03 Nov
Blog

How To Get Skinny Fast Without Hampering Your Health

Given the current pandemic situation caused by the COVID 19 outbreak, many people are suffering both mentally and physically. We are having a hard time surviving this pandemic and so our only focus should be on surviving. But we're only human, so we can't resist thinking about the extra weight we've put on over the past few years. Since most of us are unable to exercise due to limitations and are forced to sit idly at home, the extra weight seems to accumulate on its own.

So, in order to get rid of all that extra fat that has accumulated, one must follow certain diet and fitness restrictions. Also, if you want to know how to get thin quickly and do what is necessary, this article is sure to be useful for you. We've provided a lot of the information necessary to achieve the goal of getting slim fast, but there are also a lot of rules you should follow. Fortunately, we're going to cover everything you need to know in order to achieve your goal of losing that extra accumulated body fat in no time. So what are you waiting for? Please read this article to the end as we promise it will be well worth your time!

How to get slim fast and achieve the perfect body figure effectively?

If you are looking for tips and advice on how to get thin and lose all unhealthy fats, you've come to the right place. We want you to take a back seat and read this article carefully as we are disclosing some important and helpful information that you certainly haven't heard of. All you have to do is read it carefully and you are good to go.

Tips to keep in mind if you want to know how to thin yourself quickly:

Some constructive and amazing prices are on your doorstep right now. So read them carefully, and especially if you want to get skinny efficiently and healthily, put them into practice.

Commit to the goal
The first thing you need to know about getting thin fast is that it is not a process that should be rushed. Instead, it is a gradual process that requires patience and steady peace of mind. Many advertisements are sure to tell you that you will lose a lot of body weight in a short period of time. But that's all fake. Studies have shown you can lose up to 1 to 2 pounds a week with the right nutrition plans and fitness routines.

If you really want to get rid of the unhealthy fat, you need to remain committed and patient throughout the journey. Hard work and a dedication to success are all it takes to achieve your desired goals.

Set a certain regular calorie limit and stick to it
Excessive training or a reduction in consumption will not get you anywhere near your goal. So if you are planning on losing at least 1 to 2 pounds a week, you need to burn at least 1000 calories a day. The two things that you need to do in order to burn calories and achieve your goal of getting thin fast are reducing calories and adding some exercise to your daily schedule. However, reducing calories shouldn't get in the way of meeting your daily nutritional needs.

Make sure you avoid any liquid source of calories
Consuming caffeinated, sugary drinks, or even alcohol can prevent you from achieving your desired motive. If you don't want to sabotage your goal, avoid glasses high in sugar or high sodium. Instead, you should drink plenty of water as it not only quenches your drink cravings, but also helps you stay hydrated and brings you one step closer to weight loss. If you want to add some flavor to your water, you can also add a slice of fruit to enhance it further.

Keep your body in an active state every day.
As we all know, moderate exercise brings you one step closer to weight loss. So regular physical activity, not excessively but in a limited way, will really help. Even if you do 30 minutes of aerobic exercise, you can lose body fat. This will likely improve your mood, lower blood pressure, and improve your cardiovascular functions as well. So you should try.

Avoid consuming processed foods
If your goal is to lose weight and get thin, avoid consuming processed foods. Since they're full of preservatives, artificial flavors, and unhealthy fats, it's best to cut back on their consumption. Plus, they're loaded with calories and have almost no nutritional deficiencies.

frequently asked Questions

  1. How do you get thin naturally quickly?
    Here are some tips to help you get thin faster and more efficiently:
  • Make sure you drink water before meals
  • Do not eat hastily; Instead, do it slowly
  • Avoid preserving drinks and consume naturally pressed fruit juice instead.
  • Make sure you eat high fiber and whole meals and avoid skipping meals.
  1. What Are Some Unhealthy Ways To Get Thin Fast?
    Some unhealthy ways to lose extra body weight and get thin quickly are listed below:
  • Skipping daily food needs
  • Consume only beverages for weight loss and avoid water
  • Taking dietary supplements without the consent and consultation of a doctor
  • Exercise without eating.
  1. How do you get thin quickly without exercise?
    Here are some scientifically proven ways to get thin urgently without exercise:
  • Make sure you chew slowly and efficiently
  • Eat lots of high protein foods
  • Drink water regularly and occasionally.
23 Sep
Blog

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 Review: Fast, But Flawed

Opened Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 sitting on the floor.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4

RRP $ 2,095.00

"The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 is not a perfect performer, but there is a lot to like."

advantages

  • Excellent workmanship

  • Superior entry-level display

  • Solid performance

  • Good keyboard and touchpad

  • Very powerful configuration options

disadvantage

  • Performance was inconsistent

  • Battery life was average

Lenovo's most powerful non-workstation ThinkPad is the ThinkPad X1 Extreme, an earlier 15-inch laptop that served as a strong competitor to the Dell XPS 15 and other high-performance laptops in its class. The fastest components and the most aggressive thermal designs can be found in the ThinkPad X1 Extreme, something Lenovo took to extremes with the fourth generation.

Not only has the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 increased performance, but it has also joined the movement of the larger displays and features a slightly larger 16-inch 16:10 display, while at the same time being roughly the same size as the previous generation fits.

I tested a ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 with an Intel Core i7-11800H and Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060, which costs $ 2,095. You can also choose up to a Core i9-11950H with vPro and an RTX 3080, which further improves the laptop's theoretical performance and even outperforms the impressive Dell XPS 17 in terms of pure performance. As I found out in this review, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 is a fast premium notebook – but according to my tests it has some performance weaknesses that take away some of its clout.

draft

View of the lid of an opened Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4.Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3 was 14.24 "x 9.67" x 0.72 "and weighed 3.75 pounds. The new Gen 4 model is 14.13 inches by 9.99 inches by 0.70 inches and weighs 3.99 pounds. Aside from adding a tiny bit of depth thanks to the taller display and a quarter pound of weight, Lenovo did what it set out to do: a 16:10 16-inch display the same size as the previous 15.6 – Pack inch display. Inch generation.

The thing is, it's still a lot bigger than the Dell XPS 15, which comes in at 13.57 "x 9.06" x 0.71 "and a slightly heavier 4.22 pounds. If you put the two next to each other, the ThinkPad looks huge in comparison. This is mainly due to the larger bezels of the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4, which also give it an old-school look with the modern, higher display. A new competitor, the MSI Creator Z16, also has a 16:10 16-inch display and measures 14.13 inches by 10.08 inches by 0.64 inches and weighs 5.07 pounds. Its bezels are a bit smaller than the ThinkPad's, but it's still deeper – just imagine.

All in all, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 looks like a large laptop, but it doesn't feel like it thanks to its light weight. It's made of an aluminum alloy on the lower chassis (with some plastic parts) and contains four layers of reinforced carbon fiber in the lid. I'm not sure how Lenovo kept the weight down without using a magnesium alloy, but they succeeded and the laptop sits comfortably in the hand. It has the usual soft-touch coating on the ThinkPad and is extremely comfortable to hold.

The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 looks like a ThinkPad.

It's also pretty stiff, with just the slightest flexing of the lid if you try hard enough, and without giving way to the keyboard deck or the bottom of the case. The Dell XPS 15 is all around stiff, which makes it feel more solid, but there is no significant difference. The Gen 4 model is at least as robust as the Gen 3, making it one of the class leaders in terms of build quality – and it offers the usual MIL-STD 810g certification for robustness.

Aesthetically, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 looks like a ThinkPad. It is completely black with just a few red accents in the X1 logo on the lid, the red LED dot on the "i" in the ThinkPad logo, the red TrackPoint stud in the middle of the keyboard and accents on the edges of the TrackPoint buttons. My test device came with a display with WQXGA resolution (2,560 x 1,600), so the lid was simply black.

Choose one of the 4K + WQUXGA (3840 x 2400) displays and you get a carbon fiber fabric to add some pizzazz to the lid. Overall, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 has an attractive and bold look, and if you like the ThinkPad aesthetics, this is your one for sure. The XPS 15 looks more modern and slimmer overall, and overall more attractive, especially with the white fiberglass keyboard deck, but the ThinkPad aims at and achieves its own appearance.

The MSI Creator Z16 has a more straightforward aesthetic in the case. Nevertheless, it integrates RGB lighting into the keyboard, making it the exact opposite of the conservative ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4, at least when you open the lid and switch on the keyboard lighting.

Charging connector, 2 micro USB ports, HDMI port and headphone jack on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4.

Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Hinges on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 Aptop.

Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 ports: SD card slot and 2 USB ports.

Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Connectivity remains a strength, with a proprietary power port (that supports a 230 watt power adapter), two USB-Cs with Thunderbolt 4 ports, a full-size HDMI 2.0 or 2.1 port (depending on the model), and a 3, 5mm audio jack on the left and two USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 ports and a full-size SD card reader on the right. Wireless connectivity is provided by the latest and fastest Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.2, and you can configure WWAN support through an optional nano-SIM slot.

power

Lenovo didn't mess around when developing the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4's performance profile. You can configure up to a Core i9-11950H with vPro in the CPU department and up to an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Max-Q in the GPU department. There is no other 15- or 16-inch laptop that I know of that is as powerful outside of slot machines.

My test device was equipped with a Core i7-11800H and an RTX 3060 and thus more powerful than the Dell XPS 15 and identical to the MSI Creator Z16. Unfortunately, Lenovo sent me a machine with only one 16 GB RAM stick installed, which limits the memory to single-channel performance. As we shall see, this had effects that were not immediately apparent.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4.Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

In Geekbench 5, the ThinkPad does well enough, just behind the MSI Creator Z16 and the Dell XPS 15. It beats the MSI and Dell by a few in our Handbrake test, which encodes a 420 MB video as H.265 Seconds. And it was also clearly ahead of the XPS 15 and the Z16 in Cinebench R23. So far, so good. Only the Lenovo Legion 5 Pro with its Ryzen 7 5800H – a fast processor for compute-intensive tasks – stood out in our comparison group.

The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 was in the midfield in PCMark 10, faster than the XPS 15, but slower than the Z16. It was able to keep up in the areas of essentials and productivity of the test, but lagged behind the MSI Creator Z16 in content creation (but before the Dell XPS 15). Again, according to the benchmarks reported so far, there were no red flags in terms of performance.

If you buy this laptop, make sure you tick Dual Channel RAM in the configurator.

However, when I switched to the Pugetbench benchmark running in Adobe Premiere Pro, things got a little strange. The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 achieved an extremely low value of 432 in this test, which uses both CPU and GPU. The Dell XPS 15 with Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti achieved 509 in standard mode (and 590 in performance mode), the MSI Creator Z16 was faster at 732, only reaching 54.5 compared to the 119.1 from MSI and 74.8 from Dell.

It turned out that the single-channel RAM caused such a low score in this benchmark. Lenovo tested an identical device with two 16 GB RAM sticks and dual-channel storage and gave it 642 points. To be honest, that's still low for the CPU and GPU, especially with 32 GB of RAM, well below the MSI Creator Z16 (also with 32 GB) and only a bit better than the XPS 15 in performance mode. But it's better than my test device. If you buy this laptop, make sure you tick Dual Channel RAM in the configurator.

I was happy with the performance of the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 until I hit the Pugetbench results. This laptop is intended for developers running CPU and GPU intensive applications like Premiere Pro, and the ThinkPad didn't do as well as I expected even when configured with faster RAM performance. I have no idea how well the Core i9 version might do, and you can increase the overall performance in these apps by opting for an RTX 3070 or 3080. The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 will likely be the fastest laptop in this comparison group when it is at full capacity. Note, however, that if configured similarly, it won't be the fastest laptop when compared to the competition. Note that if you choose to mirror, you can add a second solid-state drive (SSD) to the machine for additional storage or redundancy.

Laptop 3DMark time spy Cinebench R23 Underdog Bench 5 Handbrake
(Seconds)		 PCMark 10 Fourteen days
(1080p epic)		 Civilization VI (1080p Ultra)
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 (Core i7-11800H) 6691 1519/10497 1520/7353 99 6251 85 fps (1920 x 1200) Wouldn't run
Dell XPS 15 OLED 2021 (Core i7-11800H) 4540 1513/9979 1544/7692 101 6024 50 fps 73 fps
MSI Creator Z16 (Core i7-11800H) 6322 1444/9615 1540/7625 103 6486 59 fps (1920 x 1200) 92 fps
Dell XPS 17 (Core i7-11800H) 7039 1525/10145 1568/8801 n / A 6209 78 fps 104 fps
LG gram 16 (Core i7-1165G7) 1390 1394/4137 1573/5454 213 4827 13 fps n / A
Lenovo Legion 5 Pro (Ryzen7 5800H) 9175 1430/11195 1460/7227 99 n / A 101 fps 114 fps

Considering the RTX 3060 and the fast CPU, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 should be a good entry-level gaming device. That's how my tests went for the most part. Unfortunately, the ThinkPad Civilization VI would not run without a crash, so I am unable to report any results for this game. In Assassin's Creed Valhalla, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 hit 53 frames per second (fps) in 1080p and high graphics, much slower than the MSI Creator Z16's 82 fps, but that gap narrowed as I went up in resolution and graphics. At 1600p and ultra-high graphics, the ThinkPad managed 39 fps compared to 45 fps on the Z16.

