Latest Laptop Innovations: A Comparison of HP, Acer, and Lenovo Models

HP OmniBook X review: An excellent ultrabook compromised by a silly mistake

Why you can trust Laptop Mag Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test. Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite chips have been pulling their weight like Atlas in these laptops, so getting a Copilot+ PC should be an easy win for you, but the HP OmniBook X makes a strong case against that notion. For $1,199, the HP OmniBook X gets you that awesome Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100 performance, a clicky keyboard, and an impressive battery life. However, a slow SSD has a chilling effect on that performance, and this laptop has the dimmest display I've seen all year. The HP OmniBook X had plenty of potential, enough to make it one of the best HP laptops, but let me tell you how it squandered that opportunity. I reviewed the $1,199 model of the HP OmniBook X (on sale for $899 at Best Buy), which boasts a Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100 processor, 16GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a 14-inch, 2240 x 1400, 60Hz, touch display. The base model drops to $849 and reduces storage to a 512GB SSD. It is on sale at the time of publication (from $1,149). Otherwise, you can upgrade to 32GB of RAM and a 2TB SSD if you get the $1,499 model. If you're looking for something a little cheaper, check out our best laptops under $1,000. With its Meteor Silver color scheme, the HP OmniBook X looks like most other premium laptops. Minus the "HP" logo, it wouldn't look out of place in a line of MacBooks, so it's fine, I suppose. However, If you want some variation, I'd recommend going with the Ceramic White color, which is $10 more, but absolutely worth it. The interior offers more of the same dark silver design contrasted with a dark gray keyboard that doesn't look that appealing. Laptop manufacturers need to hire someone obsessed with color theory. The touchpad takes up quite a bit of space, while the bezels on the display are pleasantly slim all around. There's even a webcam on top with a privacy shutter. At 2.91 pounds and 12.32 x 8.8 x 0.56~0.57 inches, the HP OmniBook X makes one hell of an impression, coming in as the lightest and the second thinnest among the competition, giving the MacBook Air a fight for its life. This is how HP OmniBook X compares: Being a thin laptop, the HP OmniBook X doesn't offer many ports, but it covers the necessities. These ports include two USB Type-C ports on the left side, and a USB Type-A port and a headphone jack on the right side. Need more ports? Check out our best USB Type-C hubs and best laptop docking stations pages. Wow, I haven't seen a display this dim in a long while. The HP OmniBook X's 14-inch, 2240 x 1400, 60Hz, touch display is sharp and offers a nice bit of color, bringing depth to your favorite content. But the brightness is so low that it has no right to wear a glossy panel. In the trailer for Secret Level, the opening cinematic fell flat due to low brightness. I couldn't catch the finer details of the characters due to how dark the scene was, and the ambient glare (not even directly) from my window made it even less enjoyable. The blue rocket exhaust from a speeder riding toward the dark sunset had a strong depth, but the laptop couldn't capitalize on the higher color range because of the low brightness. According to our colorimeter, the HP OmniBook X covered 80.2% of the DCI-P3 color gamut, which isn't as colorful as the average premium laptop (88.9%). However, it brings more life to Game of Thrones than the Swift 14 (75.6%), Zenbook 14 (79.8%), MacBook Air (77.5%), and the infamous D&D (not the TTRPG). At 283 nits of brightness the OmniBook X crumbles against the average premium laptop (454 nits). It didn't make it anywhere near the Swift 14 (367 nits), Zenbook 14 (339 nits), and MacBook Air (482 nits). With a glossy display, 283 nits is downright offensive. The worst part is that there are no other display configurations. Don't scoff at the HP OmniBook X's low key travel because this baby's keyboard is delightfully clicky. Between its well-spaced keys and their bouncy click, my fingers were tap dancing across the deck like they were at a talent show. I typed at 87 words per minute on the 10fastfingers.com typing test, soaring above my usual 81 wpm average. Deep key travel is pleasant, but there's something about precise, low key travel that can keep your fingers bouncing to the next key with ease. I was less impressed with the 4.9 x 3.2-inch touchpad. It's fine, but it's not glass so it's not as smooth as I'd like. And the clicker is too shallow and sharp for my taste. The HP OmniBook X's front-firing speakers threw me for a loop. Its part-hollow and part-wide range of sounds were bad one second and good the other. I listened to the "Tom's Diner" cover by AnnenMayKantereit x Giant Rooks (thanks TikTok), and the opening vocal stims sounded brassy and hollow. However, the guitar and trumpet were bright and pleasant. When the actual vocals kicked in, they were crisp albeit quiet. Meanwhile, the percussion had a tough time staying above the rest of the instruments. There's no audio app onboard the HP OmniBook X, which is odd because HP usually includes Bang & Olufsen speakers and its accompanying app in its laptops. The HP OmniBook X rocks up with Qualcomm's star child, the Snapdragon X Elite chipset, specifically the X1E-78-100 processor. It could easily handle a couple dozen Google Chrome apps and a handful of YouTube videos without breaking a sweat. On the Geekbench 6.3 overall performance test, the HP OmniBook X scored 12,861, speeding past the average premium laptop (9,907). It surpassed the MacBook Air's M3 (12,052) and the ZenBook 14's Intel Core Ultra 7 155H (12,707), but it couldn't get past the Swift 14 (14,531) which matched its CPU. In a real-world test, the OmniBook X