Came across this intriguing crowdfunded project for the Surface Pro today. The ProKASE is both a portfolio-style case and a mobile dock for your tablet.
According to the project's Indiegogo description, "The ProKASE protects the Microsoft Surface Pro and give it 3 USB3.0 ports, and a full sized SD/CF card reader. It can be used with or without the Mobile Dock."
I went ahead and made my contribution and should receive my ProKASE in late January. Look for a review next month.
It’s taken me a while to get down to writing this review of the Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga because I know a lot of you are hoping that this convertible laptop addresses all the shortcomings of the Surface Pro while answering all of your artistic mobility dreams.
So, to cut to the chase: the Thinkpad Yoga is a very capable device for creative users, but it isn’t perfect.
Instead of offering a lot of technical details, I’m going to focus on the Thinkpad Yoga drawing experience and how it compares to the Surface Pro and other Windows tablets I’ve acquired over the past year.
The Display
The 1.9-inch diagonal size advantage that the TPY offers over the Surface Pro makes a significant difference. Even at its default scale, crowded desktop apps like Photoshop CC are easier to use on the 12.5-inch display. And if you run the UI scaling hack we posted here, Photoshop is even easier to use.
However, if you’re not a Photoshop user, the additional real estate may not be worth the decrease in portability vs. the Surface Pro.
If you don’t like reflective displays or want to occasionally work outdoors or in brightly lit environments, you’ll appreciate the Thinkpad Yoga’s matte screen finish, which diffuses reflections. But the coating also makes colors less vibrant to my eye and type appears somewhat fuzzy or muddy. I tried to capture the difference on camera, but my iPhone 4S is not up to the task. According to one reader, the Thinkpad is only able to display 75% of the sRGB color space. I don't know much about the subject, but it does appear that colors are muted compared to the glossy displays of the Surface Pro and Sony VAIO Flip 15A.
In the following screenshots I attempted to demonstrate the color, brightness and reflectivity differences in different lighting conditions. All shots were taken with the devices at maximum brightness.
The matte coating on the Lenovo screen diffuses reflections vs. the sharp reflections on the Surface Pro 2 display.
Laying flat in tablet mode, the reflections on the Surface Pro's bezel are even more distracting than on the screen itself.
The Digitizer
The drawing experience on the Thinkpad Yoga is comparable to any other Wacom-equipped tablet pc. Like many of you who’ve had troubles with Wacom tech on the Surface Pro and other tablets, I’ve encountered several annoyances along the way that I’m forced to work around.
I’ve been unable to get either the touch or pen calibration set up 100% perfectly despite running both the standard and Wacom calibration tools dozens of times. Installing Wacom’s feel drivers deletes the standard calibration settings, but I was able to confirm that the problem I describe below isn’t introduced by the Wacom drivers.
The problem I’ve encountered is that pen alignment and touch don’t match. If I tune the calibration for pen accuracy, the screen won’t respond to taps along the bottom edge of the display so I can’t unhide the desktop taskbar.
I’ve ended up compensating for this by purposely tapping just below the bottom points in the Wacom calibration tool. Now taps on the bottom edge are recognized but there is a one or two pixel drift in cursor accuracy as I move the pen up the screen.
If Wacom ever gets around to releasing a calibration tool with more than four points, it should be easier to limit that drift to the very bottom of the screen.
Based on reading the community’s experience with the Surface Pro, it’s clear that digitizer accuracy varies from machine to machine, so please don’t assume that all Thinkpad Yogas will display this same behavior.
The Stylus
Not much to say here. It’s a tiny pointer that will do in a pinch, but will otherwise stay in its silo forever.
The screen’s matte coating interacts with your pen’s nib very differently than the Surface Pro’s glass. The soft felt nibs I prefer on the SP offer a little too much resistance and feel slightly waxy. Hard plastic nibs don’t feel quite as slippery as they do on glass.
Thanks to the TabletPCReview forum reader who first suggested I try the Fujitsu stylus, I also purchased a set of flex nibs to try. These are black with a white rubberized tip and to paraphrase Goldilocks feel “just right” when sliding along the Thinkpad Yoga’s screen.
All the Surface Pro compatible pens I’ve tested work equally well on the TPY, although they also may require recalibration for best results. This shouldn’t be a problem for most of you who may have one or two at your disposal. I’m sure I’m unique in having 10(!) pens to choose from.
