Microsoft Surface Pro 7 tested: USB-C and Ice Lake U processors at last

If you need a tablet that you can also use for work, then the Surface Pro 7 could be a good choice. All programmes that run on a normal Windows PC can be installed on the device. A tablet can rarely claim that. However, to use it as a convertible, i.e. also as a laptop, you have to dig relatively deep into your pockets: In addition to the proud price for the device, there are additional costs for the magnetic keyboard cover and the pen.

I bought the i5 version of the Surface Pro 7. It doesn't have an active cooler. This is only available on the i7 version. I'll find out for you whether it's a good idea for Microsoft to do without the cooler on the i5. I'm also curious to see how the new Intel processor compares to the Surface Pro 6 with its predecessor i5.

The technical data:

• Intel Core i5-1035G4
• Integrated graphics processor: Intel Iris Plus Graphics
• 16 GB RAM (SK Hynix, LPDDR4-3733, 2 x 8 GB soldered)
• 256 GB SSD (HFB1M8MO331C0MR, M.2 2230 PCIe 3.0 x4)
• 12.3" IPS multi-touch display (PixelSense display) with 2736 x 1824 pixels (aspect ratio of 3:2, 267 ppi, high-gloss, supports pen input)
• USB 3.0 Type-A, USB 3.1 Type-C, power connection (Surface Connect port), microSDXC slot, Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0
• 3.5 mm jack connection, stereo speakers, dual microphones
• Environmental light sensor, accelerometer, gyroscope, Windows Hello camera (facial recognition)
• 5-megapixel front camera and 8-megapixel rear camera (both with 1080p video resolution)
• Lithium-ion battery with 45 Wh
• Windows 10 Home

You can also get the Surface Pro 7 with the latest generation i3 or i7 processor. You can also choose between 4, 8 or 16 GB of RAM. I strongly advise against buying a version with only 4 GB of RAM. Anything less than 8 GB can cause your device to stall if you have a lot of browser tabs or programmes open.

In terms of storage, you can get models with 128 GB, 256 GB, 512 GB or 1 TB. However, you pay a hefty surcharge for the memory from Microsoft. For example, 128 GB more memory costs over 350 euros. You should therefore definitely check whether you would prefer to use the microSD slot before buying. You only pay a fraction or around 25 euros for a 128 GB card. Of course, the speed of the card will not quite match that of the SSD, but you will hardly notice this in your everyday work.

Design and connections: USB-C at last

The design still looks contemporary in 2019. Some may wish for thinner display edges on the 29.21 x 20.07 x 0.85 cm Surface Pro, but on the other hand, the extra 1.5 cm or so makes it easier to hold in the hand.

The magnesium alloy chassis is available in either black or silver. Without the Signature Type Cover (keyboard), it weighs 770 g. The stand is somewhat suboptimal. Thanks to this, the device can be placed on a table at any angle, which is particularly advantageous when drawing with a pen. However, unlike a normal laptop, the Surface Pro is a rather wobbly affair when you're sitting on the train and it's on your lap. Incidentally, the microSD slot is located under the stand.

The Surface Pro 7 also has a 3.5 mm jack connection on the left-hand side. On the right is a new USB 3.1 Type-C port. This is located exactly where the Mini DisplayPort was on the previous model. If you want to connect an external display, you will need an appropriate adapter for USB-C. There is also a USB 3.0 Type-A and the magnetised power connection (Surface Connect connection). If you want to charge your Surface Pro 7, the best way to do this is via Microsoft's proprietary port. The USB-C port does not offer a fast charging function.

The power button and volume rocker are located at the top of the tablet
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Sharp display in 3:2 format

The 12.3-inch high-gloss display in 3:2 format offers a resolution of 2736 x 1824 pixels, which corresponds to 267 ppi. It is razor-sharp and therefore a lot of fun. Only the reflections are a little annoying. Spotlights and sunlight should therefore be avoided.