took 5 minutes and 46 seconds to transcode a 4K video to 1080p on our HandBrake test, swiping away the average premium laptop (6:37), the Zenbook 14 (6:36), and the MacBook Air (6:30). Meanwhile, it was a whole minute behind the Swift 14 (4:46). Now, you may be wondering why the OmniBook X is slacking behind the Swift 14 if they share the same CPU. Well, it's likely the SSD. The OmniBook X's 1TB SSD clocked in at a transfer rate of 893 megabytes per second. Never mind fumbling against the category average (1,471 MBps) and Zenbook 14 (1,236 MBps), it is nearly 1GBps slower than the Swift 14 (1,891 MBps). Like many of its Copilot+ PC siblings, the HP OmniBook X features the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100 chipset, which offers dedicated AI performance and a slew of new features. We tested the HP OmniBook X's AI performance (see how we test AI PCs), but keep in mind that since this is relatively new, our testing methods will adapt as necessary. Now, let's see how the HP OmniBook X did. On the Geekbench ML 0.6 AI performance test, the HP OmniBook X hit an ONNX/CPU score of 2,572, which falters against the Swift 14 (2,925) and the Zenbook 14 (2,971). The MacBook Air did not undergo this test, but the HP Spectre x360 14 2024 (2,876) did and the OmniBook X fell short of that as well. Despite that, Qualcomm's CPU may not be optimized for Geekbench ML 0.6. Since this doesn't test the NPU, it's not an accurate depiction of Qualcomm's AI capabilities. As with the rest of the Copilot+ PCs, the most interesting and controversial feature is Recall. This tracks the history of your PC just like your browser history. So you can easily bounce around your timeline to see what you did hours ago. It's a bit spooky, and while this information is supposed to be stored locally, it's only sensical to be worried, especially with all these privacy lawsuits. However, you can adjust the information stored and Recall is limited to Windows Insiders and disabled by default. Some of our favorite Copilot+ PC features include Windows Studio Effects and Live Captions. Of course, AI art programs are also available, but they are not without controversy. Unique to the HP OmniBook X is the HP AI Companion (Beta) app, which offers a collection of AI tools that can "increase productivity." You can ask the AI questions and it'll provide information much like how AI Overviews works. You can use it to analyze files you add to a created library and it'll create streamlined ways to sort and compare the documents. It'll also give you access to system drivers, BIOS updates, and additional firmware. As with the rest of its Snapdragon X Elite siblings, the HP OmniBook X doesn't live up to the lofty aspirations that Qualcomm had for its graphics. The Qualcomm Adreno GPU won't get you far. On the 3DMark Fire Strike synthetic graphics test, the HP OmniBook X scored 5,330, falling in the back of the premium crowd (8,812). And that placement is consistent against the Swift 14's Qualcomm Adreno (5,754) and Zenbook 14's Intel Arc Graphics (8,064). On the Sid Meier's Civilization VI: Gathering Storm (Medium, 1080p) benchmark, the HP OmniBook X averaged 20 frames per second, making it unplayable (30-fps minimum). The Swift 14 (21 fps) landed in the same boat, but the Zenbook 14 (31 fps) made a reasonable effort. As we've seen this year, with AI comes great battery life. On the Laptop Mag battery test, the HP OmniBook X survived 16 hours and 18 minutes, outliving the average premium laptop (12:13) by half a workday. It even sideswiped the Zenbook 14 (15:52) and MacBook Air (15:03). However, the Swift 14 still managed to overcome the odds, with a time of 17:30. Whoa -- I don't think I've ever seen a 2880 x 1620 webcam in a laptop before. It does a decent job but fails in the most basic respect. The contrast is well-balanced, capturing each blind on the window behind me without overexposing the surface. The green in my shirt and the rainbow of colors in the My Hero Academia poster behind me were bold. However, the overall quality is fuzzy and distorts the color in noisy pixels all over the image. So, instead of my green shirt looking flat (the way it's supposed to), It looks like it's caked in sand that matches the color of the shirt. The webcam is passable, so I don't think it's necessary to opt for the best webcams. You can put it in your lap, but your fingers might get toasty. After streaming a 15-minute video, the HP OmniBook X climbed to 93 degrees Fahrenheit on the underside, which is safely below our 95-degree comfort threshold. The center of the keyboard and touchpad reached 101 and 82 degrees, respectively. However, the hottest was 112 degrees, located on the 2 key. I'm not too excited about the top of the keyboard being that warm. Everything you need is in the myHP app. Well, the important stuff, there's also plenty of HP software strewn about the PC, like HP Energy Star and HP System Event Utility. But myHP features your device information, diagnostics for your performance, network, audio, and operating system, and links out to HP's manuals and support center. You can mess with Video and Audio controls as far as conferencing goes. The OmniBook X comes with a one-year limited warranty. See how HP performed on our Tech Support Showdown ranking. That dim display is tough to forgive, but HP really killed the OmniBook X's chances with that dismal SSD. At the right price, it is worth considering thanks to its great performance, splendidly long battery life, and clicky keyboard, but there are far too many excellent options for around $1,000. If you want something long-lasting and powerful, try the Acer Swift 14 AI. It trades a clicky keyboard for a silky touchpad, and while the color in the display isn't as good, it's considerably brighter. Overall, the HP OmniBook X is a decent notebook, but that slow SSD will kill you in the long haul. You're probably better off getting something else.

