Microsoft Surface Duo, hands-on with an intriguing double-screened foldable

The Microsoft Surface Duo is Microsoft's return to phones... but it's a dual-screeened Android phone, not a Windows machine.

The dual 5.6 inch displays combine to form an effective 8.1 inch tablet-like viewing area with a bar in between.

The Surface Pen works with the Surface Duo, but isn't included. (It should be.)

The Duo is a phone, but its phone specs aren't great. There's just a single 11-megapixel camera, and its shutter speed hasn't been good so far.

The Duo's hinge lets it fold around 360 degrees to lie flat, be stood up at angles, held like a little laptop, or folded into a tent.

Two apps can run at once, but Android apps don't handshake well when running in multitasking modes.

The Kindle app used across both screens is one of the best killer apps for the Duo... but beware of glare.

The Surface Pen sticks to the Duo via magnets. By accident or on purpose?

You can run a game and work at the same time, but it's awkward.

Only one screen at a time runs when folding into tent mode. This kills the novelty of having both screens running at once, but probably saves battery.

The Surface Duo is about the size of a Moleskine notebook.

Solitaire runs on both screens, as will any app if you stretch it across. But not all apps work well in this expanded mode.

There are a lot of buggy issues with the software we've tried so far. Maybe the processor and RAM are holding it back, or maybe the software still needs work.

The software keyboard orients in different ways depending on how the Duo is folded, but most of the time I found it hard to type on.

The Surface Duo (left) running Minecraft, next to a Nintendo 3DS XL (right). If only the Duo had unique dual-screen games it could take advantage of.