Along with the Surface Pro 4 tablet, Microsoft's Surface Book notebook officially goes on sale today. While the company is not offering any hard numbers yet, Microsoft hints that so far sales of the Surface Book have been high.

According to a Wired behind-the-scenes profile on both the laptop and Surface leader Panos Panay:

"The Surface Book is on sale today. Pre-orders have been huge—Panay says they're selling laptops faster than they can make them. He's crystal-clear on the importance of this device to Microsoft's business, especially on the heels of the Surface Pro 3 and 4, which gave the Surface line its first real momentum.

The article also talks about the secrecy surrounding the Surface Book, which no one outside of the Surface team itself had seen until nine months ago, when Panay finally revealed their latest hardware product to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and other team members.

"Panay pitched the Surface Book as the ultimate laptop. He showed them the hinge, the keyboard, the beautiful screen. "They were like, 'Whoa!'" he says. And then, detach. Everyone in the room—Satya Nadella and the rest of the company's leadership—freaked out. "It felt like a magic trick," Panay says."

Indeed, Wired states that while the Surface Book was shown to third-party partners and retailers before it was officially announced earlier this month, those folks didn't know about the display's ability to detach and work as a stand-alone tablet until about a month before the launch.

The article even has Panay talking about Microsoft's cancelled Surface Mini tablet, with him stating, "It was like a Moleskine . . . It was awesome." Indeed, he used his own Surface Mini to write an email about what he thought the Surface team could do to make "the ultimate laptop" about two years ago.

Pre-order the Surface Book from $1499 at Microsoft

Source: Wired