
The keys are snappy and they deliver a decent amount of travel considering how thin the deck is. The keyboard looks undersized on the Surface Book 3's wide deck, but it's surprisingly comfortable to type on. Microsoft Surface Book 3 keyboard and touchpad The screens on the Yoga C940 (432 nits) and MacBook Pro (429 nits) are brighter. It reached an impressive 402 nits, making it more luminous than the panels on the XPS 15 (371 nits), the Surface Laptop 3 (366 nits) and the average premium laptop (368 nits). The Surface Book 3's screen regained some footing when we tested for brightness. The average for the premium laptop category is 121%. Content creators might be disappointed by that color coverage considering the displays on the XPS 15 (115%), the Yoga C940 (105%), the Surface Laptop 3 (105%) and the 16-inch MacBook Pro (114%) are all more vivid. I'm surprised our colorimeter only clocked the Surface Book 3's screen at 101% of the sRGB color gamut. The retro hues throughout the trailer were punchy and the screen was bright enough to distract me from the reflections bouncing off its glossy finish. That dense layer of pixels captures such a sharp image that I could see "Casio" written on a watch Gal Gadot gifts to Chris Pine's character. Worse yet, Microsoft's bizarre security fears mean this isn't even a Thunderbolt 3 input, so I couldn't connect to the 4K Dell monitor I'm reviewing.

Microsoft Surface Book 3 portsĪ single USB-C port isn't good enough on a 15-inch laptop designed for content creators. Factor in the thick bezels and the 4.3-pound Surface Book 3 stands at 13.5 x 9.9 x 0.9 inches, which is thicker than the Dell XPS 15 (14.1 x 9.3 x 0.7 inches, 4.2 pounds), the Lenovo Yoga C940 (14 x 9.4 x 0.8 inches, 4.4 pounds), the Apple MacBook Pro (14.1 x 9.7 x 0.6 inches, 4.3 pounds) and the Microsoft Surface Laptop 3 (13.4 x 9.6 x 0.6 inches, 3.4 pounds). Also, the screen wobbles when you tap on the touchscreen, undermining what is an otherwise sturdy laptop.Īnother issue with the accordion hinge is that it extends the deck of the laptop. It's ugly and it leaves the keyboard exposed to debris when you stuff the Surface Book 3 into your bag. Connecting the tablet and the deck is what Microsoft calls a "dynamic fulcrum hinge." This is the third generation of this laptop and the hinge still leaves an unsightly gap between the lid and the keyboard when the laptop is closed.