I saw similar results with Battlefield V, where the ThinkPad achieved 69 fps at 1080p and medium graphics compared to the MSI at 81 fps. Then the ThinkPad was faster at 1600p and ultra graphics at 56 fps versus 43 fps. Finally, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 massacred the MSI Creator Z16 in Fortnite, reaching 85 fps at 1200p and epic graphics versus 59 fps. The same discrepancy was shown for the rest of the tested resolutions and graphics settings.

You will find that the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 is a competent, but not class-leading gaming laptop for modern titles at reasonable resolutions and graphics settings. You can probably play most games at 1600p with medium to high graphics, as long as you are willing to accept lower frame rates or turn things down a bit, and you get very playable performance. You may find some inconsistencies like I did, but overall you will be able to play along with your work.

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The display of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 laptop.Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Lenovo offers several 16:10 16-inch displays for the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4, WQXGA (2,560 x 1,600) IPS, WQUXGA (3,840 x 2,400) with Dolby Vision and WQUXGA touch display with Dolby Vision. My test device equipped the entry-level WQXGA display, which is better for battery life, but not as sharp. When I used the laptop during the test, I found the display a delight, with lots of brightness and contrast, and colors that pop but didn't seem inaccurate. It's not an OLED, but it was excellent for an IPS display.

My colorimeter agreed. It's incredibly bright at 468 nits, well above our 300 nit threshold, which is better than the 385 nits of the MSI Creator Z16's IPS WQUXGA panel and the 381 nits of the Dell XPS 15's 3.5K OLED display The contrast of the ThinkPad was very good for an IPS display at 1,240: 1 (above our preferred contrast ratio of 1000: 1), whereas the MSI was disappointing at 800: 1 and the Dell was spectacular at 381,130: 1 (typically OLED) .

The ThinkPad also stood out among the entry-level IPS displays with a color width of 82% AdobeRGB and 100% sRGB. You probably get better colors with the WQUXGA options, but those numbers are good enough that developers could use this display. The MSI was better with 91% AdobeRGB and 100% sRGB, and thanks to its OLED technology, the Dell again did excellent with 99% AdobeRGB and 100% sRGB. The colors of the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 were also very accurate with a DeltaE of 0.81 (less than 1.0 is excellent), with MSI achieving 0.76 and Dell 0.46.

Loudspeaker on the right of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4.Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The ThinkPad's two upward-facing speakers on either side of the keyboard produce a lot of volume when turned all the way up, and there was no distortion. The mids and highs were clear and there was a hint of bass. The Dell XPS 15's quad speakers are better, but the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4's audio system is sufficient for Netflix on its own. However, you will need headphones for the best quality music.

Keyboard and touchpad

Open the lid and you will find the typical ThinkPad keyboard. It has a lot of travel at 1.8mm, molded keys with large keycaps and good key spacing, and switches that are snappy and precise. It feels like most ThinkPad keyboards, and my only complaint is that the keys take more pressure than I want to press. I find it more tiring during long typing sessions than the lighter keyboard on the Specter range from HP or the Dell XPS 15, and I found that the keyboard on the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9 also has a lighter stroke than I preferred. If you don't mind, or maybe even prefer, a stiffer mechanism, then this keyboard will appeal to you.

The keyboard of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4.Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The TrackPoint knob in the middle of the keyboard works well as usual, but the keys take up the same space on the touchpad. You'll be happy if you like this cursor control method, but I'd rather skip it and have a bigger touchpad. Speaking of which, the touchpad is a decent size, but nowhere near the massive version of the Dell XPS 15. It was sleek and responsive, with Microsoft Precision touchpad support, but I wish it was bigger given all the palm rest space.

Windows 10 Hello passwordless login is provided by a fingerprint reader built into the power button that works quickly and logs you in immediately when you turn on the device. There is an optional infrared camera for facial recognition that my test device did not have. There's also the Lenovo ThinkShutter physical webcam privacy slider, which is old-fashioned compared to some electronic versions you'll find on some other laptops like the HP Specter, but it works.

Close-up on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 webcam.Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Battery life

The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 has a 90 watt hour battery, which is a lot. The 16-inch WQXGA display should have better battery life than the UHD + version, but the components aren't particularly energy efficient. In addition, except for the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9, the battery life of the ThinkPad was disappointing and I wasn't expecting too much.

The ThinkPad managed just under 7.5 hours in our web browser test, well below the 10 hours we like to see. Nevertheless, the MSI Creator Z16 (also with a WQXGA display and 90 watt hour battery) only lasts 5.3 hours. The Dell XPS 15 with its 3.5K OLED display and 84 watt hours was more powerful with nine hours. In our video looping test, which played a local Full HD movie trailer, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 lasted just over nine hours, again better than the eight hours of the MSI, but behind the 11 hours of the XPS 15.

If you keep your workload low, you might make it by evening, but I wouldn't count on that.

I also ran the PCMark 10 Applications battery test, which is the best indicator of productivity battery life. The ThinkPad lasted 8.75 hours, a low score compared to the average laptop that lasted 10 hours or more in this test. The XPS 15 was worse at eight hours, and we didn't run the MSI through this test. In the PCMark 10 gaming battery test, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 managed just under 90 minutes, compared to the XPS 15 with three minutes less (again we did not run this test on the MSI Creator Z16). In my experience, this test shows how hard a laptop works on battery rather than absolute longevity, and the ThinkPad is one of those laptops that seem to maintain speed even when switched off.

Overall, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 was not a bad battery performance in view of the 16-inch WQXGA display and the high-end components. It's unlikely to get you through a full day of work on a single charge, and the Power Brick is pretty big to take with you, but that's the price you pay for so much power. If you keep your workload low, you might make it by evening, but I wouldn't count on that.

Our opinion

The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 lives up to its title. It's the most powerful ThinkPad you can buy, and in a completely different class from most ThinkPads designed for standard productivity performance. Since you can configure it with a Core i9 and an RTX 3080 Max-Q, there is no other non-gaming laptop in the same class that can compete with bare specs.

At the same time, the performance is less than it should be, at least in the one benchmark that provides the best example of the laptop's performance in creative apps from practice. And its gaming performance is inconsistent. If you can live with these limitations, you'll love the look and feel and build quality, probably love the keyboard and touchpad, and even the entry-level display is excellent. You will just be a little unsure how the laptop will work in your given workflow.

Are there alternatives?

A solid alternative in terms of its aesthetics and build quality, the Dell XPS 15 offers good performance and a stunning 3.5K OLED display option. It's about the same price as configured, so you're sacrificing some performance for the XPS 15's superb design.

The MSI Creator Z16 is another option that has better performance in most tests (except for some games), but not as good battery life. With a similar configuration, it's more expensive at $ 2,549, but you get better Premiere Pro performance that creators will like.

After all, the Apple MacBook Pro 16 is a solid choice in the 16-inch class, but the Intel version won't keep up with the ThinkPad, especially if you configure the Lenovo to the maximum. The rumored M1X MacBook Pro might be worth considering, however.

How long it will take?

The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 is well built and should be in use for years. The components are up to date and should keep Windows 10 (and 11) running. However, the 1 year warranty is very disappointing for this class of notebooks.

The one-year warranty is disappointing for such an expensive notebook, but it still offers on-site service.

Should you buy it?

Yes sir. If you're a ThinkPad fanatic and looking for the fastest model you can buy, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 4 won't disappoint. If you're not a ThinkPad fan, your decision will be a little tougher – but in the end, this is a viable option compared to the competition.

Editor's recommendations



28 Jun
Blog

Asus VivoBook Flip 14 Review: A Fast, Cheap AMD Laptop

Asus Vivobook Flip 14 review 3

Asus VivoBook Flip 14 2021

"The Asus VivoBook Flip 14 is a powerful budget laptop despite the disappointing display and build quality."

  • Outstanding productivity performance

  • Mostly attractive aesthetics

  • Affordable

  • Active pen is bundled

  • Upgradable RAM and storage

  • Mediocre build quality

  • Glossy display

  • Below average battery life

Everyone likes a good budget laptop. They may not seem as exciting as the latest and greatest, but budget-conscious laptops have their place. Not everyone has the resources or the need for a laptop that costs well over $ 1,000, but everyone deserves great things. Finding a diamond in the rough can be a lot of fun.

Most manufacturers have a distinct budget lineup, and in Asus' case, that's the VivoBook. The company recently launched the updated VivoBook Flip 14, an AMD-powered 360-degree convertible 2-in-1 designed to deliver solid performance and an exciting experience at a low laptop price.

I checked the VivoBook Flip 14 configuration for $ 629 (if Asus offers it on their website, it will sell for $ 600) which has an AMD Ryzen 5 5500U CPU, 8GB of RAM, a 512GB PCIe -SSD and a 14-inch IPS Full HD (1,920 x 1,080) display in the increasingly old-fashioned 16: 9 aspect ratio. You can also get a version with a 256GB SSD for just $ 529. Attractive features for the price, but does the VivoBook Flip 14 keep its value proposition?

design

The VivoBook Flip 14 is mostly made of plastic, with the lid lined with an aluminum alloy. You don't have to buy plastic for this price, but it's not uncommon. Unfortunately, the build quality was not up to the usual Asus standard, with a lid that bends with too little force and can cause LCD distortion, quite a bit of flex in the keyboard deck, and a case base that yields to pressure. The similarly priced Acer Swift 3 is more solidly built, and for around $ 300 you can grab the HP Envy x360 13, which is also much better built – unsurprisingly, both machines are on our list of best budget laptops . You won't find many 14-inch 2-in-1s at this price level, so I can't think of a direct comparison that we tested.

Aesthetically, the VivoBook Flip 14 is a little more impressive, if a little strange at the same time. It comes in a “Bespoke Black” color scheme that covers 99% of the chassis. There's a bright silver logo on the lid and some chrome bars around the touchpad, but that's mostly it. It is strange that the Enter key has a lime green border and lettering and stands out rather boldly – but at the same time I would say garish. And it's the only element on the laptop that bears that color, so it's not part of a theme.

If you're usually struggling to find Enter, the bold color scheme helps, but I usually don't run into this predicament so the color scheme detracts from the aesthetic for me. Still, I think the VivoBook Flip 14 looks better than the Swift 3 and is on par with the Envy x360 13. In fact, it's as attractive as a more expensive notebook like the MSI Prestige 14 Evo and has a more distinctive look than the Lenovo Yoga 7i 14 2-in-1, which is also about $ 300 more expensive.

The bezels are a bit big with a screen-to-body ratio of 82%. Premium laptops tend to be 90% or better, but the VivoBook Flip 14 isn't bad for a budget device. That makes the chassis a bit bigger, and it's not the thinnest or lightest 14-inch laptop at 0.72 inches and 3.31 pounds. The Yoga 7i comes in at 0.69 inches and 3.09 pounds, while the MSI Prestige 14 is 0.63 inches thick and weighs 2.85 pounds.

The Acer Swift 5, another 14-inch clamshell, is just 0.59 inches thick and fairly light at 2.31 pounds – it's also twice as expensive. Looking at our budget competition, the Acer Swift 3 is 0.63 inches thick and weighs 2.65 pounds, and the HP Envy x360 13 is 0.65 inches thick and weighs 2.92 pounds. Obviously, the VivoBook Flip 14 doesn't win the thin and easy battle.

Asus built its ErgoLift hinge into the VivoBook Flip 14, which is a nice touch considering the overall complexity of the 360-degree hinge. It works well, raises the keyboard deck to a more comfortable typing angle, and theoretically offers additional space for air to circulate – except there are no vents on the bottom of the laptop. Rather, the air is sucked in via the keyboard, so that the usual thermal advantages are not available. Anyway, the hinge is a bit stiff and the lid takes two hands to open, but it keeps the display in place in clamshell, tent, media, and tablet modes.

Asus has also built in some upgrade options. The SSD slot is easily accessible if you ever want to upgrade the memory, and of the test device's 8 GB of RAM, 4 GB is soldered to the motherboard and the other 4 GB is plugged in. So you can swap this out for an 8 GB chip if necessary and increase your RAM to 12 GB. A maximum of 16 GB is available, which of course has to be configured when ordering the laptop.

Connectivity is good, with a USB-A 2.0 port, a USB-A 3.2 port, a USB-C Gen 2 port, a full-size HDMI 1.4 port, a 3.5mm audio jack and a microSD card reader. A proprietary connector provides power, and given the AMD chipset, there is no Thunderbolt support. Wireless connectivity is a bit behind the times with Wi-Fi 5 and Bluetooth 4.2.

performance

The VivoBook Flip 14 featured the first six-core Ryzen 5 5500U CPU we tested, and I was curious to see how it compares to the various Tiger Lake variants from Intel and the Ryzen 7 series. I got away impressed.

