Microsoft has priced the Surface Laptop Ultra at $2,599 in the US and Rs 2,29,990 in India — launching October 16, as a direct, spec-for-spec challenge to Apple’s 16-inch MacBook Pro, which starts at $2,999 (Rs 2,49,990). The move marks Microsoft’s first serious attempt in over a decade to position a Windows laptop not just alongside the MacBook Pro, but undercutting it on price while claiming superiority in brightness, memory scalability, and I/O flexibility. It is not a mobile device. This is a laptop story. Filed under laptops, not mobiles.  The Surface Laptop Ultra is a 15-inch Windows-on-Arm machine built around Nvidia’s new RTX Spark chip: an Arm-based system-on-chip combining an Nvidia Grace CPU (up to 20 cores) and a Blackwell RTX GPU (up to 6,144 cores). That chip enables up to 128GB of unified memory, double the max RAM in the M5 MacBook Pro. And powers what Microsoft calls its “brightest, sharpest, and most vivid” Surface display yet. Peak HDR brightness is claimed to be 25% higher than the M5 MacBook Pro’s. It’s a mini-LED touchscreen with gesture support. No stylus input.  The chassis is lighter than the 16-inch MacBook Pro. Storage is upgradeable, a rarity in premium laptops today. There’s a large haptic trackpad. And Microsoft has added Magnetic Connect: a proprietary magnetic USB-C charging system it bills as the “world’s first built-in magnetic USB-C charging on a laptop.” Ports include three USB-C, one USB-A, HDMI, SD card reader, and a 3.5mm jack.  Windows on Arm means x86 app compatibility relies on Microsoft’s Prism emulation layer. A known performance and compatibility variable. Microsoft does not claim native x86 performance parity.  Alongside the laptop, Microsoft unveiled the $5,999 Surface RTX Spark Dev Box, aimed squarely at Mac Studio and Mac mini users doing heavy AI model work. It promises up to 1 petaflop of AI performance and supports models up to 120 billion parameters.  To accelerate adoption, Microsoft is offering up to $1,000 cash back for MacBook trade-ins. A targeted incentive timed against Apple’s rumored OLED MacBook Ultra, expected later this year with M5 Pro/Max chips and touchscreen support.  The Surface Laptop Ultra arrives October 16.