Today Microsoft made major news with the announcement of the Surface Book, the Band 2, the Surface Pro 4, the Surface Pen, the Lumia 950 and 950XL, and the Lumia 550.
Below is a list of everything Microsoft announced.
Microsoft unveils wearable holograms in HoloLens, taking applications for devkit today
Microsoft kicked off its big hardware event in New York today with wearable holograms for its HoloLens gaming platform.
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The on-stage demonstration showed a game player wearing a HoloLens headset with a weapon formed around his hand. He used this to do battle with some scary-looking robo-monsters.
Microsoft unveils Surface Book: 13.5-inch laptop starting at $1,499
Today’s big announcement was Microsoft’s new Surface Book. It’s a little bigger than Microsoft’s tablet-laptop Surface hybrid with a slightly larger screen: 13.5 inches, with a resolution of 267 pixels per inch.
The Surface Book starts at $1,499, and you can preorder it starting on October 7. The device will begin shipping on October 26.
The keyboard can detach from the display and be used as a tablet, albeit a heavy one. It also features a touch-sensitive display that works with Microsoft’s new Surface Pen.
Microsoft announces the new Surface Pen stylus
Seemingly in answer to Apple’s new Pencil, Microsoft has developed a new version of its stylus, the Surface Pen. The device is designed to work well with Microsoft’s new Surface Pro 4 and the productivity and creative apps that run on it.
The tip of the pen is very sensitive, allowing it to detect 1,024 levels of pressure. It has an eraser on the end. It magnetically attaches to the top of the Surface so that it can be stowed or grabbed easily.
Users can get the pen in five colors — silver, gold, red, blue, and black — and 24 different pen tips.
Microsoft unveils Surface Pro 4: Same size, bigger screen, starting at $899
Microsoft today unveiled the Surface Pro 4, starting at $899. The biggest highlight: The device’s bezels have been reduced to cram a slightly larger screen (12.3-inch versus 12.0-inch, 267 ppi versus 216 ppi) into a tablet that is still the same size. Like the Surface Book, the Surface Pro 4 also works with the Surface Pen.
Upgraded to the max, the Surface Pro 4 can get up to 16GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. Microsoft also offered a few comparisons: The Surface Pro 4 is 30 percent faster than the Surface Pro 3 and 50 percent faster than the MacBook Air.
We got a hands-on look at both the Surface Pro 4 and the Surface Book and found that though the devices are very similar, the Surface Book captured our attention in a way the Surface Pro did not.
Don’t get us wrong: The Surface Pro 4 has notable improvements over the Surface Pro 3, but it’s not hugely different. It’s thinner, lighter, and faster. It has a better-designed hinge, a better camera, and so on. The ports are the same. Yet none of that is what you’ll really notice from using it, unless you’re explicitly using one beside the Surface Pro 3.
Check out the full review here.
Meet Microsoft’s Windows 10 budget phone: the $139 Lumia 550
Among Microsoft’s other devices was a new budget-minded smartphone, the Lumia 550. The $139 device is set to launch this December.
Microsoft glossed over the 550 during its hardware event in New York today, focusing instead on the new 590 and 590XL flagship phones.
Microsoft unveils its next flagship smartphones, the Lumia 950 and 950XL
Meet the first smartphones designed for Windows 10 Mobile: the 5.2-inch Lumia 950 and the 5.7-inch Lumia 950XL. The Lumia 950 starts at $549 and the Lumia 950XL starts at $649. Both phones will be available in November, Microsoft said.
The new Lumia flagships aren’t terribly sexy-looking phones, and they’re not radical departures, design-wise, from earlier Lumias, but they are powerful.
The Lumia 950 runs on a Snapdragon 808 hexa-core chip running at 1.8 GHz. The 950XL has a Snapdragon 810 octa-core running at 2.0 GHz.
Both phones ship with Skype, Cortana, Microsoft Office, and Continuum. (Continuum allows the phones to wirelessly connect to mice, keyboards, and displays.)
The phones feature a large 20-megapixel camera on the back that shoots 4K video. The camera uses Zeiss optics and triple-LED flash technology. On the front of the phones is a 5-megapixel selfie camera.
The phones ship with 32GB of storage, in addition to 256GB of memory via the memory card, Microsoft said, with 3GB of RAM.
Microsoft unveils Display Dock, a Lumia accessory that turns your Windows 10 phone into a PC
Microsoft also debuted the Display Dock today. This accessory extends your Windows 10 phone into a PC-like experience, though Microsoft did not share a price.
The feature that makes this possible is called Continuum. In short, if you connect an external display, mouse, and keyboard to your phone, you can use it like a basic PC.
The Display Dock features a USB Type-C connector for the phone, a DisplayPort for an external monitor, and three traditional USB ports for input devices like mice and keyboards. Windows 10 Mobile’s apps and user interface scale up to the larger display.
Microsoft unveils the Microsoft Band 2 for $249, available October 30
Today Microsoft unveiled its second go at a fitness wearable: the Microsoft Band 2. The smart bracelet launches October 30 and will retail for $249.
The Band 2 features a curved display and additional sensors, and is expected to be available in more countries on launch day than its predecessor. The redesigned display is now apparently more touch-sensitive, and features built-in GPS, UV monitoring, sleep tracking, and calorie tracking, as well as notifications for calls, texts, and email updates. It also now comes with a barometer.
Windows 10 is now installed on over 110 million devices
Of course, what would any tech event be without the release of new company stats?
Microsoft announced Windows 10 is now installed on over 110 million devices. It took the latest and greatest operating system from Microsoft just 10 weeks to enter the 9-digit range.
Previously, Microsoft had shared that 24 hours after its July 29 launch, Windows 10 was installed on more than 14 million PCs and that four weeks after launch, Windows 10’s install base passed 75 million PCs.
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