The weakest aspects of the Thinkpad Yoga are its clickable touchpad and the stylus which makes a very poor drawing instrument compared to full size pens.
The Form Factor
I expected not to like the feel of the keyboard behind the screen while in tablet mode. And, while it’s not ideal, I find it’s not as distracting in practice as I thought it might be.
I think this is because the size and weight of the Thinkpad Yoga forces you to either cradle it on your forearm or rest it on your lap. It would be very taxing to hold the convertible for long with the keyboard resting on your hand. My average sized hand covers the entire back of the Surface Pro, but it only extends to about two thirds of the Thinkpad.
The clickable touchpad doesn’t lock when in tablet mode, but I find that’s only distracting when I try to draw in portrait orientation. Then either my fingers or palm are certain to come in contact with it, causing the occasional errant click. The system doesn’t recognize the click, so it’s not really a problem, but it just feels wrong.
Though not as distracting as I'd feared, the keys can still be depressed slightly while in tablet mode. As seen here in portrait orientation, your fingers or palm are more likely to accidentally press the clickable touchpad which doesn't lock in place.
While in tablet mode, you’ll also need a bluetooth keyboard around, at least until someone develops a Thinkpad Yoga-specific ArtDock. With the Acer and Sony convertibles I’ve used, you can always lift up the screen to access the keyboard in a pinch, but the Yoga design makes it all or nothing.
The biggest design flaw of Thinkpad Yoga is the location of its fan vents.
The vents are located at the back of the keyboard, which theoretically blows the hot air away from you while in laptop mode. In practice, this is not always the case. For instance if you’re in bed and like to prop the keyboard up on your knees, the fans will blow right into your legs. Or worse, ventilation will be obstructed by your bed covers.
In tablet mode, the vents blow into you unless you rotate the tablet upside down: with the home button up and the camera lens down.
And the vents can get hot. Not scalding like the bottom of my 2008 MacBook Pro, but uncomfortably warm.
Pictured side by side with the Surface Pro. The Thinkpad Yoga is too large to hold in one hand. In this orientation, the fans point downward and will blow hot air into your body as you hold it.
Despite moving a lot of hot air, the fans are very quiet and seldom noticeable. When compared to the Surface Pro, however, the fans are definitely louder. To stress the CPUs, disks and graphics hardware, I ran Passmark’s Performance Test 8 and while the Yoga’s fans were audible throughout half the tests, the Surface Pro 2 remained silent.
Fit & Finish
Like most Lenovo products, the Thinkpad Yoga won’t win any design awards. It’s a utilitarian device that feels solid and built for durability.
It avoids some of the sharp edges of the Surface Pro and the magnesium alloy finish resists fingerprints and smudges.
The keyboard feels great and is certainly one of the most popular features for road warriors. I really don’t like the clickable touchpad which feels cheap and flimsy. I don’t know what Lenovo’s reliability record is for this touchpad design, but I worry that it will be the first thing to go.
The keyboard also features the signature red Lenovo TrackPoint touching stick which is fairly redundant on a touch screen, but can be mapped as a middle mouse button. I haven’t tried this but that is a nice feature if you need it.
As I mentioned in my unboxing, my Thinkpad Yoga has a small defect in the upper right corner of the screen. There is a bit of tape or something sticking out between the display and the matte coating. It’s no big deal and I’m not going to risk cutting it off, but a $1735 retail device shouldn’t have such an obvious manufacturing flaw.
In laptop mode, the screen is quite springy. The slightest tap will start it wobbling.
The power button on the right side of the keyboard is very small and hard to find without looking.
Performance & Battery Life
Several of you requested that I run extensive benchmarks and software tests on the Thinkpad Yoga, but I’ve been unable to do so. There are a lot of hardware dedicated sites that do that sort of thing all the time and you’re likely to find more reliable results there anyway.
Using the aforementioned Passmark benchmarks, the Thinkpad Yoga scored 1944 vs. the Surface Pro 2’s 1975. Clearly the Core i7 in the TPY doesn’t make a huge amount of difference in the overall rating.
In practice I found the Yoga to be equal to the Surface Pro 2 in all respects, except for occasional stutters while using Clip Studio Paint 1.27. I’m not certain what to attribute those hiccups to; there may have been background activity going on that I was unaware of, but these delays only lasted a second or so. I did have one freeze that cost me an hour’s worth of work on CSP that may have been caused by a loss of network connectivity.