Acer Swift 14 AI review: Lots of ports, long battery life, weird AI indicator

Why you can trust Tom's Hardware Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test. Not that there haven't been giant leaps in computing in the last few years or anything, but AI has become a bit of a buzzword, even among the best ultrabooks. So it's no surprise that that's the case with the Acer Swift 14 AI ($1,199.99). The laptop's best features -- long battery life, a crystal clear webcam, a fast SSD -- are subsumed by AI branding. There's an AI icon on the lid, and an AI "indicator" on the touchpad. Acer's take on the AI/Copilot Plus/Arm PC is thicker and heavier than some competitors, and doesn't have a ton of personality outside of really wanting AI to be cool. Which is a shame, because the laptop has redeeming factors, like having more ports than its rivals, which have opted to go as thin as possible. This is a capable PC. If you want to make the jump to Windows on Arm, want lots of ports, and care a lot about the webcam, it will satisfy. But Acer still needs to work on the touchpad, should strip out a ton of bloatware, and focus more on making a great Windows laptop than an AI computer. Acer desperately wants you to think about AI when you use its laptop. While the Swift 14 AI is actually quite plain, the company has peppered a few reminders that, yes, the Swift has Copilot and an NPU, and that makes it special. Unfortunately, those reminders also make little sense. On the sturdy, metal lid, the dark gray material is punctuated only with an rainbow Acer logo and, on the opposite corner, a series of dots and lines. In materials sent to reviewers, this is referred to only as an "AI Icon." Sure, I guess. With the lid open, the Swift 14 AI appears premium. The dark metal chassis feels solid, and there's not much of a bezel around the display. But on the touchpad, there's an "Activity indicator," a series of lines and dots. This illuminates when you launch Copilot or when you use Acer's AI software. I found this more annoying than anything else (for instance, Acer QuickPanel activates whenever you turn on the camera, illuminating the indicator). Fine, I get it, you have AI. On the bright side, if you dig through the AcerSense software, you can disable the lighting. That being said, the setting didn't always stick for me. There are a fair number of ports on the Swift 14 AI, likely because it's a bit thicker than some competing Snapdragon-based laptops. On the left side, you get a USB Type-A 3.2 Gen 1 port and a pair of USB 4 Type-C ports.The right side houses a second USB-A port and the headphone jack. Acer also includes a USB-C to HDMI dongle in the box. The Swift 14 AI measures 12.7 x 9 x 0.72 inches and weighs 3.2 pounds. That's larger and heavier than the Dell XPS 13 (9345) at 11.63 x 7.84 x 0.6 inches and 2.62 pounds, which also has a Snapdragon X Elite, or the Microsoft Surface Pro which is 1.97 pounds before the keyboard. The Asus Zenbook 14 OLED, an Intel-based machine, is 2.82 pounds. The Swift 14 AI is the latest laptop we've tested with a Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processor (specifically, the ever-so-elegantly named Snapdragon X Elite X1E-78-100). This laptop also comes with 16GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. The chip in the Swift is a slight step below the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 we tested in the Dell XPS 13 (9345) and the Microsoft Surface Pro. The 78-100 doesn't support dual-core boost and has slower graphics, but still offers 12 cores. We also compared it to the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED with an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H and 32GB of RAM. On Geekbench 6, the Swift 14 AI earned a single-core score of 2,452 and a multi-core score of 14,635. Both the Dell and the Surface outperformed it in single-core, but the three systems were more comparable in multi-core scores. The Swift 14 AI was on par with the Zenbook 14 OLED for single-core, but the Intel-powered machine trailed when it came to using multiple cores. On our file transfer test, Acer was the fastest of the group, copying 25GB of files at a rate of 1,891.13 MBps. The slowest was the Surface Pro, at 1,001.16 MBps. The Acer and the Dell came in neck and neck on Handbrake, transcoding 4K video to 1080p. It took the Acer 4 minutes and 46 seconds to complete the task. The Surface came in at 5:21 while the Zenbook took 6:17. We stress test laptops by running Cinebench 2024 for ten runs. The Swift started at 714.57 before dipping down into the 690's. By the end, the system had recovered and was running as high as 724.37 before starting to show a dip by the end of the runs. According to HWInfo, (which now supports Snapdragon's Oryon processors in beta), the CPU ran at an average of 3.4 GHz and measured 68.62 degrees Celsius. Acer put a 14.5-inch, 2560 x 1600 touch display with a 120 Hz on the Swift 14 AI. The display is colorful enough, and while I found it mostly bright enough in everyday use, competitors get brighter. The trailer for Captain America: Brave New World looked fine on the screen -- it showed off orange explosions and neon electric blue weapons, but the darker scenes didn't stand out as much as they do on some competitive laptops. The Swift covers 75.6% of the DCI-P3 gamut (107% sRGB), beating the Dell XPS 13's base screen and effectively on par with the Zenbook 14 OLED. But the Swift measured just 367 nits, which was dimmer than the XPS 13 (456 nits), and the Surface Pro's display (564 nits, 115.2% DCI-P3) was the most impressive of the group, though you have to fork out more cash for it. The backlit keyboard on the Swift 14 AI is serviceable. Considering the Swift is thicker than its competition, I wish the travel were a bit deeper. That being said, the keys are snappy, and I hit 123 words per minute on the monkeytype typing test. Despite the high speeds, I was slightly less accurate than usual at 97%. The trackpad, however, is abhorrent. Nevermind the AI drawing, which doesn't affect functionality; it just feels bad to click on. The best way I can describe it is that it's crunchy in the center, as if I was hitting something underneath the touchpad (it even made a sound, as if someone in rainboots stepped in a pile of leaves). It's not as bad on the edges, but there it still feels cheap. The speakers get comfortably loud enough to fill a room. Hozier's voice in "Nobody's Soldier" was clear, as were the drums, but the guitar was a bit muddy and the bass was