Latest news with #WindowsOnArm
The Verge
3 days ago
- Business
- The Verge
Surface Laptop 13-inch review: a little less for a little less
Microsoft finally found its answer to the MacBook Air last year with the 13.8-inch Surface Laptop (formerly known as 7th Edition). That Snapdragon X-powered laptop matched the MacBook in build quality, battery life, and at least some aspects of performance — something Windows laptop makers have been trying to do for ages. The 13.8-inch Surface Laptop was brilliant, but Windows on Arm's occasional app incompatibility stopped it just shy of being the default alternative to the MacBook Air. Nearly a year later, Microsoft has new Snapdragon-based Surfaces that are a little smaller and a little cheaper. The $899.99 13-inch Surface Laptop is nearly as great as last year's, despite some cost-cutting measures like a lower-resolution screen, a processor with two fewer cores, no face unlock, and no magnetic charging port. The hardware remains excellent, and Windows on Arm is even slightly better than last year. It'll probably work fine for some of you, but not all. The base 13-inch Surface Laptop, officially known as the Microsoft Surface 13-inch 1st Edition with Snapdragon (man alive, what a name), has an 8-core Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus processor, 16GB of RAM, and 256GB of storage. For an additional $100, you can get 512GB of storage. If you want more RAM or storage — or a more powerful processor — you'll need to jump to last year's 13.8-inch model, which now starts at $1,099.99 with a 10-core processor and 512GB SSD. There isn't a single major flaw in the new Surface Laptop's hardware, though there are some minor downgrades and unfortunate omissions compared to the larger version. It doesn't quite match the 13.8-inch's screen, trackpad, ports, or webcam, but it's a very good offering for its lower price. The 13-inch Surface has a 400-nit IPS screen that's 1920 x 1280 resolution and 60Hz. It's sharp and pleasing to look at, and it retains the 3:2 aspect ratio that's so great for productivity, but it's a step down from the 2304 x 1536 and 120Hz of the 13.8-inch Surface. For ports, it's equipped with a pair of USB-C 3.2, one USB-A 3.1, and a 3.5mm combo audio jack. It lacks the magnetic Surface Connect port of the larger models, which means you're reliant on USB-C for power and port expansion. I can forgive that, but the more disappointing omission is Windows Hello face unlock. The 1080p webcam is otherwise sharp and contrasty, but Microsoft opted for Windows Hello biometric unlocking through a fingerprint sensor in the power button instead, likely to save money. But, thankfully, there are a few key areas where the 13-inch excels despite its cost-cutting measures. The four-speaker setup sounds pretty good overall, though once you crank the volume, the low end hollows out. Typing on the Surface is pretty quiet and has just enough tactile feedback to feel nice — I even prefer it to the MacBook Air that it's competing with. But one of my favorite parts is the trackpad. It's mechanical, instead of haptic like its larger counterparts, but I've been shocked by how good it sounds and feels. Each click is crisp and well defined; it has a nice ka-chunk that's pretty satisfying. You can't click anywhere on it like you can on a haptic pad, but if every mechanical trackpad were this good, I'd finally shut up about it. Like last year's 13.8-inch Surface Laptop, the Qualcomm chip sips power and can even get through a 12-hour day of productivity apps (messaging, calls, Google Docs, lots of Chrome tabs, occasional music listening, downloading and uploading files). It also has exceptional standby times, so you can leave it closed and unplugged overnight with minimal battery drain. Even if your laptop stays plugged in most days, it's just so convenient not to worry about battery life when you take it off the charger. As I type this, it's around 5:30PM, and I unplugged the charger at 10AM. I've had a one-hour Zoom video call — always a battery killer — and mixed use between productivity apps and some photo editing in Lightroom Classic (which isn't a native Arm app, so it drains the battery faster). The Surface dipped below 30 percent battery and Windows turned on energy saver mode well over an hour ago, and I haven't had to rush from my spot to plug in. The 8-core Snapdragon X Plus processor performs well for core productivity and