Surface Pro 9 5G Review (SQ3): A Beautiful Lie | Engadget

Can you believe it’s been 10 years since Microsoft first released the Surface? That’s a decade of trying to make hybrid tablets a thing, something I’m still not sure a lot of people really want. But, guess what, I give Microsoft credit for trying to push laptop designs at a time when everyone was trying to copy Apple’s unibody MacBook Pro and ultra-thin MacBook Air. The Surface was a radical alternative.

The Surface Pro 9 with 5G shows that Microsoft has learned a few lessons since its first tablets: it’s impeccably designed and it’s the first Surface to hit fast 5G networks. Unfortunately, it’s also a disappointing reminder that Microsoft can’t help but repeat many of its past mistakes. It’s another ARM-based Windows PC that we couldn’t possibly recommend.

That’s not exactly surprising given our tepid reaction to the ARM-powered Surface Pro X line. But what’s even more annoying this year is that Microsoft is actually calling it the Surface Pro 9 with 5G, as if it’s directly comparable to the Surface Pro 9, which is powered by Intel’s 12th-gen chips. This is more than hubris—it’s a blatant lie that will no doubt confuse shoppers and IT staff for the next year.

Sure, both share the same gorgeous and impressively thin aluminum body, 13-inch PixelSense display, and very serviceable keyboard covers (which sadly still sell separately). Both models also have the same built-in kickstand, allowing you to prop the screen up on a table or, if you’re feeling risky, on your leg for the computer on the go. If you’ve seen a Surface tablet before, particularly last year’s solid Pro 8, not much has changed.

A tale of two surfaces

Here’s the rub: Microsoft now has a product line that runs on two very different chip designs, Intel’s x86 hardware and Microsoft’s custom SQ3 ARM System-on-a-Chip (which itself is based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3). The Intel-powered Surface Pro 9 can run all the legacy Windows apps you would expect. The SQ3 model, on the other hand, can only run newer apps natively. Everything else is emulated, resulting in significantly slower performance. On the plus side, Windows 11 now supports x64 emulation, allowing the Pro 9 with 5G to run many apps that the Pro X couldn’t at launch. But that doesn’t apply to gaming, and it’s a trade-off I don’t think anyone should make right now.

Even more frustratingly, Microsoft makes you pay a $300 premium over the $999 Surface Pro 9 for the privilege of owning an inherently slower computer. How much is built-in 5G worth to you then?

A better Windows on Arm experience, but not by much

After using the Pro 9 with 5G for several days, I’m even more baffled by Microsoft’s reckless attempt to merge its x86 and ARM product lines. While some of the company’s engineers assured me in a recent interview that performance was comparable between the SQ3 and Intel models, I knew this was inaccurate when I launched Chrome. As an emulated x86 app, it starts slower and is quite laggy when browsing the web and juggling tabs. Microsoft Edge, on the other hand, is faster all around because it’s a native ARM app.

I usually run multiple browsers at the same time as it’s the easiest way to separate work and personal accounts. I can’t just switch to Edge full-time. So if I wanted to work the way I’m used to on the Surface Pro 9 with 5G, I’d just have to live with an experience that’s inferior to a three-year-old Surface Laptop. Does that sound like progress to you? While it generally worked well with native apps like Spotify and Evernote, multitasking between them and emulated apps still felt noticeably sluggish. In many ways it felt like a step backwards from the Surface Pro 6 I reviewed four years ago, aside from the silkier 120Hz refresh rate on the Pro 9’s larger screen.

All of the benchmarks I’ve run on the Surface Pro 9 also show that it’s slower than any premium laptop we’ve tested in recent years. Sure, Geekbench 5 ran as a slower emulated app, but its score also indicates how other emulated programs will perform. Even the underperforming Surface Go 2, with its low-power 11th Gen Intel chip, was able to outperform the Pro 9 5G in single-core performance. (At least the SQ3 performed better at multi-core speeds.) 3DMark’s Wildlife Extreme test, one of the best ways to compare cross-platform gaming, also returned a low score, as expected. (The bigger surprise? It was on par with the ASUS ZenBook Fold 17, a foldable computer held back by a low-wattage Intel chip.)