LG GRAM 17
A laptop that is simultaneously both large of screen and impossibly light
ith the Gram 17, LG has tried to make a laptop that’s both super-light and super-large – a laptop that doesn’t make much of a compromise on screen size or portability, in a market where you usually have to choose between one or the other.
In case you missed it, there was also a 2019 version of the LG Gram 17; this 2020 edition adds some small improvements (including a redesigned hinge) without messing with the original formula too much. The lightweight, premium construction means the computer is just about as portable as it possibly can be – it weighs in at a mere 1.35kg. You might think it’s missing some components when you pick it up, though the full keypad and expansive screen still mean it’s not all that easy to lug around.
The laptop is also extremely well designed – open or closed, it looks thin and stylish, and it’s absolutely going to add a touch of class to any desk you open it up on.
The 17-inch display is running at a supersharp resolution of 2560 x 1800 pixels, which shows off everything really well, from movies to
Wwebpages. It’s a gorgeous screen to look at, with bezels so thin you’ll hardly notice them. Contrast and brightness are excellent, though of course the brighter you have the display, the quicker the battery will run out. Our review model LG Gram 17 came with a quad-core 10th-gen Intel Core i7-1065G7 processor, 16GB of RAM, 512GB of SSD storage, and Intel Iris Plus integrated graphics. That’s definitely enough grunt to breeze through most everyday tasks, and we were able to do some serious image editing without the laptop showing signs of faltering.
Compromises have to be made to get a laptop to this sort of lightness and thinness though, and it’s not suitable for gaming or heavy-duty video editing. The fans did kick in rather more than we would have liked but to be fair they don’t make a lot of noise.
A huge display, lightweight form factor and decent internal specs all come at a cost of course – this will set you back £1,399 and up, depending on your configuration, so we’re not talking budget Chromebook prices.
If you’re in need of a screen this big though, and you don’t need to do any gaming or any demanding video editing, then the LG Gram 17 is an excellent purchase. It’s difficult to go back to a smaller laptop after getting used to this.