Love the idea of the Gram 17.  Here's how they could easily improve it.

- Ice Lake G7 / AMD 4800U (former is coming)
- matte screen
- 600+ nits
- remove the power supply port and replace with USB Type C PD.  Swap a USB Type A with a USB Type C.  Functional now and in the future with 2x Type A and 3x Type C.

I would pay full price for that laptop.  It would be fantastic.

Just an update to my previous post. I bought a Sonnet Breakaway Box 550 and an Asus Strix RTX 2070 OC Edition.

I'm definitely going to now call this the best laptop I've ever owned. Love it.

I had the Gram 15 and this is a great concept for a laptop, but that glossy screen is totally useless, it's completely unusable, even inside sometimes bright lights force you to move the screen around or change your working position. Awesome idea the 16:10 ratio for productivity but doesn't make sense paired with a glossy screen, what in the world are the engineers thinking?! Why cut the keyboard when there's still estate to make it a real keyboard.

I won't be buying again any Gram laptops until they stop with this garbage screen.

Another thing, a big request - to make 2 audio outputs for 4 pins, left and right side, they often break (with frequent removal and insertion of headphones, headsets), one will be reserved and plus the ability to quickly build on the road, 4-channel  sound on two audio outputs, Plus, optical SPDIF, so owner can connect an external portable DAC with galvanic isolation from the power supply of the laptop. It all costs a penny. Ordinary Realtek chips can do all this for over 15 years!

16:10 this is the right decision! It is necessary to strengthen the case, make a normal full-size keyboard and a good matte 4k screen with high contrast and somehow deal with the low i5 / i7 performance, although of course this is a difficult engineering task with such a low weight. I hope the new 10nm processors of the Intel U series will give a sharp gap in performance at the level of no less than a full-fledged i5 8400H. And then, with a fairly robust case (especially the screen hinges, cable to the screen), many will start to buy it. Listen to these tips and you catch the luck by the tail.

QuoteHere's how LG could improve the next Gram 17: make it heavier.

- 100 Wh battery
- quad front-facing speakers + 2 bottom sub woofers
- 2 SODIMM slots and socketed Wi-Fi card
- 2 fans + 2 heat pipes
- more vents
- add: 2 TB3 (one on either side), HDMI 2.1, full UHS-II SD, RJ-45
- remove: proprietary charging port
- brighter touchscreen option
- bigger touchpad with glass texture
- a lot better, centered keyboard
- eSIM
- 1080p@60fps IR webcam
- include a 80W USB-C PD charger

HDMI 1.4b is bad decision for LG. No HDR/4km output from UHD movies.

HDMI 2.1 not possible. This will require a discrete сhip next generation from NVidia (will probably come out this summer).

Touch not need. Touchscreen is not needed! We need a matte 4k screen (of course Flicker Free) with native contrast from 1500: 1! That would be perfect!

LG stop spoiling the keyboard! There is plenty of space !!!
Make a normal full-sized digital block and normal-sized Fx function keys! This is all that is needed for it to become a working tool! To enter a lot of data, programs, text!

Quote from: Robin Smith on April 22, 2019, 08:45:19
It is really big problem to me to understand what's happening. I can see AliExpress sellers who sell 4k 15" screens as low as 150 buks. And then I can see $1,5k laptop with a garbage instead of a screen and this really pisses me off as I don't have sane explanation for that.

How can we reduce number of morons paying for that circus? Do we really need WW3 to achieve it?

What are you talking about? This 16:10 display is far better than a 16:9 4K display IMO.

Thanks for being receptive to user feedback and making amendments. Could you address my comments on other articles, which call out oversights regarding 'PenTile' displays? Here is a handful of articles where NotebookCheck staff left my concerns unaddressed. Thanks.
- https://www.notebookcheck.net/The-Best-Notebook-Displays-As-Reviewed-By-Notebookcheck.120541.0.html (Fujitsu LifeBook U758 should be disqualified because it is PenTile)
- https://www.notebookcheck.com/Test-Fujitsu-LifeBook-U758-i7-8650U-UHD-Laptop.298120.0.html (Original article about U758)
- https://www.notebookcheck.net/Fujitsu-LifeBook-U758-i7-8650U-UHD-Laptop-Review.302878.0.html (English-translated article about U758)
- https://www.notebookcheck.net/Faux-K-Make-Sure-Your-Next-4K-Laptop-is-Actually-4K.289242.0.html (important article, but casts some points in manners that are harmful to proper public awareness)
- http://www.notebookcheck.net/HP-Chromebook-13-G1-Core-m5-Notebook-Review.172378.0.html (RG/BW display notebook shouldn't be called a Chromebook Pixel competitor)
- https://www.notebookcheck.net/Eve-V-m3-i5-i7-Convertible-Review.264092.0.html (omits subpixel matrix photo)
- https://www.notebookchat.com/index.php?topic=78203.msg316915#msg316915 (also omits subpixel photo, in both original and translated versions)

On the topic of the article, nice 17" 16:10 2560x1600 display. (Not PenTile of course, since I'm on that note). I've thought this should exist as an option for a while now.

