It seems that LG has mastered this laptop thing. The company’s latest system, the LG Gram 14 2-in-1, is incredibly lightweight yet rugged enough to shock. Thanks to the Whiskey Lake processor, it is a serious work tool that goes beyond the limits of computer productivity. And with over 11 hours of battery life, this machine can work and play easily. It can be converted into different shapes that are suitable for different purposes and a pen is included. The LG Gram 14 is an excellent choice for mobile professionals if they can handle a screen a little dark and a weak sound. Keep reading to know about this 2-in-1 below in our LG Gram 14 Review.
LG Gram 14 Review – Design
I could barely feel the Gram 14 2 in 1 in my backpack during the trips. Since 17-inch gaming laptops were always carried at home, this lightweight machine was a welcome change. Ultimate lightness aside, the slate gray notebook does not stand out. It’s not bad, especially if you work in a buttoned atmosphere. With its rounded corners and Gram logo in the center of the lid, the awesome design of the laptop fits all environments.
By opening the lid, we discover a more discreet gray magnesium alloy. Instead of a defined depression, the keys on the keyboard are just in the middle of the keyboard. It’s a modern look that gives the impression that the keys float above an unshakeable sea of gray. Another Gram logo is located directly below the left Ctrl key, while the touchpad is located below, centered under the G and H keys. The power button, which duplicates the fingerprint reader, is hidden in the line of the function key, directly above the printed backspace key.
With its double 360-degree hinges, the Gram 14 can go from the laptop to the tent, through the tablet and support mode, and vice versa with minimal effort on your part. Although Gram is quite thin, it has enough space to accommodate a number of ports. You have a USB 3.1 port on the right, a headphone jack, a microSD card slot, a secure slot, and a button to go to sleep. On the left are another USB 3.1 port, a type C USB port, a full HDMI port, and a power connection. Unfortunately, this 2-in-1 does not offer Thunderbolt 3 support, so you will not enjoy the faster transfer speeds of the port for docks and other devices.
It is a very lightweight laptop. It is not as light as the Lenovo Yoga Book C930 (10.3 x 7.1 x 0.4 inch), but weighing 2.5 pounds is the 12.8 x 8.3 x 0.7 inches Gram 14 2-in-1 is certainly one of the notebooks I’ve seen. It is certainly lighter than Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 (2.7 lbs, 12.1 x 8.8 x 0.6 inches), Lenovo Yoga C930 (3.1 lbs, 12.6 x 8.9 x 0.6 inches) and HP Spectre Folio (3.4 kg, 12.6 x 9.2 x 0.6 inches). This lightweight design comes from the Gram 14 2-in-1 magnesium alloy chassis.
LG Gram 14 Review – Keyboard and TouchPad
“Shallow, but not bad.” That’s what we have to say about the keyboard which is an island style. With the key travel of 1.2 mm (between 1.5 mm and 2 mm is ideal) and an actuating force of 69 grams of this keyboard (60 g is our minimum). The keys were definitely at the bottom when I typed the LG Gram 14 Review. After more than 2 hours of typing, however, my fingers did not hurt, because I had a similar experience with several other keyboards.
But I have two queries to LG on this keyboard: make the backlight brighter and not reduce the backspace and the Enter key. I could hardly see the brightness of the keyboard in a dark environment and I made some more mistakes than usual, thanks to the smaller keys. Gestures such as pinch-to-zoom, scrolling with two fingers and sweeping with three fingers were a breeze on the 4.1 x 2.5-inch touchpad. And I have never seen a cursor jump by typing. The bottom corners of the touchpad were a little soft, but I could still reliably click on the left and right.
LG Gram 14 Review – Display
You get beautiful colors and crisp details on the 14-inch Gram touch screen, but it’s not as clear as I would have liked. Regina Hall’s bright red trousers and royal blue striped shirt dipped onto the 1920 x 1080 screen when I saw Little’s trailer. I could even see Benjamin Franklin’s face on the folded sofa that held Hall in her hand as she pushed a child to the floor.
The fascinating color of the panel comes from the ability to reproduce 128% of the sRGB range, reaching the highest average of laptops by 117%. This screen is also more alive than the Spectre Folio and C930, which measured respectively 119% and 100%. However, LG’s screen did not match the Surface Laptop 2 screen, with a 176% return.
