The Acer Swift laptop series is well-known for its laptop offerings that combine a thin and light design along with powerful internal components specifically for everyday productivity purposes in and out of the office.
Acer Swift X 14 was introduced in 2021 as a laptop that combines productivity and leisure capabilities in a laptop that not only has powerful performance in various aspects, but is still compact enough to carry and use anywhere.
We were given the opportunity to review the third generation Acer Swift X 14 laptop which combines the latest components from Intel and NVIDIA for both productivity and leisure purposes.
Design And Specifications
Acer Swift X 14 (2023)
14″ 2.8K (2880×1800) OLED screen, 120Hz
Intel Core i7-13700H CPU
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 GPU
RAM 32GB LPDDR5-5200
Internal Load 1TB M.2 2242 PCIe Gen4
1080p Primary Camera
I/O 2x USB-A 3.2 Gen
2x USB-C Thunderbolt 4
1x HDMI 2.1
76 Wh Battery (4 Cells)
100W charging
SIM/Telephony None
WiFi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac/6E
Audio Jack Yes
Waterproof None
Scan System Windows Hello face scan
Selling Price RM5999
Starting with the screen display of this Acer Swift X 14, it is equipped with a 14-inch OLED display with a resolution of 2880×1800 and a refresh rate of 120Hz. It also comes with a 16:10 display ratio which makes this computer display taller and this helps in loading more content in the display.
The frame of this laptop is made of aluminum and comes with a thickness of 17.9mm with a weight of only 1.55kg, making it light enough to be used anywhere; at home, office, or your favorite coffee shop.
In terms of plug options, the Acer Swift X 14 is loaded with two Thunderbolt 4 plugs that not only promise fast data transmission and reading rates, but also laptop charging. It also has two USB 3.2 Type-A plugs. one HDMI 2.1 plug and a built-in Micro SD card reader.
Charging of this laptop is done using one of the two Thunderbolt 4 plugs, and you will need at least a 100W charger to properly charge this laptop's battery. You can use a 65W charger, but will receive a warning that charging is too slow.
If you do activities that use both CPU and GPU components, you will need to use more powerful charging, such as what Acer already offers.
Acer is also a company that emphasizes the use of sustainable components, and on the Acer Swift X 14, the laptop's touchpad is constructed using OceanGlass, a material developed using glass recycled from ocean waste.
In terms of specifications, this laptop is powered by an Intel Core i7-13700H processing chip with 32GB LPDDR5 memory and 1TB PCIe Gen4 SSD storage. It also has a built-in NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 graphics card that is powerful enough to run computer games at 1080p resolution, as well as to edit and process videos at high resolution.
This is because the Acer Swift X 14 comes with NVIDIA GeForce RTX Studio certification. Technically, depending on your usage, you can install GeForce RTX Gaming or GeForce RTX Studio software on this laptop without any problems.
For this review, I used the GeForce RTX Gaming software to maximize the gaming capabilities of this laptop, and I will explain my thoughts on it in the paragraphs below.
User Experience
I can honestly say that it took me some time to get used to using this Acer Swift X 14 as my main work machine. Having used laptops like the Acer Swift 5 and ASUS ExpertBook B9, the combination of thinness and lightness of these laptops is something that is hard to match.
But I will also say that when I used this laptop for 2-3 weeks, this thing stopped bothering me, and I now prefer to have a laptop with more powerful processing power, even if it is 1.5 times thicker than a computer my lap before.
The use of an OLED screen display is also another excellent upgrade. A brightness value of 500 nits and DisplayHDR True Black 500 support promises a more immersive viewing experience for video streaming and computer games, but what really helps me is that I can set this display's brightness value to 50 percent, and it's still bright enough to use comfortably, in addition to saving battery power.
The 16:10 display ratio also helps me in my daily report writing and review tasks. The WordPress platform now has a lot of side menus now it doesn't look so dense anymore, and I can read and write more content without having to scroll through the menu and even the website.
This laptop keyboard is just average in my opinion. This laptop touchpad is probably one of my favorites for a Windows laptop. Although it is not very large, it is comfortable to use, and accurately tracks the number of fingers used.
The use of an Intel Core i7-13700H processing chip on this laptop, along with 32GB of RAM ensures that I can open as many Microsoft Edge tabs as I want, and I don't have to worry about the computer slowing down. A large amount of memory also allows the tabs of this website to not face the problem of needing to be refreshed to ensure that the computer runs well.
Gaming
The laptop comes with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 graphics card that comes with 6GB of GDDR6 memory, and I used it to play some games that I've recently gotten back into.
Final Fantasy XIV and Diablo IV are two of those games, and yes, these two games don't really require such high graphics capabilities, but for a laptop like this, the presence of the graphics card helps in providing a comfortable medium-class gaming experience.
Both of these computer games can be played at Full HD resolution with a combination of medium and high settings without problems, and they can still be moved at a rate of 60FPS.
Just for this purpose, my recommendation is to use the provided USB-C charger so that you can get the best performance, because the built-in battery will not be able to cover the power required to power the games that require the power of the graphics card.
In the meantime, it is also not surprising if I say that the keyboard surface of this laptop will get hot when you play computer games with it.
In terms of the cooling system, this Acer Swift X 14 uses a Stereo Ring Fan to cool the components, and yes, for normal activities such as surfing the web, watching videos and daily productive tasks, this laptop is seen to operate quietly, and parts the keyboard is also just lukewarm.
But as said, if it moves hard tasks like computer games, or video processing, these fans will rotate very fast and strong to flow the hot air from the laptop.
Bench mark
Here are some of the benchmark tests we used to show the performance level of this laptop:
PCMark 10
3DMark (FireStrike Extreme)
CrystalDiskMark
Audio
The Acer Swift X 14 is loaded with speakers with DTS support, which throughout my use of this laptop, I would say that it is quite loud, but unfortunately lacking in terms of bass levels.
This isn't to say that these laptop speakers are bad, but they aren't the replacement for the premium class speakers you might expect.
Battery
One of the downsides to this laptop for me is the battery life. As a productivity laptop, I would typically expect a laptop to run for around 9 -10 hours on a full charge.
With the Acer Swift X 14, I can get around 5-6 hours of battery life on a full charge. When I looked for information on this, I found that this laptop does not support NVIDIA Optimus technology, which the Intel Xe graphics chip will activate when no high graphics requirements are required.
This can be seen as the main reason why the battery life is relatively poor. It is possible that if this laptop comes with support for NVIDIA Optimus, this laptop battery could last an extra hour or two.
What's good is that at least this laptop can charge fast. Using the USB-C charger that comes with this laptop, it can be charged from almost empty to full in under two hours.
What's In The Box
As a measure to reduce the use of unnecessary materials, Acer laptop box packaging has recently been seen with packaging and minimal accessories that do not take up space.
Acer Swift X 14
USB-C charger
Closing
The Acer Swift X 14 is a laptop that in my opinion is a near perfect replacement for all my productivity and leisure needs. The design of this laptop might be a little thick, but it's still light enough for me to carry around in my backpack along with my compact 100W GaN charger without a problem.
The slightly short battery life of this laptop may be a bit of a concern, but the Acer Swift X 14's bright enough OLED display allows you to lower the brightness value to extend the life.
At a price of RM5999, you might feel that a mid-range laptop might be worth more, but not many gaming laptops in this class offer the capabilities of this Acer laptop in terms of compact design and performance.
Pros:
Compact design
Powerful specs
Bright OLED display
USB-C charging
I/O options are sufficient
Cons:
Not very long battery life
Speaker audio quality
The cooling system is difficult to cope with the heat of both CPU and GPU components