Microsoft Surface Pro 8 Review: i7-1185G7, 16GB/256GB

Microsoft’s latest Surface Pro 8 was recently released, can be said to be the pinnacle of the series, both inside and out. The Surface Pro 8 we received is a graphite gray color scheme, and Microsoft finally keeps pace with the times and uses a narrow bezel to make the visual perception wider.

Of course, the screen specifications remain high as always. First, thanks to the ultra-narrow bezel size up to 13 inches, the 120Hz high brush is also used for the first time. It is officially called PixelSense Flow, with a resolution of 2880×1920 and a pixel density of 267PPI. And supports 99% sRGB color gamut, Dolby Vision.

The performance is not inferior. This Surface Pro 8 uses the Intel Tiger Lake-U 11th generation 4-core 8-thread i7-1185G7 processor, with a hardware combination of 16GB LPDDR4X memory + 256GB SSD, and such a powerful configuration is inserted. In such a slim body, it is naturally quite capable of being beaten.

It is worth mentioning that Surface Pro 8 is also the first two-in-one tablet in the Surface brand that has passed the rigorous Intel Evo certification. Its performance, quality, and experience are absolutely guaranteed.

Of course, there has always been a saying that without a professional keyboard and stylus, the experience of the Surface Pro is incomplete. For this reason, Microsoft equipped it with the second-generation Surface ultra-thin stylus and paired it with a new generation of Surface Pro. Edition professional keyboard cover.

The new generation of the Surface ultra-thin stylus can be said to be the killer feature of Surface Pro. It adopts magnetic placement and charging, can be stored in the protective cover, supports 4096 levels of pressure sensitivity, built-in Microsoft G6 processor, haptic motor, and slight Vibration, comprehensive improvement of strokes, accuracy, delay, closer to the feeling of writing on paper, whether it is writing or painting, it is enough to bring a silky smooth experience.

The following figure shows the parameter information of the Surface Pro 8:

Design

What we received is the Surface Family Bucket, including the Microsoft Surface Pro 8 body, a new generation of the Surface ultra-thin stylus, and a special version of the professional keyboard cover.

The graphite gray color scheme is more business-oriented and looks calm and low-key. Surface Pro 8 has a body size of 287×208×9.3mm and weighs only 891g. Compared with other thin and light notebook computers, Surface Pro 8 has advantages in lightness and thinness. The screen uses a 13-inch PixelSense Flow display, supports 10-point touch, 2880×1920 resolution, a display ratio of 3:2, and supports Dolby Vision, which looks fine and clear, and has an excellent look and feel.

What is rare is that the screen refresh rate has finally been increased to 120Hz, and the addition of high brushes makes the operation smoother, but the default is 60Hz, which requires manual switching. The front-mounted 5 million pixel camera that supports 1080p video, and supports Windows Hello facial recognition, can log in to the system directly. There are 2 matrix microphones and ambient light sensors next to the camera.

The rear camera has 10 Megapixels, and the video shooting function is upgraded from 1080P of the previous generation to 4K. As always, the light and thin body are maintained, and the body design and the previous generation have not changed much. The back material is made of special anodized aluminum.

For the port details on the left and right sides, in addition to the conventional power button and volume button, the USB-C interface has been increased to two, and it also supports Thunderbolt 4 and USB 4.0, which can be connected to multiple 4K screens. The ancestral USB-A and microSDXC are also discarded. Lost. However, the current demand for USB-A devices is still not low. It is recommended to prepare a USB docking station just in case. Surface professional keyboard interface at the bottom put it on, it will automatically adsorb.

Surface Pro 8 combines the functions of a laptop with the flexibility of a tablet. The rear integrated stand can open up to 180 degrees. This second-generation Surface Pro special keyboard cover with an ultra-thin stylus can turn Surface Pro 8 into a professional productivity tool.

The surface of the keyboard is made of luxurious Alcantara material, and it also takes into account the anti-fouling and hydrophobicity. The appearance is like velvet, and the touch is soft and smooth. The buttons also have a built-in backlight, which can be used in dark situations.

The stylus uses a flat pen body design, supports 4096 levels of pressure sensitivity, and also supports writing on the screen at an inclined angle of 77°, allowing users to enjoy a paper-like writing experience on the computer screen. After several generations of upgrades, the writing experience has been very smooth.