work tasks, though it did slow down once for me during some heavy multitasking on battery power. That was so far a one-off. I was on a browser-based Microsoft Teams video call, bouncing in and out of a document to take notes, with over 15 Chrome tabs open and a couple of other apps like Slack and Signal running in the background. It didn't crash, but things slowed down for a moment while the video feed on Teams crapped out. I was able to jumpstart the video again by minimizing the window and restoring it, and things went back to normal. The fan kicks on when you're working it hard like that, but it almost always stays quiet and inoffensive. It would have been nice to see Microsoft go fanless as it did on the new 12-inch Surface Pro. Fortunately, any fan noise is infrequent enough that I often forget it's there, and the chassis never got more than slightly warm to the touch. With two fewer cores than the 13.8-inch and four fewer than its pricier Snapdragon X Elite configurations, the 13-inch is predictably slower at multicore tasks and related synthetic benchmarks. It's still adequate for general purpose needs, but it's not going to do any heavy lifting in creative apps without slowing down. By contrast, an M4 MacBook Air costing just $100 more than the Surface Laptop 13-inch can dabble in content creation apps and actually beats all the Surfaces (even the pricier ones) in many of our tests. It's still hard to beat Apple, but if you're not cross-shopping operating systems that doesn't really matter. System Microsoft Surface Laptop 13-inch / Snapdragon X Plus 8C / 16GB / 512GB Microsoft Surface Laptop 13.8-inch / Snapdragon X Plus 10C / 16GB / 512GB Microsoft Surface Laptop 15-inch / Snapdragon X Elite 12C / 16GB / 512GB MacBook Air 13-inch M4 / 10C / 10C / 16GB / 512GB Geekbench 6 CPU Single 2437 2446 2841 3775 Geekbench 6 CPU Multi 11427 13190 14661 14899 Geekbench 6 GPU (OpenCL) 9391 19993 Not tested 30701 Cinebench 2024 Single 109 108 122 171 Cinebench 2024 Multi 682 808 971 736 PugetBench for Photoshop 4773 5600 6748 10163 Sustained SSD reads (MB/s) 3840.78 3663.1 3656 2910.04 Sustained SSD writes (MB/s) 3476.62 2478.44 2944 2115.57 Blender Classroom test (seconds, lower is better) 486 418 712 (tested before Blender had Arm support) 69 While app compatibility can also be a mixed bag, I'm relieved that it's gotten better since last year. The vast majority of Windows apps work fine on Arm, either natively or through emulation, but there are enough edge cases, especially around photo and video editing, 3D rendering, and music creation, that you still do need to make sure your apps are going to work well before you buy. In my review of the HP OmniBook X, I lamented that the lack of support for Adobe Lightroom Classic forced me to use the standard, mobile-centric Lightroom, which I hate. Lightroom Classic now works via emulation, and it does so quite well. I can edit my 50-megapixel RAW files on the Surface Laptop 13-inch, and it's fast enough for some dip in, dip out sessions. I wouldn't want to edit an elaborate product shoot on a tight deadline or cull and batch-process a full wedding shoot, but it's good to know that I can do some photo editing if I have to. It's still hard to beat Apple, but if you're not cross-shopping operating systems that doesn't really matter. But elsewhere, even within the Adobe Creative Cloud suite, there are still some major omissions. Adobe After Effects, Illustrator, and InDesign have zero support for Windows on Arm — they don't even run emulated. Adobe says on its help page that Arm-supported versions of these apps 'will be released soon,' but there's no estimated timeframe. In other cases, apps run but still leave a bit to be desired. Blender was updated with Windows on Arm support last year, but it still doesn't fully utilize the Snapdragon X's GPU cores, leading to significantly longer rendering times than even a MacBook Air. Windows on Arm seems to be on the right trajectory, but it's going to take much longer to reach full parity with vanilla x86 Windows, especially if you account for games. Game support for the Snapdragon-based Surfaces, as with Macs, is still a crapshoot. The Surface Laptop 13-inch is not a gaming machine, obviously, but plenty of games that work just fine on other Windows laptops with integrated graphics run poorly or not at all. Right now, most popular online shooters, like Fortnite and Valorant, which include