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Microsoft claims its Skylake Surface Book is ‘most powerful on planet’

Although Microsoft has never not been a hardware company, it's software has always been its bread and butter. Its tablet drive in the early ‘oos never really gathered much steam and the Zune series was hardly a game changer. However it's had much more success in recent years with its Surface and Surface Pro tablet two-in-ones, which is why it's so surprising that after announcing its Surface Pro 4 as the ideal laptop replacement, it announced a laptop of its own, called the Surface Book.

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Packing a Skylake CPU, an Nvidia GPU and a 3,000 x 2,000 pixel display, the Surface Book is nothing to sniff at hardware wise. Indeed, Microsoft feels comfortable in calling it the most powerful laptop on the planet. While we would imagine a number of gaming laptop makers might have something to say about that, Microsoft claims that this ‘laptop' is 50 per cent faster than the latest MacBook Pro. Despite this, the battery is said to last as long as 12 hours.

What's extra strange about this powerful sounding piece of kit, is that while it's touted as a laptop, it's just as much a two-in-one as the Surface Pro 4. It too can switch into tablet mode, detaching the keyboard – where the Nvidia GPU is housed – switching over to the Skylake CPU's on board graphical processor and allowing for a slimmer, touch screen appliance of its abilities. [yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVfOe5mFbAE']

Of course this ‘laptop' is running Windows 10, and has USB 3.0 ports (though no type-C), a mini-DisplayPort and the usual headphone and mic jacks. It also supports the latest Wi-Fi standards and Bluetooth 4.0 for wireless connectivity and has a front facing five megapixel camera for video conferencing. The rear facing one is more impressive at eight megapixel and is capable of 1080P HD video recording.

Options include an i5 or i7 Skylake CPU, as well as the additional Nvidia GPU and up to 16GB of memory. Storage options are SSD only, with anything from 128GB all the way up to a terabyte of space.

No pricing or availability details have been released for a UK launch as of yet, but the starting price in US dollars is $1,500. A direct conversion plus 20 per cent for VAT puts that at a starting price of £1,180.

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KitGuru Says: Now that's a two-in-one that I like the look of. It's a shame there's no Intel RealSense camera on there to complete the package, but I certainly wouldn't mind one of these to replace my ageing laptop. 

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10 comments

  1. Oh my god.. That Surface Book looks epic. Definitely buying.

  2. Work at Home~Follow this guide to make $97/hour…I just purchased themselves a McLaren F1 when I got my check for $19993 this past 4 weeks and just over 17 thousand lass month . this is really the nicest-work Ive had . I began this 10-months ago and straight away started making more than $97… p/h .learn the facts here now .
    kv.
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  3. U must be rich!!

  4. This thing is also the most expensive skylake on the planet.

  5. U mean dream of buying right…. Surely if u can afford to even think in those prices then u should not me reading articles on a website like this but have a butler reading them out loud for you whilst u sit in ur private cinema and watch movies thats not even out yet….

  6. With those specs it’s worth every cent.
    50% faster than MacBook air, pfft Apple charges those prices just for their logo printed on. 😉

  7. Now this is finally something really innovating! The fact that the GPU is on the keyboard and the CPU in the screen is incredible, because when you want to use it as a tablet you’ll get significantly higher battery life, while when you need massive horsepower for games or video productivity you just attach the keyboard and enjoy that Nvidia goodness.
    Microsoft nailed it, now let’s just hope they don’t screw up on the price. 1500€ seems alright, but that “starting” price is worrying me.

  8. Work at Home~Follow this guide to make $97/hour…I just purchased themselves a McLaren F1 when I got my check for $19993 this past 4 weeks and just over 17 thousand lass month . this is really the nicest-work Ive had . I began this 10-months ago and straight away started making more than $97… p/h .learn the facts here now .
    tu.
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  9. This article has a couple errors. MS referenced the Surface Book as being the most powerful laptop, but would then qualify that with ‘in its class’. Further defined, during the event, as 13″ class.

    Second mistake is that MS referenced the Surface Book as being 2X faster then the Macbook Pro, not 50% faster. The Surface Pro 4 was referenced to as being 50% faster then the Macbook Air.

  10. Isn’t affordable, at least for me… Damn.

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