Consumer Reports is happy with Microsoft Surface reliability again

Consumer Reports is happy with Microsoft Surface reliability again, but not Surface Go power
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Microsoft is unlikely to make any sort of a splash with its refreshed new Surface Pro and Surface Laptop next week, but if you were thinking of buying a previous member of the Redmond company’s versatile computer family, you should no longer worry about hardware reliability.

After deeming the entire Surface lineup as “significantly less reliable” than similar products from “most other brands” last year, nonprofit organization Consumer Reports decided to give Microsoft a second chance.

The latest survey conducted by the consumer advocacy and public education association found that Microsoft’s reliability is “now on par with most other laptop brands.” That obviously doesn’t mean your 2-in-1 Surface hybrid will never break down. But failure rates have definitely dropped, earning the Surface Pro, Surface Laptop, and Surface Book 2 a coveted “recommended” status in Consumer Reports’ ratings.

It’s worth pointing out that every single Surface family member was re-tested and rated as a laptop rather than a tablet, which unsurprisingly meant the Surface Go fell short of a recommendation.

Microsoft’s smallest and cheapest tablet couldn’t compete against “a number of laptops” in terms of performance, with its Intel Pentium processor considered too slow for certain essential tasks like “cycling through different windows.”

Consumer Reports evaluated both the $400 and $550 Surface Go configurations, finding the latter to be “just slightly faster” than the former, while the lower-cost model impressed with its battery life, unexpectedly scoring one overall point better than the pricier variant.

It’s important to highlight mediocre processing power was the key reason why the Surface Go didn’t receive a “recommended” badge, with reliability deemed satisfactory as far as the 10-incher is concerned as well.