Surface Pro 11 - Is it any good for Music Production (updated)

[@FL_STUDIO]

Always nice to see a Robin video on Windows performance - Early indications from our users are that Microsoft has done an (almost) equivalently great job on their emulation as Apple did with Rosetta 2. Rosetta 2 was not perfect and there were quite a lot of issues initially. It's true drivers are probably the major issue as many legacy devices won't have updates. OTOH, we have high hopes for this incarnation of Windows ARM and are working on native support. The good news is all the work we and others have done to support Apple ARM will be reusable and shorten development times. No ETA.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Great information, thank you imageline, keep up the good work

[@alidisco]

It's great (really great!) to hear a manufacturer come out and say they are actively working to support this architecture on windows. Let's hope others follow your lead and make this the device a lot of us hoped the M4 Ipad Pro would be: a portable touchscreen computer, powerful enough to work on all the time, with decent battery life but without the restrictions of a dumbed down operating system.

[@rbus]

I’ve been looking forward to ARM-based laptops for years and given all the security problems with AMD and Intel’s coverup of stability issues, it’s about damn time. Also, ARM64 is an excellent architecture and integrating heterogenous compute on the CPU (as opposed to putting that on discrete GPUs, or introducing countless mediocre extensions like MMX, 3DNow, etc, etc, etc) like AI and DSP (Qualcomm’s Hexagon cores) can potentially allow low-latency real-time synthesis features not possible before on ultra thin laptops,

[@TheMaartian]

Thanks for the review. Note that Cubase and RME ASIO drivers including TotalMix now run native on Snapdragon ARM.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Awesome, thanks, we're getting there

[@RondallaScores]

Glad to know that Steinberg and Microsoft is now updating the MIDI and asio drivers now! Now, I just have to wait for the drivers to arrive. This was announced in the Snapdragon summit.

[@TheMaartian]

There's more. I just downloaded the 4th beta of Bitwig 5.3 and noticed that there's an ARM version available for Windows. That's what I'll install on the SP 11 Pro Elite X that I received yesterday!

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Cool, let us know how it goes

[@BartdeBoisblanc]

4:30 Yes what you are talking about is the hardware abstraction and drivers for Window OS

[@lcpumpkin]

Thanks Robin. Found this interesting. Very much enjoyed the finger drumming.

[@bmbell71]

Thanks for the video Robin. I've actually had some experience with the Surface Pro 11, and I returned it to get the Surface Pro 10, for exactly the reasons you mention in the video. Let me first say some good things about the Surface Pro 11. I was using Cubase 13, and the performance of the application itself was excellent,, most of the plugins and VI's worked flawlessly and surprisingly efficiently in x64 emulation. If you were doing EDM production with limited use of periferals and just using the built in audio for playback, the snapdragon x might work for you. If you plan on using any audio interface of midi controllers, the pro 11 wont work for you. I wish that Microsoft had relased the 10 and 11 together and not made the 10 only as a buisness class machine available direct from Microsoft (although there are some on Amazon in the US, not sure for you all in the UK). The so called "Copilot+ PC" is a designation being used for all windows machines being released with processors with an AI neural processor onboard., from all the OEMs. This includes the new Intel Core Ultra chips which have a built in NPU. I am very curious for music production what AI might have to bring to the table. However for the purposes of your viewers, I'll just leave it that for now unless you want to do everything on the Surface with little or no use of external hardware, skip the Surface Pro 11 for now. If you can get your hands on a Surface Pro 10, I highly recommend the device. In addition to performance improvements over the Surface Pro 9, there are some much needed improvements on battery power and heating/cooling issues (unfortunately not as much as the Surface Pro 11). Cheers, and once again thanks for all you wonderful knowledge and insight!

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Useful information, thank you

[@RondallaScores]

Hi! Do the audio drivers work? I did you encountered problems with your audio interface?

[@ModulatorX]

Cubase 13 works ok with Steinberg's own built-in ASIO driver. Since it's all emulated and not native ARM yet, performance of course isn't stellar, but it works for smaller projects. I tested this with a Surface Laptop 7th edition (Snapdragon X Elite, 16GB RAM). Latency with the Steinberg ASIO driver is 10ms Input/20ms Output when disabling the Input Device in the driver's setting. Ableton 11 can also be installed, while 12 is blocking installation on ARM for now. Roland Cloud Manager and their VSTs work as well. The biggest issue is of course no drivers for Audio Interfaces yet. Time will tell if devs jump on the hype. Fingers crossed!

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Thanks for the info. Yes, I'd heard that Ableton Live 12 actually looks for an x86 processor for some reason - doh! Useful information - thanks!

[@DataPastor]

How could you make Cubase 13 to have audio output?? For me it doesn’t work. 😢

[@ModulatorX]

​@@DataPastorjust use the Steinberg Built-in ASIO driver that comes with Cubase 13. Sound will be coming from your SP11 though, not an audio interface. There are no drivers for audio interfaces on ARM yet.

[@RondallaScores]

Since the Snapdragon Summit, Cubase on Arm and arm64 drivers (yamaha) will arrive this week. Really hoping it arrives sooner

[@roszyknuke]

I see more ARM powered devices coming in the future, but it will take some time before there are enough in the wild to make it worth developing drivers. Maybe in a few years.

[@PWMaarten]

I used asio4all drivers for 15+ years on my previous PC. To be fair, I only record, add some effects and mix in the computer and I didn’t change much in and/or around the system.

[@trolex2287]

has anyone used and ezdrummer 3 on surface 11 pro?

