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Surface IT Pro Blog
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Announcing the availability of Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2

yoabar's avatar
yoabar
Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
Sep 01, 2020

Today’s environment requires different kinds of flexibility to make people and teams as productive as possible. It’s never been more important to empower every worker, employee, and student with the tools they need to collaborate whether they are together in person or connected remotely. Surface Hub 2S can help bridge the gap and connect people wherever they are whether in traditional workspaces and classrooms or in personal offices and offsite locations.

 

To further support this new way of working and learning, we’re excited to bring a new configuration of Surface Hub 2S with Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise available today. Let me show you how it works:

 

 

Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 enables individuals to use any application on their Surface Hub and creates a large screen meeting and collaboration experience – bringing collaboration, productive meetings and large screen productivity to any location including personal offices and learning spaces. We’re bringing the full Windows 10 desktop experience to the Surface Hub 2S 50”.

 

Customers can now install the Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 configuration to maximize their productivity.

 

The Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 configuration enables customers to break the monotony of sitting at one's desk all day and allows our customers to stand, move around and meet with remote participants more naturally and invitingly.

 

Coming soon, users will be able to quickly sign in with Windows Hello using the Surface Hub 2 Fingerprint Reader which will be exclusively available for use with the Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 configuration.

 

With the availability of the Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 configuration, customers can also create custom kiosk mode configurations in targeted environments – just like you would on any Windows 10 PC. The possibilities are endless with the Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 configuration.

The following table details the difference between Surface Hub 2S with the traditional Windows 10 Team operating system and Surface Hub 2S running Windows 10 Pro or Windows 10 Enterprise:

 

Configuration Surface Hub 2S with Windows 10 Team Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2
Optimized for meeting spaces Yes No
Optimized for personal use No Yes
Apps Microsoft Store only Microsoft Store, Win32, x64
Microsoft Teams certified Yes Yes
Secured out of the box1 Yes No
MDM management Yes Yes
GPO management No  Yes
Support for USB accessories Supports inbox drivers only Any Windows 10 compatible USB accessory
Wired Video ingest to OS Yes Yes (Requires the Connect app)
Windows Hello Biometrics No  Yes, with The Surface Hub 2 Fingerprint Reader or third-party Windows Hello accessories
Walk up and use2 Yes No
Microsoft Defender ATP No Yes
Kiosk mode No  Yes

1 Windows 10 Team on Surface Hub 2S brings unique security features as described here

2 Unique features of Windows 10 Team on Surface Hub and Surface Hub 2S

 

Prepare for Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise on Surface Hub 2

 

We designed Surface Hub to provide a rich and immersive collaboration experience for anyone to walk up and use without the need to authenticate. For this, we built Surface Hub with a purpose built OS, the Windows 10 Team edition – which we recently updated with the 2020 Public Preview.


To install Windows 10 Pro or Windows 10 Enterprise on Surface Hub 2, you’ll need to make sure that your Surface Hub’s UEFI version is 694.2938.768.0 or later. Use the Surface app on your Surface Hub 2S to check your device’s UEFI version. If your UEFI version isn’t 694.2938.768.0 or later, update your Surface Hub 2S from the Settings app.

 

 

 

To install Windows 10 Pro or Windows 10 Enterprise on your Surface Hub 2S 50”, you will need to confirm you have the necessary license and apply changes to the device’s UEFI by enrolling your device in Surface Enterprise Management Mode (SEMM). These changes will unlock the device’s factory settings that only allow the Windows 10 Team OS to run on Surface Hub 2S 50”.

 

To create a UEFI configuration package, you will need to download and install the Surface UEFI Configuration Manager from the Surface Tools for IT webpage.

 

Photo of the Microsoft Surface UEFI Configuratuor showing the new EnableOSMigration setting

 

Creating a SEMM package requires a certificate. Follow the instructions in Migrate to Windows 10 Pro or Enterprise on Surface Hub 2 to obtain one.

 

Use your imaging tool of choice to create a bootable Windows 10 Pro or Windows 10 Enterprise installation USB drive. If you’re familiar enough with SEMM, you can copy the UEFI configuration package files to the root of the Windows 10 installation USB drive and use a single USB drive throughout the process. Alternatively, you can use 2 USB drives, one for the SEMM package and one for the Windows 10 installation media.