When you don’t need to use the stylus, you can place it in the pen slot built into the keyboard and charge it. The included Surface power adapter and cable can support 60W output power. The details of the magnetic charger interface can be charged by aligning it with the Surface Connect port.

Keypen set experience

We also received a special version of the professional keyboard cover for Surface Pro with ultra-thin stylus 2, which can turn Microsoft Surface Pro 8 into a notebook. Let’s take a look.

This Surface Pro special edition professional keyboard, just put it off, directly transforms from a two-in-one tablet to a notebook, and push it again to raise the angle of the keyboard, making the user feel more comfortable when typing text.

As far as the author’s experience is concerned, this professional keyboard is quite comfortable for typing. The press feedback is obvious and does not appear loose, but the keyboard layout is slightly compact and it takes a while to get used to it. Surface Pro 8 can fully take into account the functions of a notebook computer and the flexibility of a tablet computer.

In your leisure time, you can directly take down the professional keyboard and open the integrated stand behind the Microsoft Surface Pro 8 to transform it into a compact multimedia display. Let’s briefly experience the stylus. Take OneNote as an example. This stylus supports 4096 levels of pressure sensitivity and can get different thickness lines according to the feedback of the intensity. There is almost no delay, and the writing experience is very smooth.

Microsoft has added a vibration motor to the pen body, which can simulate real brush strokes through subtle vibrations during the use of the stylus. Of course, for unsatisfactory handwritten text or patterns, just like a traditional pencil, you can flip it over and use the cap to erase it. The pen cap function is also very rich, you can customize different shortcuts from Settings→Bluetooth and other devices→Pen and Windows Ink.

Hardware & Performance

The processor of our Microsoft Surface Pro 8 is the 11th generation Core i7-1185G7 with Willow Cove micro-architecture and 10nm SuperFin process technology. The specifications are 4 cores and 8 threads, the main frequency is 3GHz, and the turbo frequency can be accelerated up to 4.8GHz. The level cache is 12MB and supports dynamic TDP adjustment of 12-28W. Microsoft also provides an optional i5-1135G7.

Hardware Dog

Hardware Doggo is a professional hardware detection and running score tool produced by the driver’s house, which is very suitable for mainstream PC players. Relying on fast technology self-developed algorithms and authoritative test modules such as 3DMark, it can quickly, accurately, and comprehensively detect the overall configuration of PC computers, and conduct individual and comprehensive tests on the computer’s CPU processor, GPU graphics card, memory, and hard disk. Machine performance, and through the global performance rankings, you can know your performance level at a glance.

The score given by the hardware dog performance running score is 205678, surpassing 60% of users. The CPU score is 69592, the graphics score is 43840, the memory score is 63566, and the hard disk score is 28680.

CPU-Z

In the CPU-Z score test, i7-1185G7 single-core score 610, multi-core score 2960.

CineBench series

In the CineBench R15 test, the i7-1185G7 single-core is 102.47, and the multi-core is 953. In the CineBench R20 test, the single-core running score was 586, and the multi-core score was 2633. In the CineBench R23 test, the single-core running score was 1527 and the multi-core score was 5203.

WPrime

In the wPrime test, the 32M single-threaded running score took 27.755 seconds, and the 1024M multi-threaded running score took 211.8 seconds.

International chess

Summary of running scores:

Compared with the 25W i7-1065G7 equipped with the previous-generation Surface Pro 7, i7-1185G7 has a single-core increase of about 28.2% and a multi-core increase of about 31.5%. The improvement is very obvious.

The single-core performance of i7-1185G7 is comparable to that of mainstream desktop products, and it is also one of the hottest models this year. It is used by a large number of thin and light laptops and even professional laptops. In the case of such a thin and light body, the 28W i7-1185G7 can be used to such a point, it is a very good existence.

Graphics Performance

The i7-1185G7 version is equipped with a built-in Iris Xe torch core display, with 96 execution units, equivalent to 768 stream processor cores, and an acceleration frequency of 1.35GHz.

3DMark series

In the 3DMark Time Spy (2K rendering resolution) test, a graphics score of 1821 was obtained. In the 3DMark Time Strike Extreme (2K rendering resolution) test, a graphics score of 2402 was obtained.