[@yesitsnoise4658]

A warm hello to everyone, have any of you had any experience with how well Bitwig runs on the Surface pro 11? I've been using a Pro7 for years, which is absolutely great, but I would like to have more power. If you would recommend the Surface Pro 10 (I would follow Molten's Surf 9 tip and buy an i5 in the hope of lower heat development) I would be very happy to hear your opinion.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

don't know until someone tries.....

[@DataPastor]

Any ideas how could I get audio output for Cubase 13 on my SP11? The asio4all driver doesn’t seem to be working.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

I don’t have one, so not really but check my other videos in using Asio4all with a Surface because it’s real easy to get it wrong

[@perejurado1478]

Hey! Do you have any info about Reason Studio 13 on a Surface 11? I have the surface 8 and I am very happy with it, but I am considering on buying Surface 11. Thanks for your videos!

[@MoltenMusicTech]

I dont have a SP11 so i can't say, sorry, but generally software seems to work well, it's the audio driver side that's being a problem.

[@dEadnAstyrEcords]

Great advice. It's always best to wait, and let others guinea pig things.

[@kenfuller9907]

What was wrong with the surface 2 and the surface RT?

[@MoltenMusicTech]

I never looked at anything before the SP3. RT was just the worst version of ARM Windows that wasn’t compatible with anything outside the Win8 store…. I think

[@kenfuller9907]

@@MoltenMusicTech I had an rt and I’ve currently got a 2 pro lol

[@kenfuller9907]

I had betamax too 😂

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Of course you did :D

[@atom_jack]

I read somewhere that Ableton has no future plans to support Live for Windows on ARM

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Live 12 apparently looks for an x86 processor so won't run on anything else. Live 11, however, will install on Windows ARM. They probably have a reason but it's a little bit strange.

[@thecastingdeck8148]

Why make a device so subpar to your competitor (Apple), when you are going for the "creative" marketplace. This is supposed to be a device for creatives, which to logically means music production, photographers, video editing, drawing, etc. Sounds like a fail.

[@derpstarz]

has anyone had any luck so far with setting up an audio interface that works with the surface pro 11? I just purchased one and discovered none of the current audio interfaces I have will work with the surface pro 11. I'm trying to DJ with it and I need two channel outputs.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

You can get a usb-c to audio adapter for basic line/headphone output, or use Asio4all as suggested in this video. I know of no audio interfaces that will work with the sp11 natively at this time, sorry.

[@derpstarz]

@@MoltenMusicTech thanks for the reply i know you mentioned asio4all but i don't think it gives me the ability to have two channel outputs for cueing the next track in my headphones while the current song is playing to the master - hopefully someone comes out with an arm based audio interface sometime in the near future

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Oh two stereo channels - got ya. Asio4All will work if you have anough audio outputs. It's difficult because audio interfaces will only be seen with WASAPI drivers. But Asio4all can use those.... so if you have two audio interfaces it would see a stereo output on both and let you combine them in the software you're using. This is theoretical as i dont have one to try it out.

[@derpstarz]

@@MoltenMusicTech problem is none of the drivers i've tried using work with arm - since i just bought the surface pro 11 i'm within the return window so i'm probably going to return it and buy the surface pro 10 instead since its still using the intel processor

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Good plan i think

[@Gilles2010]

I don’t comment on your videos much, but I really enjoy watching them … have a nice 4th of July and good luck with the elections. I hope whatever side you’re on wins, if you’re on the good side that is 😂👍

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Thanks mate!

[@jamesdegriz]

Ive heard from a reliable source that MS are making a complete dumpster fire of development for these. Strongly sugggest holding off for at least a year.

[@PWMaarten]

So the simplest solution is that windows updates their native driver to see more I/O.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

I think that because WASAPI is a generic driver it has to work with a thousand difference audio systems on a thousand different computers, which means it will always have built in safety buffers to cope with the crappiness of OEM implimentation and prioritse uninterupted Netflix playback - it has to work with everything on every system. A specialised ASIO driver only has to work with one thing, on one form of very standardised connection and so will always perform better and be more consistently stable.

[@PWMaarten]

@@MoltenMusicTech fair point. In my very limited understanding of software, drivers and such, I could imagine a system that works on the basis you describe and have a “search for more I/O” button.

[@Soundwrecker]

Quick! Sell your intel stock!

[@thehandoflenin]

The answer to everyone's question is No. The Surface Pro is not that great for running a studio. It's ok for an old plugin or a dedicated bit of software. I'd say if you really want to go down the PC route, best processor you can get, best memory you can get, biggest HD you can get, or get a MAC.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Yeah, not the point. The surface has other qualities in form and interaction that make it interesting. I’ve been running my studio on one since the surface pro 3. It’s great. You can do more, obviously, on a huge desktop machine, if that’s your bag.

[@KentanLenneg]

My surface pro 11 has 1 Terabyte and 32 Gb of RAM. I’ve never had such a powerful PC in my entire life. My test project has 32 tracks, all analogic (guitars, drums, hardware keyboards, voices..), each with at least a compressor VST, an equaliser VST , and a sophisticated reverb. Some has modulation and delay too. Tell me I can't do music with my Surface... I practice music production on my computer since 1998, when Logic Pro was running only on Windows..

[@thehandoflenin]

​@KentanLenneg this is true but (I've taken MS and Apple Prices here) Surface 11 with spec you state 2k1, Macbook Pro little less in memory 2k5. Surface only has 2 port Pro more. Not checked PC laptop prices. Size the Surface is great. I do use an old surface to run my mixer which mainly is used as extra inputs and routing to rack effects.

[@MoltenMusicTech]

Awesome

[@setaihedron]

I personally get tired of people who don't seem to understand the difference between a tablet with a touch screen and a laptop or a big desktop box. These are completely different hardware form factors.