Microsoft Announces The New Surface Pro: Refined with Kaby Lake

This morning in Shanghai, China, Microsoft announced the latest generation of their Surface Pro tablet. The numbering system is gone, and it’s back to just Surface Pro, but the latest generation is a long way from the original Surface Pro that came out in 2013, and it’s a design that they’ve now morphed into its fifth incarnation. Clearly they are pretty happy with the form factor, since Surface Pro hasn’t had a huge change in design since the Surface Pro 3 launched with the 3:2 display. Microsoft has had a lot of success with Surface Pro, but the previous generation Surface Pro 4 launched way back in October 2015, so this new model has been anticipated for a while.

Despite the Surface Pro still offering the same 12.3-inch PixelSense display as its predecessor, Microsoft says that there are over 800 new custom parts inside, and they’ve managed to use up 99% of the interior of the tablet to pack it with new cooling, battery, and performance. The Surface Pro 4, despite being launched 580 days ago on October 21^st, 2015, was still the tablet to beat in this space, with a fantastic display, impressive performance, solid battery life, a great keyboard, pen support, and a brilliant design. It felt long in the tooth because it was, but what was available was still a solid system. The issue any company offering a system like this is that people know there will be a new version, it’s only a matter of when, so once Kaby Lake was launched, it would have been tough to recommend someone run out and buy a Surface Pro 4 since there had to be a new model coming soon. Well, it didn’t exactly come soon, but it’s here now, so let’s look at what’s new.

Unsurprisingly, Microsoft stepped up to Intel’s 7^th generation Core processors, codenamed Kaby Lake. Kaby Lake doesn’t jump to new levels of performance, but it’s a nice step up from Skylake, and it offers a lot more power saving features as well. Just like the Surface Pro 4, Surface Pro will offer a Core m3 model, a Core i5, and a Core i7 with Iris graphics. Memory configurations are also the same, with a 4 GB base model, and up to 16 GB maximum with the Core i7, so LPDDR3 is still the name of the game here. Storage is also the same, at 128 GB up to 1 TB of PCIe SSD. This is a very incremental update for performance, but nonetheless it is very welcome. The battery life has gotten a boost as well, with Microsoft now claiming up to 13.5 hours in a charge, although that test was done with video playback, which is offloaded to fixed function hardware and takes the least energy to perform.

The display is also the same 12.3-inch 2736×1825 PixelSense panel, which works out to 267 pixels per inch. Microsoft has focused a lot on display quality over the last several years, so it would be expected that this is a solid, accurate, display, but much like the Surface Studio, Microsoft is adding a wider than sRGB color mode to the new Surface Pro, with a toggle to choose between enhanced color and sRGB. We’re not yet sure if that means P3-D65, but hopefully it does. The move to 3:2 triggered a new category of devices, so it’s difficult to blame them for not changing what already worked so well. Framing the display are new speakers though, with Dolby Audio Premium, and Surface Pro has always done a nice job of blending the speaker grilles into the frame.

Reading this, you may be wondering where the 800 new parts fit in, if it’s an incremental update on the CPU side, with the same display. Rest assured, there’s still a lot new to the Surface Pro. First up is cooling, and the new Surface Pro now extends the fanless capabilities to the i5 model as well, despite the U series CPU having a 15-Watt TDP. When the Surface Pro 4 launched, I was talking to one of the engineers at the launch event who showed off the new cooling, and was told at the time, it would be able to handle the entire 15-Watt passively if needed, but with another 19 months under their belt, they’ve clearly tweaked it a bit more to make the i5 fanless as well. The i7 will continue to offer a fan, despite the same TDP as the i5, but the main difference is that the i7 offers Intel Iris Plus Graphics 640, which will be able to stress the system much more than the HD Graphics 620 that ships with the i5 model. The m3 gets HD Graphics 615, and with just a 4.5-Watt TDP, there’s no question it can be run fanless.

Microsoft is also evolving the hinge, again. The kickstand can now tilt back all the way to 165°, compared to 150° of the Surface Pro 4, and the reason for the hinge change is undoubtedly because the Surface Pro ships with support for the Surface Dial, which launched with the Surface Studio. Support will be added for on-screen use of the Dial through firmware for existing Surface Pro 4 users, but they won’t get the “studio” mode the new hinge provides.

