14 DAY TRIAL // The first buyers of the Surface Book have already found issues affecting “the ultimate laptop,” and one of them is causing the screen to flicker at random times either on the desktop or when running third-party apps.
Microsoft had already acknowledged the issue late last week, and today the company has released the very first firmware update that comes to address this problem and improve the general performance of the device.
The new firmware is called System Hardware Update 11/2/2015 and includes HD Graphics 520 driver update to version 20.19.15.4308, which, according to Microsoft, “addresses some display issues, including some scenarios that result in screen flickering.” This means that the graphics drivers were the ones causing the screen flickering, so make sure you update them in case you’ve seen this problem on your device as well.
No fix for Windows Hello bug
At the same time, the new firmware version also comes with an update for the display audio driver to version 8.20.0.650, which includes compatibility with the upgrades graphics driver.
Additionally, there are also the Surface Embedded Controller Firmware update (v103.855.257.0) and Surface Pen Settings driver update (v10.0.302.0) for improved system stability and support for future functionality on Windows 10, respectively.
In the meantime, users have found a new issue impacting the Surface Book, this time reportedly caused by Windows Hello, which appears to be leading to huge battery drain, especially in standby. While some company employees have already confirmed that Microsoft is looking into reports, this new firmware version doesn’t include any patch for this bug, so turning Windows Hello off seems to remain the only solution until a fix arrives.
The Surface Book is Microsoft’s first laptop in history and comes with very powerful hardware, including i5 and i7 processors, up to 16 GB of RAM, and 1 TB of storage, NVIDIA graphics, and a removable keyboard that allows the device to turn into a notebook in just a second.