It didn't dominate Geekbench 5, with the lower single-core score typical of AMD chips and the more competitive multi-core score. It landed in third place in the comparison group, behind the Asus ZenBook 13 UM325UA with an eight-core Ryzen 7 5800U, which dominated, and the MSI Prestige 14 Evo with its four-core Intel Core i7-1185G7. In PCMark 10, the VivoBook Flip 14 took second place behind the ZenBook 13 and did particularly well in the content creation of this test. Accordingly, the Ryzen 5 5500U is competitive with Intel's Core i7 and significantly faster than the Core i5.

The VivoBook Flip 14 was particularly convincing in two particularly compute-intensive apps, Handbrake and Cinebench R23. In the Handbrake test, which encodes a 420 MB video as H.265, the Asus was 31 seconds faster than the Prestige 14 Evo and only seven seconds behind the ZenBook 13. The results in the demanding Cinebench R23 test were similar, where At least in multicore mode, the VivoBook Flip 14 took just second place behind the ZenBook 13 and was significantly faster than the Prestige 14 Evo. And the Ryzen 5 5500U is a real step up from the previous generation, making the VivoBook Flip 14 an impressive budget performer.

As with all current Ryzen laptops we tested, the VivoBook Flip 14 excels in CPU-intensive tasks and will go through the typical productivity workflow. It can handle creative applications too, although its Radeon Graphics doesn't offer much in the way of enhancing applications that the GPU can take advantage of. Of course, this also applies to Intel's integrated Iris Xe graphics. In this comparison group, only the HP Envy 14 with its Nvidia GeForce GTX-1650 Ti brings real added value for these applications. Everywhere else, the VivoBook Flip 14 will do exceptionally well, especially given its $ 630 price tag.

Underdog Bench 5
(Single / multiple)		 Handbrake
(Seconds)		 Cinebench R23
(Single / multiple)		 PCMark 10 3DMark time spy
Asus VivoBook Flip 14
(Ryzen 5 5500U)		 1102/5432 131 1180/7579 5191 1099
MSI Prestige 14 Evo (Core i7-1185G7) 1593/5904 162 1479/6680 4866 1465
Acer Swift 3 2020 (Ryzen7 4700U) 1120/4831 152 N / A N / A 975
HP Envy x360 13 (Ryzen 5 4500U) 1101/4485 176 N / A N / A 902
Asus ZenBook 13 UM325UA
(Ryzen7 5800U)		 1423/6758 124 1171/7824 6034 1342
HP Envy 14 2020 (Core i5-1135G7) 1398/4741 190 1343/5028 5178 3147

One area that won't impress is gaming. The 3DMark Time Spy test result is nothing special, and the VivoBook Flip 14 performed poorly in Fortnite. It only managed 25 frames per second (fps) at 1080p and medium graphics, in line with laptops with Intel Iris Xe graphics. It reached 15 fps in epic graphics, which in turn corresponds to Intel's integrated GPU. Simply put, the VivoBook Flip 14 is not a gaming laptop at any cost.

display

Spend $ 630 on a laptop and you'll be giving up on something. There is usually a big tradeoff in display quality and the VivoBook Flip 14 is no exception.

First, it's not very bright at just 230 nits (we like to see 300 nits or more). This is almost identical to the 233 nits of the Acer Swift 3, and so the VivoBook Flip 14 is not alone among budget laptops with a weak display. The contrast is also poor at 720: 1, below the Swift 3's 770: 1 and well below our preferred threshold of 1000: 1. The Lenovo Yoga 7i 14 performs even worse with 690: 1, which shows that it is not only true budget laptops that suffer from poor contrast.

Next came the VivoBook Flip 14's colors, which were incredibly narrow. The coverage of the Adobe RGB color space was only 50% and the sRGB color space was only 66%. That's well below the 70% and 95%, respectively, that we normally see minimums on mid-range and premium laptops – and the HP Envy x360 13, which is on our top budget list, scored 71% and 96%, which is much better is. I notice that the Swift 3 was in the same class as the Asus at 48% and 64%, respectively. The VivoBook Flip 14's color accuracy was better than the Swift 3's 4.76 at a Delta E of 2.62 (1.0 or less is considered excellent), while the Envy x360 13 got a lower 2.26.

Subjectively, the VivoBook Flip 14's display wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. It's enough for web browsing and productivity apps, but that's about it. Viewing media on the 2-in-1 device was also not a terrible experience despite the poor colors and contrasts.

Two downward facing speakers provide audio with Harman Kardon tuning. The speakers get loud, but also distorted, with crackling at any volume above 80%. Treble was blown out and mids muffled, which resulted in a tinny sound. Of course there was no question of bass. You'll be fine with system sounds and the occasional YouTube videos, but anything else requires headphones or a pair of bluetooth speakers.

Keyboard and touchpad

The keyboard on the VivoBook Flip 14 is eerily reminiscent of HP's Specter keyboard, which is purposely a good choice. It offers good spacing, large keys with attractive and easy-to-read lettering and a number of Home, PgUp, PgDn, End and Fn keys on the far right. Unfortunately, although it looks like a Specter keyboard, it doesn't feel like it. There's a lot of travel and a nice click to the switches, but the ground motion is too abrupt. There's no crisp jump like HP, and the overall typing experience isn't nearly as comfortable. I would rate this keyboard a few steps behind the Specter and Dell XPS keyboards and way behind Apple's Magic Keyboard on the latest MacBooks. I will notice that the three-level backlight is even and useful.

To be clear, the touchpad is way too small. There's still plenty of room on the keyboard deck for a larger version, and the small size is reinforced by the fingerprint reader in the right corner. The touchpad is a Microsoft Precision version, so it works fine with good support for Windows 10 multi-touch gestures, but it's tiny.

The display is of course touch-enabled, as it is a 2-in-1, and an Asus active pen is included. It supports Windows 10 inking well, with smooth strokes and precise response.

The fingerprint reader mentioned above has Windows 10 Hello support for passwordless login. It was quick and accurate during my tests, and it was welcome on such an inexpensive laptop.

Battery life

Asus only put 42 watt hours of battery into the VivoBook Flip 14, which is not much for a 14-inch display even with Full HD resolution and a powerful CPU. I wasn't expecting great battery life.

Starting with our web browser test that ran through a number of popular websites, the VivoBook Flip 14 lasted nine hours. That's a little less than average for this class of machine, but not a terrible result. The Acer Swift 3 managed just eight hours, while the HP Envy x360 13 managed a little over nine hours. In our video test, which plays a Full HD Avengers trailer until the battery runs out, the VivoBook Flip 14 lasted 12 hours, again slightly less than average, but not too much compared to the Swift 3's 10 hours disappointing. The Envy x360 13 beats both with 13 hours.

The VivoBook Flip 14 lasted just over two hours in the PCMark 10 gaming test, which stresses the CPU and GPU, which is average for the test. The Lenovo Yoga 7i managed just over 2.5 hours, and we didn't test the Swift 3 or the Envy x360 13 with this benchmark. In the PCMark 10 Applications test, which is the best indicator of battery life, the VivoBook Flip was again below average with just over nine hours. That still beats the 8.5 hours of the Yoga 7i.

Overall, the VivoBook Flip 14 was only a hair behind the pack in terms of battery life. It will likely take a full working day if you don't put too much stress on the CPU, but it definitely suffers from the small battery. However, this is again a budget laptop, and so the results are pretty good if you keep the price in mind.

Our opinion

The VivoBook Flip 14 is really very fast for a $ 630 laptop. Its build isn't the best, its battery life is slower, and its keyboard isn't one of my favorites. But a laptop that works like this for so little money shouldn't be neglected.

If you have a demanding productivity workflow or occasionally use creative applications, the VivoBook Flip 14 will give you the performance you are looking for. And nothing else is so bad about the laptop that you shouldn't think twice about it.

Are there alternatives?

I'll start with the Asus ZenBook 13 OLED UM325UA. It's not a 2-in-1, but it costs just $ 170 more for a color-accurate OLED display, a faster AMD Ryzen 7 5800U CPU, 16GB of RAM, and a 1TB PCIe solid-state drive. If your budget isn't that tight and you don't really need a 2-in-1, then the ZenBook 13 is a great option.

If you need a 2-in-1 and your budget is limited, the HP Envy x360 13 is a solid alternative. It's also a little more expensive, but you get better performance, better battery life, and a better display. What do you dislike?

How long it will take?

The VivoBook Flip 14 isn't the most solid notebook we've tested, but it's not bad for a budget device. It won't withstand extreme abuse, but with normal wear and tear at home and in the office, it should last for several years. You won't be surprised by the one-year limited warranty.

Should you buy it?

Yes, if you don't need a color-accurate display and you are short of money. The outstanding performance of the VivoBook Flip 14 makes up for many of its weaknesses.

Editor's recommendations



25 Mar
Blog

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 Review: A Supremely Fast Chromebook

Acer Chromebook Spin 713

"The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 is one of the fastest, longest-lasting Chromebooks ever made."

  • Very good performance

  • Fairly long battery life

  • Conservative looks good

  • Good touchpad

  • Excellent 3: 2 display

  • No active pen option

  • The chassis could feel a bit more stable

  • The keyboard wasn't as sharp as some

The inventory of high-end Chromebooks continues to grow, and new products seem to be coming online all the time. But not every good machine is brand new. Take the convertible 2-in-1 Acer Chromebook Spin 713, which was launched in the summer of 2020 and is still a relevant laptop today thanks to fast components and willing buyers. In other words, it's current enough to consider today, and a lot of people are buying it. That's a good sign.

Acer sent me a mid-range version of the Chromebook Spin 713 priced at $ 630 for a 10th generation Intel Core i5-10210U CPU, 8 GB DDR4 RAM, a 128 GB solid state drive (SSD) and a 13.5-inch display on the Internet with a higher aspect ratio of 3: 2 and a resolution of 2K (2256 x 1504). That's not cheap for a Chromebook, but the price matches the components. Note that you can spend up to $ 1,000 if you go for a Core i7 and 16GB of RAM.

Does the Acer Chromebook Spin 713 still have what it takes to compete with the latest and greatest Chromebooks?

design

Acer Chromebook Spin 713Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 has a light gray (or dark silver depending on the lighting) case that is conservative but attractive. The beveled edges and angled lower chassis add some sheen, but don't stand out too much. For example, it's not a bright red like its near-rival Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2, nor does it have the rounded edges of the Google Pixelbook Go (if that's the look you're into). Think of the Acer as a modern sedan and the Samsung as a sports car and you get the picture. The Asus Chromebook Flip C436 is much closer to the Acer Chromebook Spin 713 in terms of aesthetics and nobody would find fault with either machine.

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 would look more modern if the bezels were slimmer. The side bezels are thin enough, but the top bezel is relatively thick and the lower chin is huge. Coupled with the 3: 2 aspect ratio, these bezels not only detract from the look, but also result in a laptop that is much deeper than it could be. The Asus Chromebook Flip C436 has smaller bezels with a 14-inch display with a 16: 9 aspect ratio – we prefer 3: 2, but there's no doubt that the Asus looks a bit slimmer.

Apply extra pressure and the lid will bend.

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 is 3.02 pounds and 0.66 inches thick, which is quite a bit heavier and thicker than the Asus Chromebook Flip C436 (2.5 pounds and 0.54 inches) and the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2 (2, 71 pounds and 0.55 inches thick)). Each of these machines is a 2-in-1 convertible, so Acer couldn't use a more complex hinge to excuse the laptop's weight.

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 has an aluminum case that is almost on par with a premium laptop in terms of build quality. Put a little more pressure and the lid will flex a little more than I like and the keyboard deck has a little flex. That's fine for $ 630 but gets a little less acceptable at $ 1,000 for the most expensive configuration. The Asus Chromebook Flip C436 feels like a more rugged laptop and costs about the same price as the Acer.

Note that Acer put the MIL-STD-810g series laptop through durability and reliability tests. Hence, there is a reason to trust that is beyond my subjective experience. The display of the Acer Chromebook Spin 713 is made of Corning Gorilla Glass with an antimicrobial coating to reduce the growth of certain microorganisms. The touchpad uses the same glass and offers the same protection.

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 closed "class =" m-carousel - image dt-lazy-no "src =" https://img.dtcn.com/image/digitaltrends/olympus-digital-camera-1056-640x640.jpg "srcset = "https://www.digitaltrends.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://www.digitaltrends.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 closed "class =" m-carousel - image dt-lazy-no "src =" https://img.dtcn.com/image/digitaltrends/olympus-digital-camera-1057-640x640.jpg "srcset = "https://www.digitaltrends.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://www.digitaltrends.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 closed "class =" m-carousel - image dt-lazy-no "src =" https://img.dtcn.com/image/digitaltrends/olympus-digital-camera-1055-640x640.jpg "srcset = "https://www.digitaltrends.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://www.digitaltrends.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Acer has equipped the Chromebook Spin 713 with a solid selection of ports. On the left side you will find a USB-C 3.2 Gen 1 port, a USB-A 3.0 port and a microSD card reader. On the right side there is another USB-C 3.2 port and a full-size HDMI 2.0 port. That outperforms both the Samsung and Asus laptops, which are limited to USB-C and microSD. The Chromebook Spin 713's wireless connectivity is completely up-to-date with Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0.

performance

We don't have a lot of benchmarks to objectively measure a Chromebook's performance. I can refer to Geekbench 5, where the Acer Chromebook Spin 713 with its quad-core core i5 scored 966 in the single-core test and 3,040 points in the multi-core test. That surpasses the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2 (at least in multi-core) with 1,003 and 2,179 with its dual-core core i3 and the Asus Chromebook Flip C436, also with the same processor, with 938 and 1,653. Interestingly, the Acer also beat the Lenovo ThinkPad C13 Yoga Chromebook with AMD's Chrome OS-specific CPU, the AMD Ryzen 5 3500C. This laptop scored 907 and 2,739.

