Microsoft Slaps $400 Premium on Intel-powered Surface Lineup (theregister.com) 50
Microsoft is charging business customers a $400 premium for Surface devices equipped with Intel's latest Core Ultra processors compared to models using Qualcomm's Arm-based chips, the company has disclosed. The Intel-powered Surface Pro tablet and Surface Laptop, starting at $1,499, come with a second-generation Core Ultra 5 processor featuring eight cores, 16GB of memory and 256GB storage.
Comparable Qualcomm-based models begin at $1,099. The new Intel devices will be available to business customers from February 18, though versions with cellular connectivity will launch later. Consumer Surface devices will only be offered with Qualcomm processors. Microsoft also unveiled a USB 4 Dock supporting dual 4K displays and the Surface Hub 3, a conference room computer available in 50-inch or 85-inch touchscreen versions.
Comparable Qualcomm-based models begin at $1,099. The new Intel devices will be available to business customers from February 18, though versions with cellular connectivity will launch later. Consumer Surface devices will only be offered with Qualcomm processors. Microsoft also unveiled a USB 4 Dock supporting dual 4K displays and the Surface Hub 3, a conference room computer available in 50-inch or 85-inch touchscreen versions.
Did I miss something? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not sure when Microsoft started thinking that they were a "premium" laptop producer like Apple, and felt like could start dictating when their customers will start migrating to ARM processors.
I'm sure that Dell/HP/Lenovo will take advantage of their hubris and undercut them on price for their Intel based business laptops. Probably by around $400.
Re:Did I miss something? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Commonly this involves a fair amount of hubris and discovering that the OEMs do what they do for a reason(first gen surface docks, thankfully gen2s are not my problem, never worked properly; surface firmware had the joy of no CSM and 'modern standby' only well before that was actually not badly broken for power ma
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Not even Apple. I just bought a brand new Apple M3 with 1tb of storage and 16gb of ram for around $1,500. Runs fast as hell and the battery life is fantastic.
$1,600 to Microsoft gets you another ho hum boring Intel processor.
Re: Did I miss something? (Score:2)
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How is the battery life on that Intel CPU/nvidia gpu? The benefit of the ARM cpu is that it sips electricity vs the intel /nvidia chugging those watts.
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See, this has always been what happens - someone will always list a dissimilar machine and say "but, but see what I got for X dollars!".
I remember way back when Apple first introduced the MacBook Air. Guys here would post "That's stupid expensive! My HP LapBurnerExtreme cost $500 less, has twice the RAM and a faster processor!" Somehow they missed the point that the LapBurnerExtreme weighed 12 pounds, had a desktop processor, and was almost two inches thick - not even remotely a similar machine.
But back to
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Goodness knows I am not at all a fan of Microsoft. I have spent years cursing at blue screens, and before that, frozen systems. Their office suite often isn't even compatible with itself, and their development tools don't exactly enthrall me. I could go on, but won't.
That being said, I actually like the Surface. It has a cool design that just fits my expectations for a tablet-laptop hybrid.
Now, whether it's worth a $400 premium? Meh...
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their development tools don't exactly enthrall me
Curious what you don't like about their dev tools. Visual Studio is top notch, and the open sourcing of .Net Core has allowed companies like Jetbrains to release other top notch tools that are cross platform.
There's a lot we could legitimately bitch about Microsoft on, but their dev tools isn't it any more.
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Curious what you don't like about their dev tools. Visual Studio is top notch, and the open sourcing of .Net Core has allowed companies like Jetbrains to release other top notch tools that are cross platform.
Okay, I have used VS and VS Code and yes, they're good. I was thinking of other tools like TFS ... and (the horror!) VSS. Also, I'm lukewarm about their database tools. I don't even want to mention MDX - oh look, I just did.
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I'm not sure when they decided that a 'premium' laptop still only has 16GB of RAM, especially one meant to run Windows 11.
No thanks, never running any laptop or desktop with less than 32GB again.
It's a rip-off for ARM-based notebooks anyway (Score:3)
Those prices are ridiculous for Windows ARM notebooks. A Samsung notebook with the same Qualcomm processor and Windows doesn't cost much more than half the prices they're asking for the Surface line.
