I use the surface 3 for college, it is perfect for my needs.

I take all my notes with OneNote on it, importing pdf or powerpoint slides and study on it at the library between classes. The touch screen is really nice for reading documents as well.

For equations and diagrams you can use your finger to draw them, but it is a lot easier if you use the pen, everything else is easily typed.

The forward facing camera is nice for taking quick pictures of stuff in class that is complicated and too difficult to take note of for onenote.

At home and for demanding applications I study and work on the desktop i built, and study off the notes I took on the surface through the onenote sync feature.

I'm not someone though who needs a very powerful laptop for highly demanding applications on the go.

Because the surface i have has a tiny ssd, I store huge stuff on a USB flash drive.

I use both the microsoft cover/keyboard and the "Urban Armor Gear Military Drop Tested Case" thing i found on amazon, I think they work really well together.