20 Best Laptop With Sd Card Reader (2023 Updated)

I bought this laptop on the labor day at $649 (excluding taxes) which is a sweet deal, spending anything more than that wouldn’t be advisable as it is not a great performer. Let me explain by breaking down my review into pros and cons.

Pros: 1) Display: Great display with good color accuracy and the 16:10 aspect ratio makes it good for productivity tasks. Bezels are really slim and the touch response is also pretty good. 2) Build and form factor: Excellent build quality, there is not much flex anywhere and it feels like a premium product.

The weight distribution is good. The hinge seems to do its work fine. There is no issue in folding it and using it as a tablet. 3) Others: Good sound quality, decent amout of ports (surprised to see 2 thunderbolt ports at this price) and thanks for including 2 full size USB A ports for such a thin form factor, decent battery life 6-7 hours on mixed usage (no gaming), good sized trackpad, and great keyboard.

Cons: Processor: THIS DOES NOT DESERVE TO BE AN i7. What I’m trying to say is that this laptop comes with a 12th Gen Intel Core i7 evo (1250U) which on paper has 10 cores, BUT there are only 2 performance cores and 8 effeciency cores which makes the performance of the laptop really weak.

I just work on Python using Anaconda or open some heavy Google Sheets and it starts struggling a little bit. The fans crank up to max speed and the laptop starts heating up. I believe for an i7, a dual core performance setup is unacceptable in 2023.

It should at least have a quad core setup. 2) Hinge: This is a minor issue, this laptop does not open with one hand. You’ll need to keep a finger on the base to lift the lid. Not a big deal though. Verdict: If you need a top notch performance on a thin and light laptop, there are many others which are better than this laptop, the Macbook Air M1 being the best of all.

However, on an overall level at $649 this laptop gets the job done!.

I bought this laptop as school was starting in a couple of weeks. Came in to my local store and decided on this one. Setup was very easy and I like the new look of Windows 11 as it looks very sleek and modern compared to 10.

Coming from a Mac, I really enjoy the new build quality these windows computers are bringing, and this Envy is no exception. The build quality is great, feels very premium for the price, the display is bright and colors are amazing.

The key travel is great, and I am actually currently writing this review on the device. The reason for my 4 stars is the fact that the i7 branding is a little misleading. This computer features and i7-1250U series.

This is a “low-end” mobile chip set which brings 2 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores, This is great if you are multitasking a lot of low performance apps, but not so great if you are going to be multitasking a lot of resource intensive apps.

The reason it is misleading is because an i7 of this kind is not that same as an i7 from previous generations, which were arguably more powerful. Besides that no complaints. This laptop is a no brainer if you want something that will last you a couple of years, run a business, or a college student.

Very fast, screen is a bit hard to see in bright light. The facial reignition is fast and accurate but fails to confirm in very low light; don’t forget your PIN! The pad is very sensitive and makes for a lot of errors.

Hopefully there is a setting to de-sensitize it. Screen is almost entirely side to side which is a good thing until you try to adjust its position and your hand changes the screen display. Overall, a nice laptop but I don’t feel it is worth over $1000.

I would have preferred last year’s model with the OLED screen even with the older processor.

There are many good things to say about this laptop. First of all the display is excellent; it has very good saturation, crisp text and overall excellent brightness. I currently have it set on a value of 60 and this is quite bright.

The initial set-up of the machine was super easy. The combination of the fingerprint scanner and the power button is good. Since this laptop has the Intel evo certification it has been tested and must pass certain requirements to obtain that certification and it certainly does.

From the time you touch that fingerprint/power button to useable Windows is seconds; it’s really fast. It’s equally fast opening programs and working with them. On-screen displays pop up with different key combinations to let you know when you activate various functions such as Caps Lock, Keyboard Backlight, etc.

Very nice. There are reviews out there that mention the flex in the unit. Well, I don’t really notice any extreme flex, I can easily pick it up from either corner without any noticeable flex. In any case it is not creaky or noisy when you do pick it up from one side.

Which brings me to weight; no computer this large (16”) should weigh this little! You mind plays tricks on you because you see this larger device on your desk and you anticipate it being heavy, but when you pick it up, well it is not heavy at all.

In fact, the advertised weight of my MacBook Air (early 2015 13. 3 inch) is 2. 38lbs, this LG is only 2. 62lbs; amazing. The track pad is large and just slightly off-center to the left not; really noticeable, but a good placement to help avoid unintentional input from it when typing.

It is very responsive to clicking and tracking as well as scrolling. I have had absolutely no issues with unregistered or extra clicks, it just works flawlessly. The keyboard has good size and feel to it with good travel and is backlit.

You can adjust the level of backlighting via the Fn+F8 option, and you can even set a “time out” for the backlight to turn off vial the LG Control Center. There is also a numeric keypad on the deck. The bundled LG Control Center makes it easy to see how things are set up on the computer and very easy to make changes from one central place.

Definitely a good piece of extra software as is the LG Update Center which takes care of drivers and such that LG specifically installed that are not part of Windows Update. I don’t doubt that the advertised battery life is achievable, but realistically I am getting about 14-16 hours from it.

That is to be expected as I changed the default behavior of the display battery saver in the Intel Graphics control from level 6 (most conservative) to level 3. This gives me a good balance of display quality and battery life.

Should I ever need to approach those higher battery numbers I would simply change that level back to 6. Also my normal activities do involve some battery draining actions, such as online games. A far as upgrading well the memory is soldered to the system board so what you buy it with is fixed.

There is however a second NVMe slot inside the unit that will accommodate another SSD should you ever want to add storage. Note that to take off the bottom cover you do have to remove the feet as they hide screws.

Heat of the unit is not really a problem either; there are professional reviews out there that measure temperatures, but I can say this; is it as cool on the lap as my 2020 M1 MacBook Air? No. But it is no where near as warm as my Mid 2010 MacBook Pro.

I have to mention the display again, because it is absolutely perfect. When you look at the image quality this display produces, you cannot say enough about it. So if you are looking for a light and quick laptop with a large screen (16” 2560×1600) with excellent saturation and color reproduction, that is quiet and a pleasure to use…well, you found it!.

I needed an updated laptop as my i5 8250U chipped laptop was sometimes struggling to drive a big 4k screen when there were a lot of windows active and lots of cameras on in Zoom calls. Costco ran this LG laptop at a very good price for Black Friday so I retired the old laptop a bit early.

Good points: Good internal spec. Unless you like playing games you will find this set up fast & capable for pretty much everything. Really good screen. 99% colour gamut & higher than HD resolution is great.

Even if you don’t edit photos you’ll like it. Real number pad on the keyboard! Not embedded in the letters like smaller laptops. It really is very light indeed and the power pack is reasonably compact.

Every time I pick it up I’m surprised at how little it weighs. Battery life is good and as it’s only a week old it’s getting better. It can cope with a 10 hour day working with Office apps on battery.

I haven’t tried any heavy photo editing etc. on battery yet. It comes with a little rubber keyboard protector. I don’t use it but if you want to use the laptop in the kitchen for recipes or while you’re eating breakfast it’s a very handy little addition.

Not so good: Keyboard is a bit clacky and doesn’t ooze quality. It’s a big laptop and the keys seem a long way away. You’re sort of reaching over half the laptop to reach the keys which makes it tiring to type a lot of text.

They could shrink the oversized touchpad and move the keys closer. If you lock the number pad on you need to hold down the Fn key to use Home & End! What were they thinking about? I guess I’ll get used to this but really.

When you close the lid to put the laptop to sleep there’s no way of knowing if it’s actually asleep. Other laptops will have a flashing yellow LED or similar so you can see if something wakes it up and starts eating the battery.

I would really like this functionality. Maybe this isn’t the laptop’s fault but my bluetooth headset connects even when the laptop is asleep. My other laptop doesn’t do this and I wish the Gram didn’t either.

It’s probably a setting somewhere in the BIOS. Obviously every review of every laptop has to complain about the ports. I need an SD port (full size please) so I bought a little USB-C dock which has extra USB ports, LAN, SVGA etc.

The camera is good rather than great. Good enough for family Zoom calls but if you make a living delivering online meetings you’ll want something better. Speakers are good enough for listening to radio or a movie but you really notice the improvement when you plug in external speakers for music.

As always I’m not interested in freeware so McAfee went straight away and I’ll have a look at the Cyberlink stuff but they’re unlikely to stay. I’ve no idea what the various LG apps do but so far they don’t seem to be using up too much resources so I’m leaving them for the time being.

Probably the biggest issue is the super-sensitive touch pad. Instead of the left & right buttons being fully separate from the pad they are still part of the pad so you’ll find yourself zooming in on pages when you are just trying to left click.

Obviously a wireless mouse solves this at your desk but I still use a laptop on the move quite a lot and I’d prefer not to have to keep undoing things that I’ve done by accident. Overall it is a great machine and highly recommended if you find it a the right price.

HISTORY: I have been using two old LG Gram models for 5 years. Started with a 14 inch Gram in 2017 and 13. 3″ Gram in 2020. Those were very light and highly portable notebooks for frequent domestic and overseas travelers.

DESIGN: A good-to-touch, smooth and distinctive texture. All ports are neatly arranged. Two USB-C ports are nicely located and an HDMI port is at the rear. Very much thoughtful touches as considering the cable ergonomics.

A huge screen and a large touchpad are also easy to see and use. The best point is its SLIM & LIGHT-WEIGHT, 2. 95lb or a little over 1 KG. POWER SUPPLY: Previous GRAMs had an issue, Power Supply, it was a weak tiny round connector and not compatible with any other devices.

