14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft was expected to launch the Surface Pro 5 and the Surface Book 2 in late 2016, but the release was then postponed to the spring of this year because the company reportedly needed more time to complete work on some specific features.
More recently, however, Microsoft took the wraps off the Surface Laptop, so now the new-generation Surface Book and Surface Pro 4 are expected in the fall of 2017.
In an interview with Bloomberg, however, Microsoft corporate vice president Yusuf Mehdi explains that an update to the Surface Pro 4 is closer than we think, though no specifics were provided.
“We are in Surface to create new categories of computing, and you see that with the Surface Book, Surface Studio, and even the original Surface Pro. And then what we want to do is that we want to grow the overall Windows ecosystem with HP, Dell, Lenovo. If you look at the last year, we’ve grown share in large parts because of the pioneering work in Surface. This last year it’s true we’ve seen more price competition from OEMs. The Surface Laptop is new today, and you might expect to see an update to Surface Pro 4 coming soon,” he said.
Just a hardware upgrade?
Since he refers to this new model as “an update to Surface Pro 4,” there’s a chance that Microsoft doesn’t plan to launch a completely new generation, but only certain improvements to the existing models, like refreshed hardware. Kaby Lake chips, a GPU upgrade, and 4K screens are all expected.
This is a strategy that Microsoft embraced for the Surface Book as well, as the company launched an upgrade last year, while holding back the second generation a little longer.
The next event is Build, but seeing a new Surface model launching here is highly unlikely, as this is mostly a software event. Another conference takes place on May 23 in Shanghai, and there’s a good chance that new hardware will also be on display there, but there’s still no confirmation that a new Surface is expected.