In its biggest update to the Surface Pro line-up in a long time, Microsoft has announced the Surface Pro 8. Since 2014 there have been very subtle, simple tweaks to the design of the Surface Pro, as Microsoft believed it had nailed the design. In a big change, the Surface Pro 8 now boasts a 120Hz display with smaller bezels than on the model it replaces. It also now has Thunderbolt 4.0 support, as well as a new keyboard and Surface Slim Pen 2 housed in it.
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The Surface Pro 8 has a lot in common with the Surface Pro X, but it is running on Intel silicon. The smaller bezels makes it look bigger while having very similar dimensions.
The new 13-inch display, dubbed the PixelSense Flow Display, is slightly larger than the usual 12.3-inch displays seen on previous Surface pro devices. According to Microsoft, it is also a lot better – it is 12.5 percent brighter, 11 percent larger with 11 percent higher resolution. Microsoft calls it “the most technically advanced display we’ve ever built,” and it comes with Dolby Vision and Adaptive Colour Technology.
The display on the Surface Pro 8 will run at 60Hz by default, but increases to that all-important 120Hz when taking touch input or use with the stylus. It also has a Dynamic Refresh Rate feature, which automatically fluctuates between different refresh rates depending on what the user is doing with it.
As mentioned, the Surface Pro 8 supports Thunderbolt 4 and gets rid of the USB-A port found in prior models. It has two USB-C ports that support Thunderbolt 4 and a third for charging. This means you can connect the Surface 8 to two 4K displays using those ports, or even high-speed storage or an external graphics card to turn it into a gaming machine.
Microsoft is shipping the Surface Pro 8 with a choice between the 11th-Gen Intel Core i5 and Core i7 processors. The base model includes 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, up to a 32GB of RAM model with 1TB or storage.
