When is 64GB not 64GB? It seems that happens when its the Surface Pro, which, when launched on February 9th will only have 23GB of free storage out of the box. 41GB of its capacity will be eaten up by the operating system, built-in apps, and a recovery partition.
Lest users think this is totally unusual, it is standard for all computers that have a running OS. It is just that having 2/3 of your available memory used by the OS, that is more than the norm.
With the 128GB model, things are better, with 83GB of free storage – the OS memory usage remains about the same. It appears that the Windows 8 install, will make up the 41GB total on the base Surface Pro model.
The Verge reports;
Microsoft says users will be able to free up additional storage space by “creating a backup bootable USB and deleting the recovery partition,” but out of the box they’ll be left with as little as 36 percent of the advertised storage available. The storage situation is similar to Microsoft’s Surface RT tablet. The Windows RT operating system, that powers Surface RT, accounts for half of the 32GB disk space on the entry model. Microsoft’s Surface Pro supports USB 3.0 hard drives and microSDXC cards, meaning there are ways to extend the storage.
Of course, the main challenge Microsoft will face on the 9th is that 4 days earlier, Apple is preemptively launching the 128GB iPad 4 for $100 less than the Surface Pro, at $799. That launch is designed to steal Microsoft’s thunder… and customers.
Is the amount of memory available on the 64GB Surface Pro adequate? Let me know what you think in the discussion below.
