I recently bought a Surface Pro 7. Yes, the tablet Microsoft released about seven years ago. The latest Surface Pro is already on generation 12, so why buy something this old?
Price came first. I only need this tablet for one thing right now: updating posts on bobbuilds when I’m away from my desk. It might get other uses later, but that’s the only goal for now. I spend most of my time at a computer anyway, and most bobbuilds posts get written there too. This tablet just covers the gap when I’m not at the PC but still need to write. Paying around ¥10,000 for that alone isn’t worth it.
I found a local listing on Xianyu(China’s secondhand marketplace) and picked it up in person. It was also my first time buying used electronics.
After I got it home, I upgraded to Windows 11. Windows Update never offered the upgrade, so I used the Windows 11 Installation Assistant. That part went smoothly. Then a serious problem showed up: the whole screen started flickering. Luckily I had installed Grok Bot and had it help fix the issue. It eventually worked. I’ll write up the exact steps in a later post.
Going forward, small updates will mostly happen on this tablet; longer technical posts stay on my work PC. I hope this is a good start, and that I can keep writing on bobbuilds—a little seasoning for busy workdays.
