Surface studio shouldn't be compared to the iMac.
Surface studio is an all-in-one PC with a 28" better-than-4k display primarily targeted at "creative professionals" (or wannabes). The iMac is an all-in-one Mac with a 27" 5k display partly targeted at "creative professionals" (or wannabes). There aren't a whole lot of other systems that fit that description. On what planet shouldn't you compare them?
Now, if you compare them, the conclusion may well be that the iMac gives significantly more bangs-per-buck unless you were also planning to buy a Cintiq digitiser to go with it, and that the Studio is let down by its lack of high speed i/o, but its still a sensible comparison. I'll wait and see (a) how much Apple jacks up the price of the iMac if/when it gets round to updating it vs. (b) what the Studio actually ends up selling for when its widely available.
Because if you are producing video then wider is better....
Actually, the Studio's 4500x3000 display sounds pretty much perfect for displaying a 3840x2160 "4k" video at 1:1 while leaving plenty of room for window furniture, timelines and control palettes on the same screen. I also have a mental picture of the Studio tilted down in "easel" mode showing a touch-sensitive editing console, with a 40" TV hung on the wall behind, at comfortable viewing distance, for video preview... sweet.
Unfortunately, what
does probably limit the studio for pro video production purposes is the lack of Thunderbolt or even USB 3.1gen2 for fast external storage, but its probably fine for "prosumer" 4k stuff.
The Studio's design is a potential solution to the "gorilla arms" issue with touch-screen desktops - it opens up far more possibilities than just creating freehand masterpieces (I can't draw freehand for toffee but I
can use vector drawing software, which could work well on the Surface).
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The keyboard has chiclet keys, but that's not an Apple original either.
I think the "modern" chiclet keyboard
was popularised by Apple when they introduced it on the MacBook Pro ~2008.
Prior to that, "chiclet keyboard" was virtually a term of abuse, reminiscent of various nasty 80s keyboards such as the original commodore PET (you really don't wanna know) and, particularly, associated with the spectacular flop that was the IBM PC Jr (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_PCjr). The mantra, as always, is that Apple may not have wrought many original inventions from raw firmament, but they've been the ones to refine and popularise new ideas.
Then, of course, it was Apple - in partnership with Sony - who created the original
Powerbook from which pretty much
all modern laptop designs are descended (there were clamshell laptops before then, but the Powerbook introduced the modern layout with the keyboard pushed back to make space for a wrist-rest and central pointing device). Even in the dark years before the second coming of Jobs, when Apple totally fouled up their desktop line and OS, they kept turning out the nicest laptop hardware.
What is happening now is that Microsoft, with their Surface range, seem to be making an effort to take over Apple's position of trendsetter. Certainly their advertising is aggressively targeting - and trash talking - Macbooks, and since Apple's current idea of "innovation" seems to be "make the same basic design 10% smaller, prematurely force all-USB-C and jack up the price" they're probably smelling blood in the water.
Its going to be interesting to see whether Dell, Lenovo et. al. produce their own takes on the Surface Studio concept. The difference between Apple and Microsoft, though, is that Windows still wins, even if Dell copies them.
