Microsoft Surface Pro X
Price: £999 from fave.co/2Pt5Xp3
Microsoft’s Surface Pro X was supposed to signal a new chapter for Qualcomm’s foray into Windows PCs and tablets, one where battery life was no longer the sole selling point. To its credit, the new, semi-custom Microsoft SQ1 chip (based on the Snapdragon 8cx) delivers improvements in graphics and performance. We also appreciate the appearance of USB-C and a marvellously-engineered pen cubby.
But in a baffling turn of events, the Surface Pro X falls short in battery life. Meanwhile, the app compatibility issues and bugs that are an unfortunate staple of Snapdragon-powered PCs remain. Maybe it can be tolerated in a system like the Samsung Galaxy Book 2, which delivers 18 hours of battery life. But not the Surface Pro X, with a mere eight- to 10 hours. The tired chant of ‘this is a new architecture, give it some time’, doesn’t fly anymore. When a bug or another issue pops up – and it probably will – it’s painful.
Design
Little has changed from our first impression of the Surface Pro X: it’s a Surface Pro tablet, revved up for a new generation of tablet users. Interest in tablets has apparently diminished somewhat, given the lack of third-party Windows tablets we’ve seen recently. But Microsoft’s Surface tablets are known for their sleek, stylish physical designs, and the Surface Pro X lives up to its legacy.
Don’t forget, however, that you’ll be tacking on an outrageous £259 for just the keyboard (and pen), a virtual necessity. That’s the price of a Chromebook or a cheap desktop.
The Slim Pen is a delight, though. In a few years, this design detail (first spied in Dell’s Inspiron 13 and