Article is an advertisement (Score:3, Insightful)
TFA contains no information on the reason for the price difference, it justs lists a bunch of prices. It's basically just a copy of a press release.
Re:Article is an advertisement (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think that's a bad reason to use that article, the submitter is linking to it as evidence not as an article discussing the issue.
In terms of the reason, one can speculate, but it could easily be that nobody really wants an ARM-based Windows machine. Windows isn't popular because it's great, it's popular because it's a component of "the standard computer." The moment you say "Oh, this computer won't be able to run (efficiently) with your software or more obscure hardware" there's nothing about Windows that'd make it compelling.
The only way ARM laptops would be worth the same as Intel laptops is if they're capable of running software compiled for ix86 at speeds comparable to those self same Intel chips. Until then you're limited to either slower Intel programs or specially recompiled-for-ARM software that customers don't generally think is available.
By comparison, Chromebooks seem to cost about the same whether they're ARM or not, because nobody cares about the availability of software or worrying they're going to plug something in that requires a special driver that's only compiled of ix86.
Not an ARM problem so much as a Windows problem. Windows isn't great, it's just standard. Changes the standards and Windows ceases to be something compelling.
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I don't think that's a bad reason to use that article
Not only is it a bad reason (we have enough slashvertisements here already) but it's also just a bad article, which is a good reason not to use it. It has no information of any value since none of us will be buying these piles of trash.
Re:Article is an advertisement (Score:4, Funny)
How is an argument telling people Microsoft has a massive price discrepancy, something we'd want to discuss, a "Slashvertisement"?
You're being a jackass. Knock it off.
Re: Article is an advertisement (Score:2)
That's not what I said at all. Learn to read and understand English before trying to argue in it. If it's your first language, your performance was especially pathetic.
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That one is easy, point out all the components and specs being the same, but with the CPU being the only difference, and THEN you can say the CPU is the reason for the price being different. Now, what if they put an AMD CPU in one, but with an 8k display, 128GB DDR5 RAM, and 4TB SSD, but then charged more, would you say the CPU is the reason for the price difference, or all the other stuff that is higher end than what you get from the Qualcomm and Intel versions?
Note, we still see this a fair bit, they p
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None of us? At least one poster said he has a surface and likes it. The hardware is quite nice really. Windows is okay if you need it.
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The only way ARM laptops would be worth the same as Intel laptops is if they're capable of running software compiled for ix86 at speeds comparable to those self same Intel chips
It really depends on what percentage of software runs on the architecture natively.
Really, it's not like Intel natively runs x86. It's a translation layer to the real CPU instructions. It's possible that ARM's instruction set is more closely aligned with the hardware but they are already RISC. The difference is that it doesn't convert x86 in hardware but rely on software instead. Software still runs on the CPU, though. These have gotten fairly fast.
A generational performance bump usually is enough to w
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> It really depends on what percentage of software runs on the architecture natively.
Well, to be more precise, it depends on what percentage of software you have access to works on the architecture natively.
There's:
- Software you already have
- Software you plan to get
- The selection of choices in areas you don't think about like "If I upgrade the Wi-fi, will this USB thing work?" (does it come with an ARM driver?)
At this point I'd say that unless your needs are a disposable laptop that runs Microsoft Off
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The moment you say "Oh, this computer won't be able to run (efficiently) with your software or more obscure hardware" there's nothing about Windows that'd make it compelling.
That's not the case at all. ARM is SO much more efficient, emulating x86 makes it on par with a low tier x86 machine. The downside is the emulation itself has issues and some apps for video editing, for example, crash.
You may be able to buy one of these machines today, and through future software updates have a better machine than the Intel version in a year or so. There are trade offs switching to ARM, but to say it's inferior is not at all true.
source [youtu.be]
What is premuim (Score:2)
with only 16GB ram?
Re:What is premuim (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, it also has a Core i5 (er Core "Ultra" 5) processor, 13" display, integrated graphics, and 256 GB of storage for that $1,400 base price.
In other words, it's about $500 overpriced compared to the business tier laptops from their competitors.
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It's a tablet. What are you doing on a tablet that needs 16gb of ram?
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As an extension of that, what are you doing on a tablet that you feel like spending over a thousand dollars on?
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People use their tablets as laptops when combined with a keyboard.