nowhere to be found. In the DTS software on board, I was able to use bass boost to get a better hint of the low-end, as well as make some tweaks to the EQ that improved the sound. There are 10 Torx screws on the outside of the Swift 14 AI. They're all the same length, thankfully. That's the easy part. Once you take the lid off, you'll see that most of the key components are soldered to the motherboard. This includes the RAM and the Wi-Fi card. The battery can be removed, and you can replace the SSD, though you have to explore to find it. The drive is located underneath a ribbon cable attaching the motherboard to a smaller board on the right side of the notebook for additional ports. You'll have to flip up a holding latch (you can use a fingernail or a small pry tool) and remove a ribbon cable, and then you can get the standard M.2 2280 SSD. There are oddities in the case design. For instance, there's plastic that looks like it could hold a CMOS battery, though it's among some empty space to the right of the battery. It makes me wonder if Acer could've fit a better battery in here, or if it re-used an older chassis. Like many of the other other Copilot Plus PCs running on Qualcomm's Snapdragon X platforms, the Acer Swift 14 AI has impressive battery life. It ran for 17 hours and 32 minutes on our battery test, constantly browsing websites, running OpenGL tests, and streaming video with brightness set at 150 nits. The Dell XPS 13, with a lower-resolution display, went even longer at 17:32. But the Swift beat out both the Surface Pro (12:17, with an OLED screen) and the Intel-based Asus Zenbook 14 OLED (12:21). During our Cinebench stress test, the Swift 14 AI got toasty, but not unusable. The center of the keyboard climbed to 104 degrees Fahrenheit (40 C), while the touchpad was cooler at 90 F (32.22 C). The hottest spot on the bottom, near the exhaust, hit 114.6 F (45.88 C). Acer has a high-resolution 1440p webcam on the Swift 14 AI. When one of Windows' marquee AI features is Windows Studio effects, a high-end camera to show that off makes sense. And the camera is solid. In a challenging situation next to a window, it balanced out the light as best as it could (one side of my face is brighter than the other, sure, but that's how it was in real life). My red shirt was slightly more vivid than in real life, and I could see plenty of details, like the bags under my eyes after a sleepless night and the titles of books on a shelf behind me. Acer QuickPanel, with fast access to Windows Studio Effects (it's effectively a huge shortcut), pops up every time you open the camera. It's annoying, and I wish there were more obvious ways to keep it from turning on so often in the first place. Acer puts way too much software and other bloat on the Swift 14 AI. There's a ton of Acer-branded apps, including Jumpstart, which just links to Acer's website (which seems unnecessary, I can go there if I want); QuickPanel to get access to camera settings; User Sensing, which lets you lock the screen when you walk away or make sure you're at a safe distance; and AcerSense, which has system usage settings and system stats. But Acer also fills the Start Menu with junk, like small games like Amazing Slots, Solitaire, Elvenar, and Forge of Empires, some of which open in the web browser. There are also links to Booking.com in both the taskbar and the Edge browser bookmarks folder. There's also GT Booster AIFlow, which shows which apps are connecting to the internet and provides statistics about your network. As of this writing, Microsoft only includes Windows 11's Copilot+ features -- such as Windows Studio Effects, Cocreate images, and live captions -- with Snapdragon X laptops like the Swift 14 AI. They're set to come to select AMD and Intel laptops soon. Acer sells the Swift 14 AI with a 1-year warranty. The Acer Swift 14 AI is a capable Copilot+ laptop with long battery life; a high-quality, high-resolution webcam; and a fast SSD. It's not as attractive or thin as some competing Snapdragon machines, and the touchpad feels unsatisfying. While AI is still a minimal part of the Windows experience, it's a big part of weird icons peperring this laptop. Perhaps the best excuse for the Swift's relative chunkiness is that it has both two USB Type-C ports and two USB Type-A ports, letting you attach plenty of peripherals (assuming they all work with Windows on Arm). There are other positives, too, like an excellent webcam for a laptop, and a speedy SSD. At $1,199.99 for the sole configuration, however, this is a bit pricey. The Intel Core Ultra-based Asus Zenbook 14 OLED with 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a 2880 x 1800 touchscreen was $1,299.99 when we reviewed it, and additional configurations have gotten even cheaper. If you're willing to drop storage and screen resolution, the Dell XPS 13 (9345) is starting as low as $999.99 with a more powerful variant of the Snapdragon X Elite. If you want some bells and whistles, like a 120 Hz display and tons of ports, the Swift 14 may be for you. But if you prefer something sleek and thin, you can find more power and the longevity in laptops that feel a bit more polished.

Acer Swift Go 16 review: Premium performance for a decent price

The Acer Swift Go 16 is a powerful machine that won't cost you a fortune. Finding the perfect balance between price and performance isn't easy, and not every company knows what to sacrifice to lower the cost without destroying a laptop's positive qualities. However, the Acer Swift Go 16 does a great job of this, maintaining a reasonable price point while featuring strong performance, long-lasting battery life, and a colorful display in a sleek chassis. I'm not saying it's cheap by any means, but you can often expect to pay far more for this quality of machine. It has some flaws, particularly its dim display and mediocre keyboard, but keep reading to see if this is the right laptop for you. The Swift Go 16 we reviewed is available at $1,199 at Amazon. It's built with an Intel Ultra 9 185H processor, Intel Arc integrated graphics, 32GB of RAM, and 1TB of SSD storage. It also has a 16-inch, 1,920 x 1,080-pixel display at 60Hz refresh rate. It can be upgraded with up to 8TB of SSD storage, which is an enormous amount of space, but could be useful for specific types of consumers. I was surprised by how thin and light the Swift Go 16 is for its size, and when I pulled it out of its box, I was taken aback by how easy it was to hold. Its minimalist lid and Iron color finish (pretty much a darker silver) also