anti-cheat software, can't run on Windows on Arm laptops (though Fortnite is coming to Arm eventually). Some of my favorite indies — like Vampire Survivors and Balatro — work, but your best option is to stream games from services like GeForce Now or Xbox Cloud Gaming, though even as a PC Game Pass subscriber, you can't install any Game Pass games locally like you can on x86 PCs. There's an easier path around these obstacles. Microsoft could have just used an Intel Lunar Lake chip in the new Surface Laptop, which would have likely sacrificed some battery efficiency for wide-ranging app and game compatibility. Last year's Surfaces did get that as an option, but Microsoft positioned them as enterprise laptops with higher prices. You can buy them, but only at specialized retailers. Despite Microsoft's ongoing Windows on Arm push, the vast majority of the Windows ecosystem and user base still lives on x86. Since the first Snapdragon X PCs came out last year, Intel Lunar Lake and AMD Strix Point chips have proven x86 still has the juice (for now), and there's a draw to sticking with a proven platform instead of risking potential frustrations with Arm, especially for creative work. Opting for a Lunar Lake laptop like the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i, or a Strix Point one like Asus's Zenbook S 16, avoids the app compatibility issue entirely and gets you better performance in graphical tasks like photo and video editing, at the cost of a few hours of battery life and a few hundred dollars. Though, there are pricier Windows laptops running these chips that totally flub the basics compared to the Surface. At $900, the 13-inch is an exceptional no-nonsense Windows laptop for general productivity stuff, and it looks and feels great. It's right at the price range where laptops start getting really good, without the kinds of compromises that feel like penalty boxes a few years later: slow processors, low-quality screens, bad battery life, or cheap builds. It's much better hardware than some other laptops in its price range, with better battery life, in exchange for small compromises on speed and app compatibility. The 13.8-inch version is still nicer overall, but that one now costs $200 to $300 more thanks to Microsoft's own price and configuration shuffling. Would I buy one for myself? Truthfully, no. I moonlight as a wedding photographer, and while Lightroom Classic works with Windows on Arm now, it's just not fast enough to rely on yet. And my gaming sensibilities lead me to feeling that if I can't play games on a laptop, I might as well switch back to a MacBook. But nearly every downside of the Surface Laptop 13-inch is just a downside of Windows on Arm. If developers keep updating their programs to use the architecture properly, the edge cases get fewer, and the closer the Surface Laptop 13-inch gets to being the easy answer to 'what laptop should I buy?' 2025 Microsoft Surface Laptop 13-inch specs (as reviewed) Display: 13-inch (1920 x 1280) 60Hz touschscreen CPU: Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus X1P-42-100 RAM: 16GB LPDDR5X (non-replaceable) Storage: 512GB UFS Webcam: 1080p Connectivity: Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4 Ports: 1x USB-A 3.1, 2x USB-C 3.2, 3.5mm combo audio jack Weight: 2.7 pounds Dimensions: 11.25 x 8.43 x 0.61 Battery: 50Wh Price: $999.99 Photography by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge Featured Videos From The Verge Why Apple is trying to save Google | The Vergecast Where will Meta, Apple, and Google be three years from now? It's starting to look like they might all be very different. Nilay, David, and The Verge's Richard Lawler start the show with Eddy Cue's testimony in the Google search trial, in which Cue argued that AI is taking over — and that Google should be allowed to keep paying Apple gobs of money. The hosts also chat about the latest in the Meta trials, and how the recent Apple ruling is already changing the App Store. Then, there are some gadgets to talk about: the panopticon-slash-killer-app coming for Meta's smart glasses, the new Surface Pro and Surface Laptop, and a lot of new iPhones. In the lightning round, we do another round of Brendan Carr is a Dummy, then talk about some new Netflix designs and the latest in our worldwide hunt for party speakers.
Digital Trends
5 days ago
- Digital Trends
Windows on Arm vs Intel: Which laptop platform is right for you?
