Why I'm Warming Up to iPad Pro, Surface Pro as PC Replacements

Ever since 2-in-1s were introduced about five years ago, I've been skeptical of this form factor.

The idea of marrying a tablet and a keyboard was a disconnect for me. Part of the reason is that I am a diehard laptop user. My love affair with laptops goes back to the early 1980s, when I used a pseudo laptop, the Tandy TRS 80, as a portable word processor. Then in 1984, I was asked to work with IBM's research group on what became its first full-fledged laptop and ever since then, a laptop has been my go-to computing device. I have used desktops from time to time, but since I travel so much, a laptop has long been my primary computing tool.

My first foray into the 2-in-1 concept was with Lenovo's Yoga. Since the screen did not detach, I used it as a traditional laptop, but never in tablet mode. My first real experience with a tablet/keyboard combo came through Microsoft's first Surface product, and that experience was so bad it put me off this type of device for a couple of years. I have to admit that I did use a Bluetooth keyboard with an iPad from day one and liked the mobile flexibility it gave me for things like email and notetaking. However, it never replaced my laptop since I could never do the kind of heavy lifting a true laptop delivers.

But over the last two years, the technology to deliver a more robust 2-in-1 experience has gotten much better and there are two products I think might be pointing us to the next major shift in portable computing. Microsoft's Surface Pro and Apple's new iPad Pro ( at Amazon)  are at the moment the best of breed in 2-in-1s.

I like the design and the keyboard on my Surface Pro 3 ($889.00 at Amazon) , coupled with Windows 10, make this 2-in-1 a good mobile computer. It delivers the power of Windows and, even with its lack of a large pool of touch-based apps, I can see how it could be a laptop replacement for some people. But I still struggle with its layout and smaller fonts and am not convinced that it could replace my Dell XPS 13 ($979.00 at Amazon)  or my Lenovo Yoga as my full-time portable computer. Call me old-school when it comes to the Windows platform, but these traditional laptops still seem a better fit for my needs.

As for the iPad Pro, at first I really struggled with such a large iPad and its keyboard case. Although I am a power user on the Mac OS platform, I spend most of my mobile digital time on an iPad Air and am more proficient with iOS. But to be honest, I was not a big fan of Apple's keyboard case and could never become comfortable using its keyboard. And since I am artistically challenged, even the Pencil ($94.99 at Amazon)  was of little use to me. I did try to take notes using the pen, but I can't read my own handwriting so that was not a big draw either.

But by using my favorite Bluetooth keyboard, the iPad Pro started to live up to its potential for me. The 13-inch screen is equal to the ones on my Dell and Lenovo laptops and since I use iOS so much, using touch to navigate was very easy. 

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When Tim Cook announced the iPad Pro, he said it could do as much as 80-90 percent of what anyone could do on a traditional laptop. On a recent trip, I decided to try that theory out. I only took my iPad Pro with me and used it as if it was my MacBook or a Windows laptop. I found that in general Cook was right. I did email, text messages, took notes, wrote, and edited my columns and used it for video, movies, music, and Skype videos with clients. My only problem is that it does not cut and paste as easily as it does in Windows 10 or Mac OS X, but that was minor compared to its actual ability.

Intel and Microsoft have a goal to make 2-in-1s and convertibles, or products like Lenovo's Yoga, as much as 50 percent of the overall laptops shipped by the latter part of this decade. They are convinced that the flexibility a tablet/laptop combo gives a person is so valuable that they, along with their OEM partners, are working hard to make these devices sleeker, more innovative, and flexible.

While I was skeptical of this goal at first, I am starting to come around. While the jury is still out on how successful Microsoft, Intel, and their partners will be in getting the majority of laptop users to move to these new mobile computing form factors, it's no longer a foreign concept to me, at least.