There’s also a new pen, except it’s no longer included with the device. The new pen now offers 4096 levels of pressure sensitivity, and lower latency than the previous model, with Microsoft tagging latency at 21 ms. It also supports tilt, which is something that wasn’t available on the previous model and was something it was often compared against. I really like the last Surface Pen, with its changeable tips, and it offered great on-screen traction and feel, so I’m excited to see the new, improved model. It’s no longer included, but you can buy it for $60, and the cheapest m3 model is now $100 less than when the Surface Pro 4 launched. Plus, it’s available in several colors to match the new keyboards.

The last generation keyboard will still work, and likely be available, but Microsoft is touting the new Signature Type Covers, which offer Alcantara fabric over the keyboards for a softer feel, and they are available in Platinum, Burgundy, and Cobalt Blue, which happens to coincide with the colors of the new pen, if you’re into matching sets. The Alcantara is covered in a polyurethane coating to provide protection from liquids and oils, so hopefully they will hold up well. The Alcantara on the Surface Ergonomic keyboard has been pretty decent so far.

There’s a lot that’s new, but there’s also some things that haven’t changed at all. The I/O ports on the Surface Pro are exactly the same as the Surface Pro 4: Full-sized USB 3.0 (Type-A), microSD, Surface Connect, Headset, mini DisplayPort, and the keyboard cover connector. What’s missing is USB-C, and Microsoft seems to be taking a hard stance here about supporting a future standard. Their concerns over USB-C are that the port is too open to interpretation, with quite a few different capabilities that could or could not be available, leading to customer confusion. It’s hard to argue with that since it is 100% true, and USB-C has kind of shot itself in the foot by being too open. Some ports support power, some don’t, and some have Thunderbolt 3, and some don’t, and just today Huawei launched a new MateBook X with two USB-C ports, and it can only charge on one of them. This kind of confusion is not ideal, and USB likely needs to come up with a good solution, soon. In an apparent attempt at humor, Microsoft will be releasing a dongle which supports USB-C, for those that need it.

Even though they do have reasons to question USB-C in the marketplace, and the fact that, today, you need to use adapters for most things, there’s still the main issue in that the Surface Pro ships with a mini DisplayPort video output. To hook up practically anything to mini DisplayPort, you need either a dongle, or a DisplayPort to mini DisplayPort cable, meaning you already need a dongle to use the port that’s there. They could have swapped that for a fully functional USB-C with Thunderbolt 3 and Power Delivery, and it could have handled the DisplayPort natively (with a dongle, of course, just like mini DisplayPort. If they included everything that USB-C can do, there also wouldn’t ever be the scenario where a customer buys something and it wouldn’t work in the Surface Pro. So I don’t fully buy their argument, but it’s also not invalid either.

Other than the lack of USB-C, the new Surface Pro does offer everything that would have been expected in an update like this, with a new CPU, a slightly updated design, a new kickstand, and better battery life. Hopefully by dropping the number from the end of the name, it won’t take 19 months until the next refresh can occur, since if it’s just a CPU refresh, it should be able to be handled with little fanfare.

The Surface Pro is available for pre-order today, and ships June 15^th, which is the same day the Surface Laptop will be shipping. Availability is listed as “worldwide” as well, so those that had to wait for the Surface Pro 4 to become available in their region shouldn’t have to wait any longer.

Source: Windows Blog

Huawei Launches the MateBook E 2-in-1: The Next Generation

Today we’re in Berlin to cover Huawei’s launch of the new MateBook series. For this second generation, Huawei has on offer a 13-inch clamshell aimed at premium users, a 15.6-inch device for education and office use, and their next generati…

Huawei Launching Two New Clamshell Laptops: The MateBook X and the MateBook D

On the back of the launch of the MateBook last year, Huawei is launching a new generation using the latest hardware and diversifying the brand.  As an upgrade from a single model last year, Huawei is expanding the MateBook like into three products. The MateBook X is a 13-inch ultraportable clamshell with a focus on style, thin bezels, and packing enough hardware underneath to go deep into the market. The MateBook E is the second generation 2-in-1, following on from the MateBook launched in 2016, with improvements all round, such as an adjustable hinge, a spill-proof keyboard, and bundled accessories. The third element is the MateBook D, a 15.6-inch clamshell aimed squarely at the student and business markets, featuring dual storage options and a discrete NVIDIA GPU but also going with the narrow bezel design similar to the MateBook X.