In just over a year, the landscape of Windows laptops has changed with the arrival of machines that draw power from Qualcomm Snapdragon processors, instead of those from Intel. Or even AMD. Think of it as the same kind of transition that Apple pulled off with the Mac, but instead of one, there are multiple brands carrying the torch for Microsoft. The overarching project is called Windows on Arm, and it has solid a few solid products in the past few months. The ultra-slim Asus ZenBook A14 and the Dell XPS 13 have been my favorite Snapdragon machines so far, and more are yet to come. The core premise behind these machines is to deliver snappy performance (with a special focus on AI) and long battery life in a thin and light chassis. Recommended Videos In their current shape, think of them as the MacBook Air equivalent on the Windows side of the ecosystem. In fact, a couple of Snapdragon devices that I've tested even leapfrog Apple's smash-hit laptop and deliver an astounding multi-day battery life. But can they really beat legacy laptops on the x86 architecture, when the latest generation of Intel chips has also started to embrace the Copilot+ badge for top-tier performance? Let's unfold the conundrum: What about my apps? Are my Intel-based PC apps going to work on an Arm-based Windows laptop? Yes, they will. If the developer has created a separate codebase for the Arm version of their app, even better. If not, you can still download the Intel (or x86) version of the app and run it on your Snapdragon-powered Arm-based laptop or PC. One of the biggest challenges with bringing Windows to an entirely different architecture is the situation with non-native software aka the stuff made by other developers. Now, Microsoft has developed an emulation layer that can run x86 apps just fine, with a small performance hit, that is. The secret sauce here is Prism, which essentially translates x86-64 code into ARM64 instructions. So, if an app was originally developed to run on an x86 PC powered by Intel and AMD processors, it will technically work on Windows on Arm machines with a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor at their heart. Microsoft is using Prism to pull it off, while Apple relied on the Rosetta 2 emulator when it shifted Macs from an Intel (x86) to M-series (Arm) silicon. What about the performance hit that comes with emulation? Well, it is definitely here, but you likely won't run into it. Microsoft says that 87 percent of the total app minutes spent by users of Copilot+ PCs are inside software that is now written natively for Windows on Arm. In a nutshell, you won't have to worry about the emulation hit by Prism, which itself got a performance boost with the Windows 11 24H2 update. Windows on Arm is right for… If your primary requirements from a laptop are fast wake up, thin and light design, reliable productivity performance, and above all, a fantastic battery life that can easily last a full day, you can safely pick a Windows on Arm laptop. In my time with Windows on Arm machines, I have noticed that they are pretty fast, especially at running apps for office-based work. If your typical work day entails browsing, task management software such as Asana or Trello, communication, and workplace platforms such as the Office suite, these laptops will run just fine. Even if you are trying a creative suite of apps such as Adobe InDesign, Photoshop, and Premiere Pro, they work without any major red flags. If you're interested in making the best of AI tools, such as Recall or Copilot Deep Research, these machines can handle the workflow without breaking a sweat. At benchmarks, the underlying Snapdragon X series laptops beat Intel and AMD machines, so there's that. The only major hiccup is the graphics performance, and especially the scalability part of it. In my time, I never found Windows on Arm a limitation for my work, which is spread across web browsers, task management apps, communication platforms, and a bit of media editing. For a majority of business customers and even students, the experience would be similar, unless you are running specialized software. Why pick the Windows and Intel combo Emulation has its limits, and for a certain audience, it totally doesn't work. Gaming is one such scenario. 'Drivers for hardware, games, and apps only work if they're designed for a Windows 11 Arm-based PC,' says Microsoft. Likewise, any program that requires custom drivers, such as an antivirus package, printing utilities, and virtualization software, will give you a hard time. Games that rely on anti-cheat software simply won't work. But there is more to it. There are only three Windows on Arm processors currently on the market viz. Snapdragon X Elite, X Plus, and X. The latter is pretty weak, and often gave me a 'processor not supported' warning message for a large number of games in the Xbox Game Pass library. The graphics situation is to blame here. The top-end Snapdragon X Elite won't fare dramatically better at AAA games, either. Likewise, if you are planning to run CAD software or engage in hi-res multi-stream video editing, a powerful processor paired with a beefy graphics engine is a must. You will also need a lot of RAM and onboard storage. Unfortunately, even the most powerful Windows on Arm laptops won't offer the graphics chops needed for that kind of work, nor the memory upgradability you seek. Gaming laptops are here to stay, and so are mobile workstations with 'Pro' grade processors such as the HP Zbook for creative professionals. In a nutshell, if scalability and flexibility are what you seek, you can skip Windows on Arm. Another crucial part is the pricing. Windows on Arm laptops are still struggling to go below the $700 price point. That leaves out a huge chunk of buyers. For nearly half the price, or close to the $450 margin, you can get competent laptops with Intel (and AMD) processors that can handle light workloads with ease. So yeah, if affordability and hardware versatility are what you desire, look on the Intel side of the Windows laptop ecosystem.
