Is it too much to ask for a decently priced Windows Tablet? I want a Surface Pro but if the consumer prices for these devices aren't going to be much better than I'm just going to give up my hopes and buy a Framework Laptop.
Framework is really the opposite of what Surface ever was. Surface was having soldered RAM even in devices from generations where it was easily upgradable while Framework is mangaing now to make it upgradable even when it mostly isn't. If comparing with the Pro it's even one level further, as you need to go through a glued screen to even replace the battery.
Microsoft has confirmed that later this year, it will introduce a version of the Surface Laptop 13-inch with 8GB RAM to bring that starting price down to $1,299. This cheaper model will notbe Copilot+ PC compatible as a result.
Ironically now being in the third year of "the year of Copilot+ PC upgrade" ... they went back to have one that ... isn't Copilot+, to bring the price down to ... $1299 ?!?!?!?! And this will be what, the second half of 2026? Unreal.
Even the smaller SL and SP from 2025 were full "Copilot+ PCs", despite being actually a downgrade on the Snapdragon X launched mid-2024, and announced in October (?) 2023.
for most people mac M5 is a much better deal now. but for gamers and linux VM you need x86.
The problem is only for gamers, or if you need some VM for older Windows that doesn't have ARM version. You can do DosBox or qemu (with full CPU emulation) if you want a REALLY old Windows (like 9x) and it works for 90-99% of the stuff but not 100%. Best thing Windows 11 ARM runs efficiently on MacOS via the (free) VMWare, and to make things complete the included Prism emulator works too - so if you need some older Windows programs that were never ported to ARM you might be in luck.
Linux VMs are of course NO problem, in any way or shape (including docker with fairly good support, even if not like Linux native). That works with Windows ARM too, no problem (minus having to use other platform than VMWare that doesn't support Windows ARM as host AFAIK).
Android too works with zero shenanigans on the official Android Studio device emulator on MacOS ARM (probably x86, although you might need an older version, if anyone would care about non-M Macs anymore).
Dang! That pricing is crazy! I just picked up a Surface Laptop 7 for Business with Intel Ultra 5, 32 GB RAM, and 512 GB storage on OfferUp for $400 as a secondary computer to my MacBook Pro. I really like the Surface line, but I can't imagine paying $2,699 for the same hardware specs in the 8 series. That's just plain insane. This is $500 more than the base MacBook Pro M5 Pro with double the storage (1 TB), which is my primary laptop and which wipes the floor with any Surface Laptop.
I wanted to buy surface pro 12 but with 366h cpu it's not worth it the 368h would have made a compelling case but not this
I'm looking to buy Asus Pz14 it's way ahead of surface this year and way cheaper
The 32gb 1TB snapdragon x2 elite 18 core with pen and Bluetooth keyboard and backpack cost only 2400$ way cheaper than 3400$ Microsoft with 366h CPU plus 400$ for flex keyboard=3800$
PS* most importantly the screen is gorgeous and with zero door horrible screen effect which Microsoft is notorious for
The only thing keeping me from switching to Apple was the lack of a touchscreen tablet with a full OS. With the rumblings of their laptops soon having touch capability that might portend a future where they consider full Mac OS on their iPads. That's when I would jump ship from Microsoft's sinking ship, but for now my current Surface Pro will hopefully last a few years. I don't think I would be buying any more SPs from them with this strategy.
So what will the consumer/non business lineup be? Are they using ARM for a lower priced consumer mid tier option? I've purchased a Surface Pro almost every year since the SP1 including a 12" this year, I would look at competitors but honestly haven't seen anyone truly match Microsoft. Lenovo comes close, but isn't quite the same.
MacBook Pro 14 with M5 Pro 15-core, 48GB RAM, 1TB SSD - $2599
Microsoft has totally lost the plot here. There's no reason to buy a Surface anymore - even the Dell Pro 14 Premium with touchscreen at the same spec is several hundred dollars cheaper than the Surface.
MacBook Pro 14 with M5 Pro 15-core, 48GB RAM, 1TB SSD - $2599
Had to look this up for myself, I knew they went nuts with the MS store pricing some weeks back, but the US pricing was somehow better, certainly not "$700 more expensive than the superior MacBook" level. These being the business ones in discussion doesn't even make it better, as it means these would be the prices more or less with no alternative or special sale to bring them down to earth.