give it an appealing professional look. Atop its shiny lid is a reflective Acer logo, and lifting the lid reveals a sleek deck with a large keyboard. Unfortunately, the deck is malleable, and placing pressure against its surface causes it to bend inwards slightly. While it is built with aluminum and feels sturdy for the most part, it especially feels thin around the trackpad and keyboard. The Swift Go 16 weighs 3.5 pounds and measures 14 x 9.6 x 0.6 inches, which is pretty lithe for its size category, but a competitor like the Asus Zenbook S16 UM5606 (3.3 pounds, 14 x 9.6 x 0.5 inches) comes in a bit thinner and lighter. The Dell Inspiron 14 Plus 7441 (3.2 pounds, 12.4 x 8.8 x 0.6 inches) and Lenovo Yoga 9i (2.9 pounds, 12.4 x 8.7 x 0.6 inches) are 14-inch laptops, so they're unsurprisingly smaller. With a competent selection of ports, the Swift Go 16 fulfills what you need a productivity laptop to do. It has two Thunderbolt 4, one USB Type-A, and an HDMI port on its left side. On its right, there's another USB Type-A port, a microSD slot, an audio jack, and a Kensington Lock. Built with a 16-inch, 1,920 x 1,080 display, the Swift Go 16 won't particularly impress with its 1080p resolution and subpar brightness. However, it has a surprisingly colorful panel that will make watching films more than satisfactory. I watched the trailer for the animated The Lord of the Rings prequel The War of the Rohirrim, and I was stunned by the vividness of Middle-Earth. Early in the trailer, there's a shot that overlooks the Golden Hall in Rohan, and the view of the starry night sky contrasting with the warm orange glow of torches against the intricate carvings on the wooden structure was stunning. The Swift Go 16 did pretty decently on our color tests for an LCD panel, reproducing 86 percent of the DCI-P3 color gamut. This is a bit above the 83 percent mainstream laptop average, while it's also ahead of the Zenbook S16 (80 percent) and Inspiron 14 (69 percent). Meanwhile, it's absolutely no shock that the Lenovo Yoga 9i (136 percent) took heads with its gloriously vivid OLED panel. It did worse on our brightness tests, hitting a peak of 332 nits on average, which is well below the 378 nit category average. This is dimmer than the Zenbook S16 (357 nits), Inspiron 14 (470 nits), and Lenovo Yoga 9i (357 nits). The Swift Go 16's speaker system isn't anything to write home about, with lower volume than expected, but it's clear and balanced enough. I listened to "Calma" by Madreblu and while the audio was sufficient, you still might wish you could turn it up. At the very least, the sound of the strings in the background wasn't lost against the percussion and loud vocals. And as the chorus intensifies in the latter half, it doesn't become flat or overbearing. While watching the trailer for The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim, I was disappointed by the volume. It's not necessarily low, but it lacks a punchiness that would make watching films feel impactful. However, it's clear and well-balanced at the very least, as the epic soundtrack and voices were easy to distinguish from the intense sound effects. I took the 10fastfingers typing test and managed 110 words per minute with 97 percent accuracy, which is around what I can normally do on my mechanical keyboard. However, I didn't love the feeling of the Swift Go 16's keys. It's shallow and spongy, and especially after the exceptionally clicky Lenovo Yoga 9i I recently tested, it couldn't compete. At the very least, it features a dedicated number pad courtesy of its larger 16-inch size. As a result, the keys are too scrunched together, but it was still more than enough room for someone with decently sized hands. The 4.9 by 3-inch trackpad is smooth and I had no issue moving files, browsing the web, and performing multi-finger gestures. It also benefits from its entire surface being clickable, although the less-than-sturdy material of the deck makes the material bend inward every so slightly when clicking, which isn't the most appealing visual. The Swift Go 16 is powered by an Intel Core Ultra 9 185H processor, 1TB of SSD storage, and 32GB of LPDDR5X-6400 DRAM. It features excellent performance thanks to its high-end Meteor Lake processor, and considering you can get it with up to 8TB of SSD storage, it's a powerhouse for productivity. On the Geekbench 6.2 overall performance test, the Swift Go 16's multi-core score of 13,088 is pretty great. This is far above the category average of 9,883, but was in a pretty similar range with the AMD-powered Zenbook S16 (AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, 13,282) and Snapdragon-powered Inspiron 14 (Snapdragon X Plus X1P-64-100, 13,281). The Lenovo Yoga 9i (Intel Core Ultra 7 155H, 12,455) was a bit behind, which isn't a surprise considering it features an Ultra 7 versus the Swift Go 16's Ultra 9 processor. We converted a 4K video into 1080p using the HandBrake app and the Swift Go 16 managed to accomplish the task in 4 minutes and 51 seconds, which is better than the 7 minutes and 54 second category average. The Zenbook S16 (5:08), Inspiron 14 (6:23), and Lenovo Yoga 9i (5:10) were all a little slower, but none did poorly. The Swift Go 16 duplicated 25GB of multimedia files in 18 seconds at a transfer rate of 1,468 megabytes per second, faster than the 1,235MBps category average. The Zenbook S16 (1TB SSD, 908MBps) and Lenovo Yoga 9i (1TB SSD 1,016MBps) were far behind, but it was in a similar lane as the Inspiron 14 (512GB SSD, 1,510MBps). Gamers shouldn't expect an Intel processor to carry a laptop's graphics alone by any means, but since the Swift Go 16 features the higher-end Intel Ultra 9 185H processor, you'll get okay integrated gaming performance out of it. We played Sid Meier's Civilization VI: Gathering Storm at 1080p and the Swift Go 16 achieved an average of 48 frames per second. Considering the Zenbook S16 (63 fps) has an AMD processor, it's by far the best in gaming performance. Meanwhile the Qualcomm-powered Inspiron 14 (21 fps) and Lenovo Yoga 9i (35 fps), with a weaker Intel Core Ultra 7 155H, were a bit behind. On the 3DMark FireStrike synthetic graphics benchmark, the Swift Go 16 scored 8,642. This is better than the 6,894 category average, meanwhile, the Zenbook S16 (7,468), Inspiron 14 (5,965), and Lenovo Yoga 9i (8,468) did worse. On the Laptop Mag battery life test, which involves continuous web browsing over Wi-Fi at 150 nits, the Swift Go 16 lasted 10 hours and 35 minutes. This is close to the category average of 9 hours