Phone Arena
19-05-2025
- Phone Arena
HP's new OmniBook 5 brings Snapdragon chips and a battery that won't quit
HP is giving its OmniBook 5 Series laptops a solid upgrade with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X and X Plus chips, bringing better battery life and performance to a more affordable price range. Before, if you wanted a Snapdragon-powered HP laptop, you had to go for the pricier OmniBook X models, which start at around $1,000. Now, HP is opening the door for more budget-friendly options with the OmniBook 5 Series. The 14-inch model kicks off at $799 and the 16-inch version starts at $849 – both packing ARM processors that promise solid efficiency. Windows on Arm is shaking up the PC scene by combining the familiar Windows experience with the energy-saving benefits of Arm processors. These chips, which have dominated smartphones for years, bring perks like longer battery life, always-on connectivity and better portability to laptops. The 14-inch OmniBook 5 is thin (12.69 mm) and light (1.35 kg or 2.98 lbs.). | Image credit – HP While the OmniBook 5 may not match the raw power of the OmniBook X, it still comes loaded with Microsoft Copilot+ AI features like Recall, Click-to-Do and a smarter Windows Search experience. Wonder what these actually do? Recall: Lets you quickly find and jump back to things you have seen on your PC before. It uses an explorable timeline to help you track down that content you remember but can't quite place. Lets you quickly find and jump back to things you have seen on your PC before. It uses an explorable timeline to help you track down that content you remember but can't quite place. Click-to-Do: This tool scans the text and images on your screen and lets you take quick actions on them. You just pick what you want to act on and it helps you get stuff done faster. This tool scans the text and images on your screen and lets you take quick actions on them. You just pick what you want to act on and it helps you get stuff done faster. Smarter Windows Search: This upgraded search on Windows 11 works a bit like Google Lens. It lets you find images, documents, videos and more using simple text queries – making it easier to locate what you need without digging around. HP also adds its own AI Companion that handles things like document analysis and PC performance tweaks right on the device. The bigger 16-inch laptop, just like the smaller model, is available in only one color – Glacier Silver. | Image credit – HP The laptops rock a sharp 2K OLED display and boast an impressive 34-hour battery life, plus a quick recharge that gets you to 50% in just 30 minutes. HP is pitching these as perfect for students and families who want reliable performance that lasts days without slowing down, even unplugged. And if one screen isn't enough, the OmniBook 5 can connect to a single 5K external monitor or two 4K displays for serious multitasking. For virtual calls, it features a 1080p IR camera with Audio Boost 2.0, which includes AI-powered noise removal to improve your sound quality. Here is a quick look at the specs you get: Up to 32 GB RAM Up to 1 TB storage Windows 11 right out of the box Dual speakers 2 USB Type-C ports 1 USB Type-A port Headphone/microphone combo jack Bluetooth 5.3 Wi-Fi 6E Lightweight aluminum body 65W fast charging The 14-inch OmniBook 5 will be available first on Amazon and Micro Center starting in June. By July, you can grab it from HP's site, Best Buy and Costco. The 16-inch model will hit shelves in July, too, available directly from HP and its retail is nice to see HP pushing AI-powered features down into more affordable laptops. Sure, some of the AI stuff feels a bit extra right now, but having the option to try it out is still a win. Plus, with Microsoft giving Windows 11 a serious boost – especially on Snapdragon-powered devices – HP's timing couldn't be better for attracting buyers looking for a more affordable laptop that still delivers.