It is really big problem to me to understand what's happening. I can see AliExpress sellers who sell 4k 15" screens as low as 150 buks. And then I can see $1,5k laptop with a garbage instead of a screen and this really pisses me off as I don't have sane explanation for that.

How can we reduce number of morons paying for that circus? Do we really need WW3 to achieve it?

Quote from: Jam on April 20, 2019, 10:03:13
I don't know why they don't put a 4K uhd panel instead of this 3200 x 1600 screen which is uncommon and you're stuck because you can't watch 4k videos. This screen is almost a deal breaker.
Otherwise this light laptop looks awesome.
This test is missing performance with an eGPU, in order to see if the CPU throttles or not.

I've owned this unit for about a month now, I also own a 15.6" 4K notebook. From a perspective of how sharp the desktop looks there really isn't a noticeable difference between the two.

The huge draw of this notebook is the 16:10 aspect ratio panel for productivity and creative work IMO. I wouldn't want them to swap it out for a 16:9 4K panel. It's in a class of it's own right now with zero competition in this regard. There's a lot of notebooks that could start to challenge this one in the 17" 16:9 space if you were willing to add a little weight to your purchase.

(The stated specs by notebookcheck at the top of this review are incorrect, this isn't a 16:9 panel, it's 16:10).

The only thing I'd like them to change for the next iteration would be to beef up the heat sink and fan so it can maintain higher boost clocks and maybe replace the charging port and put two thunderbolt 3 ports instead. Otherwise I'd probably be fine with nothing else changing. This thing DOES throttle. A lot. The heat sink and fan are sub-par. If they could upgrade those things without adding extra noise it would be nice. Check out this entire thread at the notebook review forums where a bunch of us have been discussing modding the heat management. http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/new-lg-gram-17.827017/
Pflugshaupt in particular has been doing some good work.

Other less important nit-pick stuff:
I could MAYBE say switch to a slightly less cramped centered keyboard without a number pad but I've slowly gotten used to the existing keyboard, in contrast to this the number pad comes in handy for DAW work, which this laptop is kind of made for and which I am learning music production but I'm not good enough yet to rely on the number pad for hot keys in the workflow, I'm still fumbling around. Number pad also is good for roguelikes, lol. Not a deal breaker though.

It would be nice if they put some top-firing speakers like the macbook pro and razer blade have. I really don't care much about this personally since I always use a pair of great cans, but it would be more universally appealing to the masses with great speakers, there's PLENTY of room for it.

All said I really love it. There's nothing else like it out there.

One other thing I thought I would never say, I'm kind of surprised at how much gaming I'm able to do on this meager 620 igpu if I keep my expectations in check. I thought it would be worse. (especially coming from a Tornado F5 with a 7700K + 1080). I assumed I would just be playing pretty much zero games. It's actually caused me to plumb the depths of  the massive backlog of my gaming catalog that work acceptably on it, which has been fun.

I'm planning on getting a Sonnet Breakaway box and an RTX 2070 at some point though to remove that restriction. I'm obviously not expecting miracles, but it should be more than acceptable.

Quote from: Benjamin Herzig on April 21, 2019, 13:16:26
@Gobrel,
the Vaio SX14 has a far higher rating when it comes to the build quality and the keyboard. Also, the Vaio is a subnotebook, while the LG is a Multimedia laptop. These are completely different laptop classes, so the rating is different as well.

Seems legit, nevertheless a little missleading.

The LG is my favorite for a new notebook. The problem is, it will not go on sale in germany as far as I know.:(

@Gobrel,
the Vaio SX14 has a far higher rating when it comes to the build quality and the keyboard. Also, the Vaio is a subnotebook, while the LG is a Multimedia laptop. These are completely different laptop classes, so the rating is different as well.

Why has this Notebook a worse rating than the Vaio SX14? I mean the LG has a far better battery and also for example usb-c with thunderbolt. The vaio lacks both and has 85% compared to 84% from the lg.

The size of the screen s 17 inches exact.  Not 17.3 inches.  17.3 is a standard 16:9 format, 17 inches is a 16:10 format, which is this LG unit.  It even says so on LG's website.

The LG 17 has a 17.0 inch screen with a 16:10 aspect ratio.
A 17.3 inch screen has a 16:9 aspect ratio.

A 17.0 inch 16:10 screen is both taller and narrower than 17.3 inch 16:9 screens.  Taller and narrower means more power can be devoted to displaying documents, such as two-page PDFs or two full-page windows, without wasting as much energy displaying large sidebars.