Microsoft launches Surface Laptop Ultra using Nvidia 'super chip'
After revealing it earlier this year, Microsoft officially launched the Surface Laptop Ultra at its own event in San Francisco and will be available for ordering from October 8, with delivery from October 16.
The product is described as "super powerful", aimed at developers and artificial intelligence researchers rather than regular computer users. The device has a starting price of 2,599 USD (68 million VND) and the highest price of 5,899 USD (154 million VND) for the 128 GB RAM version.
Surface Laptop Ultra uses the RTX Spark chip announced by Nvidia in June instead of the usual Intel or AMD chip. Nvidia calls RTX Spark a "super chip", combining Arm Grace CPU and Blackwell RTX GPU on the same unified architecture.
The chip has up to 20 CPU cores, Blackwell GPU with 6,144 CUDA cores, AI performance of 1 petaflop FP4 and supports up to 128 GB of LPDDR5X memory. The company also describes it as "the most efficient PC chip ever made", designed to operate AI agents locally instead of relying solely on cloud computing.
Microsoft laptops come in two main configurations: a version with the RTX Spark N1X with an 18-core CPU or a more powerful version with a 20-core CPU. Maximum RAM is 32 GB for the basic version, but can be increased to 128 GB when combined with a 20-core RTX Spark processor.
On the product page, the Surface Laptop Ultra's SSD has a maximum capacity of 2 TB, but on the pre-order page, only the SSD has a maximum capacity of 1 TB.
Microsoft does not hesitate to compare directly with the MacBook Pro line using the new M5 Pro chip. Specifically, the company said Surface Laptop Ultra creates videos 6.2 times faster, creates photos 4.3 times faster and processes the first token 2.1 times faster. It has 2.5 times better heat dissipation than any other Surface before it and maintains 99% of maximum performance even when unplugged.
The Ultra Laptop screen is a 15-inch Mini-LED PixelSense Ultra touch screen, 3:2 aspect ratio and maximum brightness of 2,000 nits. The device has a touch trackpad that is 30% larger than the regular 15-inch Surface line.
The company also introduced magnetic charging with the world's first USB-C port, called Magnetic Connect, similar to what Apple does with Magsafe. The product has full connection ports such as SD card reader, HDMI, USB-C, USB-A, and 3.5 mm headphone jack.
According to Engadget, the device's design does not go into different details like previous Surface lines but focuses on finishing quality and looks like "a simple copy of the MacBook Pro".
The chassis is made of monolithic aluminum, 18 mm thick, weighing 2 kg. The removable hard drive is a big advantage that helps users easily upgrade the SSD themselves later. Users have two colors to choose from: platinum and dark gray.