Microsoft launched the high end Surface Book last year, and a few months ago, photos of placeholders of upcoming Surface devices also surfaced at Building 88, leading to speculation that the company could be refreshing its premium device lineup in 2017. Now, to further fuel these speculations, it appears that Microsoft itself is teasing the upcoming "Surface Book 2" on its official Instagram account.
Discovered by Windows Central, the images show off a considerably different hinge from the original Surface Book. While Microsoft obviously hasn"t officially outed it as the Surface Book 2, the image is in line with previous reports which suggested that the company is working on improving the unusual and elaborate "fulcrum hinge" of the Surface Book, to remove the gap created when the device is folded shut. The new design is said to allow the display to fold flat with the keyboard section, like a conventional notebook.
Another noticeable detail in the image is the black color of the alleged device, which is considerably different from the silver/magnesium color of the current Surface Book. Windows Central reports that while internal prototypes of the upcoming Surface Book are indeed black in color - or a dark metal for that matter - it is not yet confirmed if the device will be available to the public in the aforementioned color.
With that being said, it is important to keep in mind that nothing can be said for sure about the upcoming high end device. Rumors indicate that the arrival of the new Surface Book will depend upon availability of Intel"s Kaby Lake chips, pointing to a Spring 2017 timeframe, which coincides with the release of Windows 10 Redstone 2. Additionally, the company is also expected to launch the alleged Surface Phone and possibly three iterations of the Surface All-in-One desktop PCs.
Update: It appears that the image Microsoft posted on its Surface Instagram account is of a Surface Book after all. Prolific Windows phone developer Rudy Huyn has just posted an image on Twitter which indicates that previous one is from an earlier Surface Book promo and not from an internal Microsoft "sizzler reel" as the original source had speculated.
Hey @verge and @windowscentral, sorry but it"s a promo image of the original Surface book... ;) pic.twitter.com/jTav2tJjwv
— Rudy Huyn (@RudyHuyn) August 29, 2016
Indeed the two images are rather similar and it now seems likely that Microsoft isn"t teasing images of the Surface Book 2 after all.
Source and image: Microsoft (Instagram) via Windows Central