Acer Swift 7 Hands-on, First Impressions

Acer’s latest ultra slim notebook finally made its way to our hands during the launch of their partnership with New Balance. Here’s our initial impression of the Acer Swift 7.

The Swift 7 is Acer’s top-of-the-line slim notebook for the year. It battles the likes of HP Spectre and Apple MacBook. Actually, it’s currently the thinnest among them at 9.98mm but is the slimming competition really necessary?

Its all-metal chassis gives it the sturdiness you’d want from a portable notebook. With that, though, comes the heft. It’s quite heavy when lifting it with one hand but the weight seems to be evenly distributed. It has a 13.3-inch display which is a common size among the competition.

The laptop’s display has its resolution maxed at Full HD (1920 x 1080 pixels) and doesn’t have touch input. The absence of a touchscreen on ultra-slim notebooks are common due to their thinness. What you’re getting in exchange is Corning Gorilla Glass for a clear and scratch-resistant display.

The laptop has very limited ports — two USB Type-C and a 3.5mm jack. No HDMI or dedicated power port here as the latest gen of USB can do it all. Since you only have two ports and USB-C accessories are still growing, you’ll have to resort to using dongles and adapters.

The bottom plate is sealed but should easily be accessible thanks to screws keeping it tight. The stereo speakers of the laptop are placed below that’s prone to muffling when placed on a soft surface.

As for the keys, there’s not much travel when typing but the spaces in between them make it comfortable to speed type on. Also, the trackpad is ridiculously wide and spacious.

What’s powering the Swift 7 is the Intel Core i5-7Y54 processor clocked at 1.2GHz. Nope, it’s the Core i series we regularly find on most notebooks but rather the latest Core m chipset. It’s fanless and low voltage silicon ideal for notebooks like the Swift 7 but it doesn’t have the power of usual laptops. It’s paired with 8GB RAM and 256GB SSD to keep things speedy. Of course, it boots Windows 10 Home out of the box.

Acer Swift 7 key specs:
13.3-inch Full HD IPS display
Intel Core i5-7Y54 1.20GHz Processor (4M Cache, up to 3.20GHz)
Intel HD Graphics 615
8GB LPDDR3 RAM
256GB SSD
WiFi 2T2R 802.11ac MU-MIMO
2x USB 3.1 Type-C port
9-hour battery life
9.98mm thick
1.1kg
Windows 10 Home

We’ll be doing a complete full review soon, be sure to check back for that. The Acer Swift 7 retails in the local market for Php64,999USD 1,108INR 93,898EUR 1,055CNY 8,066. If you’re going to buy one at participating Acer stores before December 31, you’ll get a New Balance Gift Card worth Php5,000USD 85INR 7,223EUR 81CNY 621. That’s basically a new pair of shoes already with a little spare for another one.

If the Acer Swift 7 is too much for you, you can also check out other members of the Swift series:

Acer Swift 5

• Core i3 — Php51,999USD 886INR 75,118EUR 844CNY 6,453
• Core i5 — Php59,999USD 1,022INR 86,675EUR 974CNY 7,446

Acer Swift 3

• Core i3 — Php34,999USD 596INR 50,560EUR 568CNY 4,343
• Core i5 — Php49,999USD 852INR 72,229EUR 811CNY 6,205