The Surface Laptop Go 2 is Microsoft’s latest slim laptop, packed with an 11th-generation Intel i5 CPU and up to 8GB RAM. Style-wise, it’s one of the best-looking laptops I’ve reviewed this year, with a simple, no-distractions approach and four colours to choose from.
This isn’t a laptop for power users, but it certainly makes a case for itself as a cloud-dependent working laptop. It’s lightweight, it’s sleek and it offers the high-end feel that MacBook users might crave.
I believe The Surface Laptop Go 2 could make a great companion computer to a high-end PC (say, a desktop PC at your office) or a great low-spec PC on its own, with a price point that feels just right.
One Surface 2 Go, please
As of late, I’ve become quite a fan of Microsoft’s Surface laptops. This year’s Surface Laptop Studio remains my favourite high-end laptop, with a discreet, professional chassis and the high-spec grunt to match.
The Surface Laptop Go 2 complements this. Smaller and less powerful than the Surface Laptop Studio (which has a 14.4-inch screen, against the Go 2’s 12.4-inch display), the Surface Laptop Go 2 retains the touch screen and Microsoft’s discreet style. It’s available in four finishes: Sage, Ice Blue, Sandstone and Platinum, and unfortunately doesn’t come with a backlit keyboard.
That’s not to say it’s an underpowered device. I was more than satisfied with the Surface Go 2 I reviewed, which packed 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD storage and an i5-1135G7, priced at $1,299.
In Cinebench, the laptop scored 1,314 points in the single-core test (seventh place) and 3,826 points in the multi-core test (15th place).
The laptop also performed quite well in our Chrome tab test. Using Google Chrome, the computer only started to stutter and lag after 43 active YouTube tabs, coming to a complete freeze at 50 tabs.
Daily use-wise, this laptop didn’t struggle too much. My job involves having multiple Chrome tabs open across two monitors and this laptop only started to stutter when put under significant pressure. I noticed this when using Canva, Gmail, WordPress and web browsing all at once, with the laptop stuttering and going slow at times when trying to download, save work or upload files.
Like the Acer Aspire AV15-51, the Surface Laptop 2 Go’s weakness is graphics processing, with only an integrated Intel Iris Xe GPU. Usually, we make the computer run Forza Horizon 5 to test out graphics capabilities, but the Surface Laptop 2 Go was unable to do this, crashing whenever the benchmark tool was run. This isn’t a problem, but it is indicative that this laptop would likely struggle with higher-end games or graphics applications, even at their lowest settings.
Finally, in our battery test, the Surface Laptop 2 Go performed just about as well as we expected. Streaming Avengers: Endgame on battery power, the laptop dropped to 78 per cent in the first hour, 59 per cent in the second and 39 per cent in the third.
I will say that the 1536 x 1024 screen on this laptop makes for a flashy, colourful screen, if admittedly below 1080p, however it is a bit small and may annoy someone for its size. The speaker system was also quite impressive, producing lots of deep, action-packed sound during the movie.
On the sides of the device, you’ll find Microsoft’s “Surface Connect” charging cable port, a USB-C port and a USB-A port, along with a AUX port. This small amount of ports might be unimpressive for someone who needs to plug their device into several things, but if you’ve got an adapter, it shouldn’t be a problem.
The price is right
Trading muscles for affordability, the Surface Laptop 2 Go is a laptop that I would recommend to most people. Users who want a big screen, a bigger keyboard or better graphics performance would be best to steer clear, however, this laptop makes a great case for, say, a university student, a laptop for home use or an out-of-office work device for someone who uses Word and web applications.
Where to buy the Surface Laptop Go 2
The Surface Laptop Go 2 starts at $1,099, although models with more RAM and storage capacity are available, up to $1,299.
Microsoft ($1,099) | Officeworks ($1,197) | Harvey Norman ($1,234)