As beautiful as the color of the Gram, the brightness leaves something to be desired. The average screen displays only 253 nits. This is well below the average of 322 nits and the results of the C930 (273 nits), Folio (313 nits) and Surface Laptop 2 (321 nits). Made of tough and scratch-resistant Corning Gorilla Glass, the Gram display is durable enough. It’s also very responsive. The panel kept pace with my fingers as they pinched and zoomed and created random doodles.
LG Gram 14 Review – Graphics
Although the LG Gram 14 2-in-1 represents a significant boost to the front of the processor, the Intel UHD 620 Graphics graphics processor does not offer much graphics performance, at least with current AAA titles. Still, Gram was able to play 51 frames per second on the Dirt 3 racing game, a score below the average of 74 frames per second, but far exceeding the results of the C930s (37 frames per second) and Folio (28 frames per second). The Surface Laptop 2, however, produced a much higher result and reached 82 fps.
LG Gram 14 Review – Audio
The two speakers at the bottom of the Gram are not the worst, but they are far from the best. Even with the help of the DTS software, the Gram 14 was barely filling our medium-sized office. The bass and the piano competed as I listened to Bruno Mars’ ‘Perm’, which provoked distorted instruments and overworked vocal parts.
LG Gram 14 Review – Performance
Sometimes all you need is a shot of Whiskey Lake. Armed with a 1.8 GHz Intel Core i7-8565U processor and 16GB of RAM, the LG Gram 14 has been subjected to most of our tests. There was certainly no problem broadcasting a Black Mirror episode on Netflix with 20 additional open tabs in Google Chrome, some of which streamed Twitch streams, TweetDeck videos, and YouTube.
The laptop continued to run our tests and scored an impressive 15,943 in the Geekbench 4.1 overall performance test. This is well above the average of 12,856 premium notebooks. Kaby Lake chips such as the Core i7-8550U and Core i7-8500Y of the C930 (14,739) and Folio (8,090) outperform. The Surface Laptop 2 and the Core i5-8250U remained behind and scored 12,744.
However, the tables activated the Gram 14 during the Excel spreadsheet test. It took 1 minute and 25 seconds for the notebook to match 65,000 names and addresses. It was enough to beat the 1:31 average and 3:37 of the Folio. But the Surface Laptop 2 (1:15) and the C930 were faster, while the latter only opened at 4 seconds before.
Gram found its base in the file transfer test with its 512 GB SATA M.2 SSD, which took 13 seconds to duplicate 4.97 GB of mixed media files. This is a transfer rate of 391 megabytes per second. This result is below the average of 526.8 Mbps, but that is to be expected with powerful machines like the MacBook Pro 13. The gram is always better than the 339.3, 318 and 203 Mbps that slow down the C930 (256GB SSD NVMe), the Folio (256GB SSD) and the Laptop Surface 2 (SSD 256GB M.2 PCIe NVMe).
LG Gram 14 Review – Battery Life
You can spend a full day of work and then with Gram. The LG Gram 14 lasted 11 hours and 28 minutes on our battery test (which includes continuous web browsing via Wi-Fi). It’s almost 3 hours longer than the category average of high-end laptops at 8:31. The Folio came in second at 10:18, with the Surface Laptop 2 in 9:22 and the C930 in 8:09. With such a decent battery life, you can take this laptop with confidence in your college or office, without carrying your charger.
LG Gram 14 Review – Heat
Although it has only two small vents, the LG Gram 14 has remained relatively cool throughout our tests. Once the system ran Full HD video for 15 minutes, the touchpad, center, and bottom of the system measured 80, 97 and 95 degrees Fahrenheit, respectively. The center was slightly warmer than our 95 degree comfort threshold, but after more than 2 hours of use, I did not experience any side effects. This is fine for a notebook so thin and light.
LG Gram 14 Review – Conclusion
With its three main highlights, “formidable performance, exceptional battery life, and convertible versatility”, the LG Gram 14 2-in-1 proves that LG is at the center of discussions on high-end notebooks. For the money, though, I was expecting a brighter display, especially because the colors are not so vivid. And the audio of the laptop can certainly be improved. You can buy the Lenovo Yoga C930, which offers similar performance and better display, even if you will have a considerable impact on the battery life. But if you’re looking for a powerful, versatile and lightweight system that can be used most of the day and part of the night, it’s hard to beat the LG Gram 14 2-in-1.
That’s it with our LG Gram 14 Review. Do you like this laptop? Share your thoughts with us in the comments box below.
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