Okay, I got my Surface and have a couple of questions

[TJLamb0518]

Hi, all!

got my 128gb Surface 3 and am loving it so far. A very nice device. I do have a couple of questions, though. I'm hoping some of you can help since you're apparently better versed in these things than I am.


1) When I tried to hook up my external to it so I could transfer files, it was not recognized by the system. I had it plugged in and it was read fine by my desktop. Any special drivers I'd need?

2) Screen protectors. okay, let's forgo the what I'm sure are the usual "they charge too much for peripherals" thing (but they do) and just say that I was looking for a tempered glass screen protector for my Surface to go with my keyboard cover and my leather case (with the money we've spent on these things, I'm sure I'm not alone in being overly careful). Here's the problem. I bought a glass screen protector for my iphone and it was...well, you know....glass. Yes, very hard and durable. But looked and acted like glass. Every "tempered glass" screen protector I've seen for the Surface is....not very glass like (like them being flexible. Glass shouldn't wiggle if you grip a corner and waggle your hand, right? I remember that from 3rd grade science. Glass is rigid.) and more of a plastic looking sheet. Am I horribly behind the times and they're reconfigured glass or are these people making these being as flexible with their descriptions as they are with their glass?

3) Getting back to the transferring files thing. Can I hook my Surface up to my PC via USB and drag and drop or will there be a problem running two Windows machines tethered to one another?


I'm sure I'll have more as time goes on, but if you can help me out here, I'd appreciate it.

 

[leeshor]

Welcome to the forum

#1, External what?

#3, You can't do that but you can or should be able to access either one on your local network.

 

[TJLamb0518]

Sorry I wasn't more clear.

#1, external hard drive currently nestled in a Micca slim HD media player enclosure. When I hook it up to my regular desktop, it reads like another hard drive.

#3 I figured as much. I'm just so leery of using the whole network thing in these days of hacking via wifi. I know, that's a grandma answer, but it's just a fear I have.

 

[compnovo]

Re: #3: I haven't done this for several years so I don't know if it's still possible, but back in the days of Windows 95 and 98 you could use a "crossover" cat5 Ethernet cable to directly connect two PCS and transfer files. This was back when you had to manually set up the TCP/IP address, but it wasn't all that hard.

 

[leeshor]

Re: #3: I haven't done this for several years so I don't know if it's still possible, but back in the days of Windows 95 and 98 you could use a "crossover" cat5 Ethernet cable to directly connect two PCS and transfer files. This was back when you had to manually set up the TCP/IP address, but it wasn't all that hard.

You're right, that's an option, but a pain.

 

[leeshor]

Sorry I wasn't more clear.

#1, external hard drive currently nestled in a Micca slim HD media player enclosure. When I hook it up to my regular desktop, it reads like another hard drive.

#3 I figured as much. I'm just so leery of using the whole network thing in these days of hacking via wifi. I know, that's a grandma answer, but it's just a fear I have.

Dose the enclosure have a powered option? Just want to see if that would make a difference but I'm not familiar with that enclosure.

 

[malberttoo]

Hi, all!

got my 128gb Surface 3 and am loving it so far. A very nice device. I do have a couple of questions, though. I'm hoping some of you can help since you're apparently better versed in these things than I am.


1) When I tried to hook up my external to it so I could transfer files, it was not recognized by the system. I had it plugged in and it was read fine by my desktop. Any special drivers I'd need?

2) Screen protectors. okay, let's forgo the what I'm sure are the usual "they charge too much for peripherals" thing (but they do) and just say that I was looking for a tempered glass screen protector for my Surface to go with my keyboard cover and my leather case (with the money we've spent on these things, I'm sure I'm not alone in being overly careful). Here's the problem. I bought a glass screen protector for my iphone and it was...well, you know....glass. Yes, very hard and durable. But looked and acted like glass. Every "tempered glass" screen protector I've seen for the Surface is....not very glass like (like them being flexible. Glass shouldn't wiggle if you grip a corner and waggle your hand, right? I remember that from 3rd grade science. Glass is rigid.) and more of a plastic looking sheet. Am I horribly behind the times and they're reconfigured glass or are these people making these being as flexible with their descriptions as they are with their glass?

3) Getting back to the transferring files thing. Can I hook my Surface up to my PC via USB and drag and drop or will there be a problem running two Windows machines tethered to one another?


I'm sure I'll have more as time goes on, but if you can help me out here, I'd appreciate it.

Your external drive is probably trying to draw more power than the Surface's USB port provides. It is by design that the USB port provides a lower amount of power, in order to conserve battery life. Most devices work fine, but in this case your particular external drive may require you to use an external power supply, or a Y cable and get combined power from the USB port and a USB power brick or some such.

Like leeshor said above, a crossover cable will be a pain. If you're not savvy with networking, the easiest way to transfer files from one machine to another would to be install OneDrive or Dropbox on both, and use that to move files between machines.

Hope it helps.

 

[leeshor]

+1 for DropBox and/or OneDrive

 

[GreyFox7]

Just to add to the above which was well stated for local network access you can create a share on your computer and map a drive on the surface to it for direct transfer machine to machine without going to the cloud.

You might/should be able to enable connection encryption between your computers if you really need secure communications that would make Wifi hacking significantly more difficult and likely beyond the capabilities of all but the most sophisticated double secret senior NSA/Chinese professional super hacker.

 

[TJLamb0518]

Thanks all. I'll play with the network thing....


Surprised no one had opinions about the whole glass/tempered glass screen protector thing, though....

 

[leeshor]

I know people who have quite a few Surface tablets but none with a screen protector, and they are all mobile.

 

[narse77]

Thanks all. I'll play with the network thing....


Surprised no one had opinions about the whole glass/tempered glass screen protector thing, though....

I don't like them. I have two tablets a phone and the surface 3 and don't use them on any device. I personally think they are a waste of money.