It's worth keeping an eye on the PineTab and PineNote . Just keep in mind that these are community driven projects that are under development, and best suited for people who like to tinker with linux devices.
I've done it on a Surface Go and while the install can be a bit more of a pain, once it's done it's a great little Linux unit.
Two PITA points are it doesn't have a normal BIOS so sometimes it won't boot from USB normally and you have to go into Windows and use it's Advanced Startup process to make it work. That then means you might have to keep Windows on dual boot.
The other PITA this can cause is you might also need to install a boot manager like rEFInd to get it to boot into your distro properly. I found I needed this with Kubuntu but not Manjaro, for whatever reason.
Both issues are a pain, but not difficult, just annoying. And once it's done you don't have to think about it again.
You install Linux normally first and then install the surface kernel after. Until then you can't use the pen and touch is limited. You'll probably need at least 2 free usb slots on the surface though, one for the isntallation medium and one for an external keyboard. If you don't have a usb c dock, you'll need to figure out how to get a linux iso on a usb that includes the surface kernel, which is possible but fairly compicated compared to the usual installation.
I tried a few different linux distros on various chromebooks, and regardless of if you pick a chromebook or another device, I highly recommend you don't get a device with an arm-based cpu. Pick a 2-in-1 that has a normal x86 processor so you don't have to deal with compatibility issues.
Software can be hit or miss on ARM processors, but it's getting much better. If you stick to mainstream distros/apps, you're not going to run into many problems. I'm writing this from a 2014 Acer C720 running Debian, and it does it beautifully. This old thing still gets 10 hours of battery life, and I paid less than $100 for it.
Yes, I guess @Apostato@beehaw.org is right though that software compatibility for arm is improving, so it really depends on your use-case and workflow. I don't remember exactly what I was doing at the time I just remember the program I wanted couldn't run on arm.
The Surface might be too bare bones for some, but $610 is decent. (Also, there are several "generations" in the store now. This is the middle, non-ARM flavor with 11th Gen Intel. The Surface 9 has the current generation.)
The Lenovo is a much bigger discount and better specs, but I've heard worse stuff about the Lenovo support. Apparently Lenovo's consumer support and build quality is very different from the business offerings.
I'm daily driving a yoga x380 and am really happy. Using the pen for quick notes on my professors slides. I use Zorin and Win10 in dual boot but only really use Zorin. Only thing that doesn't work on Zorin is the HDMI port but I didn't really bother to trouble shoot.
Seconded. I daily drove a yoga for some time (really a flex). It worked pretty well. Definitely check the compatibility of whatever laptop you choose before though. I had to manually install a driver to get the touchpad to work everytime I updated the kernel until it was finally merged into mainline. 😬
Bought my daughter a lenovo chromebook duet. It is a pretty neat little machine with a detachable keyboard / form factor like a surface tablet. I have not figured out if linux is an option on it yet but I do know there are people out there who have gotten linux running on chromebook hardware.