and 59 minutes, and it's well within the realm of what we'd recommend for solid longevity. However, the Zenbook S16 (11:35) managed to last a whole hour longer, while the Inspiron 14 (18:20) pulled an unbelievable feat off with its efficient Qualcomm processor. On the other hand, the Lenovo Yoga 9i (7:24) couldn't quite compete. The Swift Go 16's 2,560 x 1,440 webcam is crisp, snapping a detailed picture of my room with the pink on my walls looking as vibrant as it does in reality. The light coming from my lamp appeared a tad overexposed, causing my ceiling to turn blinding white, but the image was quite impressive overall. You probably won't need one of the best webcam when using this laptop. If you're worried about your laptop getting uncomfortably warm, we found that the Swift Go 16 shouldn't get too hot. During our heat tests, the touchpad was cool at 81 degrees Fahrenheit, the G/H key hit 90 degrees, and the underside was 86 degrees. This is all a good bit below our 95-degree comfort threshold, but Its hottest point was 96 degrees underneath the vents on the bottom, which is a bit toasty but still not too bad. Installed with Windows 11 and featuring Acer's built-in applications, there's not much to say about the Swift Go 16's software. Acer has never had anything too grand in this regard, with something like AcerSense offering a simple collection of features allowing you to swap system usage modes, perform laptop checkups, and swap some personal settings. There's also Acer JumpStart, which exists just to advertise things to the user, and the application does nothing but take you to Acer's website. The Swift Go 16 comes with a one-year limited warranty. You can see how Acer did in our Tech Support Showdown special report. Maintaining a solid price point while offering premium performance isn't easy, and the Acer Swift Go 16 further drives its excellence with a colorful panel, solid battery life, and decent speakers. While its panel could benefit from an increase in brightness, alongside its aluminum chassis feeling a tad thin in areas, it does more than enough to be worth its $1,199 price point. And if you're a sucker for storage (and don't want to have to open up a laptop to increase space yourself), it can be built with up to 8TB of SSD storage. If you want a 16-inch productivity laptop as an alternative, the Asus Zenbook S16 is an absolute killer. Otherwise, the Acer Swift Go 16 is still fantastic.

Lenovo IdeaPad Pro 5i 16 (Gen 9): a few stumbling blocks for an otherwise solid laptop

Why you can trust Laptop Mag Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test. The Lenovo IdeaPad Pro 5i is a consumer laptop for people needing powerful performance, a quality OLED display, and discrete graphics without sacrificing too much battery life. And to that end, the IdeaPad Pro keeps its promises and has a low starting price to boot. The IdeaPad Pro 5i offers the latest Intel Core Ultra processor with discrete Nvidia RTX graphics, an optional upgrade to the 16-inch 2K OLED display, and battery life that can easily last a full workday. However, it struggles with an uninspired design, tinny speakers, a grainy webcam, and a disappointing keyboard. But does the IdeaPad Pro 5i deliver on enough of its promises to make it onto our best laptops list? The base model of the IdeaPad Pro 5i gets you an Intel Core Ultra 5 125H processor, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 graphics, 16GB of DDR5 memory, 512GB of storage space, and a 16-inch WQXGA (2,560 x 1,600) IPS anti-glare display. That model comes with a full retail price of just $1,172. For $1,499 you get an upgrade to the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H processor, 1TB of storage space, and the 16-inch 2K (2,048 x 1,280) OLED display. The fully built model we reviewed costs $1,699 and comes with an upgraded Intel Core Ultra 9 185H processor, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 graphics card, and 32GB of DDR5 memory. The fully kitted IdeaPad Pro 5i is currently only available through B&H. Of course, you should never pay the full retail price for a Lenovo laptop, as a discount is almost always available on the Lenovo site. Most third-party retailers follow suit with the discounted pricing. I've never been thrilled by the design of the IdeaPad lineup; like many of Lenovo's designs, I just find the IdeaPads rather boring and uninspired. That said, one person's boring and uninpired is another person's understated minimalism. The IdeaPad Pro doesn't strike that balance in a way I love, but it is a simple, unassuming silver aluminum chassis in Lenovo's Artic Grey colorway. So it's uncontroversial and can fit into various environments without being too attention-grabbing. When it comes to lightweight portability, the IdeaPad Pro is remarkably light and thin for a laptop with a discrete GPU. Measuring 14.02 x 9.88 x 0.69 inches and weighing 4.38 pounds, the IdeaPad Pro isn't a backbreaker of a laptop. It may be a little chunkier than other 16-inch laptops like the Samsung Galaxy Book 4Edge, MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo, or Asus Zenbook S16 but it is packing an Nvidia RTX 4050 GPU under the hood while most of our other mainstream 16-inch laptops are rocking integrated graphics. The MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo is the lightest option, measuring 14.11 x 10.01 x 0.66 inches and weighing 3.3 pounds. Meanwhile, the Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Edge is the thinnest, measuring 13.9 x 9.8 x 0.4 inches and weighing 3.4 pounds. The Asus Zenbook S16 is solidly between those two, measuring 13.92 x 9.57 x 0.47-0.5 inches and weighing 3.31 pounds. So while the IdeaPad Pro is thicker and heavier than the competition, it doesn't come without benefit. The IdeaPad Pro 5i is portable enough to fit in any standard backpack or laptop bag. So you won't have to worry about lugging a massive machine to work or class. The IdeaPad Pro 5i features a ThunderBolt 4 port, one USB Type-C 3.2 Gen 1 port, two USB Type-A 3.2 Gen 1 ports, an HDMI 2.1 port, an SD card reader, a 3.5mm audio jack, and a proprietary Lenovo power-in port. While there are a decent amount of ports on the IdeaPad Pro, if you want to work the laptop into a permanent desktop setup, investing in one of the best USB Type-C hubs or best laptop docking stations to kit out your space would be a good idea. The IdeaPad Pro 5i features a 1080p infrared webcam that can be used for secure Windows Hello sign-in. The webcam also features a physical shutter