Martin Lachter, senior research associate for Consumer Reports says Microsoft’s “reliability is now on-par with most other laptop brands”. While this recommendation is hardly binding, it is important, especially with new Surface devices launching next week. Consumer Reports is a go-to location for many customers who want to know if a product is worth buying. That Surface was deemed unreliable was a problem for Microsoft. Sure, it didn’t really affect sales of devices, but having a recommendation will help. Surface devices were last year deemed by Consumer Reports as unreliable. The non-profit publication conducted a survey across 90,000 tablet and laptop owners. The results show an estimated 25 per cent with Surface products say they have “problems by the end of the second year of ownership.” “If you are very concerned about how long your products are going to last, it might be better for you to go with a brand that has a higher predicted reliability,” Jerry Beilinson, electronics editor at the consumer goods testing publication, says.
Disagreement
Microsoft naturally disagreed with the removal and went as far as questioning methods used by Consumer Reports: “We don’t believe these findings accurately reflect Surface owners’ true experiences or capture the performance and reliability improvements made with every Surface generation,” the company said in a statement. Customers pay a lot of money for Surface devices, so the survey was an eye-opener for many users.
