Microsoft again challenges Consumer Reports Surface findings: every generation getting better

From the launch of the Surface Pro LTE Advanced to the news about Surface Book 2 being part of the future of computing, it’s been a great day to be a Surface and Microsoft fan. But even with these evolutionary advancements to the Surface family, it’s hard to forget what Consumer Reports said about the reliability of Microsoft’s Surface devices.

It turns out Microsoft is still talking about it too, again challenging Consumer Reports and telling ZDNet that “every generation of Surface keeps getting better.”

Specifically, Microsoft is highlighting that fewer than 1 in 100,000 of new Surface devices has gone bad while in the hands of a consumer. This is meant to be a direct shot at Consumer Reports, which originally claimed that of a total of 90,000 surveyed laptop and tablet owners, 25% of those with Surface devices believe they will experience issues by the end of their second year of ownership.

Ryan Gavin, the general manager for Surface at Microsoft, talked more about the reliability of Surface and questioned Consumer Report’s methodology:

One of the things you’re seeing is the reliability of our products over time, with every generation getting better and better and better…We’re talking about incidents per device of less than 0.001%…

We thought it was unfortunate the report that Consumer Reports put out, partly used the methodology that is consistent with how you evaluate home appliances and applied it to laptops. That would be like [asking] ‘Has your dishwasher behaved unexpectedly in the past two years?’ and if the answer was ‘Yes’, you’d be deemed unreliable…

Echoing the words of Panos Panay, the genius behind the Surface lineup of devices, Gavin also mentioned that consumers are especially enjoying Surface devices:

“This is not consistent with our ongoing testing and we have a good ongoing conversation with them… What we hear from our customers, however, and from the telemetry data that our customers want to share with us, is that Surface devices have never been more reliable and with every generation we release they get increasingly so.”

Consumer Reports has noted that it still will not be recommending the new Surface Book 2 and that their original decision will “still in effect.” It’s their loss, really, especially because Surface is becoming very popular, and was a contributor to Microsoft’s $24.5 billion in revenue in the last quarter.