Acer Launches Lightest Ever 15-inch Notebook: Swift 5 at 990 grams / 2.2 lbs
by Ian Cutress on August 29, 2018 5:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
- Acer
- Trade Shows
- Notebooks
- 8th Gen
- Whiskey Lake
- Swift 5
- IFA 2018
Everyone loves the lack of weight. Carting around a trade show, at least for me, helps the less I’m carrying, and so my work device has transitioned from a clunky beast into a light 13-inch thin-bezel with as much power and battery as I can put into it. The holy trinity of quality, battery, and weight, is hard to achieve. Acer thinks they have something at a 15-inch screen size that fits the bill.
The newest Acer Swift 5 (SF515-51T) is officially launched today as the world’s lightest 15-inch notebook. The key behind the weight saving, says Acer, is the magnesium-lithium alloy clamshell design. We’ve seen laptops with this contruction before, such as the LaVie Z, however never in a 15-inch design. Acer is planning the Swift 5 to be a ‘productivity powerhouse’, featuring 8th generation processors.
The design reminds me a lot of the Zenbook Ultimate editions, with a small hinge, but this time with much thinner screen bezels. The display on this new machine is a 1080p IPS rather than 4K (likely to help with battery), with Acer promoting an 87.6% screen-to-body ratio. The system will lie flat with its hinge, rather than a full rotation, and the full unit measures 15.9mm (0.63-inch) thick.
Under the hood, Acer is offering up to a Core i7-8565U, the latest Whiskey Lake 8th generation part, with up to 10 hours of battery life. Using the newest Whiskey Lake means also offering Intel’s 2x2 802.11ac 160 MHz Wi-Fi CRF, which Acer pairs with up to 16 GB of DDR4 and up to 1TB of NVMe PCIe storage. The keyboard is fully back lit.
Other features includes a USB 3.1 Type-C port, two USB 3.1 Type-A ports, and a HDMI port. The notebook will be available in North America in January, starting at $1099.
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timecop1818 - Thursday, August 30, 2018 - link
Noone cares how it supports lunix, but you're spot on with the fucking arrow keys. No standalone Home/PgUp/PgDown/End buttons = no sale for me.fazalmajid - Saturday, September 1, 2018 - link
Linux support is a must-have for me. Sounds like an interesting machine, MaxBook Pro 15 size screen in a MacBook weight.