Acer Chromebook Spin 713Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Despite the lack of objective measures, I can say that the Acer Chromebook Spin 713 is a fast Chrome OS laptop that keeps up with everyone else I've reviewed. I used the laptop with a handful of Android apps running and a ton of Google tabs open, and the laptop didn't skip a beat. This is likely due in part to the 8GB of RAM, which is sufficient for Chrome OS, as well as the fast SSD.

I also launched a few games, including Asphalt 9: Legends, and the Chromebook Spin 713 ran smoothly with its built-in Intel UHD graphics. It was a bit bulky in tablet mode, but I was still able to do a few races with no lag or choppiness. This is a huge improvement over the ThinkPad C13 Yoga Chromebook's AMD Radeon graphics, which turned this game into something of a slide show.

As mentioned earlier, you can upgrade the Chromebook Spin 713 to a Core i7 and 16GB of RAM, but I don't see any reason to. In my configuration, it's a fast laptop and one of the faster options you'll find for just $ 630.

display

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 screenMark Coppock / Digital Trends

One of the more exciting trends in laptops is the move to taller displays. The 16:10 and 3: 2 aspect ratios show more vertical information, which is important for surfing the Internet and for creating and viewing documents. The Chromebook Spin 713 followed this trend early and was one of the first on a Chromebook with its 3: 2 display. The 2,256 x 1,504 resolution is also welcome and offers sharp text and images.

I was unable to subject the display to my colorimeter, so unfortunately, as with performance, I don't have a lot of objective metrics. In fact, I don't have any. Subjectively, however, I found the display bright enough to work comfortably in a lot of ambient light – although working outside under bright sun wouldn't be a great experience. I've used brighter displays – the Dell XPS 13 and HP Specter x360 14 OLED are both brighter – but I'm not complaining.

The combination of quality and the aspect ratio of 3: 2 made this display an attractive display.

The contrast was sufficient to make black text appear on a white background. Eventually the colors looked natural and not oversaturated, although I cannot confirm the accuracy. Gamma must have been spot on too, since Netflix videos didn't look too light or too dark.

The combination of quality and 3: 2 aspect ratio made this display a delightful display that is more than good enough for most Chromebook users. If you need a wide color gamut and precise accuracy, I can't confirm how well the display will work for you. I haven't seen the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2 in person, so I can't tell if the QLED display is better – but I can imagine that it has QLED's ability to show off beautiful colors.

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 foldsMark Coppock / Digital Trends

The audio quality was a different story. The volume wasn't particularly loud and I noticed an indication of 100% distortion. The highs were cut off a bit and the midrange was muddy – and of course, as is common with most laptops, the bass was missing. The sound quality was fine for the occasional YouTube video, but I recommend headphones or bluetooth speakers for Netflix binging and music.

Keyboard and touchpad

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713's keyboard is pretty typical island style, with good, but not large, key spacing. I found the mechanism only slightly muddy, with a lot of spring travel and a soft floor movement, but not as crisp as I would like it to be. The Asus Chromebook Flip C436 responded more precisely than I found it to be more comfortable in the long run, and the Acer keyboard didn't really come close to my favorites, HP's Specter keyboards and Apple's Magic keyboard on the latest MacBooks.

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 keyboard "class =" m-carousel - image dt-lazy-no "src =" https://img.dtcn.com/image/digitaltrends/olympus-digital-camera-1041-640x640.jpg "srcset = "https://www.digitaltrends.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://www.digitaltrends.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 Trackpad "class =" m-Karussell - Bild dt-lazy-no "src =" https://img.dtcn.com/image/digitaltrends/olympus-digital-camera-1042-640x640.jpg "srcset = "https://www.digitaltrends.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://www.digitaltrends.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 "class =" m-Karussell - Bild dt-lazy-no "src =" https://img.dtcn.com/image/digitaltrends/olympus-digital-camera-1043-640x640.jpg "srcset = "https://www.digitaltrends.com/data:image/gif;base64,https://www.digitaltrends.com/R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP//yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The touchpad was larger than usual as the larger display offers additional space on the keyboard deck. As mentioned earlier, it consists of a layer of Corning Gorilla Glass with an antimicrobial coating. I found it very convenient to swipe Google's multitouch gestures and use them precisely. The touch display also responded, but unfortunately the laptop does not support an active pen.

Acer also didn't add biometric login to the Chromebook Spin 713, which is disappointing. A fingerprint reader would have been welcome.

Battery life

Acer Chromebook Spin 713 foldedMark Coppock / Digital Trends

Acer packed 48 watt hours of battery life into the case of the Chromebook Spin 713, and that's a decent amount for the light and efficient Chrome OS. For example, the Chromebook Spin 713 lasted 11.25 hours in our web browser test, which is almost two hours longer than the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2. At the same time, the Samsung spent almost 13 hours going through our Full HD Avengers trailer for almost three hours longer than the Acer Chromebook Spin 713. Samsung's QLED display likely contributed to this as it tends to be less power hungry than IPS displays.

The Asus Chromebook Flip C436 lasted about 10.5 hours in our web browser test and the same time as the Samsung in our video loop test.

Given that the Acer Chromebook Spin 713 uses a faster CPU than any of these competitors and has a tall, high-resolution display, these are good battery results that promise a full day of work. I would describe the battery life as the strength of the Chromebook Spin 713.

Our opinion

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 fits nicely into the premium Chromebook space, offering good performance and battery life, as well as decent build for a reasonable $ 630. It's not the sharpest laptop, but its conservative looks obviously appeal to a number of buyers.

I would have liked an active pen option for the laptop, but that's only a deal breaker for those who rely on digital ink. Otherwise, this is a great option for anyone looking for a quickly convertible 2-in-1 Chromebook.

Are there alternatives?

A natural competitor to the Acer Chromebook Spin 713, the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook 2 offers the same 2-in-1 flexibility and sharper look. But it's not that fast, it doesn't have the same ability to boost performance when you need it, and it's stuck in the past with its 16: 9 aspect ratio. However, it's a little cheaper.

The Asus Chromebook Flip C436 is another strong competitor to the Acer and offers a convertible 2-in-1 device with a 14-inch 16: 9 display. It's also slower than the Acer Chromebook Spin 713, but also a little cheaper.

If you don't want to turn the display over, Google's Pixelbook Go is your best option. You get better battery life, improved audio quality, and a smaller body – all for about the same price. There's a reason we picked the Pixebook Go as the best all-round Chromebook.

How long it will take?

The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 isn't quite as sturdy in the hand as some of the other Chromebooks we tested, but Acer trusted it enough to put it through some grueling tests. It will take as long as you need it, and Chrome OS will continue to hum for years to come. The laptop comes with the usual one-year warranty.

Should you buy it?

Yes. The Acer Chromebook Spin 713 is a solid premium Chromebook offering that has a few advantages over the competition, including fast performance.

Editor's recommendations




03 Jan
Blog

Apple MacBook Air M1 Review: Fast, Fanless, and Fantastic

Macbook Air M1

"The MacBook Air M1 finally delivers on the promise of a small laptop with no performance restrictions."

  • Apple's M1 blows Intel around

  • Phenomenal battery life

  • Excellent keyboard and touchpad

  • Very solid build quality

  • Just good looking

  • Supports an external display only

Apple was never afraid to break with the past, even if the transition might be painful. For example, when it found the floppy disk was out of date, it dropped it and went all-in USB. The same thing happened with Motorola CPUs, which were dropped for Intel when the PowerPC could no longer keep up. Now it's that time again, this time the MacBook Air, the MacBook Pro 13 and the Mac mini will be equipped with their own ARM-based silicon and Intel will be left behind.

For some MacBook fans, this could be a scary proposition because how well could the Apple M1 work if ARM's only showcase to date has been the very overwhelming initiative of Windows 10 on ARM? If you've read our MacBook Pro 13 M1 review, you already know the answer to that question. At least on this machine there is nothing to be afraid of. I put the MacBook Air M1 through its paces to see if the fanless version of Apple's initiative works too.

For this review, I got the entry-level MacBook Air M1 for $ 1,000 with just 8GB of RAM, a 256GB solid-state drive, and a 7-core GPU. There's another version that gives you 512GB of storage and an 8-core GPU for $ 1,250. My experience didn't even include the maximum 16GB of RAM that can be configured for a few hundred more dollars. Was I disappointed or did Apple pull a rabbit out of my hat?

performance

OK, I know it's not fair to imply that the Apple M1 is doing some kind of magic trick. After all, it is an eight-core CPU with four high-performance cores and four more that come into play for smaller tasks and a sip of electricity. It's just that it's an ARM-based technology that has pushed Intel's core CPUs into the background in terms of perceived performance for some time now. If the MacBook Air performs well, it's no magic. Rather, it is an impressive new technology that promises wonderful things to the MacBook range.

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

There's no reason to keep you going: the MacBook Air M1 surprised me in a good way with its performance. And that's not just a comparison with the current Intel MacBook Air, which uses a 9-watt version of the Intel Core i3 and i5 CPUs that lag behind their 15-watt Windows 10 equivalents. No, the MacBook Air with the 10-watt Apple M1 is using the latest 12 to 28-watt Tiger Lake processors from Intel (this time, Intel gives a range rather than a static value) and in many cases gives them a good old value-fashionable beating.

Before we get into the numbers, let's get something straight. The Apple M1-based computers run the fastest with software written for the M1 architecture. This makes sense and includes all of Apple's software plus a few other applications and utilities. If it wasn't written for the M1, it runs through Apple's Rosetta 2 emulation layer. That means, of course, that it won't be as fast as native software. And sometimes, especially with software that requires hardware drivers, an application may not run at all.

Take Geekbench 5, for example, which runs natively on the M1. The fanless MacBook Air M1 performed slightly better than the fan-filled MacBook Pro 13 M1. We're talking 1,727 versus 1,707 in single-core mode and 7,585 versus 7,337 in multi-core mode, but it's still noteworthy that the less expensive and theoretically slower MacBook Air M1 was faster than the Pro. And with their four cores and eight threads, both machines achieved a significantly higher score than the currently fastest Tiger Lake laptops. The MSI Prestige 14 Evo, for example, has the fastest Tiger Lake CPU you can buy, the Core i7-1185G7, scoring just 1,593 and 5,904 points, respectively. Even the 45 watt Core i7-10850H with six cores in the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3 couldn't keep up with the M1 and only managed 1,299 and 6,372.

Worried Apple would force you to give up performance on its transition? Do not be so.

Next, let's look at Cinebench R23, another benchmark app written for the M1. Here the MacBook Air M1 couldn't beat the MacBook Pro 13 M1, but it was in close proximity. And it came almost close to the Lenovo Yoga 9i with its 6-core Core i7-10750H in high-performance mode that cranks up the fans. Notably, the MacBook Air M1 was completely silent (no fans, duh) and barely got warm – I was able to comfortably hold it on my lap while it ran the test. I said before that it wasn't magic, but maybe I'm wrong.

I also did our handbrake test which encodes a 420MB file in two iterations in H.265. The first used Handbrake 1.3.1 which runs in emulation mode and the second used Handbrake 1.4.0 Beta which was written for the M1. In the first case, the MacBook Air M1 took about 4.5 minutes to complete the test. This is roughly the time it would take for laptops with the 10th generation Intel Core i5. In the latter case, the MacBook Air M1 completed the test in 2.8 minutes. This is comparable to 45-watt Intel laptops with six cores and Handbrake 1.3.1 and just eight seconds behind the MacBook Pro 13 M1 with the native version. Again, the laptop barely warmed up. These results provide an insight into the effects of a native on the M1 on an application.

Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I ran some other tests in Adobe Premiere Pro (which is not yet optimized for the M1) using the PugetBench benchmark. MacBooks have been the go-to choice for many creatives in the past, but this has never been the game of the MacBook Air. Due to severe performance limitations on the Intel version, running one of Adobe's Creative Suites was a challenge. But the M1 changes all of that, even with the $ 999 MacBook Air.

The MacBook Air M1 competed heavily with the more powerful CPUs from Intel and made mince of the Tiger Lake laptops from Intel. I also ran a Premiere Pro encoding test that produced a 2GB 4K video and the MacBook Air M1 running in emulation was about 40 seconds faster than a Tiger Lake laptop.

