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During my very brief hands on time with the Neo and Duo, they both felt like premium devices. Opening and closing them, in particular, was very natural. The screens moved smoothly, but there was also a satisfying amount of resistance, especially when I twisted them into a laptop-like mode. Don’t forget that Microsoft has been obsessively focused on building hinges for PCs since the original Surface, and that experience is clearer than ever with these next generation devices.
The downside of using dual screens, of course, is that you’ll have to live with the hinge and bezel down the middle. It’s not nearly as seamless as a single foldable OLED. But based on the demos we’ve seen, the two displays still seem very usable. You can easily drag apps to either display, and span them across both screens if you want a tablet-like experience. Maybe it’s just because I’m used to working on multiple monitors, but the break between the screens didn’t bug me as much as the weird bump along the Galaxy Fold’s hinge.
The design of the Surface Neo and Duo also allow for accessories that might not easily work with a folding display. There’s a slim Bluetooth keyboard for the Neo that can magnetically stick to its rear and flip around whenever you need to type. Once you do that, the Neo turns the bit of the lower display still exposed into something called the “Wonder Bar,” which holds emojis and other shortcuts, similar to Apple’s TouchBar. You can also push the keyboard up a bit, so that it’s sitting right below the top screen, and use the lower display like a touchpad. And if you’d rather write with your hands, you can also magnetically attach the new slim Surface Pen on the back of the Neo.
Now, I’m sure we’ll figure out how to make reliable folding OLED screens eventually. But based on all of the issues around the Galaxy Fold, and the fact that we’ve seen only one other tiny company ship a foldable, it seems like we’ve got a long way to go.
And then there’s the question of price. The Galaxy Fold sells for close to $2,000, that’s the price of a specced out laptop. We don’t know how much the Surface Neo and Duo will cost, but I’d bet they come in much cheaper, since they won’t rely on an unproven display technology. The Neo will also have competition from other devices running Windows 10X, Microsoft’s new OS for dual-displays, which should help keep the price in check.
It’s also a good sign that Microsoft is taking its time with the Neo and Duo, which are expected to launch during the 2020 holiday season. They’re not rushing to be the first like Samsung, and hopefully that’ll help avoid embarrassing engineering issues. The jump towards every new generation of computing is a delicate one, and sloppy product launches could easily kill consumer interest. Microsoft might not have all the answers when it comes to dual screen devices, but at least it’s addressing the obvious issues facing foldables today.
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