Microsoft didn't lie: The Surface Laptop 4 really is twice as fast We expected AMD's Zen 2-powered Ryzen chips inside the Surface Laptop 4 to overpower the Surface Laptop 3. But by this much? Credit: Microsoft Microsoft unveiled the Surface Laptop 4 on Tuesday with some bold performance claims: The Surface Laptop 4 should surpass the performance of the Surface Laptop 3 by 70 percent or so, or even offer twice the performance under certain scenarios. Does it live up to the hype? Does it ever. Although the difference between the two generations of Surface Laptops narrows during everyday activities, our early tests show the Surface Laptop 4 winning any CPU-intensive tasks by a mile. (If you were eyeing Microsoft’s offer of a free pair of Surface Earbuds for each Surface Laptop 4 pre-ordered on or before April 15, this may provide some incentive!)