For four straight generations, Microsoft's stuck with a CNC'd aluminum wedge design. Same outfitįrom a design standpoint, the Surface Laptop 4 hasn't changed, unless you count the new Ice Blue color. What I can say is that the version I've been testing is very good -again, not M1 MacBook Pro good - but by far still my favorite thin-and-light Windows laptop. I know, it's confusing, and I hate that Microsoft has made it harder for consumers to choose. Which version do you pick? It comes down to this: AMD is for most people doing basic computing things (web browsing, watching movies, working with documents, and light photo and video editing) and Intel is for that extra power. I've been using the $1,699.99 version with Intel Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of storage.Īs you can see, there's a split between AMD and Intel (11th-gen) processors. The Surface Laptop 4 starts at $999.99, which comes with an AMD Ryzen 5 4680U chip, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of storage. Microsoft doesn't rock the boat in any way. (Unless you're gaming on your laptop in which case it goes without saying that you should get something beefier with a discrete GPU). Like its predecessor, it remains the Windows laptop I recommend to anyone shopping for a new device. (If none of the ones above jump out, then clearly the Laptop 4 isn’t for you). Intel performance is good, but not M1 good, and battery life is solid, but not Apple god level.īut even without a chip that rivals the M1, the Surface Laptop 4 is a robust laptop with plenty of features to like. The Surface Laptop 4 can't match either spec. The M1 MacBook Pro has none of these features.Īpple's M1 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro upped the ante with class-leading battery life and performance. It has a proper row of function / media keys instead of a Touch Bar. There's an M2 SSD that's easily user-replaceable. I can login just by looking at the screen. It has a touchscreen with Surface Pen support, a magnetic port for charging, a USB-C and a USB-A port.

The best thing about the Surface Laptop 4 is that it's not a MacBook.

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