Also purchased a Surface with the hope that music will become one if its big uses. So far it's (just) lived up to my expectations.
The sound quality out of the headphone jack is surprisingly good - as the poster above me stated, it's reminiscent of the Zune hardware (120GB in my case). I've found it to be a little noisy with sensitive headphones, and as a result my Westone 3s generate a slight hiss when plugged in and the audio hardware is active (Windows seems to be switching it on and off as needed). It's not overwhelming, and it's a consistent lowly hiss (think the opening track of Kind of Blue), which fades into oblivion once music starts playing. I'm thankful for that, as my laptop and PCs generate this jarring cacophony of white noises when I plug sensitive earphones and I was worried that the Surface would do the same. No such drama.
I've also plugged in a pair of Denon D2000s. These aren't all that demanding but the Surface can drive these to very uncomfortable levels of loudness. I usually find myself using the IEMs between 20-30 and the full-size headphones between 40-50 on the 100-step volume control. Driving the Denons via my headphone amp seems to minimise the hiss to an almost imperceptible level.
Of course this thing has a full-size USB host on the side. I’ve tried it with a NuForce Icon Mobile and Cambridge Audio DACMagic (v1) and both of them were recognised and initiated automatically. For the record, they both use standard USB Audio class drivers. Anyone who has used Windows Vista/7/8’s audio management will be in familiar territory. There’s no ASIO support but there is the option to allow exclusive access to the audio hardware for applications (meaning WASAPI exclusive mode support, if I’m not mistaken).
I’ve only used one music app on this device, Microsoft’s Xbox Music. I’m an Xbox Music subscriber, and their catalogue is mighty impressive, but the app chugs along uninspiringly. I feel it needs an overhaul. It’s a little too net-connected, and loads far too many useless assets on the app’s home screen. The library management is woeful; making it an n-step process to scroll to any artist/album whose name begins with something other than a number, A or B. I have no idea why it’s so clunky when more complex apps like IE10 and OneNote MX are silky smooth (and in the case of IE10 particularly, rock solid). Hopefully this will all improve, but I still think an overhaul is better than a fixer at this point (after receiving two updates to the app in the last week I'm still unimpressed).
What would be awesome is an alternative, no-nonsense music player akin to Foobar2000 for this platform.
I also get issues with sound skipping, pops, etc when typing or moving around in other apps, but this seems to only happen occasionally. I was a former Zune subscriber, and i feel that somehow MSFT has taken a step backwards with the xbox player. It doesnt seem as intuitive or friendly as the old zune player.