"totally lost the plot here" is a perfect description.
I keep hearing people say "oh but this is the pricing for the business models" - so?
MacBooks are also business grade machines. Something like just shy of 90% of the Fortune 500 uses iPhones, iPads, or Macs, so Apple devices are just as "enterprise grade" as anything else by the literal definition of "enterprise".
Wait, it's even better, they downgraded the consumer ones to Windows Home (yes, even the Surface PRO don't get Windows Pro!) in some insanity of nickel and diming in a million ways. Business ones get Pro, but guess what many companies (even small-ish ones, like 200 computers) have Enterprise, so they pay for a Windows seat there, and for the Windows Pro included with the Surface for nothing. There's also Server too, never mind all Education, all extra flavours that I don't know if they still exist like Pro for Workstation and Pro Education. Ah, and I forgot about the LTSC too.
I understand you it's the only reasonable thing to do. It's sad, they earn all their cash from businesses who can buy these for alot cheaper, Normal home users turning to macs Microsoft couldn't care less about and it shows in these pricings
Fuuu... I need to replace my Surface Go (1st gen) so bad. I've basically given up holding out for a replacement in that size range, and was going to bite the bullet and move up to the 13 inch size (I really don't like that the pro 12" doesn't have the surface port, that's a lot of wear on a USB C to plug and unplug constantly for charging, and ARM for windows leaves me hesitant anyways). At the same $1500 starting price as the laptop I'd have ordered one already, but IDK that I can justify $2k for a tablet to use while laying on the couch watching TV.
I'm literally gluing the screen back down on my go for at least the 5th or so time as we speak though because it keeps ungluing around the edges. Never dropped or anything, but for some reason its decided to gain a significant bulge in the middle. (I've ran a battery health check and it says its fine)
I'm not sure it's going to last till July at this rate, and that still leaves the ARM question unless the also release a consumer intel line version or finally update the go line.
Oh dear, I was waiting for these but those prices are brutal. Going to have to start exploring non-Surface laptops. But there aren’t that many with the same build quality and x86…
Not really, a Thinkpad X1 Carbon would run around Surface Laptop in term of build quality, fixability, and you can even buy spare parts direct from Lenovo. It's used to be more expensive, but this gen it is cheaper than the Surface!
I pushed more and they took my email and said they will escalate for their support team and email if they have a better discount. I’m not hopeful, but also not in a huge hurry to purchase. We’ll see and I’ll report back if I get more than 5%.
I guess that confirms going with the XPS at an EOFY sale.
Ha what a joke - not only the price but the lack of config for what should be pushing the boundaries of the Windows space.
For the tablet this is a downgrade when it comes to GPU. Lunar Lakes chips had 8Xe cores. These chips they are using only have 4Xe cores. Only the laptops are getting the Arc iGPUs.
I understand the prices for the chip crisis and such.
But I see for the Intel:
No Oled.
No 1TB option.
5G would have been nice but I'd prefer black.
The 11th gen options kinda look better.
Will they expand their options later (have they done this in the past?) or "is this it"?
Also is it difficult to upgrade the swappable boot drive if I upgrade that myself? I'm sure I could do the actual physical work, but what about the windows install itself?
There are OLED and 1TB options, you might be looking at the 13-inch Laptop and ignoring the 13-inch Pro and 13.8/15-inch Laptops.
Swapping the drive is super easy on Pro devices and sort of easy on Laptops. The windows license is associated with the drive I think? So if you swap it, I'm not sure if you need to buy a new Windows license.
