Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 review: A picture of elegance

Pretty in Black

Microsoft now has more Surface devices than ever, including its signature Surface Pro 7 convertible and the Surface Pro X. However, for those of you who still prefer a more traditional clamshell laptop, it's got the Surface Laptop 3, a notebook that boasts an elegant, minimalist design. However, the Surface Laptop 3 also faces more competition than its other siblings, especially from the gorgeous new Dell XPS 13, which is already looking like it could be the best ultrabook to come out in 2020. 

But while the Surface Laptop 3 may not have the XPS 13's freakishly slim bezels, it's still a very attractive notebook. The matte black aluminium colour is beautiful, and Microsoft also makes models with Alcantara fabric that give it a pretty unique look, especially when it comes to the mesmerising Cobalt Blue. A word of warning regarding the black finish though – it's quite the fingerprint magnet, so you'll have to put in work to keep it clean.

Build quality is excellent though, and the laptop feels impeccably built and just oozes quality.

The Surface Laptop 3 is also finally getting a USB-C port, a long-overdue change that opens up more expansion and charging solutions outside of Microsoft's own charger and dock. Port options are still rather sparse though, and the only other connectors are a USB 3.1 (Gen 1) Type-A, 3.5mm headphone jack, and the Surface Connect port. 

That aside, we've already done a pretty detailed hands-on with the laptop, so I won't be rehashing what's already been said. Suffice to say, the updated port selection and new colours are among the biggest changes you'll see on the Surface Laptop 3. It's actually not that different coming from the Surface Laptop 2, so Microsoft isn't breaking any new ground here. This is almost slightly disappointing – Microsoft has shown that it isn't afraid to push boundaries with devices like the Surface Neo and Surface Duo, but it just doesn't want to do so with its clamshell laptop, even if it is the one with the greatest mainstream appeal right now. 

However, the Surface Laptop 3 still nails many of the key elements of what makes a good laptop. The 2,496 x 1,664-pixel touchscreen display is bright and crisp, and the 3:2 aspect ratio makes it better for viewing documents. The bezels are starting to look a little thick though, and it's high time Microsoft thought about updating the look of the Surface Laptop. In addition, the keyboard has decent travel and feels really comfortable to type on, especially with the slight concave on each key that helps guide your fingers into place. It also has the same 19mm key pitch as the Surface Laptop 2.

The other big upgrade is the availability of Intel's 10th Gen Ice Lake processors, but the same is also found on most other modern ultrabooks today. However, the Surface Laptop 3 still has one more trick up its sleeve, if it can even be called that. The laptop is available with either 13.5-inch or 15-inch displays, and the latter also comes in a special AMD Ryzen Surface Edition flavour and AMD's Ryzen 3000-series mobile processors. 

Microsoft sent us one such unit for review, and here's an overview of its specifications:

• 15-inch 2,496 x 1,664-pixel PixelSense touchscreen display
• AMD Ryzen 5 3580U processor
• 16GB RAM
• 256GB SSD
• 45.8Wh battery
• 339.5 x 244 x 14.69mm
• 1.54kg

The above will cost you S$2,488, which isn't cheap for specs that aren't exactly class-leading. The battery size is also slightly concerning, and it's even slightly smaller than the one on the Surface Laptop 2. Both 13.5- and 15-inch models have the same battery, which is odd as it appears that Microsoft deliberately chose not to include a bigger battery on the larger and more power-hungry model. 

What's more, the AMD processor it uses is also kind of outdated now, given that AMD already announced its Ryzen 4000 mobile processors at CES. That said, head over to the next page to find out how it really performs. 

Performance

To evaluate the performance of the Surface Laptop 3, I'll be comparing it against other ultrabooks like the recently reviewed ASUS ZenBook 14 UX434, the Acer Swift 5, and the Dell XPS 13 2-in-1. It is the only 15-inch notebook here, but it still utilises the same class of hardware as its smaller competitors.

Here's a look at how the Surface Laptop 3 stacks up against other ultrabooks:

Benchmark results

The Surface Laptop 3 falls slightly behind the other Intel notebooks in PCMark 10, and it would seem like the Ryzen 5 3580U chip can't quite keep up with the Intel Core i7-1065G7. The Ryzen processor is a 4-core/8-thread CPU with a base clock of 2.10GHz and boost clock of 3.70GHz. On the other hand, the Intel chip is clocked lower at 1.30GHz but boosts higher to 3.90GHz.

Granted, this isn't an entirely fair comparison since AMD has since announced its new Ryzen 4000 APUs, so the Ice Lake processor should really be compared against those. However, it still raises the question as to why Microsoft didn't just wait for the newer APU to release a Ryzen version of the Surface Laptop 3, although it could still update it further down the road.

That said, the Surface Laptop 3 held its own in Cinebench R20, where multi-threaded performance was on par with the Surface Pro 7. However, single-threaded performance is still behind by roughly 20 per cent. 

Graphics performance is a bright spot for the Ryzen chip though, and the Surface Laptop 3 was faster than the Surface Pro by roughly 12 per cent in 3DMark Cloud Gate. 

Battery life

Battery life was surprisingly decent on the Surface Laptop 3. Despite its larger display and modest battery capacity, the Surface Laptop 3 still outlasted the Surface Pro 7 in both the Modern Office and Gaming benchmarks. 

The Ryzen 5 3580U processor is proving to be a pretty efficient chip, although it would really have been nice to see Microsoft take advantage of the extra space and cram in a larger battery befitting a 15-inch laptop.

Should this be your next laptop?

The Surface Laptop 3 marks the first time that Microsoft has introduced a 15-inch version of its clamshell notebook. However, while the larger screen would seem to be targeted at more demanding users who require more screen real estate, more power, and even longer battery life, the 15-inch Surface Laptop 3 doesn't seem to do a lot to address that.

The Ryzen edition of the Surface Laptop 3 has what appears to be a less capable CPU, at least compared to the Intel Ice Lake chip, and the battery size is also unchanged when coming from the 13.5-inch model. It's puzzling, to say the least, and storage also caps out at 512GB (I tested the 256GB model). Furthermore, you'll only be able to get the 256GB version locally, and only the Ryzen model is available.

The Ryzen laptop isn't terrible by any means, boasting absolutely stellar build quality, a sleek and elegant design, and a great display. But there's just not much of a hook here to pull you in, and I'm not sure why you would opt for the Ryzen configuration over the Intel one. In fact, the Intel version even has better wireless capabilities with support for Wi-Fi 6. 

Overall, this is a decent 15-inch laptop if you really need a bigger screen and are a fan of Surface hardware, but I would otherwise look for a laptop that has Thunderbolt 3 support and more USB ports, or even simply the smaller 13.5-inch Surface Laptop 3 with the Intel chip. And if we are talking about smaller 13- and 14-inch notebooks, then it's impossible not to consider also ASUS' ZenBook 14 UX434 and Acer's Swift 5. These notebooks have 10th generation Intel processors, discrete graphics from NVIDIA, and what's more, costs around the same or even less.

In closing, S$2,488 seems like a steep price to pay for the Surface Laptop 3's bigger screen and a previous-generation CPU that wasn't even top-of-the-line when it was released. 

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