Microsoft unveiled the Surface Pro 9 at its annual conference on Wednesday, Aug. 9. The new device comes in three colors - black, silver, and gold - and has a new design with a thinner bezel. It also has an ARM version that is designed for mobile work. The Surface Pro 9 has a 12-inch display with a resolution of 3240 x 2160 pixels and is powered by an Intel Core i5 or i7 processor. It also comes with 8GB or 16GB of memory and a 1TB hard drive. The device has two cameras - an 8MP front-facing camera and a 5MP rear-facing camera - as well as a fingerprint reader. The Surface Pro 9 starts at $899 for the base model with 8GB of memory and 1TB of storage, and goes up to $1,499 for the model with 16GB of memory and 2TB of storage. The ARM version starts at $1,299 for the base model with 8GB of memory and 1TB of storage, and goes up to $1,799 for the model with 16GB of memory and 4TB of storage. ..
The Surface Pro 9 doesn’t look much different from earlier models, with a slim form factor, 13.3-inch 120Hz touchscreen with pen support, and built-in kickstand. However, it is available in four colors, two of which are new — Platinum, Sapphire, Forest, and Graphite. The tablet can be configured with 8, 16, or 32 GB of RAM, and 128, 256, or 512 GB of storage. The front camera supports Windows Hello, and a Center Stage-like feature Microsoft calls “Automatic framing.”
Play Video
If you were hoping for a Surface Pro with an AMD Ryzen processor, like Microsoft has offered with the Surface Laptop, you’ll be disappointed. The Surface Pro 9 is available with an Intel Core i5-1235U chipset, and more expensive variants will use a Core i7-1255U. Those are still regular laptop-class processors, so you can expect a slight efficiency and performance boost compared to the 11th-gen parts found in last year’s Surface Pro 8.
Even though AMD isn’t joining the party, Microsoft is selling a version of the Surface Pro 9 with an ARM-based Microsoft SQ 3 chipset. Earlier rumors claimed the chip is based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8cx Gen3. That’s still unlikely to reach the same level of performance as Apple’s ARM-based M1 and M2 chips, but it does support 5G connectivity, which isn’t integrated into any Mac computers. Microsoft is promising up to 19 hours of battery life on the SQ 3 model.
The Surface Pro 9 starts at $999.99, with the base model including a Core i5-1235U CPU, 8 GB RAM, and 128 GB of internal storage. That’s a lot of money to pay for a computer without 16 GB RAM and barely enough room for Windows and a few large applications — doubling the storage will cost you another $100, and the cheapest version with 256 GB storage and 16 GB RAM is $1,400.
Source: Microsoft