With this new 2021 16″ ultra-slim notebook, it is a standard USB-C with 65W MAX power. The cable management is very neat & compact; PERFECT!. SIZE & KEYBOARD: Compared to the other 14″ notebook, it merely larger about 1 inch on each side.

However, inside, there is a huge WQHD widescreen. It is so bright & crispy clear on both text and pictures. The screen edges are almost none as the screen occupies most of the space. GREAT COLOR and CLEAR TEXT.

The keyboard is wide and almost full-size key size with separate numerical keys. With large hands, there is no problem typing and accessing those keys, and no slowdown. The key is a little stiff compared to a mechanical keyboard, but, it is slim and is giving tactical feedbacks; The backlit keyboard is also handy, and a large touchpad – much-improved feels and usages compared to those old generations.

GREAT a FULL FEATURE KEYBOARD!. BATTERY: It comes with a 10% charge, and it took about 2 hrs to charge it 100%. Continuously using it for about 16 hrs, work-related tasks, such as Words, Presentations, WEB surfing, and some videos & music.

Hence it has enough power for two working days. GREAT BATTERY LIFE! Overall, it is a very powerful notebook for handling regular works, graphic design, and semi-hardcore gamers. Occasionally, hear the bottom fan sound, but, it doesn’t;t bother too much.

A great entertainment notebook for watching movies. Its WQHD (2K) bright screen provides a wonderful color representation and beautiful pictures. In the 2021 models of LG GRAM notebooks, LG is inched up to perfection by understanding user’s needs more than 100%.

Yes, I STRONGLY recommend 2021 GRAM notebooks. I received this product at a discount in exchange for my honest opinion.

Design – 9/10 (Aluminum chassis gives the laptop a premium feel and durability) Build Quality – 8/10 (Build quality is great but not the best) Display – 9/10 (16:10 aspect ratio with 3K IPS panel is a treat for all the coders and content creators out there.

A faster refresh rate could have been more satisfying) Keyboard – 7/10 (Typing experience on this keyboard is pretty good but certainly not the best) Trackpad – 4/10 (Behaves erratic most of the time, hope they fix it with a Software update) Performance – 9/10 (Intel 11th Gen Core i7 H-series Tiger Lake processor handles almost all the heavy-duty tasks you throw at it without any hiccups.

I mainly use it for productivity with occasional casual gaming like FIFA21, and this boy has never disappointed me. One less star for the fan noise it makes during high load, which is not load but not silent either) Speakers – 7/10 (Audio quality is passable for a laptop.

Don’t expect anything extraordinary from these downward firing speakers) I/0 Ports – 9. 5/10 (Zero complaints. It has the right number & variety of ports that’s needed for a laptop. I only wish it had a HDMI 2.

1 port instead of 2. 0 for future proofing) Battery Life – 5/10 (I was expecting a pretty good battery life since it is equipped with 86WHr battery but I’m getting only 4-5 hours on normal usage and only 2 hours when I’m using it for productivity) Overall, the Inspiron 16 Plus is a pretty good productivity laptop, with a few drawbacks: 1.

In Dell India website, its mention that RTX 3050 model boasts 3 fans and 5 heat pipes, whereas it comes with only 2 fans and 3 heat pipes. Dell should look into such misleading information that has been put on Dell India website very seriously.

2. Trackpad behaves erratic most of the time. I believe it’s a software issue that many have already complained about. I use a separate Keyboard & Mouse so not much bothered about it. 3. I was expecting a fairly good battery life from this boy but it has been a below average experience based on my usage.

I would definitely recommend this boy to those who are looking for a great productivity laptop, with great performance and good display at a reasonable price. Just make sure you could live with the above drawbacks that I have just mentioned.

Thanks for reading ;).

CONS: – First, I need to say how poor the color quality and brightness of the screen is. It’s bad, and I usually don’t notice these things. If you’re planning on editing photos or videos, don’t even CONSIDER this laptop.

Luckily the AMD video drivers allow me to correct the colors partially so I can tolerate them now. The brightness doesn’t bother me because I only ever use this laptop indoors. – Second, OUT OF THE BOX the cooling was terrible – there was a graphite thermal pad on top of the CPU, and a dab of thermal paste.

As a result, the machine was overheating and thermal throttling as SOON as I hit it with a real load like a 3D video game. Once I let it go for a minute and it quickly hit 120°C and shut down. After replacing the thermal paste with some Arctic MX-5 and dumping that pointless graphite pad, the laptop is now acceptable for gaming, and everything else it does very quickly and quietly, I can up the power to 25-30W and with the fan at 100% it sits at 85-90°C.

Upgrade your RAM if you don’t have 16GB too and you plan to play games. – Third, get rid of Windows 11, it sucks for now – download the Windows 10 media creation tool, install it to a USB stick, and install Windows 10 instead.

The license works perfectly fine, there are no issues at all. PROS: – Really cool convertible form factor, the body is very thin and sleek-looking, nice thin bezels – Very fast performance with the 5500U, and you can also set it to battery saver and it’s still quick enough while sipping on power and staying quiet (the fan will be always off pretty much) – Upgradeable SSD, upgradeable RAM, easy to service the insides and replace parts, very good – The keyboard is nice, the backlighting has 2 levels (OFF-low-high), and you can lock the Fn key on/off whenever you like without going to the BIOS – The laptop comes with a USB C charger which can charge your phone, which is awesome, and if your phone charger is 35W or higher, you can charge your laptop with your phone charger.

The future is here.

I purchased this laptop from Dell’s website and feel compelled to write a review due to my disappointment with this expensive laptop. If you want a touchpad that works properly, then this is NOT the laptop for you.

When the touchpad first started playing up very occasionally, only two weeks after purchase, I initially put it down the immature and buggy Windows 11 operating system installed on the laptop. Now here I am a couple of weeks further on again, and the touchpad becomes unresponsive two or three times a day, with the cursor sticking and juddering when you try to move it, all the while somehow causing applications to open.

Sometimes you have to use two fingers to get the cursor to move at all rather than one. And yes, BIOS, drivers and Windows itself are fully patched. Support Assist keeps telling me there are no further updates.

I have now done research on this, and found that this seems to be a widespread issue with this laptop, reported across many threads on Dell’s own forums and also on Reddit. I have tinkered with driver settings and power settings, recommended by various other struggling users on these threads, to no avail.

My 30 years of working in IT and working on countless other Dell desktops and laptops has not been of use in fixing this issue. In short, the laptop I received is absolutely not fit for purpose, and I shall have to open a case with Dell Support.

Sadly I fear I am just over the 30 day return term otherwise I assure you that I would be returning the laptop and asking for my money back. I hoped for better from a laptop that cost me over £1300. I have gone back to using a 12 year old laptop from another manufacturer as at least on this a basic input device like a touchpad works correctly.

Also, the fans seem very noisy, even when the laptop is not under much load, so if fan noise bothers you then this is another strike against this machine.

I have been going back and forth from laptop to laptop. I have had an issue with every laptop I’ve bought but this is the first one that I can easily say is the best! This laptop is super fast, handles every task I throw at it with ease, and is super light and portable.

The battery life on it is also better than the other windows laptops I’ve used. I got it when it was $300 off but would’ve easily bought this laptop at its normal price because it’s worth it. I can already tell it’s going to last me a long time.

If you’re on the fence about buying this one and you need a windows laptop, don’t think anymore and just buy this one!.

Great computer, while it lasted. 22 months after owning it, it just doesn’t turn on. I always babied it, never dropped it or manhandled it. Tried some battery resets, it would come back on for a day, then die again.

Ends up the motherboard battery is bad, with a lovely repair price of $650. Unbelievable. I’ve owned plenty of HPs before, but this is one of the worst, $1100 down the drain.

I purchased an HP laptop several years ago and within a few months I purchased a Dell. Here’s the issue with the HP laptop. Comes pre-loaded with all sorts of HP “stuff” that slows performance. Even after going into the system and removing many of these needless programs, the HP laptop takes hours to recharge the battery, hours to download updates, and runs very slow.

Doesn’t matter whether I connect directly to the internet or use wireless remote the HP laptop has been frustrating from day one. The Dell runs faster and battery chargers faster. Both have about the same amount of data stored on the hard-drive, so the comparison was as close on one could get.

One can only hope QVC reads these reviews and rethinks their choice with HP laptops as HP needs to focus more on the quality of the product on less on the flashy appearance. HP should seriously consider building their parts and products back here in the USA.

These disposal products as killing the consumer.

Side right corner near hinge separated to the point that hinges broke inside – could not squeeze it shut. I had to have full keyboard replaced – hinges replaced. Cost $200. 00. That means this laptop ended up costing me over $1,000.

00. It started before a year old. Fell apart at 13 months old. It has never left the house, it was handled delicately. FIX THIS PROBLEM. I now have no DVD use. It does not pop out. That being said, I did purchase terabyte storage, performance is fine, but this is now happening to a 2nd HP laptop in our home that has never left the house or been abused.

PURCHASE SERVICE AGREEMENT YOU WILL NEED IT!!!.

Pros: As soon as I opened the box, I knew the HP Spectre 360x was going to be special, and I was not wrong. It looked smart and sleek. I could really feel the premium quality. I was impressed with the packaging and it coming with its own Spectre branded box which looked very smart.

The laptop is very well built and sturdy. The screen was very sturdy. The mouse pad and keyboard were solid and firm. The laptop feels solid and premium. I liked the keyboard being backlit which was handy when the room was darker.