Most impressive was that this level of performance ran through the emulation. Imagine how quickly Premiere Pro (and Photoshop, Lightroom, etc) will work if it's native in the M1. Getting that kind of performance on a laptop this thin, light, and fanless is a transforming moment for creative professionals who might want to carry around a smaller machine but don't want to compromise on performance. For the first time ever, you can get some serious creative work on a MacBook Air – and that's a big deal.

In practice, I've noticed some minor slowdowns in legacy applications like Microsoft Office (Microsoft released native versions right after the test report finished). This is especially true for the start: Office apps are only faster on Intel computers than on the MacBook Air M1. But the difference isn't so big that it bothered me, and if I didn't check the laptop, I probably wouldn't even notice. Of course, Mac OS itself and every application optimized for the M1 was incredibly fast.

What about games? I didn't run all of the gaming tests on the MacBook Air M1. This is supposed to be a productivity laptop, not a slot machine, after all. Fortnite ran at around 33 frames per second (fps), however, with a resolution of 1,680 x 1,050 and high graphics that are playable and faster than the Intel Iris Xe graphics from Tiger Lake. In Civilization VI, the MacBook Air achieved 51 fps with the same resolution and medium graphics and sank to 32 fps with ultra graphics. Again, this outperforms Intel Iris Xe laptops and competes with integrated low-end graphics such as the Nvidia GeForce MX350.

This completely silent, fanless laptop is a better slot machine than the equivalent Intel laptops, which you would never have expected from a MacBook Air. Note that I tested the seven-core GPU model. For $ 250 more, you can get an eight-core GPU model that will be … well … one core faster. This version also includes 512 GB of storage space.

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Finally, I mentioned that not all applications will run on the MacBook Air M1, although I don't have many examples to give. The decisive factor was the software for my older colorimeter, which did not require the necessary drivers for the MacBook.

But most of the other apps I tried also ran in emulation and were as fast as I would get with at least a mid-range Intel laptop. There were outliers like the Epic Games Launcher, which was just as sluggish on the MacBook Air M1 as it was on the MacBook Pro 13 M1, but there were few.

Battery life

Performance is just one area in which the Apple M1 promises serious progress. The battery life is different – after all, it is essentially an ARM chip that is designed to be efficient. How efficient can a laptop be when it offers the same performance as CPUs that are purely designed for performance? Let's find out.

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

First, I ran our standard web benchmark, which runs through a number of popular websites. This is the yardstick we use to emulate productivity longevity, and it works pretty well. The MacBook Air passed the 15.5-hour test, one of the longest results we've seen. The Lenovo Flex 5G with its own ARM processor – the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx – lasted about 50 minutes longer, but there is a catch. The Lenovo had a Full HD display (1,920 x 1,080), while the MacBook Air M1 has a Retina display with a resolution of 2,560 x 1,600. That's a huge perk for Apple – give it a Full HD display (not what you want) and we'd expect a few more hours of it.

Next, I ran our video benchmark, which runs through a Full HD Avengers trailer until the laptop shuts down. The MacBook Air M1 lasted 18.5 hours. Again, this isn't as long as some of the longest-lasting laptops we've tested, but it's by far the longest-lasting device with a high-resolution display. The Lenovo Flex 5G was stronger again with almost 28 hours, but it also benefited from its lower resolution display.

We usually use the Basemark web benchmark test to see how long a laptop with its CPU and GPU will last under heavy load. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to complete the test on the MacBook Air M1 so I won't be able to report on its longevity if you press it hard. However, given the M1's inherent efficiency, we expect that the MacBook Air M1 will allow you to spend a lot of time, even if you ask a lot of it.

design

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The design of the MacBook Air M1 is unchanged from the Intel version. Literally. That said, it's the same wedge of machined aluminum that feels like an alchemical amalgamation of glass and metal. It is completely stable, without twisting, bending or bending. Apple is doing a few things right, and designing and manufacturing laptops that exude rugged elegance is one of them. You can choose from three colors – space gray, gold, and silver – and they all look beautiful.

It's also a very thin and light laptop that is 0.6 inches and 2.8 pounds. Windows 10 laptops like the Dell XPS 13 and HP Specter x360 13 have caught up and are either thinner and lighter or close to it, so the MacBook Air generally no longer maintains its superiority in that regard. And the MacBook Air M1 isn't as small in width and depth as some of its 13-inch rivals, either, as it still has the same relatively large bezels it struggles with. When you add a display with a 16:10 aspect ratio, you'll find that the MacBook Air M1 doesn't fit into the same tiny silhouette as some others.

Really, these are nits because the differences between these sizes are tiny. Perhaps the MacBook Air M1 would look a little more modern with smaller bezels, but it's not like you'll struggle to find room for it in your backpack.

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Connectivity remains a weak point in the MacBook Air M1. You get two Thunderbolt 3 ports and a 3.5mm audio jack. That's it. There isn't even an SD card reader to get your photos and videos. Get ready to buy some dongles, and a Thunderbolt 3 dock would be a good idea. Note, however, that the M1 does not support external GPU cases.

The M1 version only supports a single external display, either via the Thunderbolt 3 ports or via a dock. The reasons are deeply technical and based on the M1 architecture. However, if you need more than one external display, the M1 version is not for you. Compare this to the typical Windows 10 laptop or Intel-based MacBook, which can support numerous displays of different resolutions. Even laptops in the same $ 1,000 price bracket can typically support more than one external display if they have a Thunderbolt 3 port, multiple USB-C ports, or even an HDMI port (hey, remember these?).

Display and speaker

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Like the design, Apple kept the same display for the MacBook Air M1. It's a 2,560 x 1,600 IPS display that looks great. It's not in the same class as the MacBook Pro, but you still get good performance enough for everyone but the most demanding creative professionals.

The brightness was 389 nits, which is enough for a laptop with average productivity but not up to Apple's high-end standards. The color gamut is slightly wider than average at 100% sRGB and 79% AdobeRGB – most premium Windows 10 laptops are 98% sRGB and 73% AdobeRGB. These aren't that big of a difference, but if you're looking to edit photos and videos, you'll appreciate the extra percentage points. The accuracy is particularly good at 1.39, with 1.0 or less indistinguishable to the human eye and the quality standard and the contrast ratio of 1130: 1 is above average (we want to see at least 1000: 1, and so the MacBook Air M1 crosses our threshold here).

The bottom line is that you are going to love this display and you probably won't have many complaints. If you're a creative professional and need the widest color gamut, go for the Pro line. You can choose the MacBook Pro 13 M1, get the same performance, nearly the same battery life, and enjoy a higher quality display.

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

Another area where the MacBook Air M1 can't quite keep up with its Pro siblings is audio quality. The speakers are very nice, don't get me wrong. They are clear and bright, with excellent mids and highs and a hint of bass. There is no distortion at the maximum volume – the only problem is that the maximum is not very loud. So you're good at listening for yourself, but if you want to share with a crowd, you'll need external speakers. And when you want to rock, prepare to pull out your favorite headphones.

Keyboard and touchpad

The MacBook Air M1 features the new Magic Keyboard, which Apple designed to replace the unfortunate butterfly keyboard on previous models. And it's a damn good keyboard, maybe my favorite of all the laptops I've used and the only one that surpasses the excellent version that HP has added to its Specter range.

The keycaps are a nice size and there is enough travel that you don't feel like you are typing on a block of wood (I'm talking to you here, butterfly keyboard). Best of all, the switches are top notch, with superb precision and perfect ground action that lets you know you've pressed a button. I can type faster on this keyboard than any other, and I hate to give up on it when I switch to a Windows 10 computer.

Macbook Air M1Mark Coppock / Digital Trends

The touchpad is also superior due to its haptic nature. It's bigger than most of the touchpads you'll find on 13-inch laptops, it's buttery smooth, and once you get used to the haptic aspect you probably have more control than most touchpads. Windows 10 touchpads have gotten a lot better over the years, but still haven't caught up.

Finally, use the Touch ID sensor embedded in the power button to sign in without a password. This works fine. It's comparable to Microsoft's Windows Hello technology, though you won't find facial recognition in the MacBook line-up yet. I missed this while using the MacBook Air M1, although I end up preferring to use a fingerprint reader.

Our opinion

We said the 2020 Intel MacBook Air is "a respectable choice for Mac fans on a budget". I'm going to change that here for the MacBook Air M1: it's a respectable choice for any MacBook fan looking for a smaller device that is perfectly quiet, charges forever, and is almost as fast as the MacBook Pro 13 M1. Not only will you save money anymore – you get a laptop that will blow your mind with its performance (especially since more apps have been developed for the M1) while being extremely thin and light.

However, there are some limitations. You can't get more than 16GB of RAM (neither with the Intel version) and are limited to just one external display.

Are there alternatives?

The same competition that applied to the Intel MacBook Air also applies here. Only you will find that in many cases they are slower and don't last as long on one charge. The Dell XPS 13 is the obvious choice that you can get for $ 980 with a Core i3-1115G4 CPU and the same amount of RAM and storage – but the MacBook Air M1 will blast it out of the water. Configure the XPS 13 with its fastest CPU and you will find that it is still slower than the MacBook in many applications.

The HP Specter x360 13 gives you the option of a better OLED display and the flexibility of a 2-in-1 for a few hundred more, depending on your configuration. But here, too, the MacBook Air M1 is the faster laptop.

Finally, the MacBook Pro 13 M1 is for anyone looking for the fastest M1 machine available (although the difference isn't nearly as big as you can imagine). The display gets better and the speakers will blow your mind. You'll also be spending at least $ 300 more.

How long it will take?

The MacBook Air M1 should have a lifespan of at least five years as Apple keeps its laptops up to date. Certainly the machine itself will last forever because of the build quality, and you'll love the support from Apple (if not the industry-standard 1-year warranty). And the MacBook Air M1 is getting faster and faster as more software is optimized for the M1 CPU.

Should you buy it?

Yes. The MacBook Air M1 isn't just for MacBook fans looking for something smaller. It is intended for any laptop buyer who is happy to move to Mac OS and wants to participate in the real future of ARM-based computing.

Editor's recommendations




22 Oct
Blog

TicWatch 3 Pro Review: Fast Performance, Long Battery Life

mobvoi ticwatch 3 pro review star face bag

"The latest Qualcomm processor and a clever second display system give the TicWatch 3 Pro good performance and long battery life, which fixes two common problems with the Wear operating system."

  • Three days of battery life

  • Latest Snapdragon Wear 4100 processor

  • Fast performance

  • The screen that is always on is now backlit

  • Wear OS is still frustrating

  • No color or strap selection

The most exciting thing about the Mobvoi TicWatch 3 Pro is what's inside. It is the first smartwatch available with Qualcomm's Snapdragon Wear 4100 processor. Many hope to be the savior of Wear OS with its higher performance and efficiency, and an incredible battery for serious endurance.

Yes, the Snapdragon Wear 4100 is a massive improvement over the geriatric Snapdragon Wear 3100 and really makes Wear OS more user-friendly than ever. However, it's not the magic bullet that helps kill the Apple Watch or the Samsung Galaxy Watch 3.

design

Mobvoi seems to have an aversion to changing the design of the Pro series. The TicWatch 3 Pro is a significant improvement over the first TicWatch Pro, but it's a shame that the knurled bezel and buttons from the Pro 4G / LTE model haven't been carried over. However, it's leaner and certainly not ugly. It's just a little bland with the single black color scheme. I'll be wearing this every day and the best wearables are an extension of your other fashion choices so I really would want more of a choice.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

The watch is relatively compact with a 47mm case that weighs 41.9 grams, but there is no question that it is a male form. I cannot see the watch for women or those with smaller wrists. The case and caseback are made of plastic and don't feel particularly expensive, while the bezel is made of stainless steel and the strap is made of silicone with an orange tinge. It's soft and comfortable, and it hasn't got sweaty either.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

There are two buttons on the housing, the upper one opening the menu and the lower one being assigned to the TicExercise app immediately. However, it can be changed in the app of your choice. The top button on my test watch is very stiff and has not come loose over time, making it awkward and uncomfortable to press. The bottom button is far better, which makes me a little concerned about the overall build quality. Nevertheless, the watch was otherwise reliable.

screen

The design is a bit damp, but the screens are masterpieces. That's right, screens. The TicWatch Pro 3 has a bright and colorful 1.4-inch AMOLED screen with a resolution of 454 x 454 pixels for Wear OS and a second FSTN LCD screen that acts as the permanent screen of the watch. You'd never know there are two screens, it doesn't add any extra size or weight, but it does reduce power consumption and is much more readable in different lighting conditions.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

It's the defining feature of the TicWatch Pro series, and Mobvoi redesigned the screen layout for the TicWatch 3 Pro to make it more consistent. Backlighting has also been added to ensure clarity in low light conditions. It makes a big difference.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

The FTSN LCD shows the time, date, battery level and step count and is all you need from a screen that is always on. I can see it in daylight and in the dark and it doesn't seem to be affecting battery life at all.

battery

Amazingly, the TicWatch Pro 3's 595 mAh battery lasts three days before it needs to be charged. At first I didn't quite believe this and took special care to check the settings, monitor usage, and count the days it worked on my wrist. Not only did I get three days of life from it repeatedly, including an hour of exercise tracking on two of them, but with less use it was still on the fourth day. The battery life of many other Wear OS smartwatches rarely whistles beyond a full day. So having three days is something to celebrate.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

This is hardly known in earlier TicWatch Pro models and the Casio Pro Trek WSD-F30, which also uses the hardware approach for the second screen to ensure an always active view. It's sad that we don't see the dual-screen hardware setup for more smartwatches as it's clearly effective. The Snapdragon 4100 also plays a big role. Qualcomm claims to have reduced electricity consumption by 25%. Both Mobvoi and Qualcomm have really teamed up and improved the smartwatch's battery life significantly.

