Microsoft announces the Surface Book 3, Surface Go 2, Surface Headphones 2 and Surface Earbuds

Microsoft has taken the wraps off four new Surface devices including the Surface Go 2, Surface Book 3, Surface Headphones 2 and Surface Earbuds.

In a blog post, Panos Panay, Chief Product Officer for Windows & Devices said, “The new Surface Go 2, Surface Book 3, Surface Headphones 2, Surface Earbuds and accessories are designed to help you do what you need, from anywhere – a concept that has taken on new weight since we first started working on these products. Instead of planes, coffee shops and offices, we’re moving from home office to kitchen table to couch, but our need for devices that keep us productive and connected has never been greater.”

Surface Book 3

The Surface Book 3 is Microsoft’s top Surface device providing a combination of speed, graphics and long battery life.

The device comes in 13 or 15-inch screen sizes with a 3:2 aspect ratio. Powering both versions of the Surface Book 3 is either a 10th Gen Intel Core i5-1035G7 or Intel Core i7-1065G7 processor with up to 32GB of RAM.

The i5 13-inch Surface Book 3 only has Intel Iris Plus Graphics while the i7 13-inch has Nvidia GTX 1650 Max-Q GPU. The 15-inch Surface Book 3 can be optioned with Nvidia GTX 1660 Ti Max-Q or Nvidia Quadro RTX 3000 Max-Q.

For storage, the laptop can be optioned with up to a 1TB SSD on the 13-inch model or 2TB on the 15-inch. Battery life is around 15.5 hours on the 13-inch and 17.5 hours on the 15-inch.

There’s also Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.0 and Xbox Wireless built-in (on the 15-inch model only).

The ports on the Surface Book 3 include 2 USB-A (v 3.1 Gen 2), 1 USB-C (v 3.1 Gen 2 with USB Power Delivery 3.0), 3.5mm audio jack, 2 Surface Connect ports (one on the tablet and one on the keyboard base) and full-size SD card reader.

There’s Windows Hello login support via the front-facing camera (which is also 5MP) and the rear camera is 8MP. The full-size keyboard on the Surface Book 3 offers 1.55mm of travel and is backlit.

The Surface Book 3 13-inch starts at $2,149 CAD while the 15-inch model starts at $3,099 CAD and ships on May 21st. Pre-orders for the Surface Book 3 are available now from Microsoft’s website.

Alongside the Surface Book 3, Microsoft also announced a new USB-C Travel Hub and Surface Dock 2.

Surface Dock 2 has the following ports:

• 2x front-facing USB-C ports.
• 2x rear-facing, video-enabled USB-C ports
• 2x rear-facing USB-A 3.2 (10Gbps) ports
• 1x Gigabit Ethernet port
• 1x 3.5mm audio in/out port
• Kensington compatible lock

You can output to two 4K displays at 60Hz or two 5K displays at 30Hz with the Surface Dock 2.

According to the company, the Surface Dock 2 is compatible with Surface Book 3, Surface Pro 7, Surface Pro X, Surface Laptop 3, and Surface Go 2.

The Microsoft USB-C Travel Hub uses USB-C and will work with USB-C devices beyond Windows computers.

The hub has the following ports:

• Ethernet
• HDMI out
• USB-C
• USB-A
• VGA

The Surface Dock 2 costs $359 CAD and the USB-C Travel Hub is $119 CAD.

Surface Go 2

Since it’s introduction in 2018, Microsoft hasn’t updated the Surface Go until now.

The Surface Go 2 has a 10.5-inch PixelSense display with a resolution of 1920 x 1280 (at 220 PPI) and a 3:2 aspect ratio.

Powering the device is the Intel Pentium Gold 4425Y processor or 8th Gen Intel Core m3 chip with Intel UHD 615 Graphics. There’s also 4 or 8GB of RAM and up to 128GB of storage.

New for this model is the addition of an LTE version (which hasn’t been confirmed for Canada) but you can expect up to 10 hours of battery life on the Wi-Fi only and LTE versions of the Surface Go 2.

For ports, the Surface Go 2 has a USB-C, Surface Connect, microSD card reader and 3.5mm headphone jack plus a Surface Type Cover port.

The Surface Go 2 starts at $529 CAD and ships on May 12th. Pre-orders are available now from the Microsoft Store.

Surface Headphones 2

Microsoft’s premium headphones have been given an update with the Surface Headphones 2.

You can get up to 20 hours of listening time (with active noise cancellation on) and the Surface Headphones 2 come with something called Omnisonic sound. That basically offers rich and immersive sound along with 13 levels of adjustable noise cancellation.

On either side are on-ear dials to control the volume and noise cancellation level. There’s also touchpads to skip tracks, answer/end called and talk to your device’s voice assistant.

There’s a USB-C port with fast charge support, the headphones fully charge in less than 2 hours.

The Surface Headphones 2 cost $349 CAD and ships on May 12th. Pre-orders start today from the Microsoft Store and the headphones come in Light Grey and Matte Black.

Surface Earbuds

The Surface Earbuds were announced back at Microsoft’s Surface event in October and were set to launch in late 2019 but were delayed to Spring 2020.

Just like the Surface Headphones 2, the Surface Earbuds use Omnisonic sound for an immersive experience.

The earbuds seamlessly integrate with Office 365, so you can keep track of your Outlook calendar, listen and reply to emails and talk to Cortana or your favourite voice assistant.

The Surface Earbuds offer up to 8 hours of battery life on a single charge and 24 hours with the charging case. A 10-minute charge (vis USB-C) will get you one hour of battery life.

The earbuds are IPX4 waterproof and work with Android, iOS and Windows 10 devices.

The Surface Earbuds are priced at $259 CAD and ships on May 12th with pre-orders starting today.

Source: Microsoft