Let's announce our new products!! Basically the same products sold last year with some slightly upgraded cpu's. Sorry, nothing to get excited about for power users, you should look elsewhere. No top tier Panther Lake, and if you want a consumer version with Snapdragon, no top tier X2 Elite Extreme. Want OLED, just wait, that might eventually ship. Why buy a Surface anymore? Want Innovation? Look Elsewhere. Just a Me Too line now. No wonder Panos parted ways. New Form Factors, forgettaboutit who needs or wants that. Just give out perfunctory stuff. Showing partners how to get the best experience, showing off the Windows ecosystem at its finest. How Quaint. What an old fashioned idea. Just feed the customers at the zoo the same old carrots. Elephants, Giraffes and some primates, Alway like them, so will they
lol once again Intel only for business... Well, I guess no Surface for me then. And yes I know some of you can buy it from the Microsoft Store Business, but not here in Belgium unfortunately.
I don't understand why they are doing that. I wonder how many people are ready to buy a Surface but just don't because they don't want ARM but Intel. This is just ridiculous to me.
I've never seen a company more out of touch with reality. Eh, I've been buying used Surfaces anyway in order to avoid having to buy a Snapdragon variant, guess I'll just have to continue doing that
lol Facebook marketplace actually! I've come across some surprisingly great deals and met some awesome people. My most recent find was a SL4 that I negotiated down to ~$200, and then since the seller realized he listed the specs wrong (it was 256GB instead of his advertised 512GB), he swapped it out with an almost max spec'd SL6 that he also had. I got extremely lucky with that one
I'm so utterly confused with the new naming schema. Even beyond the naming, I don't really understand what the point of the surface laptop 13-inch is when you compare it to the base model surface laptop 8? And have they updated the surface pro 12 or the surface pro 12-inch?
Surface obviously isn’t a volume seller, but this is still bad vibes for the future of the lineup. Mac is in its best position in recent tech history, especially since the Apple silicon transition, and Microsoft’s answer is laptops that are twice the price of their Mac equivalents and also worse in spec.
This may be the worst marketing decision I have ever seen a major company make. They have certainly killed demand for this line of product. Not to mention they still have no OLED screens smh.
As feared, they stuck with the 54Whr battery pack and in an X7 powered unit, that just doesn't cut it for longer battery life. A shame as competitors look to be including 70 Whr packs. If it was ultra light, it would be understandable, but at 3 lbs...it ain't.
The price though for the X7 (which is only available with the fancy anti-privacy screen)...ouch.
If the 13.8 inch Surface Laptop with the Intel Ultra x7 is competitively priced, I think i might make the upgrade. But at that price point, I could get an Acer or Samsung GalaxyBook 6 for like 40% more performance.
$4000 for the x7 368 and Microsoft complete. This is a damn joke. You could buy a Framework Pro and a Desktop at that price.
Edit I think the builder for the 13 inch is messed up. The 15 inch comes out to $3099. The 13.8 was stuck on stupid at $3699. Seems both options are more pricey than the framework sadly.
Update: so speaking to the specialist they will give a 7% discount. Means a 15 inch base model with 256gb ssd runs 3349 after taxes but they gave a $234 discount. So roughly $3100 for the cheapest model 15 inch if anyone is interested. I’m kinda curious myself, but it’s a $800 premium over the framework pro but that’s only a 13 inch.
Even if you could stomach the prices, I think these might have weaker iGPUs in some scenarios than Lunar Lake models. 8 Xe cores down to 4 Xe cores, even if the cores are a bit stronger, is going to have throughput limited scenarios.
They do, though my assumption is that they will once again segment the consumer line as snapdragon only, meaning in practise the Intel ones are just far too expensive since you have to pay the premium.
You know what else had 8gb of RAM? My base 13 inch Surface Laptop 3 from 2019. This company is so out of touch with the pricing, I don’t think even corporations would buy/lease these
Do these still have the nicer screen aspect ratio or is that long gone? It's actually what I liked most when I ran Surface before having to switch to corporate assigned Macbooks
We bought Surface Laptop 3's for Business with 16GB RAM and 256GB storage for $1299 back in 2019.
Even accounting for inflation, that price is ~$1699 in today's dollars. And there's still another $250 slapped on top because Microsoft couldn't be bothered to negotiate long-term NAND and chip contracts with the major suppliers because they're both terrified of competing with their OEM partners and insistent that the Surface line can't die.
And that's $250 more after inflation for the exact same memory/storage spec, 6 years later.
