Microsoft's Surface Laptop Ultra costs up to nearly $6,000, and the reviews are in

Microsoft’s Surface Laptop Ultra finally has a price. It starts at $2,599 and the flagship configuration costs $5,899.99, Gadget Review reported, with preorders that opened October 7 and units available from October 16. Gizmodo noted the base model has 24GB of memory and a lower-end CPU and GPU, so the $2,599 machine isn’t the one it reviewed, a nearly $6,000 unit with the maximum 128GB.

Microsoft lists up to 128GB of unified memory shared between the CPU and GPU, which is what lets a laptop hold a big AI model on its own. Tom’s Hardware’s verdict fits on one line: Nvidia’s Windows on Arm platform impresses in local AI, and gaming isn’t its strong suit.

The MacBook Pro still wins the straight race. Gizmodo measured the M5 Max close to 44% ahead in Geekbench 7’s multi-core test, Macworld pointed out that the M5 Max has more than twice the memory bandwidth, and The Short Cut said the MacBook Pro is still the better option for most people.

This is an Arm chip, and Gizmodo reported that anything without an Arm version leans on Microsoft’s Prism emulator. CGMagOnline found games work only when they don’t rely on unsupported anti-cheat software, and The Short Cut couldn’t run most games at a playable frame rate at full resolution, even with DLSS. Battery depends on the job: CGMagOnline drained it in three to four hours under heavy work, while The Short Cut got through eight- and 10-hour days.

If you’re tempted, I’d list the five programs you can’t work without, plus any game or plug-in with anti-cheat or a driver, and check each one against Windows on Arm before paying. I’d buy the memory for the models you’ll actually run, not the biggest number on the page. And I’d know the return window before the box shows up.