The Surface Duo is another example: The hardware was ready for years. If it'd launched when it was, they'd have scooped the foldable trend super early. But the Windows on ARM platform was still such a joke, they gave up and put Android on it.
Yet almost all use Intel CPUs, and the performance of the Surface Go / Surface Go 2, is abysmal compared to the M1.
The Surface Pro X?
Single Core score ~800 vs ~1700 for the M1
Multi Core score ~3000 vs ~7500 for the M1
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/compare/4799088?baselin...
It's a ARMv8 CPU... How is it 'very custom'
That keyboard... it makes the bad Apple ones look top shelf. I know removable keyboards are a different thing but I cringe remembering the clicks and trackpad.
The Surface Book seems like a vast improvement in that regard... but it's extremely expensive, and relied on an overengineered latching mechanism. Dell made a really neat Book alternative, the Latitude 7285, which was really compelling, but by the time I was in the market, they'd abandoned that form factor already. :/
Imagine if Microsoft said you could get a surface with arm processor, 16gb of ram, with 20+ hours of battery life and the same perf as an i5 processor. And it lived up to the hype. People would love it.
My 2c