14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft’s Surface tablet was recently thrown in the middle of another blunder, as the units used by the New England Patriots during the weekend in their game against the Denver Broncos stopped working due to what appeared to be a network issue.
While lots of people, including the sideline commentators, claimed the Surface tablets stopped working, Microsoft now explains in a blog post that its device was not at fault for this issue.
“In the past two years, Surfaces have supported nearly 100,000 minutes of sideline action, and in that time, not a single issue has been reported that is related to the tablet itself,” Yusuf Mehdi, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft’s Windows and Devices Group, stated today.
“On rare occasions like we saw on Sunday, the stadium has network issues that prevent the delivery of images to the Surface devices. In these cases, we work with the NFL to quickly troubleshoot possible network issues so we can get the photo imaging solution to proceed as normal.”
Surface helps teams be more effective
Mehdi went on to say that the Surface usage amongst NFL teams continues to grow, and more and more are actually looking into Redmond’s devices in order to check out photos and statistics.
And last but not least, it’s statistically demonstrated that Surface tablets can help teams become more effective because players are getting information faster. The Surface is an extremely durable device, Mehdi pointed out, so it can withstand pretty much everything, “even Johnny Manziel’s head.”
So there you go, the Surface tablets were not at fault for the issues experienced by the Patriots on Sunday, but the network problems that actually happened on the stadium were. Microsoft claims that the partnership with the NFL advances at the expected pace, despite the fact that commentators still seem to create all kinds of controversies around Redmond’s tablets.