Qualcomm and Mobvoi really came together and significantly improved battery life.

If you want even more, there's Essential Mode, which turns off the OLED screen and leans on the LCD for the time, but continues to count steps and monitor sleep. Mobvoi claims this offers an excellent 45 days of usage versus 30 days claimed by other smartwatch manufacturers. You can really take the TicWatch 3 Pro with you for a long weekend without the hassle of grabbing the charger and still using both screens, or disappearing into the wild for a month and still having time on your wrist in the end.

The only downside is the charging, which is slow compared to some other Wear OS watches, taking around an hour and 40 minutes to go from 5% to full. That being said, the TicWatch 3 Pro's battery life really impresses with the hardware and improved Essential mode, and is a real reason to buy this smartwatch over many others.

Performance and software

Everything works quickly. If that sounds obvious with modern technology, you've never used a Wear OS watch with 512MB of RAM. The combination of the Snapdragon Wear 4100 and 1GB of RAM means everything works when you want it to. Apps open quickly, you can scroll through Google Maps and switch faces in no time. It's a world apart from the worst Snapdragon 3100 watches and a really good omen for the future of Wear OS.

The increase in performance should mean an all round better experience, right? I thought so, but the TicWatch 3 Pro needs to be optimized. With no rotating crown or bezel, the menus need to be wiped, and there's something pretty muddy about the TicWatch software. It doesn't flow like it should and usually requires a lot more wiping than I'd like. Sometimes taps and swipes are also misinterpreted, which leads me to options that I haven't selected and then slows down because it's confused.

You'll also have to play around with the settings a little to make them more user-friendly. Tilt-to-wake is not active by default and is essential. Otherwise, when notifications come in, you'll have to physically tap the screen to switch from the constantly on second screen. Mobvoi has created its own Wear OS launcher standard. While this is fine, I prefer the look of the default Google launcher, and you'll need to check the settings to change it.

The software still needs to be optimized – there are usability problems.

Then there are the many Mobvoi apps that are installed. There's Ticbreathe, TicExercise, TicHealth, TicHearing, TicOxygen, and TicKitchenSink (maybe). All of them require you to create a Mobvoi account. The general accounts only offer Google Fit. However, you need the TicOxygen app to measure the blood oxygen content (Sp02). It's attractive and fast, although the accuracy and usefulness of this metric continues to be in question for most people.

The notifications from Wear OS are terrible too, perhaps even worse on the TicWatch than on others I test. I received a small percentage of notifications when connected to the LG Wing and the OnePlus 8T. It's such a hit or miss too. Without the Outlook app installed on the watch, I won't get any Outlook notifications, but even if it's installed I still don't get all of them. Incredibly frustrating. I wore the TicWatch Pro 3 right after checking out the Apple Watch Series 6 which came in with 100% notifications, so the silence from Wear OS just got worse.

Health tracking

Most of Mobvoi's apps are related to health and activity tracking, and many replicate the capabilities of Google Fit. However, there are some advantages to using it. TicHealth has more data on your wrist than Fit without having to visit the app on your phone. I like the overall design of TicBreathe and TicZen, although the stress test takes a long time to run. There's a sleep tracking app too, but I didn't find the watch comfortable enough to wear all night.

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The TicWatch 3 Pro has a heart rate sensor, an integrated GPS, IP68 waterproofness for use in the pool and Sp02 blood oxygen measurement. Google Fit works with all of these sensors and is attractive and easy to use. The data collected is logically arranged in the Fit app on your phone, but isn't detailed enough for the really dedicated fitness fan, and Mobvoi's own collection of apps doesn't change that.

Overall, the TicWatch 3 Pro does a good job as an casual fitness tracking system, and I really like the way you can focus your daily goals on heart points rather than steps that seem like a better way to measure your effectiveness assess daily activities.

Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

What the TicWatch 3 Pro doesn't offer is much more than any other smartwatch when it comes to activity tracking or additional sensors. It's knowledgeable and perfectly acceptable to someone like me who wants quick digestible data and quick-to-activate workout tracking, but not someone who wants comprehensive hardcore sports training data.

Price and availability

The TicWatch 3 Pro is priced at $ 299 or £ 289 is now available from Amazon.

Our opinion

The TicWatch 3 Pro shows that Wear OS hardware is a lifetime, but it also reminds us that Google's software holds back even the most powerful watch. Mobvoi's smartwatch isn't the prettiest you can buy, but it does a lot of things right, from the second always-on screen to using the Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 4100. This means more convenience, longer battery life and faster apps for you.

Is there a better alternative?

If you want the Snapdragon Wear 4100, the TicWatch 3 Pro is your only choice. That situation means it stands on its own right now and just an aversion to the design should make you consider another Wear OS smartwatch.

However, Wear OS is still frustrating and you can buy better smartwatches that don't use Google software. We recommend the Samsung Galaxy Watch 3 for owners of Android phones and the Apple Watch SE or Series 6 for iPhone owners.

How long it will take?

With the Snapdragon Wear 4100, Qualcomm's latest smartwatch platform, you get the only smartwatch currently available. Hence, in terms of performance, it is the best choice in terms of longevity. The watch is IP68 waterproof and the reinforced nylon case should prove to be very robust. The quick release strap is easy to change if you don't like it or if it breaks.

The only question mark is above the software. Google provides updates for Wear OS regularly, but rarely includes important new features. However, due to the large amount of Mobvoi software on board, the watch needs ongoing support from both companies in order to stay up to date. Regardless, you can buy the TicWatch 3 Pro with the confidence that it will last two years or more.

Should you buy one?

Yes, the Snapdragon Wear 4100's perks, the superb screen that always shows up, and the long battery life outweigh the software frustrations.

Editor's recommendations




21 Aug
Blog

HP Envy 15 (2020) Review: Insanely Fast, Incredible Price

HP Neid 15 2020 review 04

"The HP Envy 15 delivers great performance at a great price."

  • Incredibly strong performance

  • Beautiful and color-accurate AMOLED display

  • Solid build quality

  • Excellent keyboard and touchpad

  • The display supports touch and pen

  • A little stronger than rivals

  • No full size SD card slot

Dell has had great success with its XPS 15 – a sleek, professional laptop with surprisingly high performance. HP has never had its own MacBook Pro 16-inch competitor – at least not in terms of performance.

The HP Envy 15 fills this gap and offers a discount compared to Dell and Apple. My test device is priced at HP.com for $ 1,600, as configured, with a 10th generation Intel Core i7-10750H CPU, 16 GB of RAM, 512 GB of solid state drive (SSD) storage, 4K AMOLED display, and RTX 2060 Max-Q GPU. A similarly configured XPS 15 will cost you well over $ 2,000 in comparison, and you'll have to upgrade to the even more expensive XPS 17 if you want to customize the graphics.

There has to be a catch, right? After all, it takes more than just performance per dollar to compete against its high-end competitors. I've searched hard for compromises, and while the Envy 15 isn't perfect, HP hasn't cut corners with the Envy 15.

design

Compared to the gemstone-cut HP Specter x360 15 with a tiny bezel, the Envy 15 is a pretty conservatively designed laptop. On its own, the Envy 15 is a pretty attractive 15-inch laptop. Its silver color scheme adorns an aluminum housing that is very robust – cannot bend or bend anywhere. The Envy 15 has just enough chiseled parts to make it unique – like the small indentation between the keyboard deck and the palm rest. It adds some pizzazz, but not so much that it outperforms the Specter for its looks alone. Let's not forget that the Envy 15 is technically a "midrange" laptop, which makes the build quality and size even more impressive.

The Envy isn't a petite laptop. It's a bit big and heavy as you'd expect on a 15-inch all-metal machine, 0.73 "thick (actually not bad for a 15-inch laptop, actually) and 4.75 pounds. The Dell XPS 15 is 0.71 inches thick and 4.5 pounds by comparison.

The Dell XPS 15 also has a slimmer profile, largely thanks to the smaller bezels. The Envy 15's screen-to-body ratio of 82% is a bit lower, partly due to a fairly large chin. Since the XPS 15 uses a display with an aspect ratio of 16:10, the two laptops are similar in size. It's just that the XPS 15 intelligently fills the space with a display instead of a bezel.

While the Envy 15 has some of its own design tricks up its sleeve, the focus is more on performance. It includes hidden rear vents that effectively move air without affecting the look of the back of the laptop. The Envy 15 also has a large pair of feet on the floor that set it off the table more than the competition for extra airflow.

Connectivity is a strength of the Envy 15. You get two USB-C ports with Thunderbolt 3 support, plus a full-size HDMI 2.0 port (updated from HDMI 1.4 on the previous model) so you can connect three displays to the device without a dock . You also get two USB-A 3.1 ports and a microSD card reader. However, HP made a mistake by not including a full-size reader. The target group for the Envy 15 are those who want to quickly transport data directly from their cameras.

Wireless connectivity is up to date thanks to an Intel Wi-Fi 6 chipset and Bluetooth 5.0.

HP also added a nice bonus in the form of a second SSD slot that allows either a RAID configuration or additional storage. When you add a few two terabytes (2 TB) of SSDs, you suddenly have an unusually large amount of storage space, which is especially useful for the creative types.

display

The Envy 15's 4K AMOLED 16: 9 display is spectacular, according to my colorimeter – although you can save some money by resorting to a Full HD option. The AMOLED panel is bright at 404 nits (and the anti-glare function makes it appear even brighter), has an incredible contrast at 404,410: 1 (the best IPS displays come in at around 1500: 1) and its gamma is just right at 2.2. That makes it a dream machine for productivity and multimedia watchers. Turn on HDR and you've got one of the best Netflix experiences out there with black text on a white background. As a writer, I just love this role. These results are on par with the best you can find, including the Dell XPS 15 and MacBook Pro 16-inch. Their IPS displays are similarly bright, but cannot come close in terms of contrast.

The Envy 15's display is also great for developers who HP is targeting with all this performance. The color gamut is very large with 100% of sRGB and 97% of AdobeRGB. The XPS 15 does a little better with exactly 100% of both color spaces in the color gamut. The Envy 15 also has an excellent color accuracy of 0.73 (the human eye can't see anything below 1.0), again just slightly behind the 0.37 of the XPS 17 and 0.65 of the XPS 15.

Most importantly, for the first time ever, HP has a machine that has both the power and the display to compete with the world's best creative laptops. There's no such thing as an HP Specter laptop with 45-watt CPUs, powerful GPUs, and color-calibrated displays. The Envy 15 is the first consumer laptop from HP that puts it all together into a truly competitive package.

The display is also touch and pen enabled, which is an added bonus. Writing on a clamshell laptop display isn't easy, but the feature is there when you need it.

I'll note here that the Envy 15's HDR support is also better than the 2019 Specter x360 15 with AMOLED (I didn't get a chance to test the 2020 version). For the best HDR performance in Netflix, turn on HDR in display settings. Unlike the Specter, this doesn't completely change the overall quality of the display. There's a small drop in color saturation, but it's not dramatic, and Netflix HDR looks great with "true" HDR enabled. This is a benefit of HP's current AMOLED – it supports VESA DisplayHDR and Windows 10 seems to handle it better than before. It's still not as good as the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme's Dolby Vision HDR, which in my experience is the best HDR you'll find on a laptop.

Audio is provided by two upward-facing speakers on either side of the keyboard. The volume wasn't impressively loud, but very clear and without distortion. There was more bass than you would expect and the mids and highs were pleasant. You could watch Netflix on the Envy 15 and not crave headphones as long as you just listen. It still may not match what Apple achieved with its MacBooks, but the Envy 15's speakers aren't bad.

performance

The Envy 15 is HP's shot over laptops like the XPS 15 and 17 that is also aimed at creative people. Therefore the laptop has to be fast.

The problem is that the Envy 15 uses a slower processor than the XPS 15 and XPS 17 – at least based on the units we tested. The Core i7-10750H has two fewer cores and four fewer threads than the Core i7-10875H in the Dells, which puts the Envy 15 at a disadvantage in many content creation applications.

This disadvantage is most evident in Geekbench 5 and Cinebench R20, where the multi-core performance was only tested 27% behind the XPS 15. The XPS 17 is of course even faster. The Envy 15 naturally handles the processor it has chosen quite well, just like other Core i7-10750H laptops we tested.