The fingerprint reader was also a nice touch and it also had facial recognition which I liked and made logging in quick. I was very impressed with the responsiveness of the touch screen; it was very responsive with no lag and was smooth.

I found using the laptop as a tablet good, and with the gorgeous size of the screen made it very good to do. I did like tilting it at an angle with the keyboard behind in a triangle shape which made viewing movies really good especially on the go.

What really impressed me was the gorgeous 4K screen! OMG so amazing and really impressive. The colours are sharp, the refresh rate is very impressive. Watching Netflix in 4K was a dream and was very impressive.

The B&O speakers were good quality. Photo editing was a dream. The speed of the Intel i7 and the GeForce graphics card made light work of my heavy editing. The size of the screen, resolution and the colour profile were a perfect match for my needs.

The resolution of 4K also made editing very easy with lots of screen space. Applications loaded instantaneously, bootup speed was quick and no lag that I noticed even on heavy use. Battery life was good considering the specs, and little heat came from the bottom of the laptop especially after long use.

Overall, really impressed with this laptop and really exceeded my expectations. Everything from the boxing, styling and build quality was impressive. The laptop itself looks really sleek, cool and smart.

The most impressive aspect of this laptop was the 4K screen, coupled with the GeForce graphics card made this a dream. Cons: Small critic that the power input plug was a bit wobbly, but minor issue. I felt it was slightly too heavy to be used as a tablet alternative.

With the size of the screen, and the weight of the casing, I would say the weight is a little on the heavy side to make it super portable, however understandable with the specs and size of the laptop screen and wasn’t a huge hinderance.

I am really happy with the display and the design of this machine, it is very pleasing to the eye. It is very powerful as well, tried few graphically demanding games and it was able to run all of them at Ultra settings.

Keyboard typing experience is great for office work, however some of the design aspects could have made it even better. For example, the Numpad does not have PageUp/PageDown, etc. indicators – although they work if you know which keys to play with.

Also there is no LED indicator for NumLock Toggle (CapsLock has it integrated in the key) and it does make a lot of difference when you are doing some coding – I want to type 9, but it scrolls the page down if NumLock is Off.

The Speakers are decent for the price, they are loud enough to be heard even if they are present in the bottom. More importantly they don’t crack up on higher levels. I feel a top firing speaker could have been provided at this price point.

But this is me nitpicking. I would rather have a headset for better experiencing movies, entertainment stuff, and in other cases the speaker does the job more than enough. Dell Support is fantastic – The keyboard in my unit was all okay and was working all fine, but to me it seemed that the left part of the spacebar was a bit flushed with the base, and also the next key (Alt).

They did not seem to pop out of the base like other keys and seemed like they were in pressed state. It did pop out somewhat and was not entirely in level with the base, but to me it just did not go well with such a beautiful machine.

So, I called Dell Support regarding this just to see if those keys could be pushed out slightly. But instead they replaced the entire Keyboard with the Base, this was a nice surprise. Now it looks great! Regarding Battery backup is where I am a bit disappointed.

It is not bad but I expected much more backup. It gives around 4+ hour backup with Battery Saver on, around 50% brightness, Bluetooth On, Wifi On, KB Backlit Off and usual office Work. Now, when I turn Battery Saver Off, Brightness around 80-90%, everything on, and watch some videos, web surfing, etc, it gives around 2 hours.

I was expecting a bit more backup out of this machine and a low usage backup of 6+ hours. Another thing is it heats up pretty quickly. I had expected this since it has a pretty powerful GPU but since it designed as a professional thin laptop, the thermals will not perform like a gaming laptop with much bigger fans and properly working vents.

For me it is not an issue since I wanted this beautiful machine with good graphical capabilities. The SSD provided could have been better considering the price point, but it performs good enough for me.

2000Mbps+ read/ 1300Mbps+ write speeds. The HD Camera is unusable, it is 1MP and even in daylight it is practically of no use. But it is there if required, and it has a privacy shutter, so that is good.

I am loving the experience and it provide great value for money overall!.

Overall, very quick, smooth, elegant. I got the almost top of the line system, with the maxed out I7 processor, the 6 gig of RAM video card, the 1 T SSD M2 HDD, and 16 g of RAM. The only option left on the shopping list that I didn’t buy was the 32 g of RAM.

I haven’t used the on board sound system much, but the few times I received music through the system, it sounded very nice, compared to other laptop or portable pcs. It’s not going to be top end TV soundbar nice, but it’s certainly very good for a portable system.

Love the nice regular keyboard and number keyboard that’s backlit. Keystrokes are just about perfect for high speed typing and similar applications. This is not a cheap, beginner’s system, or young kid’s level system.

It’s made for serious PC gaming, lots of intense Internet WiFi use, and very advanced applications, like audio/video editing. Expect it to be heavy, more of a desktop portable than a laptop. I haven’t put it through its paces yet with a video game, or audio/video editing, so I’ll leave that review for later.

The screen resolution with the maxed out graphics card is awesome, but that’s expected as a minimum, given the tremendous horsepower not being used as just an ordinary pc. Hard drive space with 1 T is huge, and yes, a chunk of it is gone for the new Windows 11 OS and its overhead.

Wireless performance is quick, using a 450 meg down and a 20 meg up asynchronous home Internet service. I would not go lugging this system around on the job as a field IT tech, the job I retired from.

Much lighter systems would work better in that environment. It’s certainly capable, but the weight is too much for extensive field work, given all of the other stuff I had to haul in a backpack to fix world class Internet routers and switches for a living.

Use this system on a hard, impermeable surface, such as a table top, and let it breathe well.

I’ve owned multiple Surface computers, including two Pros, three Laptops, and the Surface Book. I wanted to love the Surface Pro because of its portability, but that easel configuration felt awkward and unstable, whether on a seatback tray or my thighs.

The Book is an impressive machine with its convertible design, but that’s a feature I rarely use. It was bulkier than I wanted for travel, so I repurposed it as a competent desktop replacement. If I had to choose just one Surface for maximum versatility, it would be the Laptop.

I’ve owned the first generation and Laptop 3. Laptop 4 is unquestionably the best yet. It feels fast and crisp. The AMD Ryzen 5 processor reacts swiftly to anything I throw at it–admittedly, nothing too taxing.

I simultaneously run Edge, Outlook, OneNote, some simple Excel spreadsheets, and Photoshop Elements. No gaming. The computer never feels like it’s straining to keep up. It’s more responsive than the Intel i5 in my previous Laptop 3, and the battery life is far superior.

The Ice Blue color is a refreshing change from tired shades of gray, and my palms are happy to be back on plush Alcantara after regretting the migration to cold, bare metal on the preceding generation.

My Surface Laptop 3 wasn’t yet a year old, but this Laptop 4 was a splurge I don’t regret.

A great little laptop but a few things really holding it back. It is a very well built laptop with a beautiful screen but it has huge bezels and has the same glossy super reflective screen for several years.

Would like to see much smaller bezels and an anti-reflective coating. An Oled display option would also be nice. The processor is good and bad. It was great a couple years ago but with 12th gen intel out and 6th gen Ryzen it is showing it’s age.

Speed feels fine but in a couple of years I am worried. Microsoft needs to deliver better internals for this price. Too much competition that is better. The build quality and design are top notch. The design aesthetic that Microsoft uses is one of the cleanest and best looking designs out there but as I said before it needs modernization of a few areas.

The speakers are excellent and I love them. The keyboard is excellent. Trackpad is one of the best. The battery life is decent but this is another area improvement needs to be made. Ports are just pitiful.

At least you get a usb a but I would like to see hdmi or at least sd card support. SSD sizes are really skimpy for the cost. Double the size across the line is needed. A little more heavy duty mag charging port like a braided cable would be really nice but I like the overall design.

The pure Windows experience is one of the main draws to these devices and the optimization Microsoft puts into the OS for these machines. Even on older hardware with meager specs you never feel the device is slow.

Overall the all aluminum models are a thing of art and the screen is beautiful and the speakers are good. The 3/2 screen format is also excellent. They just need to keep up with up to date internals and refine the design and add a port or too and extend battery life and I would fully recommend this device.

As it is now there are too many nagging issues to fully say 5 stars. It is certainly above average and a great device but for me I like to be current on specs if I am going to shell out premium price.

There hopefully will be a redesign and after the release a while when they go on sale I might just pick a model like this again.

This is the first Surface product I have ever owned, and I must say, I am quite impressed! The laptop itself is quite light, but feels quite premium at the same time. The trackpad is smooth and buttery, while also not making much noise when clicking.

The keys have nice travel and are also quiet. The Surface has a nice screen, and although not as bright as other comparable laptops, it’s not bad at all. The laptop has a long-lasting battery too. I can get a good 12-15 hours or so while multitasking.

This laptop can be pretty pricey for what features you get compared to other laptops on the market, but I feel you are paying extra for the premium build, durability, and portability. One major downside of the Surface Laptop is the lack of ports.

It only has one each of USB-A and USB-C. Unfortunately, it also doesn’t have Thunderbolt 4. The lack of ports means you likely would need to invest in an external hub, especially if you have multiple peripherals you want to connect.

Pros: -portable and lightweight -quite durable -nice vertical 3:2 screen ratio -the Sandstone color is really unique -long battery life between charges -fast charging with included power supply: 0% to 80% in an hour Cons: -lack of ports -can get a bit warm when multitasking.

