Microsoft and Apple both came out with a high end laptop on their side in the last quarter of 2016. The MacBook Pro 2016 and Surface Book i7. Let us see the feature comparison between these two products. Keep reading freelance tips on this Blog to know more about latest products and their features.

Laptop Design

Microsoft came out with their first laptop in 2015, and the new laptop also has the same design, but with much more features. Same magnesium allows body and hinges which can curl around. The weight is around 3.3. To 3.6 pounds/1650 grams.

Apple has managed to keep 13” model as light as possible. The 13” model is 3 pounds (1360 gm), and 15 inch is 4 pounds (1814 gm). MacBook has an all-metal body with no use of plastic. The Thickness for MacBook Pro is 0.6 inches, and for Surface Book, it is 0.9 inches. So Microsoft launched a bigger and heavier laptop but is equally feature rich as MacBook.

Display

AS MacBook Pro has two models, comparing apple-to-apple, you can say that Apple laptop is with 13.3 inches screen and MS is 13.5 inches. So, MS is slightly bigger than a similar version of MacBook. For resolution comparison, the Microsoft laptop has 3000 x 2000 pixels, and Apple has 2560 x 1600 pixels. Microsoft has provided a high resolution.

The RGB score is great on both laptops, but the advantage for Surface Book are that it has a touchscreen functionality, and it also comes with a Surface Pen. The MacBook Pro doesn’t have these features, but you get an impressive Touch Bar.

CPU Power, Graphics, and Ports

As both laptops target the high end market, the power and connectivity features are incredible. The base model of Surface Book has 8 GB RAM and 6th generation Core i5 or i7 processor. It is using Radeon Pro 450 or 455 Graphics card. Microsoft tried to make their laptop power packed and have a clear edge on some of the features.

MacBook also has same processors but Nvidia GTX 965M Graphics card. You will end up paying higher for extra power with different models. For example, the base models have i5, and top end models have an i7 processor. You have a choice of 8 GB and 16 GB also.

The Surface Book i7 has two USB 3.0 ports and an SD card reader, while the MacBook Pro comes with Touch bar and no Touch bar and has four USB-C standard Thunderbolt 3 multi-function ports. You don’t get this kind of ports on any standard laptop on the market today. The problem with advanced ports is all your cable collection goes waste, and you have to keep searching for new cables. Well, unlike iPhone, you have a headphone jack here for their laptop.

The claimed battery life for Pro is 10 hours and for Surface Book its 12 to 16 hours. Microsoft has an advantage here but depends on how much importance you have for long battery life.

OS and Software

MacBook Pro runs on macOS Sierra, while the Surface Book has Windows 10. Though both Operating Systems are completely different and you can’t compare them one-one, they both have great features.

The Cortana help, Digital Voice Assistant (DVA) are good features of Windows 10, and for all new devices, voice search is an important feature of the Software. If you are using Apple systems, you must be aware of their Siri virtual assistant on iOS. That is available in MacBook Pro as well.

Though both companies try to do their best in continuity features (known as interoperability)  from one device to another, MacOS is ahead in the game, and you can switch from iPhone to MacBook and vice versa and continue the same task. The freelance web developer community should be happy to get a lot of hardware support to implement new features.

Storage Space

For both of these high-end machines, you have options of 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB storage configurations. For 15-inch MacBook model, you can go up to2TB.

If you are a fan of SD cards and always insert your camera cards in the laptop to make edits, you won’t be happy. The MacBook Pro has removed the SD card slot from the new model.

Touch bar and Touch ID

The Touch Bar is an exciting feature which adds the most relevant tools to your keyboard. The tools change based on your current task making it easy for you to get things done. There is no training required, and you can quickly understand how to use the Touch bar.

For the first time, Touch ID is made available on a laptop which enables instant access to login to common websites.

The Surface Book doesn’t have a fingerprint sensor, but it has Windows Hello, which can use the camera for face scan. It comes with touch screen display which is not there in MacBook. You can also use the Surface Pen, which comes with every Surface Book. You can draw and scrawl on display and take notes. Most important is you can disengage the Surface Book screen and use it as a tab.

Summary

The new Surface Book i7 is a spec bump for last year’s Microsoft’s entry into the laptop market. The all-new MacBook Pro is a slim, powerful version of what you have already seen.

We have not mentioned exact prices in this post, as prices always keep changing but yes, both laptops start with about $1500 and then goes up to $3000 for the high-end version. Compare on freelance websites if you are thinking of buying a lavish laptop.

What you like also depends on your personal preferences and comfort with an operating system. If you are using everything related to iOS ad macOS, you will love the MacBook Pro. Similarly, if you are addicted to Windows (at least for laptop, if not for Windows Phone), you will see the Surface Book as best Windows laptop in the market.

Both giants have provided great features, and there will be updates (as usual) to fix the glitches and bugs. The users are kings and queens of today’s market, and only you can decide who wins in the race.

Kitty Gupta
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