for extra privacy. The 16-inch OLED display on our version of the IdeaPad Pro 5i is worth the upgrade. As nice as an IPS panel can get, the viewing experience of an OLED is just so much nicer, and the panel on the IdeaPad is no exception. To put the OLED display to the test, I streamed the trailer for Warner Bros. upcoming animated feature The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim. While the scenes from Peter Jackson's live-action The Lord of the Rings trilogy starts the trailer with the same stunning austerity of New Zealand's south island, the OLED panel on the IdeaPad Pro 5i shines with the animated scenes from the new The War of the Rohirrim film that follow. From the vibrant interiors of the castle of Rohan to the smoothly animated exterior fight scenes, the IdeaPad's OLED display makes an already gorgeous trailer into a true feast for the eyes. Our lab tested backed up my personal experiences with the IdeaPad, as our colorimeter measured the IdeaPad Pro 5i's display panel as covering an impressive 129.7% of the DCI-P3 color gamut with a Delta-E accuracy of 0.24. This was more vibrant than the other 16-inch mainstream laptops, with only the MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo rating as more vibrant and accurate, covering 137.9% of the DCI-P3 color gamut with an accuracy of 0.17. The Asus Zenbook S16 (79.7% with a Delta-E of 0.23) and Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Edge (81.8% with a Delta-E of 0.19) fail to cover 100 percent of the DCI-P3 color space. As for brightness, the glossy OLED panel on the IdeaPad Pro 5i wasn't the brightest 16-inch display we've ever seen, but the anti-glare coating did a solid job competing with bright overhead light glare regardless. The IdeaPad Pro 5i was measured in our labs with an average peak brightness of 366 nits, similar to the other 16-inch Windows laptops. The Galaxy Book 4 Edge was the brightest at 387 nits, while the Prestige 16 AI Evo (368 nits) and Zenbook S16 (357 nits) were much closer in brightness to the IdeaPad Pro. It may not be the first thing you think about when evaluating a laptop, but a bad keyboard can make or break the user experience. The IdeaPad Pro's keyboard has a soft, high-actuation for each key, which keeps your fingers from bottoming out when typing, but it also left me second-guessing whether I'd hit the key. While that wasn't too disruptive during most of my time with the IdeaPad Pro 5i, I took a pretty solid hit on my words per minute (WPM) average when it came to typing speed. On my standard Apple MacBook Pro 14 M1 Pro keyboard, I keep a rather stable 88 WPM average on the 10FastFingers advanced typing test, while I managed to hit only 82 WPM on the IdeaPad as I was constantly re-reading my typing input to ensure I'd hit the keys. The large 5.3 x 3.1-inch glass touchpad provided a smooth scrolling experience with the standard multi-touch gesture controls and decent palm rejection. Lenovo brands the IdeaPad Pro as a high-end consumer laptop offering the best of performance, battery life, and graphics all in a convenient package. So, for a multi-purpose consumer laptop, the audio experience is more important than on a business laptop. Thankfully, the IdeaPad Pro 5i has a Dolby Atmos-tuned four-speaker array of two woofers and two tweeters that provide a decent bit of power. On more clean tracks like summer sensation Chappel Roan's "Pink Pony Club" the IdeaPad sounds clear with defined highs, mids, and lows. However, the speakers struggle a bit with a tinny overlay on more distorted tracks like Arizona metal band Samsara's track "Relics." However, it is enough to handle video calls or a casual YouTube binge. But, if you want immersive surround sound, you're better served with one of the best computer speakers. With an Intel Core Ultra 9 185H processor and 32GB of DDR5 memory, the IdeaPad Pro 5i should have more computing power than most people need. Indeed, the laptop did keep up with my usual workload of 20+ "research" Chrome tabs, Spotify, and occasional Photoshop work. However, it occasionally struggled with scrolling through YouTube listings, which could have been thanks to the Windows Update loading in the background. Still, I found the IdeaPad a generally dependable machine with minimal issues opening applications, browsing the web, or streaming audio and video. Our lab benchmarks indicated a similar performance experience, with the IdeaPad Pro 5i scoring a Geekbench 6 single-core average of 2,553 and a multicore average of 14,123. The MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo and its Intel Core Ultra 7 155H processor put up a good fight with a single-core average of 2,434 and a multicore average of 13,310, but the Ultra 7 did lose out on a bit of single-core and multicore performance compared to the upscaled Ultra 9 processor. The AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX370 powered Asus Zenbook S16 had a better single-core performance with an average of 2,765 while it struggled a bit behind both Intel processors on multicore performance with an average of 13,282. Only the topline Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite XIE-84-100 processor in the Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Edge had better performance across both Geekbench 6 tests than the IdeaPad, with a single-core average of 2,935 and a multicore average of 15,818. On our handbrake video encoding test which tasks a laptop with transcoding the 4K version of "Tears of Steel" into a 1080p 30 FPS format, the IdeaPad Pro 5i held the top spot with a respectable 3 minutes and 47 seconds average completion time. The Galaxy Book 4 Edge was the next fastest, with an average time of 4:59 to complete the encoding. The Asus Zenbook S16 (5:08) and MSI Prestige 16 (5:27) could not complete the encoding in under 5 minutes. Finally, on our file transfer test, which involves copying a 25GB multimedia folder and timing how long the laptop takes to complete the transfer, the IdeaPad Pro took just 24 seconds to complete the task for a transfer rate of 1,113 MBps. The MSI Prestige 16 was the quickest at this test, taking just 19.2 seconds for a transfer rate of 1,400 MBps. The Galaxy Book 4 Edge was a bit behind the IdeaPad, taking 24.59 seconds to complete the test, for a transfer rate of 1,092 MBps.The Zenbook S16 was the slowest, taking 29.55 seconds for a transfer rate of 908 MBps. Generally speaking, gaming isn't why you're buying a multi-purpose mainstream laptop like the IdeaPad Pro. Of course, I tend to try gaming