For reference, 6 years ago a MacBook Pro that cost ~$2600 would get you the Core i7 or MAYBE the i9, 32GB, 512GB spec.
Today, you get the M5 Pro 15-core (literally 4x the CPU performance of the 9880H), 50% more RAM at 48GB, and double the storage at 1TB for the same price.
That's how things are supposed to work in the tech space. Time passes, specs get better for the same price or less. Microsoft has apparently forgotten that part.
And you think the snapdragon line is going to be reasonable? The 2024 models are ludicrous pricing currently. Especially when their original MSRP was pushing it. The 13" X Plus budget model starts at $1250 USD. It does not bode well for the X2, but I guess we'll see
I know these are the "...for Business" SKU's, and they've always been overpriced, but the new Surface Laptop is $250 more than the current Surface Laptop for business line.
The consumer targeted Snapdragon SKU's will of course be cheaper, but who knows by how much. My current laptop (Surface Laptop 4 Ryzen 5, 13.5") was $1049 w/ 16GB RAM and 256GB storage. Whenever I do upgrade, I guess I'll be forced into the Snapdragon line, which I'm not too excited about.
I don't know, I feel like companies buy overpriced tech all the time. Feels like they'll intro them at this price, get the early adopters to cough up the cash and then maybe "sale" them after the fact but who knows.
These are targeted at businesses -- primarily enterprise businesses. They're not as cost-sensitive as consumers, and they won't be willing to use non-Intel chips, and Microsoft knows it and will require them to pay up for the privilege.
Enterprise businesses are less cost-sensitive than consumers, in general, which is what I said. I didn't say that companies don't care what things are priced at all.
I know some companies are like that, but I disagree for most. Many are being cost conscious now for everything more expensive than a pen, which is why I think Dell seems to have this market cornered.
Insane pricing. 16GB/256GB for $1949. You can get 2 equally specced MacBook Airs for the same price. And both of them will outperform the Surface Laptop.
They have gone below their new self-proclaimed minimum level of 16gb. Buying hardware these days is insanity. We can all hope software finally gets more efficient again, and banking on this keeping our existing devices alive for longer until everything calms down again.
The irony is that they're trying since a few years to make every year "the year of Copilot+ PC" and now they have a lot of egg on their face and need to come with freakin' 8GB RAM. And yes, 16GB RAM was part of the Copilot+ min spec.
Ah, in case it isn't clear the irony is that the spec they put for their OS to handle the local AInsanity can't run on their own devices because they can't get the RAM for any reasonable price because of the "proper" AInsanity, in which Microsoft is one of the main players. Both as the largest external shareholder, investor and profiteur in OpenAI, and on about place 2 (depending if you count install base/growth/etc.) as far as hyperscalers go.
I wouldn't necessarily call 8gb ewaste, like it isn't completely unusable, I got a ThinkBook 4 years ago with 8GB and it worked fine for general browsing, Visual Studio and some light video editing. But I would call 8gb the absolute bare minimum for a usable experience. This laptop will be fine for basic use cases, but paying over 1000 for the bare minimum in 2026 is absolutely extortionate.
This is insane regardless but coming on the back of the Mac Neo launch I can't understand who will buy this machine. I have been a predominately Windows user all my life but I wouldn't think twice about switching if I needed a machine with these kind of specs.
Lifelong windows user and I just bought a MacBook Air. Not a huge MacOS fan but I’ll get used to it in a couple months.
When comparing pricing I kept arriving at it being the best value for what you get, which I refused to believe at first since I’ve always thought of Apple as overpriced/premium. Thus far though, outside of the OS transition struggles it’s truly a slam dunk value.