Some users have complained of weak wi-fi signal, but I can’t confirm that. Running a couple of speedtests side by side didn’t show any difference between the two systems.
I haven’t run the Thinkpad Yoga all the way down to zero battery, but it took about five hours to go from 100% to 10% remaining, all while working in Clip Studio Paint.
Conclusion
So is the Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga perfect? Far from it. Is it better than the Surface Pro 2? Not really, given the price difference.
But if your top priority is screen size in a Wacom penabled device, the Thinkpad Yoga is your best option for the moment. We’ll see what manufacturers have up their sleeves in a few weeks at CES 2014.
The racing glove inspired pin cushioned back of the Asus Nexus 7 is the most luxurious tablet we've ever fondled.
The Verge is reporting this morning that Asus is readying an 8-inch Windows 8.1 tablet with Wacom digitizer. The device will supposedly feature an Intel Baytrail Atom processor, 1280 x 800 display, 2 GB of RAM and 32- or 64 GB of storage.
This should be a great device for One Note or doodling on the go. But its true usefulness will be hampered by the mismatch between new Windows hardware and software development.
I like small tablets for casual gaming and media consumption. But ironically, after the dismal start of Windows RT, manufacturers are determined to cram full Windows 8.1 desktops into the smaller form factor.
I'm convinced this is a strategy that will fail as consumers discover what a miserable experience the desktop is on a tiny display.
The only thing that can salvage this situation is the development of a new breed of Windows store applications (Metro) that are actually useful compared to the majority of what's currently available.
It's criminal that more than a full year after the release of Windows 8, Adobe has yet to release anything more capable than Photoshop Express or that Autodesk hasn't moved Sketchbook Pro onto the Windows store.
Without knowing any sales figures, it appears that Surfaces are doing well this holiday season, as is the Dell Venue 8. Based on its price and premium pen support, I suspect this Asus tablet will sell well too.
Will this groundswell of new users be the push that developers need to get their butts in gear?
When I returned to the world of 3d modeling after a long absence, one of the most helpful books I found to help get me back into the swing of things was Antony Ward's Game Character Development in Maya (2004).
Besides providing an excellent foundation to the state of computer graphics at that time, the book also introduced me to Ward's easy to follow teaching style and his whimsical pinup models. Wanting to know more about his work led me to discover his preferred modeling tool: a low-cost program named Silo.
The product of a three-man development team called Nevercenter, Silo is a powerful, compact, uncluttered and easily customizable subdivision modeling program that became very popular among indie modelers and game developers. Despite its popularity and perhaps due to its ultra low price ($159, often discounted to $109), work on Silo slowed to a crawl as Nevercenter turned to mobile app development and the company hasn't published any updates to the software in several years.
Like most users, I've assumed Silo is abandonware and haven't thought about it seriously except to confirm that it loads on the Surface Pro.
In the meantime, Ward has reproduced his Maya game character book as a series of web tutorials and has become a prolific guest contributor to the subscription training site Digital Tutors.
This morning I spotted a teaser for Ward's next tutorial, Getting Started with Sculpting in Silo (see below). I'd forgotten Silo even had sculpting capability, and the promised emphasis on interface customization and optimization for the Wacom Cintiq tells me I need to dive deeper into this tool on the Surface Pro and other Windows 8 tablets.
When the video is released I'm going to go try to follow it on the Surface Pro and identify any potential pitfalls. If you've already got Silo 2.2 up and running as a modeling/sculpting option on your tablet pc, I'd love to hear about your experiences. In the meantime, if you're interested in learning 3d modeling and sculpting, you'll find few capable, lower-cost options than Silo.
Learn more: http://www.digitaltutors.com/11/training.php?pid=1422 Silo has a great suite of modeling tools but with this tutorial we want to introduce you to another, often overlooked, aspect of the application and those are its sculpting tools. Before we dive in and begin sculpting we will start the course by looking at how to quickly configure Silo to work in harmony with a Wacom Cintiq. This is the hardware I will be using throughout the tutorial but its important to state that you can easily follow along using a keyboard and mouse, or any other graphics tablet. Once the environment is set we will then take a basic Hoola Girl model and work over each element, enhancing the surface detail using just the Paint Displacement tools. You can expect to learn with this tutorial that Silo is more than just a modeling package. Its sculpting tools may be basic, but with time and effort you can achieve great results in a short amount of time.
