Microsoft kicked off its Future Decoded event in London with an interesting keynote featuring CVP of devices Panos Panay. If we’re used to see the exec geek out about hardware details, Panay used his stage time to discuss digital transformation as well as the “new culture of work,” a theme that the passionate exec also discussed during a private panel with the press today.
With its hardware efforts, Microsoft is exploring how to better integrate hardware and software and create new form-factors for creators and business users. In addition to the new Surface Pro with LTE Advanced, which Panos Panay officially introduced this morning (check out our quick hands-on here), the exec took the time to look back at the brand new Surface Book 2 today.
The latest version of Microsoft’s “ultimate laptop” features the highest specs you can find on a Surface device today, and it will be available for the first time in a new 15-inch format. We just had a quick hands-on time with it today, and you can see it in detail in the video below:
As the Microsoft representative said in the video, the 15″ Surface Book 2 is the most powerful tablet ever created, and it’s also incredibly light. When it’s connected to its base, you get up to 17 hours a battery life and can leverage the full power of the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 discrete GPU with 6GB of RAM. This is definitely the most versatile Surface device ever, and Microsoft worked hard to make the Dynamic Fulcrum hinge more sturdy so that the 15-inch version of the product isn’t top-heavy.
We’ve been really impressed with Microsoft’s new Surface Book, and we’re looking forward to see how it will resonate with customers and business users. As a reminder, the 15-inch Surface Book 2 will be available to pre-order in the US starting November 9, with the base model priced at $2,499. It’s definitely expensive, but it’s the first time that we see Microsoft trying to create a real mobile workstation with truly top-of-the-line specs. Now, it just needs an LTE option to make it even more versatile.