To find out how well the display is illuminated, I measure it with the x-rite i1Display Pro:

I measured an average of 432 cd/m², which is a decent brightness. If the Surface Pro 7 had a matte display, you could even work in the sun with this brightness. As far as the regularity of the illumination is concerned, the bottom right of the panel falls slightly short. However, the relatively small difference is never noticeable when looking at the display. When I measure the black and white values, I calculate a crisp, static contrast of 1223:1. The dynamic contrast is 5082:1.

The colour space coverage doesn't look quite as good. Unfortunately, this is not sufficient for professional, graphic work. The display manages to display a spectrum of 93.7 per cent in sRGB. For Adobe RGB it is 65.3 per cent and for DCI P3 68.1 per cent.
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Accessories: Signature Type Cover and Surface Pen

If you want to use the Surface Pro 7 as a convertible, you need to buy a Type Cover. This turns the tablet into a notebook. The Type Cover is a keyboard, trackpad and display protector in one. You can get the clip-on keyboard with or without the Alcantara cover (Signature), which is reminiscent of soft leather. To connect it to the Surface Pro, simply hold it near the magnetic connector and it will automatically attach itself.

The 310 gram cover can be used flat or slightly angled. The buttons have three-stage illumination. Unfortunately, the 29.50 cm long, 21.70 cm wide and 0.50 cm high cover comes without a numeric keypad. The key travel is one millimetre. When you tap it, the keys bounce comparatively strongly and you feel a clear trigger point. In my opinion, typing on it is extremely pleasant and quiet. There is nothing to criticise about the trackpad with multi-finger gesture support.

The Surface Pen offers 4096 pressure levels and has a tilt function, which should be particularly useful for creative people for shading. The input latency is 21 milliseconds. The pen is powered by an AAAA battery and has a replaceable tip. There is a right-click button on the side of the pen. A second button is located at the top. This is used for pairing and can be used for various application-specific functions. For example, it can be used to erase drawings. It's great that the flat side of the pen can be magnetically attached to the Surface Pro. This means you always have the pen to hand.

Speakers that sound pretty decent

The 1.6-watt stereo speakers with Dolby Audio Premium certification are located in the upper part to the left and right of the display. The sound is quite good considering the puny size of the speakers. Nothing rattles, the highs and mids sound clean, but the bass is starved - as is always the case with undersized notebook speakers. On the other hand, the sound seems a lot more room-filling or wider than the distance of the installed hardware actually is.

Battery performance: worse than the predecessor

Nothing has changed in terms of battery capacity compared to the previous year. It is a lithium-ion battery with 45 Wh. I'm keen to see how long the Surface Pro lasts on YouTube in a continuous loop, run a stress test and measure the runtime when working in the office.

Modest runtime for continuous YouTube streaming

I set the brightness of the display to around 150 cd/m² and run music videos on YouTube until the device can take no more. The automatic shutdown comes after 5 hours and 16 minutes. That's rather poor performance. Both in comparison to other convertibles, as well as in comparison to the Surface Pro 6, which achieves 9 hours and 20 minutes with the latest generation i5 processor.

Battery life under maximum performance: CPU throttles to 44 per cent

To push all the hardware to its limits, I run the stress test HeavyLoad and FurMark simultaneously with the screen set to maximum brightness. During the test, it is noticeable that the device throttles itself down after around five minutes. The CPU only runs at 44 per cent performance, which of course benefits the runtime. The device switches off after 2 hours and 8 minutes.

This test points to a nasty bottleneck: As the built-in i5 processor is not actively cooled, the processor can only be fully utilised for a short time. Microsoft is clearly cutting corners here. Presumably, this was also the case with the previous model with i5. Unfortunately, I don't have a Surface Pro 6 with an i5 processor to verify this. Only one with i7, which has no problems thanks to active cooling.

Battery life for office work

When I use the convertible as a mobile office and refrain from running YouTube in the background, I get seven to eight hours of battery life. That's not a bad figure. But considering the premium price, as a customer I also want premium battery runtimes.