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It's a small form factor tablet and laptop that can still be a primary PC. It's not like it can't dock to dual 4K screens and a mouse and keyboard. Shrinking things adds huge costs, though, and also heat. I don't think anyone is spending that much on a tablet for it not to be a primary laptop.
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Its actually a Windows PC that tries to pretend it is a tablet. Most people are buying them as a laptop/pc first and liking that it has an option to run as a tablet. Then they try to use it like a tablet and realize that it actually operates like a pc with touch capacity and not much more.
the only purpose a surface (Score:2)
where is the AMD choice? (Score:4, Insightful)
where is the AMD choice?
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where is the AMD choice?
Where's the Cowboy Neal choice?
Heck, I went out of my way to buy an ARM one (Score:2)
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Anything non-Intel will generally have better battery life. An AMD version would probably be close in battery life to the ARM based, but would be a full 8 core/16 thread chip. The Ryzen 8840u(not the latest AI version) has that nice 15W power draw, no big.little with some fast cores and other efficiency cores, a full 8 cores with very good performance.
Don't fall for it (Score:2)
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But but but... it's a Surface! You WANT a Surface! If you're breaking them you're holding them wro... wait, different company.
so much hate for Surfaces here (Score:2)
Dells and Lenovos fall into three categories: a) premium, thin and 1500 bucks at least or b) functional, under 1000 bucks, heavy and about 1.5 inches thick or c) cheap, thin, and barely functional because of the design tradeoffs.
MS surfaces are pretty nice premium devices, and if you want one with all
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These people posting how the MS Surface devices are awful, and they'll stick with their awesome Dell/Lenovos that are absolutely great and 500 bucks cheaper? That just doesn't track with my experience. ...
But if you're a professional that wants an ipad-like device that runs full-blown windows 11 with all the functionality, the surface pro is a pretty good option.
I think the "iPad-like device" qualification explains a lot here. People who like a good, solid, functional laptop aren't looking for an iPad.
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> that runs full-blown windows 11 with all the functionality
That seems like an extremely good reason to avoid them like the plague. Who cares what the hardware is when it's running a giant steaming pile of malware/spyware/crippleware !!!
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But there are people posting stuff like "I like laptops and thus the surface pro is a steaming pile of crap". That's like saying "I like bicycles and thus skateboards are crappy". You do you, buddy. It's
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The surface pro is an expensive device with extensive hardware QC issues and is tethered to an Operating System that sucks when used as a tablet that fits a specific niche. What is the killer application on Windows are users unable to take advantage of when using a laptop vs a Surface?
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But there are people posting stuff like "I like laptops and thus the surface pro is a steaming pile of crap". That's like saying "I like bicycles and thus skateboards are crappy".
I think it's more like saying, "I like bicycles and skateboards aren't all bad, but this thing that claims to be both a bicycle and a skateboard is not great at being either of them."
Maybe it suits your particular balance of needs, but it doesn't sound like it's all that great at being a jack of all trades. Laptop? Certainly not. Tablet? Nope. Cheap throw around device? No way. Hacker friendly? Sad panda. Repairability? Historically awful, though that has been greatly improved. Crap of all trades.
FWIW, I do
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Well, out of the thousands that we deployed in our offices people couldn't wait to get rid of them. Almost none of them use them as a tablet. I had multiple surface computers of which none of them worked well. Endless driver issues and GPU not being recognized when connected (Surface laptop pro's) etc. Most end users decided they wanted a laptop and an iPad.
MS on ARM is an ongoing joke (Score:3)
Had an ARM Surface a few months back. Mostly worked, but was missing some very important software I needed for work. Whatever they tried to do for x86 compatibility just wasn't cutting it. Plus there were no plans for making ARM versions of the software I needed.
In other words (Score:2)
Windows on ARM has always failed, will always fail (Score:1)
Collector’s item? (Score:2)
Well tbf Intel chips might be collector’s items soon. Keep it in a vault, maybe it’ll be worth something somday!
The "real" target audience... (Score:2)
Microsoft dogfoods their hardware for their own employees. The primary intended target audience is their own software engineers, who still need x86 development platforms. Those "customers" aren't paying any $400 premium, because the hardware required to do their job is simply provided to them by Microsoft.
I doubt very much that Microsoft would be all that concerned if not a single one of these new Surface products is sold outside of that audience.