V3 went along to a demo of Samsung's latest Microsoft Surface product, the SUR40, this week, and we had a chance to put the table-top computer through its paces to see how it handles.

The Windows 7-powered, multi-touch SUR40, which was unveiled at CES, targets business users.

With its coffee table looks, the device is big, measuring in at 1095x704mm on top and 736mm tall when its legs are attached - though as we saw during our hands on, it can also be wall mounted.

Unlike a regular touch PC, where emphasis is on single apps, the SUR40's 40in 1920x1080 pixel screen is tailor made for multiple users.

Using a modified version of Microsoft's Windows 7 Professional 64-bit operating system (OS) the device's user interface arranges apps in a row, letting you sift through them in the same way you'd change screens on a tablet or smartphone.

The unit also lets you move and rotate open windows around the screen adjusting their angle to where you're standing.

In our time with the SUR40, it was clear that Samsung and Microsoft have worked to make the device as user friendly as possible, with it understanding all the traditional command gestures seen on most tablets.

While the unit's OS did still appear to have a few flies in the ointment, it was generally a snappy experience. In fact, packing 4GB of RAM and an AMD Athlon 2.9GHz dual-core processor we found the unit to be quite lightening quick and responsive, even when it had multiple users playing with it.

One thing that was particularly noticeable was an increased emphasis on the device's use in retail, with - outside of a few casual games - near enough all the apps we saw being designed to "streamline consumers' shopping experience". These included a number of apps designed to let consumers check stock, place orders and call for assistance.

Indeed two common features we saw across many of the apps were the use of NFC tags and QR codes and it's clear which market the SUR40 is aimed at.

In terms of connectivity, the SUR40 is fairly well stocked housing 4 USB slots, an SD card reader and HDMI in and out ports. Additionally, the device felt fairly robust, with its screen being coated in Corning Gorilla Glass - a good thing considering the unit will likely be put out for public use.

Available for pre-order now for an eye-watering £7,499 plus VAT, while we were definitely impressed by the SUR40 and its potential business applications, the price tag might need to come down further for widespread adoption.

There's been a lot written about the new iPad, a lot. So as soon as we got our hands on one of the Wi-Fi-only 16GB models on launch day, we were eager to see how it would perform, particularly the apparently world-changing retina display.

And it seems fair to say that, like every other publication, V3 was highly impressed by the improvement Apple has brought to the device, with images, web pages and text all displayed with a crispness that is noticeably better than what was possible with the iPad 2.

The 5-megapixel camera that Apple has included is another notable improvement on the iPad 2.

The two pictures below, featuring several different colours, show just how much better the camera in the new iPad is - and while it's hard to replicate on a web page, the Retina display shows the improvements off to its full effect.

Below: the camera in the new iPad gives images a crisper, clearer display.

Below: the same photo taken by the iPad 2 lacks the sharpness of the new device.

Another major improvement that Apple has touted with the new device is its quad-core graphics processor, offering faster speeds and better displays for games, and certainly in the short play we had on the device there was a clear speed improvement when using the device.

Loading Google Maps, for example, is rapid, with Street View also loading smoothly.

However, in many ways there is little about the new iPad to separate it from the iPad 2, with the device looking identical and boasting almost identical features.

For some this won't matter at all, as the iPad is still a thing of beauty and unquestionably the best tablet on the market by some distance, and the improved features Apple has added are a significant upgrade.

However, if the idea of a super-sharp display and a better camera don't really appeal to you that much, you may find yourself happily ticking along with your iPad 2 for a while yet before you feel the need to upgrade.

Check back next week when we'll have a full review of the new iPad.

Tired of having your Wi-Fi signal degraded by the office walls? Scientists at Fermiab, a particle physics research facility in Illinois, have devised a means of digital communications that promises to be able travel through practically anything.

They successfully sent a digital signal using a beam of neutrinos (last seen causing the folks at CERN headaches) through hundreds of metres of solid rock.

Scientists have long understood that neutrinos are capable of passing through pretty much anything - even if there's been some question of how quickly they do so. But while that makes it easy to transmit a beam of neutrinos, the difficult bit is detecting them at the other end.

The researchers blasted a beam of neutrinos through subterranean rock to a detector some 240 metres away, using a simple digital code to transmit the word “neutrino”.

“An overall data rate of about 0.1 Hz was realised, with an error rate of less than one per cent for transmission of neutrinos through a few hundred meters of rock,” wrote the Fermilab team in a paper submitted to the ArXiv, a repository for non-peer reviewed science papers.

