Microsoft is excepted to unveil a successor to its dual-screen Surface Duo on Wednesday, and the new device has apparently been spotted in new FCC documents published on September 17 (via Windows Central). The documents describe the capabilities of a new Microsoft “portable handset” that comes with a Qualcomm modem, and they also mention “Flat, Flip, and Closed” postures.
There’s a lot of details about the device’s wireless capabilities, and the confirmation that the Qualcomm chip supports WiFi 6, multi-band 5G, as well as NFC, three features that were missing on the original Surface Duo. The documents also mention support for “Wireless Power Transfer,” which would also be a first for a Surface device.
According to previous reports, the Surface Duo 2 will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 SoC, 8GB of RAM, and a triple rear camera system that should create a little bump on the back of the device. Other significant design changes should include a fingerprint reader integrated into the power button, as well as a centered USB-C port on the bottom of the right-hand side of the device.
We should learn all the details about the Surface Duo 2 during Microsoft’s Surface event on Wednesday, September 22, where the company is also expected to announce redesigned Surface Pro and Surface Book models. The original Surface Duo launched with a $1,399 price that was probably too high even for die-hard Microsoft fans, but the Surface Duo 2 could be even more expensive considering that Microsoft tried to address all the shortcomings of the previous model.
