I was not expecting Surface Pro X to be this fast. Plus some tips.

I got my new Surface Pro X a few hours ago.

Summary
I was not expecting Surface Pro X to be this fast. It is a snappy little beast. The reviews (which presumably used x86-emulated software) were not so positive so I was prepared to be underwhelmed.

Now I wish I would have gone for the 512GB version. Perhaps I'll grab one of the 1TB BG4s when they make it to market. I didn't think I'd be able to use this machine for much, but now I find myself loading Visual Studio Code onto it.

The luck of the draw in regards to which SSD I got is probably helping my machine's performance. The BG4s are quite zippy for a postage-stamp-sized SSD.

Specs
Microsoft SQ1 processor
16GB ("15.9GB") RAM
256GB Toshiba BG4 SSD

Geekbench 5 scores
These appear to be shockingly close to Surface Pro 6 w/ Core-i5 and Surface Book 2 scores. GB5 is run in ARM64 mode (although it sees the processor as an emulated "Intel Pentium II/III").

Single-core: 721
Multi-core: 2790

This machine basically has a 4-thread processor ("BIG") plus the 4-thread helpers ("LITTLE"). It's funny to look at the Task Manager because half of the logical processors show lots of usage and the other half show very little.

Windows 10 Home vs Windows 10 Pro (and notes on re-installing)
I bought the consumer machine off the shelf (not the "for Business" model which comes preinstalled with Pro). I was frustrated that the initial install did _not_ let me use a local account. It forced me to either login to a Microsoft account or provide a phone number to link my computer to.

Once I got through the Windows 10 Home setup process, however, I was able to switch to a Local Account (through the Users settings). Kind of ugly, but it worked.

I was also able to create a recovery disk (and tested that I could boot to it, including booting directly to it after changing the BIOS boot order to try the USB disk first). I am relieved that this Surface behaves similar to any other surface in that regard, and I am optimistic that I would be able to "recover" to a new drive if I upgraded the SSD.

I also did a "reset" after upgrading the machine to Windows 10 Pro and the installation process gave me the option to log into an enterprise account and also the option to use a Local Account. I'm back in happy territory.

I did find it interesting that Windows 10 Home on ARM basically includes BitLocker or something really similar: the SSD is automatically encrypted by default and after installing Windows 10 Pro the BitLocker app said that BitLocker was already enabled.

The Home edition also supports Windows Subsystem for Linux. So at this point, other than some extra options during installation and the ability to join an enterprise network...I'm not sure what features Windows 10 Pro adds on this machine. Since the full Hyper-V experience isn't supported yet (i.e. just the core parts needed for WSL2 are present), I don't know of anything I want to do that I can only do with Pro and that I couldn't do with Home...as I am not joined to a corporate network.

Warranty
There are two extended warranties available for Surface Pro X. You can buy the 2-year Microsoft Complete warranty for $149 when you buy the computer (or afterwards, if you call Microsoft within 30-45 days). Or you can buy the 3-year Microsoft Complete for Business warranty for $249.

I bought the $249 warranty. It even covers a battery replacement in year 2 or 3 if the battery dies. And the phone rep told me that there's a $0 deductible on the business warranty plans and expedited service (and maybe even a loaner unit if the repair is going to take a while).

Final thoughts
I really like this machine. Way more than I thought I would. It may become my main Windows laptop. Coming from an HP ZBook Studio G3 (Xeon, 3.5 years old) maybe I'm not used to a jet-speed Windows laptop, but frankly the new Surface Pro X feels like it's not too much of a step down in performance from my mobile workstation. I know that it's not as fast of course, and as a power user I know I'm probably going to run into some software that won't run on ARM64 or x86 emulation soon...but at the moment I'm pretty darn happy.

I even picked up a T-Mobile SIM. They have a $10/mo prepaid option which only gives you 1GB or so a month of 4G data, but I think it gives unlimited 2G+ speeds after that. Lots of postpaid options are available for $20/mo. with much larger buckets of bandwidth.

Overall this whole experience reminds me of the days a decade ago when Intel 64 processors were new. I got on that 64-bit Windows train when a lot of apps and drivers wouldn't run on 64-bit Windows.

I expect Microsoft to add basic Intel 64 emulation in the next year or two. That would enable some Intel 64-bit apps that don't rely on recent processor features. But I am not sure if that will even matter much in the end, as I expect that a lot of developers of mainstream apps (i.e. apps which aren't partially written in x86 assembly code like Photoshop and graphics libraries) will simply recompile for ARM64.

Billy

 

Can you use any app in the windows store on it?

 

kojack, unless the Windows Store app is only compiled for Intel 64-bit (which I suppose is possible...but not popular), you should be able to use it on your Surface Pro X.

Also, an update after 2-3 months of Surface Pro X usage: it looks like more developers are building apps for ARM. One app that I use almost every day just got an ARM version and now starts up and runs at least twice as fast as in x86 emulation (hard to measure exactly--but startup went from many seconds to just a few seconds). And the new Microsoft Edge (with Chromium) is also super snappy. Hopefully more and more developers keep on publishing ARM versions of their code.

I also recently downloaded a beta copy of Windows from Microsoft's Insider's channel. It included new virtualization features, so it looks like there is an effort internally at Microsoft to give Windows on ARM some Intel-only features as well.

Billy

 

As more devices move to arm, more software will be compiled for it. Would be cool to see if affinity works on it as well.

 

Bill
Thank for contributing the thorough review of Surface Pro X, I've watching it ever since it came out, but holding back from it because of the pricing.
I'll take your advice considering 512G or more for my future buy.

 

I went for the 16/256 version and have a 1Tb Kioxia KBG40ZNS1T02 that's on the way ... Actually quite pleased with the quality and snappiness so far .. Fantastic device for the mobile professional ... In fact even some light games run fine on it, with Asphalt 9 in fact being very very playable (when you slightly lower some of the graphics settings). My SP7 has been lying in a corner, unused, for well over a month now, and I just ended up deciding to sell it ...

 

Does anyone want to trial affinity software on it?