14 DAY TRIAL // Chinese company Chuwi has made it a hobby to build devices that they market as rivals to Microsoft’s own Surface lineup, and after launching a Surface Book and a Surface Pro alternative, the firm is back with a device that’s placed somewhere in between.
The LapBook 12.3 is a smaller version of the LapBook 15.6 and 14.1, and it comes with a display that measures, as you can easily guess, 12.3 inches.
First and foremost, while it is positioned as a Surface alternative, the differences in hardware configurations are just huge, and there’s no way someone who previously used a Surface Pro 4, for instance, would be impressed with the new Chuwi model.
On the other hand, it features good value for the money, and at $349, you seriously can’t ask for more.
Technical specifications
For example, the device is powered by the 7th Generation Intel Apollo Lake N3450, which is a quad-core chip running at 2.2 GHz and paired with 6GB of RAM. Additionally, you get 64GB eMMC storage, but a card slot is also offered and so is an SSD connector. What’s important to know is that the SSD is not offered by default, so while the port is there, you need to actually buy the drive itself on your own.
The 12.3-inch display comes with a resolution of 2736x1824 pixels and has a 3:2 aspect ratio. Additionally, you also get USB 2.0 and 3.0 ports, a mini HDMI connector, and a 2-megapixel webcam.
The device comes with Windows 10 Home, and judging from the spec sheet, it should be able to run the operating system decently, though you’re not supposed to run demanding apps on the device, like Photoshop, where the experience is very likely to be substantially slowed down due to limited hardware.
The device will go on sale in May and it’ll be interesting to see how many buyers decide to give it a try since Chuwi is becoming one of the most popular OEMs of Surface alternatives.
