Microsoft Surface Studio Goes On Sale: Processor, Graphics Card Aren't Great For VR, Heavy Games

Microsoft's Surface Studio has been available in the United States for months now, while users from other parts of the globe are still anxiously waiting for the desktop. Fret not, though, because the device is finally launching in other countries.

Microsoft announced during the IT Partners industry event that the Surface Studio will go on sale in France in July. The sale is only "in limited quantities" but more stocks are coming in September, French news outlet Numerama reported.

Official pricing hasn't been announced yet, but the base model could cost around €3,000 EUR. Aside from France, Microsoft will also release the all-in-one 28-inch PC in seven other markets in the first quarter of 2017, according to Neowin. Those markets will likely include Germany and the United Kingdom.

There are apprehensions surrounding the convertible desktop PC's release in other markets outside of the U.S. Its July 2017 launch in France means that it's been almost a year since the Surface Studio was unveiled, and two and a half years since its Nvidia GeForce GTX 965M GPU card came out.

The Surface Studio's older Intel Skylake processor is also inferior to the newer and better Kaby Lake processors. Its exorbitant price may seem too much for such an underpowered PC.

The Surface Studio starts selling in the U.S. for $2,999 and can go as high as $4,199. It converts into a drafting or drawing table when you grab the bottom of the screen and pull it. You can also push the top edge for this.

The all-in-one PC is equipped with several accessories: the Surface Pen attached to the screen's side magnetically, the Surface Mouse, the Surface Ergonomic Keyboard and the Surface Dial. The latter costs separately for $99.99 and allows users to use other inputs such as changing brush sizes.

The Surface Studio is 4,500 pixels tall and 3,000 pixels wide, meaning it displays images and videos in a crisp and vibrant quality, Wired noted. The hardware is crammed inside the PC's base so the screen remains light and easy to manipulate.

Despite these, the Surface Studio still has drawbacks, particularly in its hardware. It's $2,999 price tag gets you Intel's Core i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM and a 1 TB "hybrid drive" that is a combination of a solid storage and a spinning hard drive.

The PC's Nvidia GeForce GTX 965M GPU card is adept at supporting Photoshop and watching 4K videos, but it doesn't perform well in virtual reality. The graphics card also can't support heavy games with high resolutions.