Microsoft New Surface Laptops and Copilot

At this year’s Microsoft event, they unveiled their next-generation Surface laptop look to compete against the Apple MacBook series. These new Surface laptops are equipped with Qualcomm’s ARM chip the Snapdragon X chips. Microsoft’s adoption of the X chips will help optimise performance and battery life, and power new AI capabilities. Qualcomm claims its X chips are 2.6 times faster than Apple’s M3 chip and up to 5.4 times faster than the Intel Core Ultra 7.

Surface Pro 11

The Surface Pro 11 is powered by the new Snapdragons X processor, Microsoft says the new Pro is up to 90 per cent faster than the previous model. Optionally consumers will have a choice of LCD or the new OLED display. It has two USB C/4 ports and comes with an improved ultrawide/HD system on the front and a 10-megapixel sensor on the back.

Surface Laptop (7th Edition)

The new Surface laptop gets a redesign with thinner bezels and, an updated keyboard deck with a haptic touchpad. The laptop comes with one USB-A, two USB-C, an audio jack, and Surface Connect ports. Available in 13 and 15-inch screens, the laptop can be spec with a max of 32GB RAM and 1TB internal storage. Consumers have the choice to be equipped with either Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus or Elite.

New Copilot and Windows Features

Recall

Recall enables users to find anything they have seen or done on their PC with a simple search query. Powered by AI it will understand various contents on the PC such as text, images and videos. It works on any application so users can search across the whole computer. The recall index is stored locally on-device and won’t be used to train any artificial intelligence models therefore making the data private. Users will be able to customise the feature to exclude certain websites or apps to prevent them from accessing private content.

Live Translations

Live translations will allow instant real-time translations from 44 languages into English across any video or audio call.

Summary

The emergence of this new ARM-powered laptop could bring a new era into the Surface series just like when Apple moved to their M series chips. Qualcomm Snapdragon X chips will bring power efficiencies across the new line-up and deliver massive improvements, especially to power-intensive tasks such as CAD or video editing. It will be interesting to see if these new Snapdragon X chipsets bring the expected stats when benchmarked directly against its competitors. Soon we may see a new player in the ARM chipset race and new laptops an desktops that are capable of matching or exceed Apple MacBook and Macs. a

James Phang