Samsung Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 hands-on: A robust sequel

Samsung is best known for phones and TVs, but on the computing side, it often takes some of the lessons learned from those products to create amazing laptops. We already liked the original Galaxy Book Pro 360 for some of these reasons, and now the new Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 is coming as a successor.

I got to try one before Mobile World Congress, and the question was could Samsung take its beautiful OLED displays, as well as some synergies from the Galaxy phone and tablet range, and combine them into another winning laptop for multimedia consumption? Let’s find out the answer.

specifications

design

Samsung’s Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 is the flagship of the 2022 Galaxy Book series. It is available in 13 inch and 15 inch sizes. Within the Samsung range, it sits alongside the Galaxy Book 2 360 (a cheaper version of the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360) and the Galaxy Book 2 Pro (which also comes in 15-inch and 13-inch sizes).

Notice the 360 ​​branding here. This is a Windows convertible. Without “360” you get a regular clamshell laptop.

I was handy with the new 15-inch Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 in burgundy. The device is also available in graphite and silver. The burgundy is a bold color choice and reminds me a lot of Samsung’s Galaxy Chromebook, which came in a bright Fiesta Red colorway. It’s a nice change from the black or silver laptops I’m used to.

Aside from slight tweaks for improved ventilation, the overall design of the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 hasn’t changed much from last year’s model. It is still made of aluminum alloy. When I picked up the 15-inch model, it felt surprisingly light for a 3.1-pound device. Even more surprising is how slim it is in profile. According to Samsung, it is just as thin as a Galaxy smartphone.

The 13-inch model is even lighter at 2.2 pounds and is about the same thickness. I can certainly imagine someone holding either model as a large tablet for watching movies or doing other multimedia tasks.

However, this thinness could come at the expense of build quality. When I pressed down on the keyboard deck while typing, there was just a tiny bit of flex near the function keys. This was an issue we had with last year’s model and it looks like Samsung has only addressed it a little.

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Many laptop manufacturers have switched to displays with a 16:10 aspect ratio. That’s good for productivity, but for multimedia it often means you get letterboxes in movies and other content. While I was hoping that Samsung would finally switch to the new aspect ratio, this year’s Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 again maintains 16:9. 1920 x 1080 resolution panels, but they’re brighter at 500 nits.

While that might seem like a bad thing for most people who use laptops for productivity, in the case of the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 it’s great for consuming movies and content. Combined with the Super AMOLED panel that can reach a peak brightness of 500 nits, everything I tried on this display looked great.

The S Pen is also supported on the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 display. It doesn’t have Bluetooth capabilities but is included and is great for doodling or drawing. I enjoyed using it in Microsoft Paint and found that the design and features are otherwise unchanged from last year’s model.

Despite the 15-inch screen size, Samsung’s decision to keep FHD panels means the screen feels a bit cramped. An increase to a 4K resolution would have been nice. Choosing 16:9 also means the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 has an ugly bottom bezel. Lenovo and HP managed to turn this off on their devices, but Samsung didn’t.

That aspect ratio and resolution might not be great for web browsing, but it’s great for movies. I pulled up a YouTube video of an aquarium and couldn’t help but feel immersed in the full-screen, letterboxed experience. Samsung told me that the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 panel achieves 120% of the DCI-PC color gamut and supports HDR content. After noticing the vivid blues in the fish and purple in the reefs, I’m pretty sure I didn’t need a colorimeter to test it.

The Samsung ecosystem

One special feature built into the new Galaxy Book range, like last year, is an app called Second Screen. This allows you to use a compatible Samsung Galaxy tablet as a second display for your Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360.

It works pretty seamlessly. Samsung paired a Tab S8 with the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 for me, and I put it on the table and dragged Microsoft Edge windows onto the tablet. Windows sees it as an external display in settings. Scrolling was smooth and the S Pen even worked on the second screen. It felt so natural like having a dedicated monitor and reminds me of Sidecar on macOS.

Other synergies include Samsung Multi Control, which lets you use the Galaxy Book 2 Pro series keyboard and trackpad on your Tab S8. There’s also Quick Shar for sharing files on a Samsung Android phone, and SmartThings for controlling compatible smart devices. There are also integrations with your phone in Windows 11 that allow you to view Android apps from your Galaxy phone on your PC.

keyboard and trackpad

The Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360’s keyboard and trackpad are unchanged from last year’s model. It has about 1mm of travel and the 15-inch model has a number pad and an integrated fingerprint reader. The keys are backlit and have a nice springy feel.

The touchpad scrolls smoothly and responds correctly to my gestures. It’s also nice and wide, which is appreciated for a wide 15-inch device.

Of course, the 13-inch versions don’t include the number pad on the side.

ports

Ports are also unchanged between generations. The Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 features a Thunderbolt 4 port, two USB-C ports, a headphone jack, and a microSD card slot. Dongles will be a must here, but considering Dell removed the headphone jack and microSD card slot on its XPS 13, it’s nice to see some laptop manufacturers are keeping them.

It should be noted that in addition to USB-C, the Galaxy Book 2 Pro also includes options like HDMI and USB-A if you’re looking for more ports.

cam

Today, 1080p webcams are the norm on new laptops, and the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 is no exception. The 13.3-inch model features a 2.0-megapixel FHD 1080p camera and the 15.6-inch model features an FHD 1080p webcam.

It’s one of the great generational shifts and I loved it. As I lit it, I could see the fine details on my face, like the curly hairs in my sideburns. The room around me didn’t look washed out either, and the webcam picked up the studio lighting just right without being overdone.

Samsung says the webcam has a wide-angle view of up to 87 degrees from 77 degrees. The software features on the device also bring improvements like auto framing to keep you centered in the frame. Background Effects and Face Effects also remove visual distractions from the background to improve your appearance. Bi-directional AI noise cancellation blocks distracting noise during video calls, on both your end and the other end.

performance

This year’s Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 is equipped with Intel’s latest 12th generation processors. I couldn’t run any benchmarks, but the model I was handy with had the Intel Core i7-1260P CPU.

This chip runs at 28 watts and has 12 cores. As part of the new P series, it has four performance cores and eight efficient cores on board. This is a hybrid processor, similar to ARM chips, allowing Windows to better manage background and foreground tasks.

As usual, I was limited to surfing the web and playing around with system apps. And in this area, the Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 has done well. Opening about six tabs in Edge, as well as the Microsoft Store and Samsung’s built-in apps, barely brought the processor to 5% utilization. Of course, this is an unscientific test, and we look forward to delving deeper once we have one in our lab.

Intel has been working closely with Samsung on these new chips, and the company tells me that the Galaxy Book 2 Pro series devices are the first consumer PCs to meet Microsoft’s Secure Core requirements. This means an improved level of protection on Windows 11. Features include deeply integrated hardware, firmware and software to increase protection against potential cyber attacks. These are typically found only in enterprise systems.

price and availability

The Samsung Galaxy Book 2 Pro and Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 will be available for pre-order from March 18, 2022 and will be available in retail from April 1.

The Galaxy Book 2 Pro 360 costs $1,250 and is available in Burgundy, Graphite, and Silver. The Galaxy Book 2 Pro will be available in Graphite and Silver for $1,050. The Galaxy Book 2 360 will be available in Graphite and Silver for $900.

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