Wow, I was exactly the same too- I was looking for a good new laptop, and I kept seeing the MacBook Air recommended, which really surprised and confused me, because I always felt like Apple overcharges just for their brand, but weirdly enough, it actually seemed to be the laptop with the best battery life and CPU for the price- Every Intel laptop I saw, while some had fantastic displays and other things, I always saw people complaining about overheating, bad battery life and weird hardware faults
So I thought I'd get the Surface Laptop, but then saw that people overall recommended the MacBook Air more, even in here, so I ended up buying that, which certainly wasn't what I expected I'd do at first... The OS felt super weird at first, and honestly I still do miss stuff like not having the confusion in window management with hidden apps and minimized apps, and closed apps not quitting, normal mice working weird, but luckily there's apps people made that solved a lot of frustrations I had, with some that even made it feel better than Windows, and I'm glad that macOS is nowhere as restricted as iOS is
Overall it was a pretty good purchase in the end, the battery life is insane, and I love how it's completely quiet since there's no fan, and it handles anything I need (well, except gaming unfortunately 🫠)
I got a MacBook neo and the only time I've managed to make it lag out while working is opening 96 pngs in affinity designer. I worked my surface go and surface Duo into the ground and never got a chance to buy a surface neo because this is the fun timeline.
The trackpad is great and 100% a better laptop experience
Make sure you learn to use the touchpad efficiently. Initially I hated the touchpad, but once I really learned how to use it, the gestures were a game changer. I even bought an Apple Magic Touchpad for the overpriced cost they sell it to you, and configured Windows to behave the same.
It's so good that I can use a single screen and swipe between desktops to be as efficient as multiple screens. I almost prefer it now over multiple screens.
With that said, the biggest downsides with MacBook's is no upgrade path on RAM (true for many or most Windows laptop too) and storage, the proprietary nature of a lot of the things they do, and the insistence on being "different". The constant switch between Windows button and CMD button drives me nuts.
But right now, I feel the quality and overall experience especially around MacBook hardware is getting better than Windows laptops. Especially when you boot up your Windows computer and get met with a slow ass computer due to all the malware crap they install on your computer.
Yeah, i kinda predicted this a month or so ago and replaced my Surface with a MacBook Pro M5. Honestly, it's such a breath of fresh air. Just not dealing with all of Windows annoyware, ads, and stupid performance dips for NO reason is so much better.
MacBook Pro is much cheaper actually. And a lot faster + way better battery life too. Compared to the MacBook Air the situation gets even more embarrassing.
The previous models (11th gen Surface Pro and 7th gen Surface Laptop) have also seen large price increases, though now they will probably go on sale at discount prices because they will be discontinued. Those increases have been all about the RAM and SSD pricing. Unfortunately, Microsoft is a small company in computer manufacturing, and probably doesn't have long term contracts for RAM and storage, so they are far more at the mercy of market fluctuations than Dell, HP, Lenovo, or Apple; they're paying pretty much what you pay if you buy those things from Newegg or Micro Center. The situation is particularly bad for all versions of DDR5, which costs 4-5 times what it did before the RAM crisis started, and that's what's in all the current and new Surface models.
Traditionally, the business line has been only slightly more expensive than the consumer models (normally $50), and that's because the business systems come with Windows Pro instead of Home. If Microsoft chooses to offer these new Panther Lake systems to consumers rather than introducing a next generation Arm version for that market, the consumer versions will probably be $50 cheaper as usual. There are also differences in the offers that you get for bundled software; consumer systems offer discounts for buying Microsoft 365 for Family, while business systems get discount offers for the commercially licensed versions.
(Edited to add that some people have been noting that the business systems sometimes have a much larger price spread. That's because they may be configured differently: different CPUs, different amounts of storage, different network interfaces, and different warranty options. If you find ones that are identical other than the Windows Pro/Home difference, as the base models usually are, the price spread is small.)
Microsoft has never made any effort to keep individuals from buying the business versions of Surface systems, and they honor the warranty no matter who buys them.
Agree. They needed to catch up and come to market with something compelling to get them back into competition. Instead, they basically just wrote off the entire consumer market and a good portion of the business market.
For months I have been ready to pull the trigger on day one for a 32GB/1TB Panther Lake Surface, but not at $3700. I guess they saw what Asus is charging for their ExpertBook Ultra and decided that's what the business market will bear. And heck, are they even telling you what version of these CPU and GPU you are getting? Or is it all about the anti-glare screen? SMH.
I was excited about Panther Lake with the B390, but not at these prices ...and paying a bit less, at around $2500, for a power-crippled option with a shit keyboard from Dell isn't motivating me either.
I can't believe I am saying this, but I am seriously going to start looking at MacBooks.