Digital Trends
08-05-2025
- Digital Trends
Microsoft's Surface Laptop 13 almost beat the MacBook Air. Here's what it missed
Table of Contents Table of Contents A barely missed display edge The bad storage situation Limits itself to only the Snapdragon silicon Loses the surface design identity Microsoft is turning a new chapter for the Surface hardware, one where it competes against the best of Apple across different form factors. The latest from the company is a MacBook Air-wannabe laptop (down to the looks) and a tablet that borrows from the iPad formula. The new 13-inch Surface Laptop and the 12-inch Surface Pro tablet are curious additions to Microsoft's lineup. The most perplexing part? Microsoft again went with Qualcomm (and Windows on Arm) instead of picking Intel and AMD, both of which now offer silicon ready for Copilot+ machines. Recommended Videos An exception can be made for the tablet, but the new Surface Laptop is gunning straight for the MacBook Air's crown. And it's got some substance, too. It's the thinnest and lightest Surface Laptop Microsoft has made to date, and it even eclipses Apple's competing laptop with a better port situation and asking price. Yet, despite all the on-paper finesse, it falls barely short of emerging as the better option, despite having the price advantage on its side. I quite like the package, but I wish Microsoft had gone the extra mile and given its latest a definitive edge on a few crucial parameters. A barely missed display edge The MacBook Air's panel gets the job done without any major red flags. With some workarounds, you can even get past the controversial notch. But it's not the best out there, neither qualitatively nor quantitatively. The likes of Asus offer an OLED panel for less, and you can find a panel with a higher refresh rate for a lower ask. Unfortunately, the new Surface Laptop failed to surpass its Apple rival at either metric by going for a 60Hz LCD screen. It's pretty surprising to witness, because the 13.8-inch variant offers a faster 120Hz screen with a more resilient glass layer on top, HDR support, and automatic color management. It's not a bad panel, if my own personal experience with the 15-inch Surface Laptop is anything to go by, but there's nothing standout either. If only the new 13-incher could go with a higher refresh rate, or OLED-type panel, it would've instantly scored a meaningful leg-up over the MacBook Air. The bad storage situation Apple continues to get flak for its stingy storage situation, and rightfully so. If you're paying a thousand dollars for a laptop, you deserve more than a paltry 256GB of storage. The status quo hasn't changed all the way into 2025 for Apple. Unfortunately, Microsoft is not doing anything different either. I was hoping that the company would finally make a course correction with its next-gen hardware, but that didn't happen aboard the new 13-inch Surface Laptop. Another issue is the storage type. If you pick the 256B model, you get an SSD storage, but the 512GB variant serves a UFS storage module. It's not user-replaceable and will require a visit to a service center, if the need arises. I have learned the storage lesson the hard way, and would never make the mistake again. By picking a 256GB laptop, it is almost a certainty that within a year, or two, you will need an external storage drive. Unless your work is heavily cloud-based, you shouldn't go below 512GB if you intend to use a laptop in the long run. That's a holy rule, more so in 2025 than ever, due to the space taken by AI modules required for local processing of tool such as Copilot or Apple Intelligence. Limits itself to only the Snapdragon silicon My experience with Copilot laptops — and Windows on Arm machines, in general — has been fairly smooth. But I fall in the lucky class of users where app compatibility is not an issue, and the raw emulation hit on performance doesn't take a toll on my workflow. There are tangible benefits to picking up an Arm chip. They are definitely more efficient, and the core reason behind the stunning battery life of laptops. Their single-core performance even leaves the likes of Apple's M4 silicon behind on certain benchmarks. But limiting users to the Arm experience is not the most thoughtful approach, especially for creative professionals who seek the full x86 ecosystem of apps. Moreover, Intel and AMD are now both making chips that meet the baseline NPU performance criteria for Copilot PCs, ultimately offering a wider diversity for users to pick from. Games continue to be a prominent chink in the Windows-on-Arm armor, and so is the spotty situation with the availability of Arm64 drivers for peripherals such as printers. The status quo is not all doom and gloom, but it's not universally smooth either. Loses the surface design identity Microsoft may not have managed to send shockwaves in the laptop market with its portfolio, but the Surface hardware has always been in a league of its own. The signature wedge-shaped look with sharp angles and flat sides gave them an unmistakable visual identity. The Alcantara keyboard is one of my favorite laptop design elements of all time. It looked stunning and felt fantastic to touch, though it was also a repairability nightmare. Microsoft has experimented with an all-metal approach, too, but without tweaking the fundamental looks. In its quest to seemingly one-up the MacBook Air, Microsoft has unfortunately ditched its signature design and nearly aped its Apple rival. The 13-inch Surface Laptop goes for an industrial look that embraces curved sides on the base, an all-metal chassis, and some familiar colors, just like the MacBook Air. The latest from Microsoft doesn't look bad. Far from it, actually. A fresh design is always a welcome change, but not when it goes back to a tried-and-tested formula on the very object you aim to surpass. The only positive takeaway is that the proprietary magnetic connector is gone in favor of USB-C and an extra USB-A port. Hopefully, Microsoft will manage to rectify a few of the internal missteps and give the next-gen model a tangible leg-up over its Apple rival, assuming it's on the company's roadmap.
