Microsoft Issues a Major Firmware Update for Surface Laptop 7, Surface Pro 11

Those with a Snapdragon X-based Surface Laptop 7 or Surface Pro 11 will want to check Windows Update today: There’s a major new firmware update waiting for you to download and install

Which is semi-infuriating: Microsoft issued a firmware update for these two PCs in late November and still hasn’t documented it. According to the Surface Update History website, the previous firmware update arrived back in September.

The December 12 firmware update for Surface Laptop 7 and Surface Pro 11 fixes issues with Wake On LAN, Network BitLocker Unlock, screen flickering/flashing, network book with PXE, and Wi-Fi consuming power during sleep, and it improves system stability, Microsoft says.

But the bigger deal, to me, is how many system components this firmware update changes. (Surface “firmware” updates include literal firmware but also hardware drivers. So many hardware drivers.) Based on a rough count, this impacts over 75 (!) system components, most of which are made by Qualcomm (neatly demonstrating how similar most Snapdragon X-based Copilot+ PCs are with each other). But it also impacts 12 Surface hardware components, one Realtek component, and three Dolby components.

What Microsoft hasn’t done, yet–in addition to documenting the November firmware update–is update its manual drivers and firmware downloads for Surface Laptop 7 and Surface Pro 11. Those are both stuck on the September version. Hopefully, that will change soon.