Keyboard

Aesthetically, the keyboard could easily belong on a Chromebook because of its simple appeal and layout. In terms of usability, the keys offer an excellent combination of travel and tactile feedback for a surprisingly comfortable typing experience. Typing feels roomy (17 x 17 mm QWERTY keys, ~2.5 mm spacing) and with almost no clatter. Individual keys are stiff and do not wiggle in place as may happen on less expensive Ultrabooks.

As great as the backlit keyboard may be, it is oddly missing brightness controls. There is no Bluetooth connectivity for the dock as it relies solely on its pins for communicating with the tablet. The Up and Down Arrow keys are halved in size, softer in feedback, and are less comfortable to use.

Finally, the proper way to use the keyboard dock is to power on the tablet while it is connected to the dock. Attaching the tablet to the dock after powering on the tablet will temporarily disable the keyboard, touchpad, and USB ports. This behavior is very strange and we can only assume that this is a bug with the system's automatic detection. The dedicated key to properly detach the tablet may sometimes be unresponsive as well.

Touchpad

With a surface area of 10.6 x 7 cm, the Surface Book touchpad is large considering the screen size. This makes for easier multi-touch gestures and basic scrolling with smooth gliding properties from edge to edge. Business purists may lament the fact the there is no TrackPoint or dedicated mouse keys. More "traditional" business notebooks from the ThinkPad or EliteBook series are faster and more accurate to control if no external mouse is available.

November 3, 2015 update: There have been multiple reports of the touchpad misbehaving during use. We can confirm on our test model that there is indeed a responsiveness issue, specifically around the edges. The entire surface can sometimes become unresponsive if gliding from the outside towards the center, but not if gliding from the center towards the edges. The problem occurs under very specific circumstances and appears to be software-related rather than a hardware issue.

Touchscreen

The 5-point capacitive touchscreen is made easy to use by the relatively lightweight tablet and narrow bezel. We experienced no responsiveness issues whilst using the Surface Book in this manner. We can, however, mention that automatic rotation can only be toggled through software. Competing convertibles like the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro offer a hard toggle switch on the edge for convenient access, which can be very handy when sharing content with others in tablet mode.

Stylus

The included Surface Pen is identical to the one for the Surface Pro 4. Anyone who has used the stylus for the Surface Pro 3 will be instantly familiar as it provides the same number of functions and 1024 levels of pressure. Its wide diameter already makes it one of the more comfortable styluses to use as it better mimics the size and weight of a typical ballpoint pen.