Microsoft is readying not one, but two new Surfaces for this holiday season.
The Haswell-based Surface 2 Pro is the successor to the Surface Pro, according to sourced reports. And the NVIDIA Tegra 4-based Surface 2 is the successor to Surface RT, according to new leaks from Neowin.Net and the Windows SuperSite on September 9.
The Surface 2 runs on ARM, just like the Surface RT, and thus runs the Windows RT operating system. (It will be the Windows 8.1 RT variant, sources have said.)
Otherwise, the 10.6-inch Surface 2 will look almost identical to the current 10.6-inch Surface RT. It will use the same VaporMg case and work with the current Surface Touch and Type keyboard/covers, as well as some of the coming, new Touch and Type ones. (Surface 2 isn't expected to work with the rumored Power Cover, however.)
Sources say battery life on the Surface 2 will come in around eight hours -- about the same as current Tegra 3-based Surface RT device. The Surface 2 is rumored to have a USB 3.0 port, support for 802.11 Wi-fi (no built-in LTE) and Bluetooth. It will ship with versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and Outlook that have been compiled to work on an ARM-based device.
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The Surface 2 will support 1080p/full HD, sources told Neowin and the Windows SuperSite. (The current Surface RT has lower resolution, at 1366X768 pixels.)
There's no word so far on how much the Surface 2 will cost. After the latest round of price cuts, Surface RT starts at $349. With a cover/keyboard bundled, Surface RT pricing starts at $399.
Microsoft officials aren't commenting on anything to do with the unannounced Surface products.
Microsoft took a $900 million Surface RT write-down in its fourth fiscal quarter of 2013. Despite that fact, Microsoft has no plans to dump Windows RT or its ARM-based Surface line of tablets. Nokia is also working on a new ARM-based tablet, codenamed "Sirius," which is expected this holiday season. Microsoft is increasingly pushing its ARM-based Surfaces as head-to-head iPad competitors, but which include features that enable their use in business situations.