 

After completing the Windows 10 Pro or Windows 10 Enterprise installation, check other post-install tasks.

 

For more details on how to install Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise, see Migrate to Windows 10 Pro or Enterprise on Surface Hub 2.

 

 

 

 

Updated Mar 12, 2021
Version 13.0
  • Peter Campbell's avatar
    Peter Campbell
    Brass Contributor
    Sep 02, 2020

    I have to ask, what is the point of this?

    It's a very expensive device to be a "room pc" compared to paying for a wall-mounted LCD and room pc.

     

    Is the development of the Hub OS still happening or is this in response to the various issues enterprise see with the device compared to say Teams or Skype on a Windows 10 x64 device?

  • cjplumridge's avatar
    cjplumridge
    Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
    Sep 03, 2020

    Peter Campbell, it's a fair question, but really what's trying to be achieved here is to allow choice for individuals or small teams the best-in-class touch and inking experience that the Hub 2s provide, but the flexibility of the Windows 10 Professional OS, so they can have their own personal experience and install Win32 32-bit or 64-bit applications that can't be installed on the Hub 2s Teams OS. Think executive offices, home offices or small teams of engineering, marketing, IT and creative employees (5 - 10 people).

     

    Yes, you could absolutely have a wall-mounted LCD with a room PC, but what's the end-user experience going to be like with touch, inking and collaboration?

     

    The development of the Windows 10 Teams Hub OS is ongoing and full steam ahead, as you can read at the recent Blog post yoabar posted on the 22nd of July - https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/surface-it-pro-blog/new-surface-hub-os-update-released-for-public-preview/ba-p/1534823 

  • FernandezSe's avatar
    FernandezSe
    Copper Contributor
    Sep 03, 2020

    I totally agree with Peter Campbell.

     

    This is really the point. This device makes the difference with the OS and the ability to use it as a ressource.

     

    To use a Hub (we have gen. 1 and 2 in use) with W10Pro/Ent wouldn't make the difference.

     

    To have a full Win 10 Pro experience you can use WVD, XenDesktop or VMWare Horizon in full-screen-mode (this is what we do here via VMware Horizon Client).

     

     

     

  • Peter Campbell's avatar
    Peter Campbell
    Brass Contributor
    Sep 03, 2020

    but what's the end-user experience going to be like with touch, inking and collaboration?

    That really comes down to the software, not the hardware and a lot of win32 apps are not that touch-optimized outside of MS Office and UWP apps

    This seems like a fail-safe in case the Teams OS gets abandoned with Windows now becoming a core part of the business again.

     

     

  • David Martin's avatar
    David Martin
    Copper Contributor
    Sep 08, 2020

    We are creating a new visual collaboration app for release in 2021.

    Will we be able to run a Windows Desktop app on a Surface Hub with the Windows 10 Team operating system?

     

    Or, do our customers need to install and run the standard Windows 10 OS?

    David Martin, CTO

  • yoabar's avatar
    yoabar
    Icon for Microsoft rankMicrosoft
    Sep 09, 2020

    David Martin 

    Windows desktop apps cannot run on the Windows 10 Team OS. Windows 10 Team only runs UWP apps.

    Your customers can install any Windows Desktop app on the Windows 10 Pro and Enterprise configuration on Surface Hub 2. 

  • David Martin's avatar
    David Martin
    Copper Contributor
    Sep 09, 2020

    Thanks for your quick response.

     

    With the Surface Hub Gen 2, can I extend my app across 2 or more displays and simultaneously have more than 1 person touching and inking on the displays?

     

    David Martin

  • JulianB1's avatar
    JulianB1
    Copper Contributor
    Sep 09, 2020

    This is awesome! thanks!

    Couple of questions:

    • I've installed windows pro now, how do I go back to windows teams?
    • Can I rotate the hubs display in windows pro? Windows does support it (in all the surface PCs), but it's mechanically locked on the Hub, I know that software can unlock the rotation lock, how can it be triggered?  Nevermind, The 2S cassette has a plastic lid that locks the rotation mechanism. (can be easily removed though). 

    Julián