Samsung Galaxy Book 2 360 Review: Performance and power in a neat little package

The first thing you notice are the embossed reliefs on the chassis near the hinges. It’s a bold design choice, one that makes it seem like the screen doesn’t lay flush with the surface, but it does. It’s a subtle hint that there is more to the device than just being a laptop, and as a 2-in-1 convertible, it makes sense. The hinges themselves are solid too, during my time twisting and turning the display on its head, I noticed no obvious gives or creaks. The hinge allows you to flip the screen and fold it over the back to use as a tablet. This disables the keyboard, to avoid any unnecessary inputs.

The metal chassis feels smooth to the touch and durable. If I were to nit-pick, I would say there is probably a little more give around the plastics used in the trackpad and keyboard, it feels like a solid push would be enough to crack it, but you would have to go out of your way to achieve that. One thing I like are the indents provided where the two halves of the laptop meet, and a relief in the centre that allows to flip open the screen one-handed, with a little practice. There is a good chance that the laptop will slip and slide all over the place, when you try it though.

Even in tablet mode, with the two halves joined together, the Galaxy Book 2 360 manages to maintain a slim profile. Compared to the competition, it also feels very light in the hands, making it a cinch to carry around. As for I/O options, there are three USB Type-C ports, one which is Thunderbolt 4, a MicroSD reader and one headphone out/mic-in jack. That is a very lean selection, and professionals who might be interested in the device, may need to invest in a dock, especially with the lack of a USB Type-A port. There is a 1080p webcam on the top of the screen.

There are two Dolby Atmos certified stereo speakers that get loud and are decent, in terms of sound quality but the caveat is that they are downward firing, placed at the bottom of the laptop, which means that your mileage may vary depending on the surface you place the device on.

Also Read: Samsung Galaxy A53 5G Review: A mid-ranger with tons of potential

Keyboard and trackpad

The backlit keyboard feels good to use but the keys are a little mushy and sometimes I felt like there wasn’t enough feedback to tell me when I was pressing down on a key. That is to be expected with how thin the laptop is though. There is also no number pad, which frees up space and allows Samsung to include full-sized keys, which is a great call, especially for someone with bigger hands. The keyboard also houses a power button, that doubles as a fingerprint reader.

The trackpad is responsive, and Samsung says that they have improved the palm rejection, compared to the last generation models. They also fixed an issue that caused accidental clicks on the previous Galaxy Books, and the result is one of the best trackpads on a Galaxy Book yet.

Display

Samsung continues its pedigree of excellent displays with the Galaxy Book 2 360. The 13.3-inch 1080p AMOLED display comes with a refresh rate of 60Hz and is simply a joy to behold. The colours look rich thanks to the support for 10-bit colour depth, which also means it supports HDR or High Dynamic Range. With HDR on, the screen can reach a peak brightness of 500nits, without HDR that number tops out at 380nits. The screen has 100 percent coverage of the DCI-P3 colour gamut and gets fairly bright outdoors. I would have loved to see a higher resolution screen but that would have driven the already expensive price up. Overall, this is probably one of the best screens on a 2-in-1 convertible. Speaking of which, this touch screen has up to 10 touch points, and it works well as a tablet. It also supports Samsung’s S-Pen.

The interesting thing to note here is that Samsung uses Wacom’s Pen technology, that is considered a gold standard for digital artists. A 15-inch WACOM display with a pen and 93% of DCI-P3 colour space will cost you quite a lot of money by itself, which makes this laptop a steal for digital artists.

Performance

Our review unit housed Intel’s 12^th generation Intel Core i7-1255U, that has 10 physical cores with two of them being performance cores, while the other eight pull duty as efficiency cores and a clock range from 1.7 GHz to 4.7 GHz. The processor has been paired with 16GB LPDDR5 memory and 512GB of internal PCIe 3.0 SSD storage.

The processor is based on Intel’s Evo platform, which means it has been tuned and designed for thin and light, convertibles, and laptops. It is a very efficient, and powerful processor that blazes through most tasks – browsing, office, meeting calls etc. and works very well as an office machine. The lack of a dedicated GPU hurts its cause as a professional workstation or gaming device though. The device also suffers from thermal issues, and tends to get hot under stress, especially around the middle of the device, that would normally rest on your lap.

On the flip side, the Intel processor is super-efficient and performs nearly as fast as some professional machines without consuming too much power (15W TDP). For light office work, entertainment, and illustration tasks, this device works well.

Also Read: Samsung Galaxy S22 Review: The right flagship at the right price

Software

The Galaxy Book 2 360 runs Windows 11 out of the box, with all the bells and whistles you would expect from Microsoft’s operating system. Samsung has included some of its own software tweaks as well, like Studio mode that allows you to control and apply effects to your webcam or auto-booting toggles that let you start the device as soon as you lift the lid.

Beyond that, there is also an option for easy Bluetooth pairing, that will automatically detect Galaxy Buds, if you happen to own a pair. Then there are various options for the screen such as preset colour modes and HDR+. You can also choose to protect your battery when it is connected to a power outlet, by limiting the charge to 85%, or you can toggle USB charging modes on or off. You can also adjust the keyboard backlight intensity. You can also choose to sacrifice performance and throttle the processor to run in silent mode without the fans operational, but given how hot the laptop gets under stress, I would not recommend doing so.

Besides these, there are several Samsung apps that you maybe familiar with if you have used other devices from the company. These can all be uninstalled if you so choose.

Conclusion

Starting at Rs 99,990 for the base Galaxy Book 2 360 variant with a core-i5 and 16GB of RAM, the 2-in-1 is pricey, compared to more affordable options from the likes of Lenovo, Asus, and HP. But nearly all of them make some sacrifices and trade-offs to achieve a lower price. Comparatively, the Galaxy Book 2 is a good mix of performance and power, making it ideal to recommend for office work or leisure. The lack of a dedicated GPU hurts its chances at being a professional workstation or a gaming device. Despite that, there is very little to fault with the Samsung Galaxy Book 2 360.