ali The Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41 Ryzen variant provides the best build quality in the industry, a passable keyboard, and a functional display.
Acer Swift 3 SF315-41G-R6MP Laptop
Performance is on par with other 8th generation Intel Core i5 variants thanks to Ryzen 2500U, which also provides better graphics support than the integrated GPU found in Intel chips. The laptop’s only real flaw, in our opinion, is its average battery, but given the price, this is hardly causing concern.
In the past year, AMD has demonstrated impressive resiliency on the desktop side, and the company is now competing with Intel in the laptop market. The Indian market has begun to see the introduction of laptops with AMD’s newest Ryzen mobile processors, and we were fortunate enough to test out the Acer Swift 3 with the Ryzen 5 2500U processor. This new chip, which has four cores and eight threads, can compete favorably with the Intel Core i5 8250U. The Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41 powered by the Ryzen 2500U recently underwent some performance testing, and the results point to it offering comparable performance. What about the laptop itself, though? Does it work well? To evaluate the performance of the new AMD Ryzen-powered Acer Swift 3, we step back and concentrate on it. Here is a summary of our review.
Build and Design
The 15-inch Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41 has the same design and build quality as the 14-inch model we reviewed earlier this year. The machine’s brushed aluminum body feels premium. Acer added a glass panel to the front to stabilize the display panel, which flexes slightly. Typing isn’t affected by the keyboard deck’s flex. The lid and keyboard deck of this 15-inch model have chamfered edges, which look nice and protect your hands when carrying it.
Acer’s 15-inch laptop weighs 2 kilograms, which is lighter than most 15 inches in the past. Without a laptop opening kit, opening the machine’s back can break nails. Opening it yields only an expandable M.2 storage bay. The motherboard’s soldering prevents 8GB RAM upgrades. The AMD APU is cooled by two heat pipes and a rear-exhausting fan. The fan whines when fully loaded.
I/O and display
The 15-inch TFT panel matches the 14-inch Intel model we tested. The display has good viewing angles and color fidelity for a 40K machine despite the reflective glass front. We like that this laptop’s base model has 1080p resolution, unlike last year’s. The 15-inch display is sharp but dim.
Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41 and I/O are excellent. The left side has an HDMI port, two USB 3.0 ports, a USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-C port, a microphone, and a headphone jack. Right-side USB 2.0 and SD card readers. Despite having more than a smaller laptop, the ethernet port is missing. Laptops are losing their basic ethernet jacks. Acer had other options. We want companies to use USB Type-C power delivery for systems under 100W. The right-side USB 2.0 port could have been a 3.0 port.
Touchpad and keyboard
The laptop’s keyboard and touchpad are good. You’ll get used to the chiclet-style keys’ low click sound and sponginess. The MacBook’s 12-inch keyboard is inferior to the keys’ limited travel. The 14-inch keyboard’s flaws remain. Touch typists struggle to press the page down or page up keys because they are still next to the arrow keys. The top row of function keys clutters the keyboard and is smaller than the rest. The keyboard’s lack of two-stage backlighting, volume, and media controls is the worst.
The only budget laptop with a better keyboard is the Lenovo Idea pad 520s, but we like Acer’s keyboard. Despite this, the keyboard deck has enough space for your hands to spread out and work at different angles, so typing won’t strain you.
The large, smooth touchpad below the keyboard works like the 14-inch models. Tracking is fine on a matte surface. If Microsoft adds gestures, Acer should receive timely updates since it uses Windows precision drivers. Windows 10 gestures worked fine. The bottom left and right click buttons click when pressed.
A swipe-style fingerprint scanner on the keyboard deck is inaccurate and slow. Acer should adopt a touch-based fingerprint scanner soon.
Performance
As mentioned, this Acer Swift 3 has the latest quad-core AMD Ryzen 2500U processor. This new 15W chip looks like the Intel Core i5-8250U. Due to its lower single-core boost clock speed, it performs slightly worse than Intel (single-core). However, multi-core performance is better (Cinebench R15). On this machine, the slower Western Digital 1TB HDD drive performs poorly. PCMark (acc) is higher for the Core i5.
Daily performance is similar despite the slower hard drive. A $40,000 SSD laptop is unlikely due to rising flash memory prices. Acer set the laptop’s thermal envelope at 76 degrees Celsius, which the chip didn’t exceed during our tests. Performance is unaffected by temperature-maintained throttling. However, Ryzen processors’ configurable TDPs enable better performance, so Acer could have designed a laptop thermal solution higher than 15W. (higher than 15W).
Ryzen’s integrated Vega GPU outperforms all laptop GPUs (in India). The chip outperforms UHD 620 by nearly twice in synthetic benchmarks. However, laptops cannot run AAA games. However, the Acer Swift 3 or any laptop with a Ryzen 5 or higher processor should run Dota 2 without lag. It uses 1GB of 8GB DDR4 RAM as dedicated memory and can use more.
This AMD laptop doesn’t emit heat. One fan and two heat pipes work. 15W TDP aids. We only heat it during our rigorous stress testing. AMD and Acer have succeeded in keeping the laptop cool.
Battery power
The battery life is only mildly impressive compared to the rest of this laptop’s impressive features. For the average day’s work, the 48W battery lasts a respectable 4-5 hours, which is nothing exceptional. If you end up binge-watching a series at maximum brightness, your battery life may even be lower. Although some people may find this disappointing, there aren’t many laptops that perform better in the $40K price range.
PROS of Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41
- Quality Construction
- Good Value
- Top-tier iGPU performs admirably
CONS of Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41
- Slow HDD
- Average battery life
>>> Read more Acer Aspire 7 A717-72G
Bottomline Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41
Overall, the Ryzen-powered Acer Swift 3 Sf315-41 is a full-featured laptop that meets all requirements but nothing more. The performance, display quality, keyboard, touchpad, and even the I/O selection of the laptop are comparable to those of its competitors. Although the keyboard, while functional, could have been better, we believe that overall, Acer offers a decent package for the price. The battery life is about average. We do think that the laptop would have performed better if an SSD had been included, but the price may have suffered as a result.
The Lenovo Idea pad 520s, whose build quality is inferior to that of this 144hz laptop, and the HP Pavilion 15, which has a GPU but a last-generation processor and only 4GB RAM, are its two main rivals.