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The Fujitsu Digitizer Pen T-5000 features two buttons, an eraser tip and eyelet. It ships with five additional hard plastic nibs and an extractor ring.
Lately it seems like another Surface Pro replacement pen option turns up for me to test at least once a week.
I thought I'd exhausted all the compatible stylus options until a poster on the TabletPCReview forums suggested I check out the Fujitsu Digitizer Pen T-5000.
Designed for the Wacom-equipped Fujitsu Lifebook series, it's not clear whether the T-5000 is widely available. The links on Amazon are all for third party vendors and the Fujitsu site doesn't reference the T-5000 directly. They list three Lifebook models with pen input, but the replacement pen sets listed as accessories don't have a model number. It's likely these pens are compatible with the Surface Pro as well, but proceed with caution unless you find someone who can verify this.
The Fujitsu pen (center) is the same length as the Wacom Bamboo Feel Carbon above it, but that pen's cap makes it significantly longer. The Modbook Pro pen (top) is the only other two button replacement option I've tested, but the T-5000 is priced closer to the generic single button Wacom Penabled Tablet PC eraser pen (bottom).
At first glance, the Fujitsu Digitizer Pen appears to be the smallest replacement pen we've reviewed yet. At 5.2 inches long, it's a full .3 inches shorter than the Surface Pro pen. However, it turns out the pen is actually the same length as the premium Wacom Bamboo feel pens. What makes those pens seem longer in practice are their large caps, which the Fujitsu lacks. But the T-5000's solid construction and textured finish almost compensate for that. The barrel is about the same diameter, so the pen doesn't really feel small in the hand.
More importantly, the pen features an eraser tip and two buttons: a rarity in the world of replacement stylii.
Although there's no way to store it or attach it to the Surface Pro, the pen has an eyelet located just under the eraser for attaching to a lanyard. The Digitizer Pen ships with a generous five replacement hard plastic nibs and an extractor ring.
Like most tablet pc pens, the performance of the T-5000 is fairly equivalent to the standard Surface Pro stylus. Whenever you get a new pen you may wish to rerun the Wacom feel calibration tool to be absolutely accurate, but I didn't have any problem drawing without re-calibrating.
The button rocker height is a bit closer to the pen barrel than I prefer, but the buttons are very firm and unlikely to be clicked accidentally. And despite the pen's short length, the button is located .1 inches further from the tip than the Modbook Pro pen (the other two button replacement option). This small difference makes it easier for fingertips to steer clear of the buttons while gripping the pen close to the tip.
Compared to other lower cost pen replacements, the build quality of the T-5000 is excellent. If you're in the market for a two-button option, have smaller hands or don't mind a shorter instrument, the Fujitsu Digitizer Pen T-5000 is definitely worth a look (if you can find it).
If any of you can confirm the model number and compatibility of the pens available directly from Fujitsu, please leave a comment below.
The button placement of the T-5000 allows your fingers to steer clear if you hold the pen close to the tip.
The .1 inch difference in the Modbook Pro pen's button placement makes it far more likely you'll tap the buttons accidentally.
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Don't ask me which one's better, because I'll advise you to buy them both.
Lisa Gade of Mobile Tech Review compares the Microsoft Surface Pro 2 and the Lenovo ThinkPad Yoga.
The included PSD file enables you to reuse these icons to create custom ArtDocks for your favorite applications!
It's only been a week since we introduced the first Surface Pro Artist ArtDock, but time waits for no one.
It's my pleasure to present to you the Surface Pro Artist ArtDock 2.0, courtesy of talented film effects artist Alex Cheparev.
For the uninitiated, ArtDock uses a utility called AutoHotkey to create on-screen triggers for a variety of commonly used inputs including keyboard shortcuts and mouse clicks. With an ArtDock enabled, you can confidently use your Surface Pro in tablet mode without constantly reaching for your keyboard or mouse.
Alex redesigned all the ArtDock icons we published to a much cleaner, flatter monochrome and he added a Mudbox dock for good measure. He also restored the Windows dock that I had hidden.
If you dig into the archive's img folder, you'll find the original PSD files so you can use these icons to create your own ArtDocks for your favorite programs. All I ask is that you share your creations with the rest of the Surface Pro art community.
Click this link to download. For instructions on how to install the Surface Pro Artist ArtDock 2.0, please read this post.
Enjoy!
Since Lenovo first announced its penabled Thinkpad Yoga, it's been clear that the convertible Windows 8 laptop would be the device to offer the Surface Pro its stiffest competition for the artist's dollar.