Upgrading from my Surface Book 2 (15 inch), I was excited to have another powerful Surface laptop but this wound up being what I know think of as a mistake of a purchase due to a plethora of issues that plagued this machine for me.

While the performance of this laptop was alright I honestly think that it could have been better. The biggest strength of the laptop studio line replacing the book line is ditching ultrabook processors for laptop ones.

This means that you get better performance while now sacrificing battery life. On the subject matter of batter life, it was extremely unpredictable for this laptop. You definitely never could do anything really intensive on it while unplugged even with it throttling processor speeds to help with power draw while not charging.

While doing things like web browsing (mainly with the Edge but had similar experiences with Chrome and Firefox) I would have days not making it to six hours of battery usage and other days surpassing twelve.

If you need consistent battery life, this laptop is not the one for you. The build quality of the unit I have was as questionable as the selection of ports they gave you get with this laptop (missing an SD card slot, and HDMI.

The HDMI sucks since universities are requiring that port and lugging around a dongle means you may forget it for a presentation). There was constant creaking from the body of the laptop and some areas had significant flex to it.

The metal scratches without trying, and the hinge for tilting the display squeaked pretty loud right out of the box which is concerning for a laptop at its price point. Another concerning thing was the touch pad moving the cursor when trying to clicking on things with the mouse, and the odd issue of the Windows 11 start menu spastically triggering itself to open for no apparent reason (operating system reinstalls did not help).

Leaving things off on the positives of this laptop, the display is phenomenal and while not the best it is incredibly vibrant and smooth. The optional Surface Slim Pen 2 accessory you can buy of the laptop is leagues more accurate than the outgoing Surface Pen 2 my Surface Book 2 used.

There is now essentially no jitter with drawing straight lines with the current pen which makes it match the competition such as the Apple Pencil. While the Intel Processor of this laptop gets pretty hot, I do think that the laptop does a good job at making it so the heat in not concentrated in places that hit your hands as much.

Thermals is a strong point of this laptop, While I really wanted to love this laptop the glaring flaws of this machine did not allow me to do that. Hopefully I just got a lemon but seeing some of these issues getting discussed online communities and forums was something I should have looked into before purchasing this machine.

Overall this product is decent. I understand Microsoft is going for a 2-1 Windows device how ever this product is not it. Honestly the product has a better performance and great visibility with its. (Battery life) good Surprisingly, the smaller battery on the Studio delivers somewhat longer battery life than the 15″ Book.

This might be coming from: lower screen resolution, Windows 11 optimization, more efficient components due to the non-detachable design. The (keyboard ) con The keyboard looks better on the Book for its uniform color with the base, and the Book’s keyboard is one of the few that doesn’t sink into a well due to the unique hinge design.

The key travel is also slightly longer on the Book and the keys are a bit softer and less tactile. The keyboard on Laptop Studio on the other hand, looks like a MacBook copy. But as every Surface Book user would know, the backlit would make the Book’s keyboard unreadable in lit environment, and this is a non-issue on the Studio.

Also the keys are more tactile on the Studio, which I personally prefer. (Pen) con Another clear win for the Studio. The lines are noticeably smoother thanks to the higher refresh rate and updated digitizer hardware.

The pen storage location is also better on the Studio so that you never need to worry about the pen accidentally detaching from the laptop. The only minor drawback is that you now have to lift the front of the laptop to retrieve the pen.

Personally I like the Microsoft Surface Book where the pain is attached on the side by magnets instead of underneath the device. The practicality of the Microsoft Surface studio is that it’s unrealistic.

For example with my Microsoft Surface Book 2 I can detach and carry around with me while looking at the Attached screen. However, for the Microsoft Surface Studio it is extremely heavy. To me it feels like Microsoft has just basically copied the Microsoft Studio 2 desktop computer and just converted it to a laptop.

The only benefit or only person I would recommend this is if there were a 3D artist or an architect. I don’t understand the chief engineer of Microsoft Amitabh Mathrawala was thinking just copy and pasting One Design to a laptop I personally enjoyed the Microsoft Surface Book 1,2,3 because it gives me the option of a laptop and a tablet.

However I wish at the Microsoft would have continued making a Surface Book 4 just with a powerful quad core processor and Nvidia GPU with a longer lasting battery.

I’ve been loving the Surface Pro’s since version 2 and 4, having skipped the rest simply because the detachable keyboards aren’t great to write on for long periods of time, and eventually they get iffy and require a replacement after taking it off and on depending on the situation.

No need to worry about that now – since it’s permanently attached. It’s quite a step up from all the 2 and 4 that I have – you still have the kick stand ability for angled viewing/typing(touchscreen) and the ability to fold it down into tablet mode, without having to take off the keyboard.

I’m saying this twice because that is a big deal and the Surface Laptop Studio does it well. Obviously it’s a bit heavier than any of the previous Surface Pros, but no heavier than a regular laptop – it feels deceptively heavier though – at least with my hands – because the bottom of the laptop has a lip around all corners.

Having the bottom not flush makes it awkward to lift it up with *my* hands. I had a friend pick it up to see if he would notice, and he did not, and I realized it’s going to depend on the hands. The lip in the front is extremely useful though, as it is magnetized and both a holder and charger from the Slim Pen 2.

Speaking of the Slim Pen 2, I would recommend getting it (and really, if you’re getting this why wouldn’t you). The accuracy of the SP2 is very good within apps, but I did notice in the windows prompts, it did not recognize my writing.

Go into any app though (I tried in Edge, Whiteboard, Word) – my same writing is recognized correctly. Not sure why it wouldn’t be recognized everywhere you can write, but technically you don’t need to use it as you can just use the touchscreen to open the app you want anyways.

The Laptop Studio comes with Windows 11, which is visually different than Windows 10, an annoying first thing is there isn’t a way to log into the computer without creating a Microsoft account. I’m a big fan of local accounts, which in Windows 10 you could click “I do not have Internet” to get around the Microsoft account creation.

Visually, the start button is now centered in the taskbar, along with any applications open. So far Windows 11 has accepted the programs I have so far installed – but it did not like Mozilla’s Firefox – it threw out an error which a quick Duckduckgo search reveals it is a common problem and how to fix it.

I expect random things like this to occur with a new OS. The front facing built in 1080p camera is fine, but my biggest problem with it is the lack of a built in privacy cover. Come on, it’s not expensive to add one – HP has a lot of their laptop models with it, and all laptops (and phones) should come with a way to cover the lens (though better to disable).

A stick-on webcam cover works wonders though – I bought quite a few as I stick them on any devices that do not have one. I’m sure keeping it open allows people to use unlock Windows with their faces, but having a slider on doesn’t prevent it from working and most consumers would be smart enough to know if it doesn’t work or it’s black – to slide it open.

It’s a little insulting to just assume having one will cause more issues with people not understanding that the webcam is in a blocked mode. Another annoying problem is the power button – it is dangerously located right next to the Del/Ins button on the upper right.

This creates two problems – the first being that you can easily press the key trying to just press delete! The bigger one is it require the laptop to be in laptop mode with access to the keyboard to press it.

In other words, you cannot turn on the computer when it’s in tablet mode, as the screen covers the button. Besides the power button being poorly located on the keyboard, the keyboard is fantastic – as is the touchpad.

Keyboards are very important – the better the feel and spacing, the longer you’re able to use it without accidentally mistyping or moving the mouse around because your wrist brushed the touchpad. My previous laptop had a great keyboard, but the touchpad was too close causing my cursor to randomly jump.

The speakers are surprisingly and delightfully loud! I immediately always raise the volume as most laptops max loudness is not very loud at all, and when I played a youtube video – it was so loud I had to immediate lower it.

Finally, not that this is directly competing with an Ipad, but it *is* competing for me and almost an ipad killer. Since I can put it in tablet mode, I don’t need to use the ipad as this is a much larger screen anyways.

The majority of my “texts” aren’t actually texts but conversations on private discord servers my friends have setup – I only need the ipad when I want to text/message someone who isn’t on discord, which are few people now.

If I could get text/imessage on this, I wouldn’t need the ipad anymore. As I was writing this, my screen got jittery/blurry for a couple of minutes before clearing itself after opening display properties.

This was a bit of a problem on previous surface pros, and I’m really hoping this isn’t going to be an ongoing problem on the Laptop Studio. *2 week update – the screen jittering has not come back Pros: 3 screen modes without having to remove the base Slim Pen 2 is excellent for drawing/typing Magnetic spot for Slim Pen 2 Excellent feeling keyboard Touchpad has customizable 3 finger and 4 finger gestures Loud speaker system Can play touch screen compatible games Cons: Windows 11 forces Microsoft account Lack of numeric keypad Power button on keyboard next to DEL button Cannot turn on if in tablet mode No camera privacy slider Lips on the sides make it awkward to carry 1 occurrence of jittery screen within a few days of owning it (!!) Only 2 USB-C ports Would I recommend it? Yes, very much so – it’s got the power of a regular laptop in tablet form, so you can perform work and then convert it so you can relax and watch a movie – loudly.

It’s not a pure work device, you can be entertained and creative on this all in one device. It’s not cheap, and I really hope this screen jitter is a one-time fluke, but if you can afford it – you can get a lot of work/play use out of it.

IšverstiShow in original languageHo avuto la possibilità di provare questo laptop ad un prezzo vantaggioso e ho iniziato ad usarlo. Di primo impatto l’impressione è ottima: si presenta di una dimensione da notebook, quindi un computer portatile non propriamente tascabile e da viaggio, ma molto utile per uno studente universitario o semplicemente per avere qualcosa di differente da un pc a postazione fissa.

un altro aspetto positivo è lo schermo, in quanto, rispetto ad altri pc portatili, il bordo della scocca è minore e quindi lo schermo riempie tutta la facciata, e garantendo quindi una buona dimensione.