on all laptops regardless because I prefer to wind down at the end of the day by handling some daily or weekly tasks in my live service games of choice. The IdeaPad Pro does have a discrete Nvidia RTX 4050 GPU, but the IdeaPad is designed more for photo and video editing or STEM homework, but it is a gaming rated GPU, so I figured putting in some game time would be well worth it. As I'd discovered while testing the recent graphics overhaul in Final Fantasy XIV with the new Dawntrail expansion, the RTX 4050 on the IdeaPad Pro struggled with running new content in the MMO. Even in uncrowded zones in the new game areas on Laptop (Standard) graphics settings and 1080p resolution, the IdeaPad struggled to maintain a stable 60 FPS framerate, as it rubberbanded quite a bit between highs of over 100 FPS and lows of 40 FPS. I had quite a bit more luck getting a consistent 30+ FPS with Genshin Impact, but I've also played Genshin on smartphones so that's not the most stressful game test possible. When compared to other 16-inch consumer laptops, the IdeaPad Pro certainly has the best graphics. But then, that's comparing a discrete GPU to integrated Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm graphics chipsets which is more than a bit unfair. So naturally, our lab tests see a huge difference in graphics performance between the IdeaPad and its competitors like the Prestige 16 or Zenbook S16. On the 3DMark Fire Strike Direct X 11 benchmark, the IdeaPad Pro averaged a score of 20,956. The MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo with its integrated Intel Arc graphics put up a decent fight but still only scraped by with an average score of 8,192. The Asus Zenbook S16 with its integrated Radeon 890M graphics (7,468) and Samsung Galaxy Bok4 Edge with its integrated Qualcomm Adreno graphics (6,003) both failed to even keep up with the MSI. We also tested all four laptops on the Sid Meier's Civilization VI: Gathering Storm benchmark on medium settings, with the IdeaPad once again making a great case for why integrated GPUs just don't keep up when it comes to gaming. The IdeaPad Pro held an 122 FPS average of the Civ VI benchmark at 1080p, while the MSI Prestige 16 held out with a respectable, though much lesser, 66 FPS average. The Zenbook S16 (63 FPS) and Galaxy Book4 (24 FPS) both lagged behind in comparison. When it comes time for me to recommend laptops to friends or to readers in our buying guides, battery life is one of the most important features I look at. Laptops essentially live and die by their battery life, as the ability to browse the web or stream videos on the go is the biggest reason to opt for a laptop over a desktop. The IdeaPad Pro 5i did a decent job of keeping up with an 8-hour workday and kept up with my 20+ research Chrome tabs and light Photoshop work. Granted, it did need to rush to a wall outlet at the end of my shift, but that's not too bad for a 16-inch OLED laptop. The IdeaPad Pro 5i survived an impressive 10 hours and 31 minutes on the Laptop Mag battery test, which sets a laptop to 150 nits of brightness and sets it surfing the web across a variety of static, dynamic, and video webpages. This wasn't the longest-lasting laptop we've seen, but it has impressive battery life for a Windows laptop with an OLED display. The MSI Prestige 16 AI Evo with its 16-inch OLED panel had the best battery life of our comparison laptops, lasting 13:04 on our battery test. The Asus Zenbook S16 also features an OLED display and outlasted the IdeaPad with a battery life of 11:35. However, the Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Edge 16-inch OLED model struggled just behind the IdeaPad with a battery life of 9:56. So while the battery life of the IdeaPad Pro 5i isn't going to be hitting our list of laptops with the best battery life any time soon, it didn't do too badly. Like most FHD laptop webcams, especially those of the infrared variety, the IdeaPad Pro 5i's webcam produces a rather grainy feed with a bit of color bleed. While it's fine for the occasional video call, if you need a professional-quality webcam for presentations and video calls, I recommend using one of our best webcams instead. When operating under more normal circumstances with some web browsing, video streaming, and light Photoshop work, the IdeaPad Pro 5i didn't throw off much heat. I only noticed that the laptop got hot after a sustained gaming session, which makes sense. The RTX 4050 GPU can throw off a decent bit of heat, and the IdeaPad isn't a gaming laptop so it makes sense the laptop's fans can struggle when under sustained stress. But for even more stressful streaming sessions, the IdeaPad Pro 5i doesn't get uncomfortably hot. On the Laptop Mag heat test, which involves streaming a 4K YouTube video for at least 15 minutes before measuring the heat, the IdeaPad Pro 5i hit a high temperature of 93 degrees Fahrenheit, which peaked near the vents on the bottom of the laptop. 93 degrees is below the Laptop Mag comfort threshold of 95 degrees, but it will still feel rather toasty so you may want to avoid putting the IdeaPad directly in your lap while streaming movies or playing games. The IdeaPad Pro 5 has a 1-year warranty with courier or carry-in service, with an optional 2-year courier or carry-in service upgrade that will cover everything but the battery. If you want to see how Lenovo's customer service performed in our annual ranking, check out our Tech Support Showdown list. The laptop comes with Windows 11 Pro pre-installed, so you get the standard Microsoft applications like Office 365 and OneDrive, plus the Lenovo Vantage software suite. Even with our high-end specs, the IdeaPad Pro 5i keeps its promised relatively long-lasting battery life despite the increased power consumption of a discrete Nvidia RTX 4050 GPU and 16-inch 2K OLED display panel. Which should make it one of my favorite laptops. I love a good combination of power and efficiency, especially if it meets expectations. And yet, it's the small details that trip up the IdeaPad Pro. From a grainy IR webcam, tinny audio, mushy keyboard, and boring design, there's much to find lacking with this Lenovo laptop. While none of these faults are enough to tank the IdeaPad completely, they equate to a disappointing package. If even one of these issues were fixed, the IdeaPad Pro could be an absolute bargain of a laptop, but with the overall experience being subpar across several features, I just can't see anyone opting for the IdeaPad Pro when Lenovo offers so many other quality laptops.