Primarily seen as a smartphone company for most of us, last year we saw the launch of the MateBook: a 12-inch 2-in-1 device with Huawei’s design ID in a thin and light form factor, but crucially a mark into the PC space. At the time, it was exciting to see a new entrant, especially one with the potential clout of Huawei: if you sell 106m+ smartphones a year, then putting some resources into a mobile PC should be something really interesting to watch. The 2016 MateBook was a good start – the visual aspect of the unit fit in neatly with the market, although there were a few hiccups for a first-generation product, such as the limited stand options, the tendency for the magnetic cover to put the device to sleep when in tablet mode, and the fact that the peak configurations were over $2000. Feedback was sought, about how Huawei should improve the products and how it should tackle this market better, and here are the results. This news covers the two laptops: the MateBook X and the MateBook D.

MateBook X: The Premium Clamshell

A common feature for technology journalists in this space, especially when discussing products with Chinese companies, is how the discussion usually comes to Apple’s success in the laptop market. They are in awe of the design, the utility, and the avid fanboyism that follows their products. As a result, some of the Chinese companies aim to compete in the same space – having a small slice of a large pie is still a large amount, even if it is a carrot cake. So when a user spots the MateBook X, thoughts instantly turn to if it is a Macbook Air/Macbook clone. Not quite, but it arguably looks like a premium competitor for users who want the Macbook form factor but in a Windows/PC environment.

The start of it is the aluminium clamshell, tapering to an almost point, with both the screen and the keyboard designed to try and take as much space as possible. One of the things Huawei wanted to emulate here is the thin bezel strategy, similar to the Dell XPS range, and coming in at 88% screen-to-body ratio is rather nice. There’s still a camera at the top, negating one of the issues with the XPS where the camera is pointing at your chin. The display is a 2160×1440 IPS panel (manufacturer not specified), with a 3:2 aspect ratio, wide viewing angles, and rated up to 1000:1 and 350 nits. Huawei also adds in 100% sRGB for good measure.

The heart of the MateBook X is Intel’s latest Kaby-Lake based 7^th Generation CPUs, and Huawei likes to point out that while their competitors fit in the Kaby Lake-Y based processors (running at 4.5W), here Huawei is using the U based processors: the i7-7500U and i5-7200U. Technically these CPUs come out of the factory as 15W parts, but OEMs can configure the base clock in cTDP down mode for 7.5W/9.5W, which is what we suspect Huawei is doing here (awaiting confirmation). Using a U processors means getting HD 620 graphics, rather than HD 615, which should make the unit better for light graphical work. Nonetheless, users might be able to feel a base performance uplift compared to the 4.5W parts.

Storage comes via an integrated PCIe SSD, and depending on the configuration will either be 256GB or 512GB. We were unable to prize the details on who the supplier is for these drives, but we might get some hands-on time later to go through the system specifications on a demo unit. Memory is, unfortunately, a downside on the X: Huawei has decided to use LPDDR3 rather than DDR4, which means that the top spec unit hits 8GB (4GB also offered, we assume 2x2GB for dual channel) rather than 16GB which would make this device high up on a prosumer list. The debate about LPDDR3 and DDR4 at this level of device gets interesting – if one is in better supply than the other, power consumption (arguably DDR4 is much better, even though LPDDR3 has ‘low power’ in the name), power profiling, etc. It’s a discussion that I need to have with Huawei’s design teams, really – at 16GB it becomes an easy replacement for my Zenbook.

Going around the device, Huawei has supplied two USB Type-C ports, one of which can be used as a charging port for the supplied 40W power adaptor but both can be used for data. We’re told that the ports are USB 3.0 (5 Gbps), and both will work with the new MateDock 2, which is this time being supplied with the device rather than being sold separately. The MateDock 2 is like the MateDock, except it exchanges the ethernet port for a HDMI and VGA ports (with two USB Type-A as well). Also on the clamshell is a fingerprint reader for login, and a 3.5mm headphone jack.

For connectivity, the MateBook X has an 802.11ac solution capable of 2×2 MIMO (we assume it’s the Intel 8265) and BT4.1, although no modem for 4G. For the audio, Huawei is promoting Dolby Atmos certification, along with Huawei’s Sound System technology. As part of our briefing, Huawei stated that they’ve been in the audio business over 10 years, but only really as a software solution. The MateBook X brings together the hardware (a Realtek codec, probably the ALC892 which would be high end for a clamshell device, though disappointing if it’s the ALC662) and software for Atmos certification. This includes dual speakers with custom drivers, as well as a dual microphone setup.