I received my Thinkpad Yoga earlier today and it definitely lives up to expectations. Officially listed as the Thinkpad S1 Yoga, the specs are very similar to the $1299 Surface Pro 2: 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD, Intel HD Graphics 4400 and the all-important Wacom active digitizer. But unlike the Surface Pro, the Thinkpad Yoga is powered by an Intel Core i7 processor and features a 12.5-inch HD display. At $1739, this is not an inexpensive upgrade, but when you add in a keyboard, the Surface Pro is actually $1428 and the only other Wacom equipped tablet in the 12-13 inch range is the $2000 Cintiq Companion.
I was fortunate to get a 12% discount on my Thinkpad Yoga order, which brought the price down to $1530. I won't be surprised to see Lenovo offer even steeper discounts in the new year, so if you're interested in one, make sure to order by phone and ask if discount codes are available. Also, be certain that the model you're ordering has a digitizer. There is an i5 model listed on their site for $1299 that doesn't have pen support.
While not exactly a lightweight at 3.5 lbs, the Thinkpad Yoga is nowhere near as heavy as the 15-inch convertibles from Acer and Sony that I've reviewed recently. But despite its weight, the Lenovo's size makes it a little difficult pick up with one hand while in tablet mode. The keyboard keys on the back of the device have a little bit of give when your fingers hold the weight of the tablet which can be a slightly unsettling feeling.
I knew I'd be spoiled by my couple of weeks with the Sony Flip 15A and Acer Aspire R7 displays. Although the Yoga's screen is big, it's not quite big enough to sit on your lap every time you work; you'll want to occasionally cradle it closer to you for detail work. Though not impossible, the weight and dimensions make this a bit more of a challenge than you'd like.
PC wonks heap praise on the Lenovo keyboard and while it's nice, I don't think it's quite all that. Keyboard travel is good, but still relatively shallow. I wish the spacebar was bigger. For some reason, Lenovo put a Function and PrintScreen key on the bottom row that eats up space and is sure to cause me to mistype. I also am no fan of the red pointing stick which seems like an absolute anachronism in this age of touch.
"Those of you who've been holding out for a Wacom device with a larger screen... may have finally found a suitable option."
The worst part of the keyboard is the touch pad, which has a significant amount of travel. It's pretty noisy to click and doesn't lock when the Thinkpad is in tablet mode. It's not active, but still feels very strange when you depress it while it's on the back of the screen.
Getting the Yoga set up was relatively painless. The laptop ships with Windows 8.1 so it only needed a handful of updates, including a couple from Lenovo itself. There's very little crapware, so I just had to uninstall Norton Internet Security.
The Thinkpad Yoga does not ship with Wacom feel drivers pre-installed. But once they are, Photoshop CC and other Wintab-dependent programs run great. Although the Adobe interface is still small, it's far more usable with the additional screen real estate. And you can always run the UI scaling hack we published yesterday. UI scaling is not enabled by default, and you may not think it's necessary, but I like the desktop icons and text to be a bit bigger.
I also tested the old standby Manga Studio this afternoon and it also ran perfectly. Despite the extra screen size, I still appreciated being able to run the software in tablet mode where the touch targets are even easier to hit.
The display appears to have a matte screen protector that may or may not be removable. It's so snug that I assume it isn't. The surface of the screen cover interacts with the pen nibs and yields very different feedback than the Surface Pro's glass. The felt nibbed Wacom Bamboo Feel styluses that I normally prefer offer a bit too much drag. The Surface pen tip feels less plastic, but the best results I got came from the Modbook Pro pen. Its tip glides like satin as does the nib of the otherwise terrible (because it's puny) standard stylus.
I tested for the "black hole" digitizer bug that many early European buyers reported and it does not seem to exist in my unit. Likewise, I didn't notice any latency or burn-in that several users are now saying plagues their displays. Some Thinkpads use LG panels which also created issues for recent Apple MacBooks.
As always, the true nature of the Thinkpad Yoga's strengths and weaknesses won't emerge until I've spent many more hours with the pc. But for the moment, it appears that those of you who've been holding out for a Wacom device with a larger screen (and don't mind paying a premium for it) may have finally found a suitable option.
Do you have any specific questions or software you'd like me to test? Please let me know in the comments section below.
The Lenovo packaging is a very utilitarian affair. Despite traveling all the way from China, there's no double boxing.
