Of course, it is another Microsoft Surface blogpost, but this time, it is a little closer to the eco- and “work-life” friendly part of my heart, and something that have saved my summer in the Nordics.
During the weeks of June and July my Surface Pro 11 (Intel) followed me and my family’s “work from anywhere” concept (aka home office, except, not home?). Inspired by the long battery life of the Surface Pro 11, I started wondering – what is the actual power consumption of the device, and is it possible to extend this to a full off-grid compute device for more than the day and a half I often get?
Of course is the answer! After powering up with a Anker Solix C300x and a 80w solar panel – I noted that the Surface Pro 11 consumed between 7 and 13 watts running web browsing and desktop applications. High compute tasks did however dig in on a around 30 watts. Running on 7 watts, my Solix claims it will be able to provide my Pro 11 with energy for little over 49 hours – with no sun or daylight. After this, I will have to rely on the ~10-12 hours of internal battery on the device itself.
Again, having to connect my 4G Netgear router it somewhat shortens the lifespan of this experience. This brings me to Tuesdays announcement:
Surface Laptop 5G for Business, powered by IntelCoreUltra (Series 2) processors!
This is a bright hope for the true mobile experience and work from anywhere without dragging my 4G Netgear router along, and who knows, it might be a challenge to see how many days in a row we can run an off-grid 5G device running only on power from the sun?!
Oh, and the Laptop 5G will be available on August 26th, 2025