If your question for somebody in 2001 was “What will the future of computing look like,” they’d probably give you an answer that would sound very much like the Surface Pro 3. It’s good because the Surface Pro 3 is indeed a futuristic machine, a marvel of engineering that combines tons of crazy features into a thin and light package. That’s not to say that Microsoft’s vision for the Surface Pro 3 is antiquated — far from it — but it does show that the dream of replacing the laptop with a hybrid device is more complicated than it first appears. Microsoft has been hard at it for two years and with this device, it is very close to the ideal realization of its goal.