E’ anche molto leggero. Non essendo un grande esperto di teconologia posso dire che il processore è molto reattivo e veloce, la tastiera che si illumina è utile, anche se pensavo si attivasse al buio, così come il lettore di impronta digitale per l’accensione, il più delle volte molto reattivo (in alternativa si immette il PIN).

Windows11 sembra soddisfarmi finora. Ho provato a utilizzare Word e la velocità di battuta è buona, mi devo abituare rispetto al precedente dove la tastiera differiva per alcuni tasti, quali ad esempio quello di invio e il touch pad.

Ottima la presenza di porte usb standard e type C. La durata della batteria è molto buona, infatti se il computer resta in standby, consuma una bassissima percentuale anche dopo ore (attorno al 2-3%) mentre nella visualizzazione di film e altro utilizzo consuma un livello accettabile di batteria.

La qualità video è buona, trovo molto bella l’estetica dello schermo in quanto quasi non si nota la presenza del bordo. La vera pecca che noto (e non da poco secondo me) è nell’audio: secondo me troppo, troppo basso, e sarei curioso di vedere altre recensioni a riguardo per capire se notano lo stesso problema; anche al massimo dell’altoparlante, la potenza audio risulta molto media.

La qualità è ottima secondo me, ma anche a distanza di giorni, continuo a notare che un volume al 100% corrisponde a un 50-60% di altri computer portatili. Forse dipende dai canali audio posizionati sul fondo.

Il touchpad molto grande può essere un vantaggio ed uno svantaggio: infatti alle volte esso prende certi comandi solo per uno sfioramento della mano, in quanto occupa buona parte della parte senza tastiera.

Nel complesso ho un’opinione positiva del PC.

IšverstiShow in original languageAls mein neues “Spielzeug” bei mir eingezogen ist und ich das erste mal das LG gram inklusive seiner Verpackung in den Händen hielt, war ich erst einmal sehr überrascht.

Zu lesen wie leicht er sein soll und das selber zu heben ist dann doch ein Unterschied. Dabei hat es das LG gram, von mir liebevoll auch einfach “der Kleine” genannt, ziemlich dick hinter seiner metallenen Schale.

Ich selber arbeite in der IT Branche und habe auch für die Arbeit einen Lap. oder eher Schlepptop um mobil zu sein. Der Gute hat sicher an die 3kg und kann von der Leistung her nicht mehr als “der Kleine”.

Aber erst einmal zum Anfang. Voreingerichtet mit Windows 10 (war zum Zeitpunkt als ich den Laptop bekommen habe noch aktuell), ging die erste Inbetriebnahme sehr schnell. Was mich überrascht hat, wie gut der Fingerabdrucksensor reagiert.

Wenn man das von seinem Smartphone kennt, weiß man wie nervig das sein kann. Das LG gram erkennt aber bisher sofort ohne jegliche Verzögerung meinen Abdruck. Leistungstechnisch kann es auf jeden Fall mit den ganz großen (und schweren) mithalten.

Um ein bisschen die Grenzen zu testen habe ich auch das ein oder andere Spiel drauf laufen lassen und auch das klappt, trotz onboard Grafikkarte durchaus ganz gut. (Jurassic World Evolution läuft auf höheren Einstellungen überraschenderweise sogar besser als auf meinem DesktopPC) Allerdings merkt man hier, dass der Kleine dabei schon ganz gut zu arbeiten hat.

Für seine Größe kann er sich ganz gut bemerkbar machen. Solange er es aber funktioniert, ist mir die Lautstärke bei einem Laptop egal. Maus, Tastatur und Funktionstasten reagieren schnell und präzise, ich hasse es wenn da die Tastatur ein wenig nach hängt.

Ist hier nichts von zu merken. Das Display ist gestochen scharf und zeigt mir auch in einem CAD alle Verktoren punktgenau an. Bei normaler Nutzung hält der/die/das Akku auch wirklich lange durch. Im Spielbetrieb, auf Höchstleistung natürlich keine 18h+ aber das erwarte ich auch von keinem Gerät.

Verarbeitung ist TOP! Ich habe im Privatbesitz noch 2 andere Laptops von unterschiedlichen Herstellern (beide deutlich teurer gewesen) und keiner ist so gut verarbeitet wie das LG gram. Mal abgesehen davon, dass das Metallgehäuse natürlich eh mehr hermacht als eine 0815 Plastikverpackung.

Die Verarbeitung zieht sich nicht nur beim Gerät an sich, sondern auch beim Ladegerät. Kennen Sie diese Netzteile die noch einmal halb so groß und schwer sind wie das Gerät an sich? LG hat hier nicht nur beim Laptop Gewicht eingespart.

Auch das Ladegerät ist klein, leicht und super verarbeitet. Die Anschlüsse sind gut zugänglich und ich weiß zwar nicht warum, aber meine irgendwie lassen sich USB Stecker echt einfach anschließen. Da hab ich bei meinem Arbeitsgerät ab und an kleine Hänger, weils wohl zu knapp konstruiert ist.

Hier passen Maus und Co. (solange richtig rum) direkt in den Anschluss. Es gibt eigentlich nur einen einzigen Minuspunkt für mich. Wohl bedingt durch die Größe wird der Kleine echt warm/heiß. Wohl auch deswegen hat sich LG hier für das Metallgehäuse entschieden, um die Wärme schneller abtransportieren zu können.

Ich würde daher aber davon abraten so in einem Zug, an einem gute gemeinten Sommertag, mit dem gram auf den Beinen ein leistungsintensives Spiel zu spielen. Im Winter mag das vielleicht sogar nützlich sein.

Aber es wird wirklich schon unangenehm warm auf den Oberschenkeln. Jetzt ist das Gerät nicht unbedingt für solch Situationen gedacht, deswegen ziehe ich da auch keinen Stern für ab. Sollte vielleicht nur der ein oder andere wissen, bevor er in die gleiche Situation der rotbeinigen Mitmenschen kommt.

Alles in Allem ein Top Gerät zu einem Top Preis. Wäre hier noch eine CAD-Zertifizierte Grafikkarte verbaut, würde ich versuchen unsere Firmenlaptops austauschen zu lassen! 🙂 Ich habe den Laptop (inzwischen schon was länger her) zum testen zur Verfügung gestellt bekommen, diese Bewertung von mir ist aber dennoch meine eigene Meinung und wäre nicht anders, wenn selber gezahlt!.

There is a real disappointment regarding the purchase. The problem comes from the touchpad and fingerprint reader of the laptop I bought (yoga 9i, 14 inch). I really would like to know why the GENIUS designer design the things in this way: the touchpad and fingerprint reader are totally flat.

I mean there is no notch (height difference) for your finger to distinguish the periphery of the touchpad and fingerprint reader. This really gives a really greasy rather than a comfortable and neat feeling for those people who really use the touchpad (I think it is designed for convenience rather than as a decoration).

When you are typing and watching the screen, it is really hard for your finger to practice the accurate left and right clicks on the touchpad, especially for some complex operations such as copying, pasting and moving an object.

And the sticker to locate the fingerprint reader should not be removed since then it becomes very hard for your finger to touch the reader accurately, and the speed and accuracy of fingerprint recognition are thus bad.

For a user like me who is heavily relying on the touchpad, this really hinders my efficiency and comfort substantially. This is the first time I see this design. I am now getting used to this but I think the traditional design of touchpad and fingerprint designers with notches are REASONABLE and there is really no reason to change things in this way, which in my opinion is ANTI-ERGONOMICS.

Any feedback and comments are welcomed and I am curious about the inspiration of this design and whether I am the only one who thinks the operation experience is not good. I will continuously support Lenovo since it has provided me with a lot of wonderful devices over the years, while I really would like to help improve the design of this Yoga 9i product by participating in the discussion of the reasons behind the design of touchpad and fingerprint reader, if possible.

Thanks!.

I have been stalling on buying a new laptop for a few months because I couldn’t find the right machine with the right features at the right price. Then I got an email from Lenovo with a link to a sale and that all changed.

Fast Processer – check, USB-C charging – check, 2-n-1 – check, 1080p with a brilliant touch screen – check, sleek design – check, aluminum case – check, in-stock and ready to ship – check! So I pulled the trigger and it was delivered several days ahead of schedule in less than a week.

As with any new tech toy, it takes a little time to get used to the features. The biggest surprise was how well the handwriting recognition works with the included/docked pen. I can scribble in the box and it generally knows what I intend.

This makes using the machine in tablet mode a very user friendly device. Speed is not an issue with the included CPU and 8GB of memory. WiFi6 is a nice addition and since my home network can support the connection speed, backups to local network storage are quick and efficient.

The screen is beautiful. I opted for 1080p vs 4k because at 14″, the pixels are already small enough! The extra money for a 4K would be wasted. The leather cover is a really nice touch. It has a great feel and steps this device up from a toy to something elegant.

Battery life is good and it charges quickly with the included 65W USB-C charger. I may add a single-cabled dock so I can easily use it with my desktop monitor keyboard and mouse. One cable for everything is very convenient.

It’s also very quiet and doesn’t seem to get as hot as other laptops that I have used. The only complaints I have are these: It came pre-loaded with Win10 and the immediate upgrade to Win11 took many hours – seems like it could have shipped with Win11 from the factory.