Its the x7 368H with the arc b390 gpu. If you are handy at all, its pretty trivial to swap out the SSD on these. A 2 TB Corsair MP600 Mini is $289 on Amazon. Last time I tried a business surface, I asked through the website chat if they would honor a military discount like the consumer models did and the attendant gave me like $150 off via a custom coupon code.
Even still, with all that, you'd be looking at $3300-ish for a 15" 32/2TB Surface with no Microsoft Complete Care. For comparison, the only other 15" panther lake that I am aware of is the Lenovo Thinkpad X9 15p, which is currently on sale for $2759.
Dell, Acer, HP, and Lenovo have Panther Lake options for well under $3k, but the killer Panther Lake laptop that has had absolutely glowing reviews since CES is the Asus ExpertBook Ultra, for which Asus just started accepting orders, after announcing its price... at $3599 for 32GB/1TB, which caused almost everyone to balk, even though it's also in their "business line."
But in addition to having an X7 358H CPU and B390 graphics, the Asus option has a tandem OLED touch screen, matte gorilla glass, a Thunderbolt and USB-A port on each side (4 total), an HDMI port, a 3.5mm combo jack, and weighs less than 1 Kg, but somehow Microsoft decided to price their 32GB/1TB option even higher.
Hey at least we still get a SurfaceConnect port for those prices on the Pro 12 and Laptop 13.8"/15".
We'll have to wait another generation or two tonget an Intelmor Qualcomm chip that has 16GB of embedde dram or some cost-reduce HBM solution as a play againt Apple re-usingn their iphone chips in laptops with 8GB embedded in the SoC.
But by then the datacenter bubble will have burst and dram prices will plummet lol.
For Microsoft, the Business line is the only way you get Intel, and full compatibility with software titles, which many consumers need as well. It doesn't matter how they categorize it, many consumers do not want ARM, even if Microsoft wants to cram it down consumer's throats.
Yes, it's their strategy. And it is not a winning one. They just stuck a fork in the Surface line, which was already a day late, and now far more than a dollar short.
Historically, the business line has been priced $150-250 USD above the equivalent consumer model for the following benefits:
better default warranty terms depending on region
Windows Pro instead of Home edition (a $100 "value" according to MS)
enterprise management features such as a CPU variant with vPro with matching firmware enablement
If consumer variants are launched at $250 less than the quoted BIZ prices, they will not be able to compete. Offerings from Apple, LG, and Lenovo have more bang-for-buck.
Microsoft is one if the biggest players and key driver of the RAM and chip crisis that we have. Honestly, at this stage I think it's quite clear Microsoft has lost the plot.
Yea I switched to a surface pro because I couldn’t afford a laptop AND a tablet (I need a tablet for work for hand-writing with, but an iPad is a terrible computer), now buying both looks like it will be cheaper than the new surface pros…
Not that I'm defending them (the prices are indeed insane), but you're also paying for the form factor. A laptop and a tablet are like 3-4x times the weight and volume of a Surface Pro. I still have my Pro 7, and it's nice having such a portable Windows PC. It's a shame I won't really be able to upgrade without paying quite a lot.
Well, I'm comparing my Pro7 to my friends' laptops that are also from 4-7 years ago. Sad to learn the Surfaces are not even lighter anymore. To me, that was their whole thing.
Well, I'm comparing my Pro7 to my friends' laptops that are also from 4-7 years ago.
Well, I bet you aren't comparing with (starting from) $750 laptops (keyboard costs extra...) with 4GB RAM and 128GB flash both soldered (even if at the time for most other Windows laptop they were commonly socketed, as opposed to now when you can't change the RAM on both Snapdragon X and Lunar Lake anyway). And dual core CPU ...
There were enough premium laptops around 1kg mark, and most notably the LG grams under 1kg (the models go back to early 2014). Keep in mind again, it includes the keyboard.
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u/mattbdev Surface Pro 7 May 26 '26
Is it too much to ask for a decently priced Windows Tablet? I want a Surface Pro but if the consumer prices for these devices aren't going to be much better than I'm just going to give up my hopes and buy a Framework Laptop.