Latest-generation CPU and graphics processor

The Intel Core i5-1035G4 is an energy-efficient quad-core SoC for notebooks and convertibles. The processor was announced at Computex in May 2019 - it belongs to the Ice Lake U generation and is therefore one of the first processors to be manufactured using Intel's new 10 nm process (2nd generation). Using all four cores (eight threads), the i5-1035G4 clocks at 1.1 to 3.3 GHz. If only two cores are used, it can be clocked up to 3.6 GHz - with one core even up to 3.7 GHz. The cores called Sunnycove should be able to process 18 per cent more IPCs (instructions per clock) than their Whiskey Lake predecessors. This should make it possible for the CPU to achieve the same performance as its i5 predecessor despite a lower clock speed.

The chip also features Intel's Iris Plus Graphics (Gen 11), which runs at 300 MHz and has a maximum dynamic frequency of 1.5 GHz. The SoC also delivers Wifi 6 and offers AI hardware acceleration, among other things.

Performance: Cinebench R15 and R20

With Cinebench from Maxon, you can test how your PC or processor performs when rendering Cinema 4D content. A new version of the popular benchmark has recently been released. For better comparability with our previous reviews, I have run the old and new versions.

This is how the Surface Pro 7 performs in Cinebench R15:

If I compare it to the Surface Pro 6 with Intel Core i5-8250U (also 4 cores and 8 threads), the latest processor generation in the Surface Pro 7 performs 21.98 per cent better in the multi-thread benchmark. The Pro 6 scores 610 points, whereas the Pro 7 achieves a score of 738. The graphics performance in the OpenGL benchmark is also slightly better. The Pro 7 achieves 58.11 FPS compared to 52.11 FPS.

This is how the Surface Pro 7 performs in Cinebench R20:

Performance: Geekbench 4 and 5

I also test two versions of Geekbench for the purpose of comparison. This is a cross-platform benchmark. Geekbench runs on Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android and iOS. In addition to simulated real-world scenarios with which the CPU is tested (single-core and multi-core), Geekbench can also determine GPU performance in the areas of image processing and machine vision. You can also compare the results with other systems thanks to the Geekbench browser.

Geekbench 4 results of the Surface Pro 7:

If I compare it again to the Surface Pro 6 with i5 processor, the result of the Surface Pro 7 is 26.89 per cent better in single-core performance (SP6: 4253 points / SP7: 5397 points) and 26.29 per cent better in multi-core performance (SP6: 13834 points / SP7: 17472 points).

In terms of graphics performance, the Pro 7 performs 37.10 per cent better (SP6: 35649 points / SP7: 48877 points).

If you would like to see the benchmark results in detail:

• Geekbench 4 CPU Performance
• Geekbench 4 GPU performance

Geekbench 5 results of the Surface Pro 7:

If you want to see the benchmark results in detail:

• Geekbench 5 CPU Performance
• Geekbench 5 GPU performance

Conclusion: Great device with minor drawbacks

Microsoft's convertible concept is a complete success and gets a good update with the Surface Pro 7. It finally has USB-C - albeit without the fast charging function -, Wi-Fi 6 and more processor power thanks to Ice Lake U. It's a shame that the i5 version still comes without a cooler. The stress test showed that the full performance of the processor can only be called up for a few minutes before the device throttles itself down to around 44 per cent of its performance due to excessive heat. Although this will not be a major issue in everyday office use, it is still wasted potential.

What really surprises me is that the battery lasts less despite the capacity remaining the same. The Pro 7 only lasts 5 hours and 16 minutes when continuously streaming YouTube, which is a whole four hours less than the Pro 6 with an i5 processor. For office work, you can expect seven to eight hours of battery life, which should be enough for most users.

If you want a well-built convertible, you can't go wrong with this device despite the disadvantages mentioned. Microsoft delivers a great piece of hardware that not only scores points for its design and functionality, but also for its durability. My colleague Raphael Knecht still uses a Surface Pro 3 from 2014 on a daily basis. This aspect makes the high price of the Surface device series seem lower.