The team think that the technology could eventually find uses in submarine communications, where the difficulty of transmitting a coherent signal through sea water severely curtails data speeds. It could also potentially be used for inter-stellar communication, the team noted.

That said, there's clearly a deal of work to be done before if becomes a practical technology. The detector used in the experiment, which was housed in a cavern some 100 meters underground, weighs approximately 170 tons.

Not even Captain Nemo would be so foolhardy as to stick such a hefty bit of kit on his sub.  

Windows 8 looks set to impose a steep learning curve on future users, as the new operating system breaks dramatically with the conventions of previous versions and adopts a user interface more in keeping with Microsoft's Windows Phone platform.

We tested the Windows 8 Consumer Preview on a HP TouchSmart 520 all-in-one PC, and found that while the new Metro-style user interface has much to recommend it, it also feels rather constrained and limiting when compared with the desktop of Windows 7 and earlier releases.

The home-screen is a whole different world to the traditional Windows interface

The impressions gleaned from our initial hands-on with the Windows 8 Consumer Preview are that many users are likely to be baffled by the Metro-style user interface, and it could take a long time for most people to get used to it, as it introduces a completely different way of working.

Overall, Microsoft has not changed the look and feel of Windows 8 much since the Developer Preview that we tested out the firm's Build conference in September.

The main Start screen still consists of a set of blocky coloured tiles that represent applications or functions, such as email, messaging, web browser, and photos. As before, the tiles are 'live' meaning that they show status updates such as notifications of new emails, and touching a tile or clicking on it with a mouse opens the application full screen.

For users of Windows Phone, all this will have a certain amount of familiarity, as the Metro-style look is largely inherited from Microsoft's smartphone platform. For pretty much everyone else, the change is likely to be a jarring experience.

It is not even immediately clear how you access settings using the Metro interface. This is partly accomplished via what Microsoft terms ‘charms' - pop-up tools that appear if you swipe or move your mouse to the right edge of the display (see screenshot).

In fact, the whole Windows 8 experience is designed around giving the user access to their key information - email, messaging, contacts, social networking - directly from the main screen.

For those wanting to use existing Windows applications, there is still a Desktop that can be accessed by a tile on the start screen. It looks very like the desktop of Windows 7, but is a largely emasculated version with no Start menu and nothing more than the Recycle Bin icon showing.

It appears that applications must be launched from the main Start menu, with current applications opening in the Desktop rather than as a Metro-style app. Built-in Windows tools such as the Computer Management console can be found if you look for them, and these run in the Desktop.

The new-look Metro applications have a deliberately sparse appearance, and are designed to fill the entire screen.

Using these can also be confusing at first, as many of the controls and menus that Windows users are accustomed to are completely absent, and you often have to resort to searching for the charms or context-sensitive menus that pop-up from the bottom of the display.

Still, it's clear Microsoft has understood that with mobile devices, chiefly smartphone and tablets, set to dominate the future of computing, the Windows 8 system needs to meet this trend.

The use of the live tiles, as on the Windows Phone platform, is a slick, innovative system, and many users may, having got over the initial shock of the new system, quickly find themselves happily using the new interface without too much difficulty.

Metro-style website display in IE10 on Windows 8

We also found installing the Windows 8 Consumer Preview more challenging than with earlier pre-release versions of Windows. Based on previous experience, we expected the best route to take would be to create a bootable DVD and perform a clean install from this.

However, we soon ran into problems as our test system had Windows 7 pre-installed, and Windows 8 declined to install itself to any of the available partitions, stating that the "selected disk has an MBR partition table. On EFI systems, Windows can only be installed to GPT disks."

GPT, or GUID Partition Table, was introduced as part of the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) initiative to replace the ageing PC Bios firmware.

To cut a long story short, we were forced to use the Diskpart tool from the command prompt to delete each existing partition, then use the same tool to convert the disk to GPT before creating a new partition to accept Windows 8.

After this, Windows 8 installed, but the clean install has some drawbacks which we found out too late. We had lost the drivers for the touchscreen hardware, among one or two other things, and Windows 8 was unable to find suitable drivers to do the job.

We managed to locate the necessary drivers on the support section of HP's website, but the install file checks which version of Windows you are running and will not proceed on Windows 8.

We hope to find a solution soon and provide a fuller report on Windows 8 running on the HP Touchsmart 520. In the meantime, we sincerely hope that Microsoft provides a better upgrade experience for users than this when Windows 8 finally ships.