However, it comes down to performance in practice. That's why I switched to the Handbrake video coding application. Limited to the CPU only, I converted a 420MB video to H.265 and the Envy 15 was ready in a little under two and a half minutes. This is comparable to the XPS 15 in just over two minutes and the XPS 17 in just under two minutes. The ROG Strix G15 with the i7-10750H lasted three seconds longer than the Envy 15.

Finally, I ran our Premiere Pro video rendering test which exported a two minute 4K project to ProRes 422. During this process, both the CPU and the GPU can be used together, allowing a graphics card like the RTX 2060 Max-Q to be bent. It took the Envy 15 just five minutes and a second to complete the test in standard mode. Compare that to the XPS 17, which lasted three minutes and 38 seconds – that's a faster score than recorded in our XPS 17 test because that test used the latest and much faster version of Premiere Pro. Given the price difference and the fact that the XPS 17 uses a faster processor, this is an impressive feat for the Envy 15.

I also tested the HP Command Center software, which has different performance modes. By default, the company sets the Envy 15 to be relatively quiet and run relatively cool. This is how I did all of the above tests. When you really need to get the best possible performance out of the system, performance mode makes a big difference. Other laptops have similar utilities, but I've found HPs to be particularly aggressive. The setting didn't affect performance on synthetic benchmarks, but it did increase Handbrake and Premiere performance on the XPS 17. Given the price difference, this is an impressive result.

Play

HP doesn't advertise the Envy 15 as a gaming laptop, but if you have an RTX 2060 Max-Q inside, there's no reason not to use it. And in our series of gaming reviews, it quickly became clear that the Envy 15 is a good mid-range slot machine.

I ran our tests at 1080p and 4K as 1440p wasn't an option in this driver set. And that's probably fine since 1080p is probably where you want to play your games.

Starting with the synthetic 3DMark benchmark, the Envy 15 achieved 5,123 points in the most demanding Time Spy test, which is slightly behind the 5,801 of the XPS 17 with its RTX 2060. As we'll see, these two machines are pretty evenly matched in terms of performance to run today's modern titles, with the XPS 17 having a slight edge.

In Civilization VI, the Envy 15 achieved 121 frames per second (fps) at 1080p and medium graphics, compared to the XPS 17 at 143 fps and the XPS 15 with its GTX 1650 Ti at 114 fps. Interestingly, the Envy 15 managed 100 fps in ultra graphics compared to the XPS 17 with 90 fps and the XPS 15 with 64 fps. The Envy 15 also beat the XPS 17 and 15 when gaming in 4K resolution.

In Assassin's Creed Odyssey, the Envy 15 hit the sweet spot at 60 fps at 1080p and high graphics, compared to the XPS 17 at 61 fps and the XPS 15 at 47 fps. Finally, the Envy 15 was able to play Fortnite at 1080p and Epic at 84 fps, while the XPS 17 hit 82 fps. This allows both laptops to maintain a solid 60 fps in Fortnite unless you jump up to 4KB with both dropping to around 30 fps.

Of course, none of these frame rates above 60 fps are of any use to you, as the Envy 15's screen is locked with a refresh rate of 60 Hz. It also doesn't include anti-screen-tearing technology like G-Sync or FreeSync. As with many of these productivity-oriented computers, casual gaming is fine, but a suitable gaming laptop with a higher refresh rate provides a far smoother gaming experience.

Keyboard and touchpad

Apple's Magic Keyboard on the latest MacBooks is the best laptop keyboard out there. Still, the HP keyboard, which has moved from the Specter to the Envy range, is my second favorite. There's a lot of traveling and just the right balance between a light touch and a snappy feeling with a confident ground movement. The mechanism is perfect for me so that I can instantly update myself and type for hours without getting tired.

I like the keyboard on the XPS 15 and some other laptops (I'm thinking of the Lenovo ThinkPad range), but I prefer the HP version over any other Windows 10 laptop. I'm delighted to see that HP isn't reserving the keyboard for the Specter range, and I'll find that you can get the same for the HP Envy x360 13, which is well under $ 1,000.

Interestingly, the Envy 15's touchpad is better than that of the Specter x360 15. It's not the same widescreen version, which means it's bigger and takes up a lot more palm-rest space. It's glass-covered and very convenient to scroll and swipe. It also supports Microsoft's Precision touchpad drivers and all Windows 10 multi-touch gestures. It's as good as a touchpad on a Windows 10 laptop.

As mentioned earlier, the display is touch sensitive and as precise as ever. If you want to use HP's active pen with 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity, you have this option too. The passwordless login for Windows 10 Hello takes place via a fingerprint scanner, which is located in the keyboard next to the arrow keys – and works quickly and without errors.

Battery life

Pack that much power into a laptop and equip it with a low-power AMOLED display (which can be aided by using a dark color scheme since AMOLED uses the least power when the screen is high in black), and you won't going to expect a lot of longevity. This also applies to a battery capacity of 83 watt hours.

According to our standard benchmark tests, that's exactly what we saw. In our most demanding Basemark web benchmark test, the Envy 15 lasted almost exactly three hours. That's not terrible for such a powerful laptop, but it does mean that if you're really putting a strain on the CPU and GPU, you'll likely run out of battery life well before lunch. Interestingly, the XPS 15 with 86 watt hours of battery and the XPS 17 with 97 watt hours did not do better. The XPS 17 lasted six minutes less and the XPS 15 16 minutes longer.

The 4K screen means you need to have the charger close at hand.

In our web browser test, which is the best indicator of productivity, the Envy 15 lasted around 6.75 hours, which is not particularly long. Once again, the XPS 15 and 17 were close together, with the XPS 17 running 19 minutes less and the XPS 15 happening 19 minutes longer. Finally, I looped the laptop through our Full HD Avengers test trailer and it took about eight hours. And you guessed it – the XPS 15 was close again with 30 minutes less. The XPS 17 did it more than an hour longer.

The bottom line is that these powerful, creative laptops with low-power displays probably won't keep you actually working for an entire day. You want to carry your charger around with you. This is quite a task as they are pretty large power bricks. But that's the price you pay for fast laptops with beautiful displays.

Our opinion

The HP Envy 15 is the company's fastest consumer laptop and the one that best meets the needs of creative professionals with high work demands. Really, it's not even close – if you want similar or greater performance, you'll have to switch to HP's commercial line, especially the workstations. And the Envy 15 does its job well – it's fast, it can be configured with even faster components if you are looking to spend more, and it offers the type of display that fits all creative needs.

The Specter line is great for productivity users and those who value good looks and a smaller case. But it's the Envy 15 that makes power users happy – for hundreds of dollars less than they spend on competitive laptops.

Are there alternatives?

The Dell XPS 15 and Dell XPS 17 both offer the same or better performance with great displays and are equally good for creative workflows. But you'll be spending a lot more money, getting a little more class, and a more useful 16:10 display, but not much more.

If you're not a creative professional and want a 15-inch laptop with more flexibility and panache, the HP Specter x360 15 is a good alternative. You'll spend similar money and have an option for an equally great AMOLED display, but you won't get anywhere near the performance.

Don't forget the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme and the MacBook Pro 16-inch. These, too, can be configured with the same powerful components, and both provide superior displays. However, as with the XPS options, be prepared to spend a lot more money.

How long it will take?

The Envy 15 is well built and should last for years. However, we would like the guarantee to be longer than a year.

Should you buy it?

Absolutely. If you're looking for a laptop that can handle demanding creative tasks at a cheaper price, the Envy 15 is the one for you.

Editor's recommendations




06 Jul
Blog

Use Your Brain to Get Flexible Fast

Okay, guys, let's take a second here and have a little chat, right?

What comes to mind when I say flexibility? I bet the first thing you think about is as strong as f ** k, right? Not. That's because when people think of flexibility, they think of little gymnasts who are folded in two and just hanging around, or of dancers who are split forever.

Now you're not wrong. The practice of holding a stretch and being pulled in by gravity is a kind of stretch called passive flexibility. Depending on the context, the context is ultimately the right choice because it is king.

But I'll be honest. I am not a fan of passive stretching because I am not a fan of all these additional movement options If you do not make the joints stable or do not develop the strength to support them. Because creating a new area is just part of the puzzle.

The place of greatness

You cannot forget the square of grandeur. (A shitty name I know). The four elements or corners are:

If you only train one of these four elements, the place will go to hell and I'm afraid that's where the injury is, my friend. Each of these elements is crucial for creating a strong, flexible and, above all, versatile body that can adapt to the unexpected.

So how do we build strength, length or flexibility at the same time as stability?

Stretch with weights

Waiting; What? That's right, you heard me. This magical thing I'm talking about is called active flexibility.

Active flexibility stretches on purpose. They use a full combination of things to build this area and above all the strength and stability in that area.

1. Muscles

You use your muscles when you exercise active flexibility correctly, from the procedure and extension to the antagonist's muscles, and you stretch.

If you do it right, you should all be a quiver and then have a pump.

2. Tasks

You are of course flexible. Just look at passed out drunks. Your brain inhibits this natural flexibility.

Your brain won't let you do anything that it doesn't think is safe and that you have a chance to improve. So if you are not strong enough to free yourself from a position, don't get involved.

One way to get around this is to give your brain a job. The brain loves tasks.

When your brain has a job, you can move to deeper areas to accomplish that job.

Every time you enter these areas, cement these nerve tracts and tell your brain that you are not an idiot, that you will not be hurt, and that you are safe in this area.

3. Weights

We can use weights to penetrate deeper areas and build muscle and stability in those areas. This in turn will strengthen neuronal trust. After all, you will always regret not having trained the position in which you were injured.

You need to develop the body-brain connection that says you have the strength to move through these positions.

Front split

I will cover one exercise for front divisions, one for medium divisions and one for a straddle fold. Let's start with the front divisions. We apply the task principle here:

  • What we're going to do is take a half-kneeling position with a little ball in front of the lead foot.
  • Extend your front leg and push the ball out as far as possible while pushing the ball in front of you.

Here is the task part:

  • When you reach the limit of your split, you need to hook your foot and push your straight front leg into the ground.
  • Bring the ball with you when you return to the starting position.

Watch the video to see how to do it.

Straddle split

The next step is to use the straddle fold and the principle of the working muscles:

  • We're going to start pretty high, so it's perfect to sit on the couch.
  • Mix your butt to the edge of the couch.
  • Spread your legs as wide as possible. This is your starting position.
  • Lean forward and try to bring your torso as close to the floor as possible.
  • From there you will use these glutes and adductors to help yourself get up without swing.
  • Then you will fall back on the couch under control.

Here is the video to get you started:

Middle split

Finally we will blow out the weights for the middle divisions. I am We all know the attitude of the horse as a conditioning tool. but if not, I'll describe it in the video below.

We get into a nice broad horse position while holding a weight in each hand.

  • We need to make sure that we can still get deep enough that our knees are bent 90 degrees.
  • We will then alternatively push the weights onto our shoulders and each time we push up we will stretch our legs to get up.
  • When the weight falls back on the shoulders, we allow ourselves to be immersed in the horse's posture each time thanks to this additional weight.
  • Finally, we continue to expand the horse's posture until it resembles the middle gap.

Here is the full video:

Right for all training

All of these different aspects of active flexibility result in one thing that applies to every training session. Flexibility, movement and muscle activation live in the brain.

When you exercise in the gym, you are not exercising your body. You train your mind. You give your brain a job, and as it does this job, it builds up neural cards and increases the required muscle activation as it sees that this job needs to be done on a regular basis.

To achieve a training goal, you need to convince the brain that the goal is safe and important enough to focus on because after all, your brain's priorities are not necessarily your priorities. Your brain doesn't matter if you want a six pack. You shouldn't fall off this balcony and try to impress Brenda.

Get some flexibility gains and some brain gains by making your workout more neurobiomechanical. Think of the square of grandeur. You will be in less hurry and never look back.

06 Jul
Blog

Use Your Brain to Get Flexible Fast

Okay, guys, let's take a second here and have a little chat, right?

What comes to mind when I say flexibility? I bet the first thing you think about is as strong as f ** k, right? Not. That's because when people think of flexibility, they think of little gymnasts who are folded in two and just hanging around, or of dancers who are split forever.

Now you're not wrong. The practice of holding a stretch and being pulled in by gravity is a kind of stretch called passive flexibility. Depending on the context, the context is ultimately the right choice because it is king.

But I'll be honest. I am not a fan of passive stretching because I am not a fan of all these additional movement options If you do not make the joints stable or do not develop the strength to support them. Because creating a new area is just part of the puzzle.

The place of greatness

You cannot forget the square of grandeur. (A shitty name I know). The four elements or corners are:

If you only train one of these four elements, the place will go to hell and I'm afraid that's where the injury is, my friend. Each of these elements is crucial for creating a strong, flexible and, above all, versatile body that can adapt to the unexpected.

So how do we build strength, length or flexibility at the same time as stability?