Final Fantasy 15

The final score of the Final Fantasy 15 Benchmark was 2416.

World of Tanks

The score in “World of Tanks” is 13,536, which translates to a frame rate of about 82 frames.

This Xe core display is compared to the Xiaomi Mi Notebook Pro 15 we tested before. Although the 3DMark performance is slightly inferior, in the game benchmark test, it has about 20%-30% more performance, which is basically comparable to the MX250 standalone display. , Naturally no problem for daily audiovisual and design needs.

Screen and others

The color gamut of Surface Pro 8 is 97% sRGB, 72% Adobe RGB, 72%, 66% NTSC. The maximum brightness of this screen is nearly 400 nits, and at 100% brightness, the static contrast ratio can reach up to 1600:1.

In terms of color accuracy, the measured average Delta E value is 1.29, the maximum value is 5.15, and the minimum value is 0.27.

This is a very accurate color display. If the Delta E value is lower than 2, it cannot be clearly perceived by the human eye. It is used for design drawings and other requirements without any problems. You can use any Surface Pro drawing app with a wide range of brushes for working with vector graphics and producing stunning visuals.

RAM

Using 16GB LPDDR4X 4266MHz dual-channel onboard memory, the memory cache test was performed on AIDA64, and the results of reading over 63GB/s, writing over 66GB/s, and copying over 60GB/s were obtained, and the latency was 97.8ns.

Hard Disk

Microsoft Surface Pro 8 is equipped with BG4 256GB from Kioxia. According to the inquiry, the solid-state of this model is M.2 2230 specifications, supports PCIe 3.0 x4, NVMe 1.3b protocol, the minimum flash memory size can reach 16×20mm, and only one chip package is used to provide high-speed sketches for Surface Pro 8. performance.

In the CrystalDiskMark test, the sequential speed of this solid-state reached 2374MB/s read and 1560MB/s write, and the 4K speed reached 58MB/s read and 164MB/s write.

Such a compact solid-state, in terms of performance, is almost the same as the performance of the desktop mid-range PCIe 3.0.

Battery

At the beginning of the baking machine, the power of the Surface Pro 8 started at 45W, and then gradually reduced to 28W. After baking for 20 minutes, the temperature stabilized at about 85 degrees and the full core frequency was 3.2GHz.

The Surface Pro 8 baking machine can still maintain a temperature of 85 degrees for 20 minutes, which shows that Microsoft’s optimization is in place. Generally speaking, it is difficult to encounter long-term high-load usage in daily use.

Endurance

Surface Pro 8 has a built-in high-capacity lithium battery with a capacity of 60Wh. We use PCMark 10 to actually test the endurance of the notebook.

The selected scene for the test is the modern office of PCMark 10. The power-saving mode is turned on, all other processes are closed during the test, the professional keyboard is taken out, and the screen brightness is adjusted to 50%.

The endurance test score in the PCMark 10 modern office scene is 9 hours and 36 minutes. A 51.5Wh large-capacity battery is inserted into such a thin and light body. This performance is enough to support a day’s leisure and office battery life needs.

Read Also: Microsoft Surface Laptop SE officially Released: With Win11 SE OS

Verdict

Since the launch of the Surface Pro series, Microsoft has become more and more sophisticated, with top performance and quality, and it can be said to be a golden sign in the industry. Surface Pro 8 is as good as ever on the screen, especially after replacing the ancestral mold, it also uses a narrow bezel design, the screen display area is larger, the field of view is wider, and the overall is more refined.

This new stylus is a highlight. It supports 4096 levels of pressure sensitivity and tilt detection, and there is almost no delay when writing. With a 99% sRGB color gamut screen, Surface Pro 8 is also adequate as a professional drawing tool.

If you want to get a more complete experience on Microsoft Surface Pro 8, the combination of the new Surface Pro special professional keyboard and the second-generation ultra-thin stylus is indispensable, especially this pen, with it, Whether you want to write, paint or code words, Surface Pro 8 will have a wider range of application scenarios.

With the powerful configuration of i7-1185G7+16GB LPDDR4x memory+256GB SSD, the stable release of 28W, the excellent temperature control at 85°, the performance is even stronger than most thin and light notebooks. For users who have professional mobile office needs and want a high-quality two-in-one notebook, this portable enough Surface Pro 8 is undoubtedly the best choice.