The contents are also very basic: the Thinkpad Yoga, a power cord and power supply and a one sheet set of instruction. Period.
Except for its stylus, you could easily mistake the Thinkpad Yoga for any business-oriented Windows laptop. The included pen is too small and thin to be your everyday drawing instrument, but the nib feels very smooth on the display's screen protector. By contrast, the Wacom Feel pens offered too much resistance on the display. The ModBook Pro pen's nib came closest to providing the same silky feedback as the Lenovo stylus (go figure).
In tablet mode, the keyboard's backplate rises, disabling and effectively "lowering" the keys. You can ignore the slightly ridged texture of the keys as you're holding it in tablet mode, but real distracting element is the touchpad, which is very springy and easy to click. It doesn't do anything, but it would be nice for it to be locked while flush.
This image doesn't do the display justice. Color is even and picture sharpness is very good. The display appears to have a screen protector which makes it significantly less reflective than the Surface Pro and other Windows 8 devices I've tested. I'm unsure whether this film can be removed from the display. You can see in this picture that the device has a small yellow tab toward the upper right corner that I might use to peel off the screen protector, but it also may be a small manufacturing defect. If anyone knows, please let me know; otherwise I'm not going to mess with it because I actually prefer the more matte finish.
Despite its larger display, the Thinkpad Yoga is remarkably thin: just barely thicker than the Surface Pro 2 with Type Cover (right).
Most artists will appreciate the extra two inches of the 12.5-inch Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga display vs. the Surface Pro's 10.6.
Although the active display is just shy of 11-inches tall in portrait mode, it's only 6.1 inches wide. A standard American comic like this page from Dynamite's Red Sonja #1 has to be reduced to fit horizontally, leaving two .8 inch black bars at the top and bottom of the screen. I'm still pining for the perfect 8.5 x 11 display where my comics and magazines wouldn't have to be reduced at all.
UPDATE: The January 15, 2014 release of Adobe Illustrator CC (version 17.1) makes this hack unnecessary. The new software now features HiDPI display support. http://surfaceproartist.com/blog/2014/1/16/new-adobe-illustrator-cc-improves-surface-pro-windows-tablet-support No word yet on when the support will extend to Photoshop.
* * *
Blog reader Luis (last name withheld on request) has discovered a clever hack that scales the Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator interfaces. I've tested his solution on my Surface Pro 2 with the CC versions of both programs and it works exactly as advertised.
Adobe's microscopic UIs flunk the patented Surface Pro Artist fan finger test.
Though not exactly touch friendly, the scaled UI won't cause eyestrain and is very easy to target with the pen.
Below is Luis' note:
Hi, I've found a way to make Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop to respect Windows PPI scaling, AKA, make their UI usable instead of microscopic.
The reason these apps have such tiny UIs is because they tell Windows, in their internal manifest files, that they are high DPI aware and that Windows does not need to scale them.
As you can easily see, that's not the case, not even by a long shot. Our objective then is to replace Adobe's bogus manifest, by one that tells the truth, that these applications are not high DPI aware.
The problem is, the manifest is internal, stored as a resource inside the .exe file, you can change it, but then you'll break the file signature making Windows complain every time you try to run these apps. So we're going to use an external manifest file, however, since Windows XP SP 2 internal manifests have precedence over external ones.
We need to change that and here's what you have to do:
1. Enable Windows to prioritise external manifests by creating and setting this registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SideBySide\PreferExternalManifest (DWORD) to 1
as mentioned here (no need to install the mentioned hotfix, just create the registry key)
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/912949/en-us
2. Create a Illustrator.exe.manifest file in notepad, paste this text inside, save it, and copy it to the same folder as Illustrator's exe file
http://pastebin.com/BZnKwU6a
3. Create a Photoshop.exe.manifest file in notepad, paste this text inside, save it, and copy it to the same folder as Photoshop's exe file
http://pastebin.com/AiZiicT6
4. Run the applications, no need to restart or anything else, and their interface should now have an acceptable size, but a but blurry as usual with this kind of scaling.
This has worked for me and made my Surface Pro a much more usable device. I hope that by divulging this information we can force the hand of [expletive deleted] Adobe to support High DPI interfaces.
I also hope that Microsoft doesn't patch this to stop it from working in the future, but seeing as this is a workaround for corporate apps to run I'd say we're reasonably safe (for now...)
Thanks!