The battery is listed as 41.4 Wh, which is exactly the same as the Macbook, and Huawei rates this as good for 10 hours of local 1080p video playback at 50% screen brightness (imagine me asking ‘what about 100 nits?’ to a confused Huawei rep).

Gallery: MateBook X

Pricing and availability was announced at the press event, starting at $1399 for the i5/8GB/256GB model and $1699 for the 8GB/512GB model. Colors will be region dependent, but expect to see one or all of Space Gray, Prestige Gold and Rose Gold.

MateBook D: The Edumacation Device

Two of the more stable elements to the laptop space is the education sector and the office markets. These are usually reasonably decent products sold at low margins but in good volumes along with potential support packages. OEMs like ASUS, Lenovo and HP play in this space, so it is rather competitive. Huawei’s MateBook D is the first crack at taking on the established players, in a 15.6-inch narrow bezel design.

A quick look at the MateBook D and you might be forgiven for thinking it isn’t a Huawei device. If you sit around Huawei devices all day, you always get a feeling of premium, and the MateBook D doesn’t necessarily give that because it’s built to a price point. That being said, a few minutes with the unit and it does actually feel quite polished from a design perspective, with the positive idiosyncrasies that as an editor I seem to notice on Huawei devices, such as the feel and the unified image. It’s bulkier than any previous Huawei device for sure, and Huawei uses that extra space for ports, fo the screen, for the touchpad, for the sound, and for battery.

At 15.6-inches, the display comes in as a Full-HD 1920×1080 and uses an IPS panel for better viewing angles. Huawei lists the panel as supporting 250 nits, 800:1 contrast, and a rather low 45% NTSC support – that would be a strangely low color support for even a basic panel (perhaps someone on the spec sheet pressed the wrong number?). Like the MateBook X, the panel aims to take up as much room as possible, with an 83% screen-to-body ratio.

Huawei isn’t stating exactly what processors are going to be in place here, except that they will be Kaby-Lake based 7^th Gen processors. We suspect they will be the 15W Kaby Lake-U parts, especially given that they list the graphics as HD 620. The MateBook D will come in a variety of CPU/GPU combinations, with either integrated graphics on the CPU or with a discrete GPU: the NVIDIA GeForce 940MX. It’s worth noting that this GPU came out in 2014 and runs around 20-30W, depending on the memory configuration. We asked about DDR3 or GDDR5 for the GPU (as the latter has 2.5x more bandwidth), although they didn’t know off hand (we might get to probe later today on that). We asked why Huawei chose this over something with a better power profile, such as the NVIDIA 1030 or 1050, although the rep we were asking wasn’t entirely sure (likely a supply issue, and bad market timing). Nonetheless, the discrete GPU is optional on all models except for the very basic storage configuration.

For storage and memory, Huawei is offering a variety of combinations. The chassis supports both a PCIe M.2 based SSD and a 2.5-inch HDD, and so there will be:

• 4GB of LPDDR3 with either 500GB HDD, or a 128GB SSD+500G HDD
• 8GB of LPDDR3 with either 1TB HDD, 256GB SSD, 128GB+500GB or 128GB+1TB
• 16GB of DDR4 with 128GB SSD + 1TB SSD

I was told that the units are user upgradeable as well. Having the 940MX discrete GPU is an option on all configurations except the 4GB models.

Connectivity comes via the same 802.11ac with 2×2 MIMO with BT4.1 as the MateBook X, along with the same specifications for audio: dual speakers, dual microphones, and Dolby Atmos Sound System support. For the ports on the side, there’s a DC-in jack (sorry, no USB-C for power here), two USB 3.0 Type-A ports, one USB 2.0 Type-A port, a full-sized HDMI port, and a 3.5mm jack.

The battery is rated at 43.3Wh, which given the size of the device and the weight (4.2lbs, 1.9kg), seems quite low. Devices this size typically come with 50Wh+, so I’m wondering if that’s another typo on the specification sheet.

Gallery: MateBook D

For pricing and availability, they didn’t list any non-940MX editions but the i5 with 8GB DRAM, 1TB HDD and the 940MX will be 799 Euro, up to 999 Euro fot the top SKU. Colors will be region dependent, but expect to see one or more of Space Gray, Champagne Gold and Aurora Blue. It looks nice in blue.

Some pictures were provided in collaboration with other Purch outlets.