The camera doesn’t work with Windows Hello. The touchpad and fingerprint reader need a more pronounced edge – they are impossible to see if the ambient light is low. The Pen could be a little bigger in diameter and perhaps have a larger battery.

I’ve had the Yoga 9i for a little over two months now, and it’s an amazing laptop, to say the least. For starters, it’s beautiful. I love the leather cover, speaker design, and fully glass touchpad area.

It feels like it weighs almost nothing when carrying it in my bag and is small enough to use in the car when I’m out and about without turning myself into an origami work of art when trying to type. The battery life is phenomenal, and most of the time, I leave the house without my charging cable.

I’ve yet to get even close to running out of juice when away from home. The video quality for zoom calls is more than passable, and I love that it has a built-in camera cover. Sound quality is top-notch, and I can’t believe that no one else has thought of designing it in the same way.

All that said, it isn’t perfect. The keyboard is comfortable and spacious, but I would like more ‘clickability’ in the keys. Sometimes they feel sort of soft, or maybe I just enjoy hearing that ‘click clack’ sound when I type.

Also, the touchpad is overly sensitive, in my opinion, sometimes resulting in unwanted onscreen actions taking place, and I still haven’t discovered a way to reduce the sensitivity to an acceptable level.

(Like many of us out there, I’ve become a lazy typist over the years, resting my hands on the trackpad area when they should be raised. As a result of the trackpad sensitivity, you’ll have no choice but to type correctly on this laptop.

I’m complaining, but I’m actually typing the way I should now. ) Finally, this laptop doesn’t support Windows Hello and uses a fingerprint reader instead. The fingerprint reader, up to this point, has been hit or miss.

It works about 65% of the time for me so far. Unfortunately, I have to leave my finger on the reader area for long periods (up to 10-15 sec in some cases) for it to work, if it works at all. None of the detractors I’ve mentioned are game breakers, but I think people should know about them before purchasing.

I’d still buy this laptop again in a heartbeat. For a portable laptop, it pretty much hits all areas I wanted to address: Long battery life, minimal footprint, reliability (we’ll see), business-appropriate appearance, lightweight, internally housed pen, and fast.

For business on the go, this is an amazing laptop.

Generally small laptops are a bit of a mixed bag in terms of capability, construction and quality, all of which is somewhat sacrificed in the face of convenience of the smaller form factor while still carrying a premium price tag.

Asus with their Zenbook line has always shied away from this perception, consistently presenting a well built small form factor laptop with premium hardware and excellent battery life. So lets break it down.

When unpackaging the laptop, simply by opening the box, Asus has developed a small cardboard lift that presents the laptop to you like a gift as you raise the lid. It’s a small but noticeable touch that gives you a sense of welcome to your new piece of technology.

The laptop itself is shrouded in plastic and has a few stickers on it touting the quality of the display specifically due to it being an OLED. Outside of that there’s a small amount of printed documentation in the box, and of course the USB-C charger hidden under a flap on the side.

When removed you’re really hit by the quality of the construction, smooth to the touch with reasonable heft, though nothing obscene for the size of the machine (it’s only 3 lbs). The action of the hinge for the screen is smooth as expected.

One thing that is noticeable, however, is that Asus has chosen to go with a plastic shell. This was likely to save weight, so I cannot entirely fault them for the choice, the plastic they did use does not feel low quality, there’s no gapping or creaking and the laptop itself has almost no flex.

On bootup, you’re immediately hit by just how beautiful the screen is, vibrant and colorful, it’s everything that the stickers and documentation proclaims that it is. At 14″, the extremely high resolution (2880×1800) presents an image that is unparalleled, even if you have to use the scale slider in Windows 11 to make everything legible.

The initial setup of Windows 11 is straightforward, with the only addition being the warranty registration from Asus themselves. The same goes for the bloat on the laptop, it’s minimal, mostly consisting of warranty and update tracking software.

Moving to a discussion of the capabilities of the laptop, it is worth noting that it ships with a 12th gen i5 which while not top of the line, is appropriate for a small form factor laptop with battery life in mind, this is paired with LPDDR5 for additional capability and of course an nVME SSD.

All of these components come together to give you a well performing machine. The graphics are Intel’s current generation on-chip graphics but capable of a small amount of gaming should you choose to use it in this manner, but bear in mind, this is not a gaming laptop.

Applications, including Word, Excel, Photoshop and others open quickly due to the processor and SSD, however I find the 8GB of RAM to be very slightly on the anemic side in this era, but it should still be sufficient for most business and casual users.

Bottom line, this is an extremely well built laptop, with price and performance to match. There’s very little being sacrificed here, and provided you understand the machine that you’re buying, it’s arguable that those are not really sacrifices, but intentions of the platform itself.

All in all, I definitely recommend it to anyone in the market for a very capable small form factor machine if you do not want to feel like you’re giving up anything to have that improved mobility.

I purchased this device during the recent promotion in order to get the OLED screen in a 14″ form factor, to gain some experience with Windows 11 and the intel i5-1240P processor, and to see whether the 8 gb RAM/250 gb SSD configuration was limiting for my uses since that clearly allowed a very favorable price point while still getting the other features.

On the whole I have been satisfied. My comparison is to an LG-Gram 17″ with the 10th generation Intel i7 processor and a Samsung Flex 2 Alpha with an 11th generation Intel i7. Both of the latter computers are configured with 16gb RAM and 512 gb SSDs.

The screen on the Zenbook, of course, is a delight compared to other two devices, which are each very nice in their own right. It is sharper than the QLED on the Samsung due to its higher resolution and brighter than the good IPS screen on the LG Gram.

The Windows 11 adjustments to increase scale, text, pointer, and cursor size work well to optimize sizes of things that would be too small at the screen’s high native resolution. The ASUS Zenbook feels quicker than both the previous devices despite the decreased RAM and SSD size while simultaneously using multiple open browser tabs in both Explorer and Chrome, Microsoft office 365, Evernote, and a virtualized cloud-based EHR application running through Citrix Workspace.

The Zenbook runs hotter than the 11th generation i7 Samsung, but cooler than the i7 10th generation in the LG-Gram. Fan noise using balanced mode is minimal. As others have noted it is higher the first couple of days while many updates are being installed in the background, but even then was not obtrusive.

In balanced mode during periods of low processer use and lower fan activity Task Manage shows the processor to be running at 1. 2-1. 4 GHz. During more demanding work it runs around 2. 8-3. 8 GHz with the fan commensurately increased.

The bottom of the computer is quite warm at that point. I have not tested Performance mode where the processors and fan speed would be commensurately higher. No real need for that in any normal use I have.

WiFI 6 is very fast and connectivity is good, but the signal strength seems to be a little lower than on the other two devices at longer distances, maybe due to configuration of the internal antennas.

Keyboard is very comfortable and roomy making it easy to type without errors. Numeric keypad built into the mousepad is cute and works nicely while not interfering with normal mousepad functions. I wouldn’t have imagine I would have much use for it, but it works so well I am starting to take advantage of it.

The 3 lb. weight is not the lightest possible for this form factor, but is very comfortable to use and carry. The 14. 5″ screen provides a usefully larger work area than my 13. 3″ Samsung without a big increase of size, but the Samsung would clearly by much better for airline seat trays.

Neither of them matches the comfort of working with the 17″ LG Gram for things that benefit from a large amount of screen real estate, but that is a different beast entirely, so each has its ideal application.

Fingerprint sensor on the keyboard power button works great and is reasonable positioned. My main use situations do not challenge battery run time. I mainly work in very well lit areas attached to AC so I am most interested in having a bright easy to read screen rather than in dimming it to maximize run time.

I also keep the battery charge level to no more than 80% to maximize battery lifetime and on the Zenbook, which has a 60% setting, have been using that. When I disconnect from AC BatteryBar shows similar energy use to the other devices (running comparable progreams) and the battery in the ZenBook is as large as the one in the LG Gram and much larger than the one in the Samsung, so I am comfortable that run time will be very workable when I need to use it disconnected.

Windows 11 interface is a step back from Windows 10 in usability, but, fortunately, there is a great available utility program available for download on the web, StartAllBack, that quickly restores all Windows 10 taskbar functionality and also optionally provides the Windows 7 style smart menu I prefer.

The MyAsus utility that came with the computer allows nice optimization of battery charging patterns to preserve battery life and screen options to prevent OLED burn-in. I have been using the disappearing taskbar, which works fine although rarely it gets stuck in the ‘on’ position and needs to be corrected by restarting Windows Explorer from Task Manager.

Relative to concerns that have been raised in other reviews: — There is no creakiness of the hinges in the computer I have. — Various updates including BIOS have gone smoothly. I have not had to long press the power button to force hard reboots, but reboots particularly after BIOS updates can be slow, so best to be patient and allow them to happen on their own.

— No Bluetooth issues with mice or headphones as of yet. — Speaker sound is deep and rich for this size computer as pointed out by others. No static issues as of yet. Much better sound than on the LG Gram, which took a year for its speakers to ‘break-in’ and sound up to their capacity, but is still much poorer than the Zenbook speakers.

IšverstiShow in original languageContext: I got this laptop to replace my old one as it was struggling to keep up with my activities and this laptop was on a crazy good sale for $699. I was a little hesitant in purchasing it as I’ve had friends whose hinges have broken on this model but ultimately decided it was worth a shot.

When it arrived, there was a gaping hole in the back of the box/package, though that likely was shipping’s mistake rather than best buys. Thankfully, I could not find any signs of damage, but it’s possible my experience was minorly influenced by that.