Stretch with weights

Waiting; What? That's right, you heard me. This magical thing I'm talking about is called active flexibility.

Active flexibility stretches on purpose. They use a full combination of things to build this area and above all the strength and stability in that area.

1. Muscles

You use your muscles when you exercise active flexibility correctly, from the procedure and extension to the antagonist's muscles, and you stretch.

If you do it right, you should all be a quiver and then have a pump.

2. Tasks

You are of course flexible. Just look at passed out drunks. Your brain inhibits this natural flexibility.

Your brain won't let you do anything that it doesn't think is safe and that you have a chance to improve. So if you are not strong enough to free yourself from a position, don't get involved.

One way to get around this is to give your brain a job. The brain loves tasks.

When your brain has a job, you can move to deeper areas to accomplish that job.

Every time you enter these areas, cement these nerve tracts and tell your brain that you are not an idiot, that you will not be hurt, and that you are safe in this area.

3. Weights

We can use weights to penetrate deeper areas and build muscle and stability in those areas. This in turn will strengthen neuronal trust. After all, you will always regret not having trained the position in which you were injured.

You need to develop the body-brain connection that says you have the strength to move through these positions.

Front split

I will cover one exercise for front divisions, one for medium divisions and one for a straddle fold. Let's start with the front divisions. We apply the task principle here:

  • What we're going to do is take a half-kneeling position with a little ball in front of the lead foot.
  • Extend your front leg and push the ball out as far as possible while pushing the ball in front of you.

Here is the task part:

  • When you reach the limit of your split, you need to hook your foot and push your straight front leg into the ground.
  • Bring the ball with you when you return to the starting position.

Watch the video to see how to do it.

Straddle split

The next step is to use the straddle fold and the principle of the working muscles:

  • We're going to start pretty high, so it's perfect to sit on the couch.
  • Mix your butt to the edge of the couch.
  • Spread your legs as wide as possible. This is your starting position.
  • Lean forward and try to bring your torso as close to the floor as possible.
  • From there you will use these glutes and adductors to help yourself get up without swing.
  • Then you will fall back on the couch under control.

Here is the video to get you started:

Middle split

Finally we will blow out the weights for the middle divisions. I am We all know the attitude of the horse as a conditioning tool. but if not, I'll describe it in the video below.

We get into a nice broad horse position while holding a weight in each hand.

  • We need to make sure that we can still get deep enough that our knees are bent 90 degrees.
  • We will then alternatively push the weights onto our shoulders and each time we push up we will stretch our legs to get up.
  • When the weight falls back on the shoulders, we allow ourselves to be immersed in the horse's posture each time thanks to this additional weight.
  • Finally, we continue to expand the horse's posture until it resembles the middle gap.

Here is the full video:

Right for all training

All of these different aspects of active flexibility result in one thing that applies to every training session. Flexibility, movement and muscle activation live in the brain.

When you exercise in the gym, you are not exercising your body. You train your mind. You give your brain a job, and as it does this job, it builds up neural cards and increases the required muscle activation as it sees that this job needs to be done on a regular basis.

To achieve a training goal, you need to convince the brain that the goal is safe and important enough to focus on because after all, your brain's priorities are not necessarily your priorities. Your brain doesn't matter if you want a six pack. You shouldn't fall off this balcony and try to impress Brenda.

Get some flexibility gains and some brain gains by making your workout more neurobiomechanical. Think of the square of grandeur. You will be in less hurry and never look back.

01 Jul
Blog

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime XSE Review: Fast and Frugal

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime XSE Review: A New Normal

"The 2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime makes the future seem normal."

  • It's fast

  • Shatter the myth of the gas-guzzling SUV

  • Competitive in the cargo space

  • Intuitive infotainment system

  • Refined driving quality

With the Hybrid-Prius and the Plug-in-Hybrid-Prius Prime, Toyota wrapped green technology in an extroverted design and used design to trumpet its success. The 2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime takes a different approach.

The Prime looks like an ordinary RAV4, Toyota's bestseller. Like the Prius Prime, the RAV4 Prime is a plug-in hybrid with better mileage than the current RAV4 hybrid model. However, the Prime is not only the most economical RAV4. It is also the most powerful and fastest accelerating RAV4.

The RAV4 Prime is available in two configurations. The SE starts at $ 39,195, while XSE models like our test car start at $ 42,500. That means the base SE is around $ 2,000 more than the most expensive RAV4 hybrid. However, due to the size of the battery, Toyota expects the Prime to qualify for a tax credit of $ 7,500 to compensate for this difference.

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime

Design and interior

In contrast to the Prius Prime, whose design differs significantly from the standard Prius, the RAV4 Prime looks like any other RAV4. Black exterior trim, another grille, model-specific wheels and badges are the only hallmarks of the Prime. The RAV4 itself looks like a rugged off-roader, but has the same TNGA (Toyota New Global Architecture) platform as cars like the Corolla and Camry.

The interior is practically unchanged, which is not a bad thing. Chunky buttons and strategically placed rubber grips give the interior a sturdy feel while improving usability. The free-standing infotainment touchscreen is easy to reach from the driver's seat, but somewhat difficult for the passengers in the front seats. The front seats were fairly comfortable, but the lower cushions of the rear seats were flat and unsupportive.

Chunky buttons and strategically placed rubber grips give the interior a sturdy feel while improving usability.

While Toyota pinned the design down, the quality of the interior material remained. The Prime is the flagship of the RAV4 series, but the interior didn't seem to be an improvement over cheaper models. The faux leather seats looked like they had been taken out of a taxi, and trim parts seemed to have been sourced from Rubbermaid.

Toyota claims that the battery mounted under the floor has no effect on the interior. However, this is not a segment-leading interior, since the RAV4 already lagged behind most of the competitors. The RAV4 Prime offers more rear headroom than the plug-in hybrids Ford Escape and Mitsubishi Outlander, but the Escape offers more rear legroom thanks to a sliding seat in the second row. The Toyota also offers more cargo space than the Ford and Mitsubishi. The RAV4 and the Outlander also have 120 volt outlets in their holds, around power tools, camping gear or whatever you want to connect on the go.

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime

Technology, infotainment and driver assistance

The basic RAV4 Prime SE has an 8.0-inch touchscreen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto as well as an integrated WLAN hotspot. The XSE trim level has a 9.0-inch touchscreen – the largest available in a RAV4. An optional premium package for the XSE adds a head-up display. This is the only way to use this function on a RAV4.

The infotainment system is easy to use, also thanks to the protection of analog controls for the most important functions. The digital instrument cluster display is known to anyone who has driven another Toyota hybrid. It packs a lot of information in a relatively small space, but is easy to acclimatize. Overall, the infotainment experience offers nothing special, but does its job in a simple way.

The infotainment system is easy to use, also thanks to the protection of analog controls for the most important functions.

The RAV4 Prime comes standard with Toyota Safety Sense 2.0, which includes: Autonomous emergency braking (with pedestrian and cyclist recognition), traffic sign recognition, lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control and lane tracking assistant that offers small steering inputs to keep the speed centered on the car .

The standard package of driver aids is comparable to other popular brands, although the lane tracking assistant should not be confused with the more aggressive steering assistance functions of Ford, Nissan and Subaru. The Toyota version is more of an improved lane keeping assistant than a real steering aid.

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime

Experience driving

The RAV4 Prime tries to outperform in two very different disciplines: performance and efficiency. An updated version of the RAV4 hybrid powertrain is used to achieve impressive numbers.

The 2.5-liter four-cylinder petrol engine delivers the same 176 hp as before, but with the additional grunt of two electric motors, the overall system performance increases to 302 hp. That is 83 hp more than the RAV4 Hybrid and much more than the plug-in hybrids Ford Escape or Mitsubishi Outlander. The Escape is also only equipped with front-wheel drive, while the two Japanese vehicles have all-wheel drive.

The Toyota, according to Toyota, a number previously reserved for sports cars, can travel between zero and 60 miles per hour in 5.7 seconds. This makes the RAV4 Prime the fastest four-door Toyota currently sold in the United States (only the Supra sports car is faster).

The four-wheel drive hybrid system is similar to other Toyota vehicles. The rear wheels are driven by a special electric motor without a mechanical connection to the front wheels. As with the RAV4 Hybrid, this rear engine is also used for torque transmission to steer performance from side to side to improve road handling and increase traction on slippery surfaces. A "trail" driving mode also helps with the latter.

The RAV4 Prime is the fastest four-door Toyota currently sold in the United States.

On the go, the RAV4 Prime felt as fast as the numbers suggest. It was not just the extra power, but also the way that power was delivered. The Prime felt like an electric car and instantly delivered a surge of torque on every stroke of the right pedal. This steady, urgent acceleration took place regardless of the state of charge of the battery. A slight buzz was the only indication that the gasoline engine was on.

Like the Mitsubishi Outlander, the RAV4 Prime also has paddle shifters that can be used to adjust regenerative braking to slow the car down without using the brake pedal and recovering some energy. However, the effect didn't feel as dramatic in the Toyota as in the Mitsubishi, and you'll have to upgrade from the SE to the XSE to get these paddles.

Toyota also tried to make the Prime more refined than other RAV4 models by getting thicker laminated glass, more soundproofing, and a different suspension set-up. The Prime felt significantly quieter and more comfortable than other RAV4 variants, but maybe Toyota should have gone in the opposite direction with a sportier chassis. As it is, the chassis cannot use this 302 horsepower.

2021 Toyota RAV4 Prime

Fuel consumption, range and safety

The RAV4 Prime proves that electricity does not have to come at the expense of efficiency. Toyota cites 42 miles of electric range with an efficiency of 94 MPGe. This is more electrical range than a first-generation Chevrolet Volt with identical efficiency. When it debuted in 2010, the Volt was a purpose-built vehicle that is considered a “moon shot” by General Motors. Therefore, it is remarkable to see similar numbers in an ordinary crossover. The RAV4 Prime also offers almost twice the electric range of the Toyota Prius Prime, albeit with much less efficiency.

The Prime beats the Ford Escape and the Mitsubishi Outlander in electric range, although the Ford is more efficient with 100 MPGe. Toyota had no fuel consumption values ​​for gasoline available at the time of release, but according to the car's on-board computer, we had an average of 42.5 mpg.

With the standard 3.3-kilowatt on-board charger, a full charge takes 12 hours at a 120-volt household socket or 4.5 hours at a 240-volt charging station at level 2. A 6.6- available in the XSE version kW charger shortens the charging time of level 2 to 2.5 hours. This is as good as it gets as Toyota doesn't offer DC fast charging on the RAV4 Prime (it's standard on the Mitsubishi Outlander).

Safety ratings for the Prime are not yet available, but the standard RAV4 received the "Top Safety Pick" rating from the Road Safety Insurance Institute (IIHS), with the highest rating being missed due to poor headlights. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) rated the standard RAV4 with five stars.

Toyota offers a three-year basic warranty of 36,000 miles and a five-year warranty of 60,000 miles for the powertrain, as well as free scheduled maintenance for two years or 25,000 miles. The Prime battery has its own 10-year 150,000-mile warranty, and other hybrid system components have an eight-year 100,000-mile warranty. Overall, the RAV4 has a good reputation for reliability because many hybrid models can easily handle a taxis service.

How DT would configure this car

The technically friendliest incarnation of the RAV4 Prime is the XSE with the optional premium package. The XSE has some technical functions that the basic SE equipment variant does not offer, including a larger 9.0-inch touchscreen and charging the Qi mobile phone. The premium package ($ 3,765) includes a head-up display, a more powerful 6.6 kW on-board charger, a socket for the cargo area, a video rear view mirror, a 360-degree camera system and a parking assistant with automatic Front and rear braking.

The Prime itself is the best RAV4. Just as the RAV4 Hybrid outperforms the petrol model in terms of performance and sophistication as well as mileage, the Prime offers the CV of this crossover more power and even more efficiency. If you have the extra money, the Prime turns the RAV4 from a pretty good car into a world hit.

Our opinion

The Toyota RAV4 Prime 2021 proves that the future doesn't have to be unusual. This plug-in hybrid breaks new ground by being normal. Instead of just trying to make a statement, the Prime is bringing green technology into a car that people are already buying. With 302 hp, the RAV4 Prime shows that the future doesn't have to be boring.

The RAV4 Prime is also the class of its (admittedly small) competitive field. It outperforms the Mitsubishi Outlander in terms of cargo space, performance and efficiency, while offering more technical functions. The Ford Escape plug-in hybrid lags behind the RAV4 Prime in terms of electrical range, but offers greater efficiency. The Ford is also below the Toyota and starts at just under $ 35,000. However, the Escape itself isn't our preferred little crossover, and the plug-in hybrid doesn't have all-wheel drive.

The Subaru Crosstrek Hybrid and the Kia Niro PHEV are not only suitable for SUVs, but also cannot keep up with the triple threat of performance, electrical range and cargo space from Toyota. The Kia is also not available with all-wheel drive.

Should you get one?

Yes. The RAV4 Prime is a true all-rounder.

Editor's recommendations




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