What Do We Know About Microsoft Surface Pro X? Review

The Microsoft Surface Pro X is the firm’s newest effort at an ARM-based Surface Pro device, this time with assistance from Qualcomm, which operated with Microsoft to build its first-ever genuine processor: the SQ1. And, it’s absolutely an awesome looking- and-feeling tablet.

Surface Pro X is an excellent device for just a small group of people because of its lack of a headphone jack and no support for a number of apps.

Microsoft Surface Pro X

Surface Pro X is a magnificent design that blows a new soul into the 2019 Surface series. It’s just a disgrace that its release was a little dominated by Surface Duo and Surface Neo.

Design

The Surface Pro X simply clips and rounds out the classic yet dated Surface Pro model, taking down its slimness and weight even more. Precisely, the Pro X measures 11.3 x 8.2 x 0.28 inches (287 x 208 x 7.3mm) and weighs 1.7 pounds (774g).

The tablet feels amazingly light and fits comfortably into almost any bag – even with the Type Cover attached. Microsoft has also dropped the solid angles of the classic Surface Pro device, giving the Pro X a much more rounded and stylish look and taste that’s more like to that of a smartphone.

There’s only one color choice for the Surface Pro X: a matte black aluminum coating paired with a black Type Cover that drops the Alcantara fabric. Though, we have one huge problem with the Surface Pro X design. While it has got not one, but two USB-C ports, there is no headphone jack on the tablet.

Performance

We’re seeing similar reports from the Surface Pro X’s power profile that we are from its design: some big reductions were made in the name of slimness, lightness and constant power. Unluckily, because of the ARM-based SoC, we were only able to run Geekbench and our video-based battery review analysis on the Surface Pro X. That’s at least sufficient for us to match it against its number one rival, the iPad Pro.

So, how does Qualcomm’s 7-nanometer SoC compare against the Apple A12X Bionic? Well, it gets beaten, to be honest. We’ve seen the latest 12.9-inch iPad Pro gain numbers 40% to 50% more than the Surface Pro X in the Geekbench 4 single- and- multi-core experiments.

While in everyday tasks like checking your emails, browsing on the internet, watching a movie and creating documents in Microsoft Office, Surface Pro X worked pretty great on the Surface Pro X.

Keyboard and Pen

Surface Pro X comes with an optional Slim Pen. It’s redesigned for fitting into a groove on the detachable Surface Pro X Signature Keyboard. In case you are wondering, this package costs a pricey $270.

The plus point is that this groove secures your pen while charging it. The pen has a flatter feeling than the pen that comes with the Surface Pro 7, but we’d rather have the peace of mind that the pen is less prone to get lost.

Features and Software

Just like every Surface that has preceded it, the Surface Pro X isn’t feature-rich neither are there any important parts of the software to consider many apps that aren’t supported at all, due to the underlying processor design – which has its pros and cons. The significant advantage here is that there is no bloatware on this tablet at all, as it’s sold directly by Microsoft.

Another plus point is the Windows Hello facial identification, using the tablet’s infrared camera next to its webcam, and is as fast and precise as earlier. Just as they have before, we can unlock the tablet from its Type Cover and it’s already logged us into Windows 10.

Surface, in particular, has the extra edge of optional LTE connectivity through a nanoSIM slot. This goes for an always-connected device but will cost additional money every month.

Battery Life

Microsoft guarantees up to 13 hours of miscellaneous usage time for the Surface Pro X, praised as one of the tablet’s most engaging features due to its new ARM-based silicon. Well, we’re sorry to say that this hasn’t panned out in our experiment.

This is more than possible due to the even more obvious display within the Surface Pro X than its two ancestors, not to discuss brand new silicon compared to the umpteenth iteration of the 14nm Intel processor in the Surface Pro 6.

In short, while the Surface Pro X battery life is surely great, it’s just not as great as Microsoft’s Pro 6, which is considered as one of the most long-lasting Surface Pro tablets to date.

Microsoft Surface Pro X Price

The price of entry into Microsoft’s future-gazing Surface Pro X is $999 (£999, AU$1,699) – that gets you 8GB of memory (RAM) and a 128GB solid-state drive (SSD). You can double the storage, which ups the price to $1,299 (£1,269, AU$2,149), and double the RAM (16GB) with a 512GB SSD, which costs $1,799 (£1,819, AU$2,899).