The laptop itself is pretty nice, especially for the price I got it at, but there were enough small problems with it that I ended up returning it. Pros: I like the color and sleekness of the design. It’s got a light sheen to it without getting too reflect-y.

I haven’t noticed any glare on the screen and the color/saturation is pretty good as well. I’ve been happy with its brightness levels, as it can go several levels higher than on my old laptop. I love that the screen really maximizes its space.

This is a 15. 6 in but only slightly larger than my old 14 in. It’s not crazy light, but for the size and specs, it’s not too heavy. The laptop stands on its own pretty well when in an upside-down position and doesn’t try to close further while tapping the screen.

I haven’t had any issues with the touchscreen as it responds well and doesn’t lag. The screen’s texture had a tiny bit of drag but I’d say is pretty good overall. Even though it needs the fan more than I’d like, I never had the computer heat up a ton which is very nice.

Cons: After thoroughly examining it and not seeing any signs of damage, I messed around with the hinges a bit. They seemed sturdy enough but did have a little bounce when I open the laptop. It seemed to work fine in tablet and upside-down mode, and the light bounce didn’t really bother me but if you use the touchscreen while in regular laptop position, I could see it getting very annoying very quickly.

I was not particularly impressed with the design in general. The image makes it look like the speakers are on the sides of the keyboard area, but the sound definitely comes from the bottom. In general, the quality was not great and super muffled due to its location.

I also noticed right off the bat that the touchpad and keys were pretty loud. This is something I hadn’t thought much about before, but this laptop’s definitely louder than my old one. The touchpad has just a tiny bit less glide than I’d like, but the light “thud” sound it made every time I tapped was definitely the bigger problem for me.

My touchpad making sound is an indicator that I physically pushed the click area down rather than just tapping, so the constant tap sound here bothers me a lot. The keys are also a bit annoying. I appreciate having some sound when I press a key down, but I found myself getting distracted by the sounds from this keyboard.

Finally, and my biggest reason for returning, is that the capacity just wasn’t enough for me. I was coming from a Ryzen 5 3000 series with 8 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD, and no touchscreen/2-in-1. Considering the serious upgrade in each of those areas, I was expecting a much larger difference than I got.

If I had over 20ish tabs open, the fan would start going and it didn’t take much more to start pushing my specs to their limits. In my task manager, my memory never dropped below 65% and it, my disc, and occasionally my CPU would often reach the 90-100% area.

Considering that’s with mostly regular sites and I do digital art/light gaming, I was very unimpressed that it was already struggling before I’d even opened those. I’ll definitely be going for a 16gb instead to feel secure for my art/gaming, but I would also recommend that for any fellow tab hoarders out there, this computer isn’t really built for more than 15-20 tabs without starting to struggle a fair bit.

Overall: 4 stars since its problems are more annoyances than large fallacies. If you aren’t a gamer/digital artist/editor/tab hoarder/etc, I would guess this computer would do well for you. The keypad and touchpad might take some getting used to, but those could probably be adjusted to fairly quickly.

The audio is definitely a drawback, but if you aren’t using it for music or things, it still is pretty understandable. Overall, definitely not the laptop for me, but I could see it being a great laptop for someone else.

IšverstiShow in original languageThe linux support out of the box is very good. The wifi module needs kernel 5. 16 or newer, but if you meet that prerequisite virtually everything else works perfectly.

Suspend/resume, frequency scaling, wifi, bluetooth, touchscreen, backlight controls (keyboard and screen), audio/volume, accelerometer, and everything else I could think to try works. The sole exception is the fingerprint reader: some synaptics model that `fprintd` doesn’t support (yet) out-of-the-box.

The integrated Vega graphics are natively supported via open source drivers and perform great at compositing and gaming. The 8C/16T Ryzen 5800U chews through the many compile tasks I have thrown it while providing amazing battery life (varies, but often well past 10hrs).

The 16GB RAM is soldered but should be enough for me for a long time. I have the luxury of being able to compare this side-by-side with a recent Dell XPS 13. The build quality and comfort is a tiny bit better on the XPS (the rubberized carbon fiber to rest my palms on is missed).

The XPS also has a nicer 16:10 screen. But with the lower price, much higher performance, vega graphics, and better battery life, I’d pick this any day for use as a linux development workstation. This laptop earns direct comparison with the XPS 13, even if the price suggests otherwise.

Shockingly (and probably owing to solid support for Ryzen APUs in linux) the linux support is also in the same league as the venerable XPS, at least with linux 5. 16 or greater. I have a nice USB-C dock and wasn’t sure if the laptop would charge that way since it comes with an old-school barrel plug and the included adapter uses that.

I’m please to report all of my USB-C PD charging adapters will charge this laptop via USB-C. They are all at least 65W so not sure what the minimum spec is. Wish this had USB-C ports on both sides and used USB-C to charge exclusively.

The extra IO and charging flexibility would have been appreciated.

IšverstiShow in original languageSpeaking of the i7/16GB/512GB model as purchased: unless you have particularly CPU- or graphically intensive needs that call for an i9 and/or high end graphics card, this model has all the power you’ll want or more.

This comes packaged in a stylish and sturdy-looking body. When it comes to wear and tear only time will really tell how a model will hold up; that said, this has a firm top case with little noticeable keyboard flex and hinges that hold any position firmly.

The clickpad is tactile, smooth, and big. A crameped touchpad experience is definitely not a concern here. The click response on this is a bit different than my previous laptop but after a quick adjustment works very well.

The omission of a numeric keypad is something some may miss but generally the keys are good for typing in my experience so far. Screen brightness is excellent and the integrated sound is excellent by laptop PC standards.

There is no fingerprint reader but the Windows Hello facial recognition camera has been similarly effective. Occasionally the PC will tell me to move my face a bit further away if I’m leaning in, otherwise it responds quickly and thus far without error.

In my use case I don’t have the chance to fully test the battery life to its fullest but this model seems like battery life won’t be a particular problem by the standards of laptop battery life. Port assortment is good, either of two type C thunderbolt ports may be occupied by the charging cable at any time but that would leave the other and another two type A USB 3.

1 ports.

PROS: Gorgeous (if a bit glossy) screen; lightweight; one of the fastest processors available — for now; CONS: No RJ-45 input; Windows 11 software still unstable; surprisingly poor graphics. I had high hopes for this model.

I ordered it July 4, 2022 — and Best Buy delivered it the next day. Unfortunately, it was all downhill from there. It’s clear that HP and W11 still don’t play nice together — this computer, like other HPs I’ve tried, has various issues with W11 instability.

But unlike the others, I was able to install a fresh copy of Windows 10 (version 21H2) on this model with ease — and that all but eliminated most software issues. But, to my eyes, the much bigger problem is the graphics component.

I don’t buy computers willy nilly — I do a lot of research beforehand. In researching this laptop, I found two credible websites that indicated the AMD Ryzen 5 5625u processor is supposed to come with a powerful iGPU — Radeon RX Vega 7 graphics, with up to 2 GB of VRAM.

Nope. This model comes with only a standard graphics card — and just 512 mb of VRAM. My eyes clearly see the difference between such a card — and my other computer with 2 GB of VRAM. There’s no legitimate reason why a computer normally retailing for $800 has such a comparatively poor graphics package.

If you’re less picky about graphics performance, this may well be a fine laptop for you. But if you are more selective about such things — then you may want to wait for the forthcoming Ryzen 6000 series models.

Originally I bought an HP Envy 8 GB/256 GB with an i5 processor laptop. I also purchased an additional 8 GB of expanding memory and I told the sales person the additional 8 GB of memory was to upgrade the memory of this laptop.

The sales person did not tell me the memory on this model was not expandable. To make a much longer story shorter, I found out shortly that the memory on this laptop was not expandable. Because of the way I use a computer (with lots of programs open) this new laptop quickly started to bog down.

I went back to Best Buy expecting a fight to return the laptop. The manager I spoke to (Shay) was very helpful and told me not to worry – to go buy the upgraded laptop I wanted, then have my data moved to the new computer – then return the first computer.

That is exactly what I did and Best Buy took the first laptop back. The HP Envy with 16GB/512GB with i7 processor I bought second is perfect. It has the capacity and speed to easily manage all the programs I keep open while working.

This is my 4th HP laptop over 12 years. I have never really had any hardware challenges. In spite of the many challenges you typically hear about doing business with Big Box stores – Best Buy came through this time with flying colors – other than the original sales person I worked with could have been better trained to know that the original laptop I purchased was not expendable.

I have purchased many electronics from Best Buys over the years. TV’s (I mean TV’s not flat screens – that’s how long ago it was), sound systems, Flat screens and many more things. Thanks for making this experience a positive one!.

Overall, spec wise, this laptop is hard to beat for the price when on sale. All aluminum case feels super well built and is packed with features. Backlit keyboard is nice and feels amazing The screen is super colorful and bright (400 nits) Great cpu Fast charging and decent port selection.

Where I question the build is. I got one and the screen did not sit 100% flush along the body. When the lid is open, you can see on the right side there is a gap in the corner between the screen lid and body and in the left side, it sits lower.

This by a few mm but still noticeable The trackpad also, for this price, should be a glass trackpad but it’s not. The click is nice and is super precise but, at 1100$ when not on sale, should be glass.

It also sits uneven slightly in the body as the right bottom corner sits slightly lower than the other corners that are flush. Onboard ram, why. no upgradability but should be good for a few years. Just don’t buy this with the intent of future proofing your purchase.

