A budget laptop isn't as useful if you don't enjoy actually using it. Despite other laptops offering better specs for the same or less money, the overall look and feel of the Surface Laptop Go 2 counts for a lot. It is, however, not nearly as nice looking or well made as the Surface. That Gateway, one of our current budget favorites, has the same processor, but includes 16GB of RAM and a big 512GB SSD, currently for $499. But other budget laptops, like the Gateway 14 or a couple of options with AMD Ryzen 7 processors, beat it out in benchmark tests. In our performance tests, the 2022 version, with its 11th-gen Core i5 was indeed faster than the 2020 version's 10th-gen Core i5. Running basic applications and web browsers were fine for everyday use, but I found myself defaulting to Microsoft's own Edge browser over Chrome, because it's better optimized for less powerful Windows 11 systems. Single Review, online available, Medium, Date: ħ8% Microsoft Surface Laptop Go 2 Review: The Tricky Math of Budget Laptop Buying Even if you end up buying the 8GB version with a 256GB SSD, it’s a terrific little machine for the price. Despite that 4GB of RAM, the base configuration is still tempting, because it would be a brilliant secondary laptop.

But, whether you’re buying for business, home use or a mix of both, it’s price and portability that appeal here.

Microsoft also hopes to lure business customers with the promise of replaceable parts, but a one-year warranty and the fact that components such as memory are embedded on the board don’t really make this a selling point.

The idea is that you have a protected “boot path” that will spot compromised firmware, but all big laptop makers offer something similar you can decide for yourself by reading Microsoft’s documentation. Microsoft is keen to push this laptop’s other security features, making much of the fact that this is a “Secured-core PC”. 80% Microsoft Surface Laptop Go 2 review: Basic but brilliant

Surface laptop go 2022