changed

based on community feedback.

This is a really cool idea.

Of course, there are downsides to buying

from a small startup,

but you can't fault them for trying a new approach.

However when you consider just how good the Surface Pro is

the V has to do some really cool stuff

to justify it's existence.

And it kind of does.

While at first glance it looks incredibly similar

to the Surface.

Take a closer look and there are some thoughtful details.

Instead of a single USB-A and the bizarre Mini DisplayPort

on the Pro, you're getting two full-size USB ports

in addition to a pair of USB-C ports,

one of which is full Thunderbolt 3

and both can be used for charging.

Now there is no facial recognition with Windows Hello

but you do have a slightly hidden fingerprint sensor

and a very similarly adjustable kickstand.

Again, at first glance the detachable keyboard

looks nearly identical to the Surface

but it has a surprisingly mechanical feel

with a lot of key travel.

It's not what you would typically expect to find

on a laptop or a two-in-one.

And while it took me a few minutes to get used to,

it kinda makes the Surface feel a little bit spongy

in comparison.

You've also got the slightly unnecessary RGB backlight

but it does double as a Bluetooth keyboard.

Detach it from the V and hold control and F12

to sync it wirelessly.

I don't know how often I would end up using this

but it is a nice feature.

I will say the trackpad isn't amazing.

It's totally fine

and combined with the touchscreen navigation is okay,

but I do prefer the clicky-ness

of the Surface Pro touch pad.

Probably the best feature of the keyboard

is that it's actually included in the box.

This is almost a necessity on a two-in-one like this

and on the Surface it will cost you another $130

to get the keyboard.

Big props to Eve for, you know,

including that basic necessity in the box.

It goes beyond that too.

They also include a pen.

Another $100 addition on the Surface.

To be fair, it's based on slightly older tech

than the latest Surface pen but the slight difference

in latency really isn't a big problem for me.

And again, it's included in the box.

One minor issue I've noticed is that while both tablets

have a microSD card slot, the Eve has a little notch on it

which makes it really difficult

to actually remove the SD card, which is just kind of dumb.

The rest of the hardware feels decent.

It's a bit heavier and entire thing is more rounded,

which feels a bit cheaper

than the incredibly tight tolerances

of the magnesium Surface.

But importantly both have fan-less designs.

Well mostly.

The Eve uses lower wattage Core Y processors,

so on paper this is a trade-off between performance

and battery life.

On one hand you are going to be losing a little bit

of performance, especially in heavier tasks,

such as video editing and gaming.

But on the flip side at least in theory

you're going to be getting better battery life.

However when you stack it up to the Surface Pro

not only does it offer a higher wattage Core i5 model,

which is still going to be fan-less,

but it also has better battery life

at 13 and a half hours compared to 10 hours on the Eve V.

The model I have here is almost top spec

with a seventh generation Core i7 processor, 16 gigs of RAM,

and a 512 gigabyte SSD, which comes in at $1,600.

However if you want to pick up the base model

with the Core m3, eight gigs of RAM and 128 gigs of storage,

that starts at $800.

Put the speced out V

alongside the $1,300 Core i5 Surface Pro,

and you'll see that they're fairly comparable in Geekbench

and that holds up well in real world usage.

The Eve is snappy and for normal stuff it's totally fine.

Just don't expect to go and do anything

all that taxing on it.

You do have that Thunderbolt 3 port

which allows you to take advantage of an external GPU

but for most people

that's going to be a little bit too much.

Screen-wise the Eve has a 12.3 inch panel

with a resolution of 2880x1920.

It's a good screen.

You're getting an individually calibrated display

straight from the factory,

that while on paper is slightly sharper than the Surface,

but in reality both are top notch.

I will say the rounded edges of the V

does make the bezels look a little bit bigger

but there really isn't much to complain about

when it comes to the screen.

However the speakers, while decent,

fall quite a bit short

of the front firing ones on the Surface.

This is what the webcam looks and sounds like on the Eve V.

So as you can see it's a little bit grainy

but for stuff like Skype and Google Hangouts

it should be okay.

On the flip side the Surface looks significantly better.

Not only is it going to be 1080p,

but as you can see it is no longer the soupy mess

of the Eve.

The story of Eve is great.

I mean who doesn't want to root for the underdog?

And to be clear, the V is a good computer.

Not only does it generally match

or even exceed the Surface in a lot of areas,

but it's around the same price or cheaper

and it includes not only the keyboard and also the pen,

which Microsoft is going to charge you over $200 for.

The problem is that they're building these to order

so availability is a lot more complicated

than you might hope for.

However if you're willing to take a chance on a new company

the Eve V is absolutely worth a look.

So what do you guys think?

Is this a true Surface Pro killer?

Let me know in the comments below

and I will catch you on the next one.