8 GB should be fine for most but not if you’re into intense video editing for example. Overall, on sale, very good buy even with those questional build issues. They are minor and don’t take away from the overall experience.

Maybe just get an extended warranty.

This is the first time buying a Lenovo laptop that is not a Thinkpad. It was chosen because of its exceptional durability and very low price. There is no other laptop close to being this sturdy even for double the price! It really feels quite solid which makes it heavier than average but considering this laptop will be taking around day after day, it is an essential feature.

It is also very impressive how full-featured this laptop is for its price point: – The display is full-HD and anti-glare, giving a nice clear view of the screen in varying lighting condition. The downside is that this is a TN display and it very clear has lower contrast and poor color accuracy.

For our use, it is not a problem but anyone doing digital art with this laptop would need an external monitor. Impressively it has a full-size HDMI port for that. – The keyboard is very nice! It feels solid and the keys have a good depth and very linear movement.

It is apparently spill-proof but I didn’t test this feature. There’s no backlight and unfortunately no trackpoint which is too bad but, again , this is not a Thinkpad , which brings me to my next point: – There is a large button-less trackpad which is very difficult to use.

While it is responsive and tracks finger movements well, it is difficult to move with precision and, more importantly the area that responds to clicks is furthest away from the keyboard which is rather annoying.

Definitely buy a trackball (a good one is much better since there is no need to move it along any surface) or mouse at least for this laptop. – It has a good number of ports and charges via USB-C, so there are tons of options to charge it other than the included 45W USB-C charger.

Now for a student laptop, the Lenovo 14w is certainly capable to handle most tasks. While its processor is acceptable and it even comes with embedded Radeon graphics, memory is tight and so much has to be loaded from storage which is extremely slow compared to everything else.

So, expect long boot times and long restore after hibernation. Once an application is loaded, honestly this is Google Chrome for most things lately, it is hard to notice the slow and limited storage.

I bought this computer after initially buying the Slim 7i (15″) model. That laptop was simply too big and the build quality left a lot to be desired. When I saw that that this laptop, with a 4k display and excellent performance was on sale for $999 (normally around $1800), I jumped on it.

First impressions were, to say the least, not great. First, some of the specs of the model I purchased: Model: IdeaPad Slim 9 14ITL5 Display: 3840×2160, glossy, HDR, 450 nits Processor: i7-1195G7 with Intel Iris Xe RAM: 16GB Of the bat, I was impressed with the packaging – much higher quality than the simple cardboard box the 7i had come in.

It also came with a carrying case so +1 Lenovo. The vegan leather cover is beautiful and the build quality is amazing. It doesn’t flex, creak, or anything else. The glass palm rest/touchpad looks beautiful as well (though it is a fingerprint magnet).

Then I started using it. The touchpad – the haptic glass touchpad. awful. Marketed as Lenovo”s response to Apple’s amazing touchpads – it falls extremely short. There are a lot of problems with this touchpad (enough that I purchased a mouse just in case).

The haptic response is hit or miss, with no clear pressure point that needs to be achieved to “click”. Sometimes if I am scrolling with two fingers it will click. Google it, its an issue being discussed on Reddit and other sites.

The touchpad also has no clear indication of where it starts and ends, meaning that when I am selecting text and dragging and dropping, I will often accidentally leave the trackpad surface, as the textured surface of the rest of the glass just is not enough.

I thought it must just be a driver issue at first with the haptics, or that I could adjust the sensitivity, but no – there are no options, no updates, and no response from Lenovo other than to reboot it or trade it in for a new one (which hasn’t fixed the problem for anyone else).

For a nearly $1800 laptop, I would expect WAY more from Lenovo. The touchpad is listed as HID-compliant mouse under Device Manager, so there is no way to update the drivers or anything. That being said, I have adapted to it fairly quickly and am using it more “correctly?” now I suppose? For the price I got this machine at, I can deal with it, but don’t get this for over $1000.

Now the screen – gosh is it beautiful. And that’s coming from a Huawei Matebook X user. The screen is sharp and detailed, with deep blacks and the ability to stream HDR content. It’s 60hz and 16:9, which is becoming a bit outdated but it works for me.

That being said, however, it has a huge ghosting issue. If I am working on a document and switch over to a different program, I can still see the ghost of the document on that other program. Like, I am still able to see a faint image of what I was just working on.

It’s not terrible, per se, but it’s definitely an issue that seems to have gotten cleared up on other models by a software update, so I am waiting on that. Definitely something to consider when you are paying this much for a laptop (never had that problem on my Huawei with a similarly specced display).

Performance: This laptop is fast. The 1195G7 is a beast for a laptop as slim and light as this one. No stuttering when turning on or logging in, Photoshop, Lightroom, and other intensive programs run smoothly and without a hitch.

The 16GB of RAM is the faster version and is more than enough for my education and work needs. I can play Cities Skylines and Binding of Isaac smoothly at near 60 FPS. No complaints on this part. The Keyboard: Fantastic.

The Huawei I had was basically a Macbook clone so the keyboard was similar – not great, not fantastic. I am loving the Lenovo keyboard here, enough key travel and fairly quiet. The camera: awful. Trash.

Why don’t we have 1080p camera modules in laptops yet? My phone has a 40MP camera on the front – can’t we get more than 1MP on a $1800 laptop – I digress, however. Audio: Not the best, but definitely premium.

It’s got a great stereo system that really is immersive, and the profiles you can choose from are fantastic. I wish it had more base, but one can always wish. Battery life: Definitely shorter than advertised but not bad at all.

The Rapid Charge feature is a life-saver and I can confidently leave my cord at home if I’ve got a few back-to-back classes and its fully charged. But don’t be fooled – if you are using HDR, at maximum brightness, and using the GPU in any way, the battery is going to go fast.

It is also a 4k display so that was a sacrifice I was willing to make as I’m really never far from a wall outlet. The performance modes are great, with intelligent cooling really doing its job and rarely spinning up the fans.

In intensive mode, I can hear the fans but they are really decently quiet. I’m happy to share anything else anyone wants to know. I’m a bit back and forth on this laptop, to be honest, as I only paid $1000 for $1800 worth of computer, and it works well enough for me.

But that being said, if the trackpad could be given an update to give us some control over pressure intensity or haptic feedback and the screen’s ghosting issues resolved, I would update my rating to 4 stars.

So far, not a fan at all. There are some frustrations that may not be entirely fair to put solely on this specific laptop. Setting up is a very frustrating experience as it must be connected to a network first, but (as others have mentioned) there is a bug that will prevent connection if you’re not on an open/public network.

Fun. The new Windows format is awful, but again, that’s not entirely fair to throw solely at this product. But what IS fair to complain about and what really shocked me is that this laptop (only four days old) already froze on me.

Apparently the Ryzen 7 and the 12GB memory isn’t quite enough to handle two open PowerPoints and Mozilla with six tabs open. Nope, that brought the thing to a screeching halt with zero response to any actions that eventually required a full power cycle.

I have a beat-up Dell that has seen abuse over several years and has far less impressive specs, I know for fact that it wouldn’t experience the same difficulty and it really does surprise me that the laptop that I got as my intended “work” computer can’t even handle a few open tabs and office apps.

(I’m genuinely half wondering if I got handed a refurb or something slipped through the cracks. ) I work with large datasets and was hoping for this guy to carry some weight in things like R and Stata.

Now I’m not even sure it can handle opening Excel to do a cursory view of the data. Will keep testing it out over the next few days, but I’m anticipating a return and will – as of right now – advise that the buyer beware.

If things improve, I’ll update the review.

This machine is a looker. With an Intel 7 processor and 16 GB Ram I have no problem with any task. It’s not a gaming machine but I can imagine that you can still do some light gaming. It is touchscreen and it has a backlit keyboard.

One of the new features is that it has a number pad that can be activated on the touchpad. Great for data entry. There are a few minor things to consider. 1. It does not have an audio jack but Asus did include adapters for one to be used with audio, and one for ethernet.

I have been using bluetooth headphones so that is not a big deal. 2. It also does not have a fingerprint reader, however, there is facial recognition so once again, not a big deal for me. 3. The keyboard is not full size.

I have small hands and I am still adjusting to this. All in all this is a very sturdy compact machine so if you are looking for an auxillary unit for travel and/or school, that can last all day, I highly recommend this laptop.

I own several laptops and I purchase them for friends and colleagues. There are a few brands and models that I stick to, especially when recommending to family and friends, and Asus Zenbook has been in the top 2.

This model is great value for money, love the OLED screen and keyboard layout. And I am happy that Asus chose to bring back some of the ports for connectivity while keeping the sleek form factor and light weight.

I was choosing between the XPS 13 and this ZenBook Flip but the OLED, Flip screen, and stylus pen won me over — and I don’t regret it. Asus customer service has also improved much over the years. If those aren’t enough, the 1 year accidental damage protection warranty is pretty hard to beat too.

Disclaimer: I am writing this review also to get an extended 3 month warranty add on to the 1 year international + 1 year accidental damage protection that comes with the laptop.

I bought this Asus ZenBook flip 13′ a week ago and couldn’t be happier! I previously had Microsoft Surface 7 and MacBook Air, and so far the Asus is quicker and easier to use. I use it mainly for work (Microsoft office programs), web browsing and tv series streaming.

The video quality is superb! Haven’t had any glitches so far. Very quick to start up, and I love the trackpad that transforms into a number pad with a long press, really nifty feature. Overall I’m extremely happy.

Asus is providing with 90 day extended warranty for writing this review.