Acer Swift Go 14 (2024) review: Meteor Lake boosts the present and prepares for the future

 The Acer Swift Go 14 is one of the first laptops to feature the all-new Intel Core Ultra processor. Given its price (starting at $1,199) and utilitarian design, the Swift Go 14 is a great example of how AI is starting to infuse into consumer gear.

The Core Ultra 7 features Intel's new Meteor Lake mobile architecture, which adds a small, dual-core neural processing unit (NPU) designed to support artificial intelligence workloads. For now, the average user likely won't see any tangible gains from NPU until software catches up and applications designed to take advantage of local AI processing arrive.

On the other hand, the new Intel Arc GPU integrated into the processor provides an immediate benefit compared to the previous iGPU. In summary, the Swift Go 14 is competitive for today's applications while preparing for the future, as new software takes advantage of its NPU.

photo credit: © Acer© Matt Elliott/CNET

The Acer Swift Go 14 is available in France from €1,199 with a Core Ultra 7 155H (16 cores), 16 GB of RAM and 1 TB of SSD. Its 14-inch 16:10 IPS screen displays 1920 x 1200 pixels.

Performance

The Core Ultra 7 155H processor offers six performance cores, eight efficiency cores and a total of 22 processing threads. This hybrid combining architecture is not new. What's new is the addition of a low-power dual-core NPU to help accelerate AI tasks.

CNET.com's benchmark test protocols don't yet feature AI workloads to put the NPU through its paces. But during benchmark tests, we saw a substantial gain on PCMark 10 compared to the older generation Swift Go 14, configured the same way but based on a 13th generation Core i7 H. Performance only increased slightly on Cinebench and did not improve on Geekbench.

Better graphics

On the other hand, the performance gains are greater in the area of ​​graphics. Switching from the older Intel Iris Xe graphics chip to the new Intel Arc resulted in an increase in 3D performance. In our testing on 3DMark, the Swift Go 14's scores were significantly higher than laptops with the Iris Xe chip.

For gamers who are rubbing their hands while reading these lines, let us point out that the 3D scores are much lower than those of the Acer Swift range. Still, it's good to see Intel making progress with its integrated GPU, which has long lagged behind AMD's Radeon integrated graphics chips.

photo credit: © Acer© Matt Elliott/CNET

To get an idea of ​​the Swift Go 14's gaming capabilities, we ran the Riftbreaker benchmark. On the GPU test, it achieved an average of 67 frames per second, far from the 173 frames per second and 198 frames per second achieved by the RTX 4050-equipped Acer Swift X 14 and HP Victus 16, respectively. 14 was unable to run our Shadow of the Tomb Raider test at 1920x1080 at the highest quality settings. But it averaged 56 frames per second at 1080p at the lowest quality settings. The Swift Go 14 proved noisy and hot when running games, which isn't surprising given its compact dimensions. The fans spin constantly and the keyboard gets hot after a few minutes of gaming.

Impressive autonomy

The autonomy of the Swift Go 14 is impressive. It lasted 12 hours and 40 minutes in our online video streaming test. That's a few hours less than the MacBook Pro M3 and a few hours more than Windows laptops based on a previous generation Core i7 H chip. This is a big leap forward in terms of autonomy, even if Apple's processor remains the most efficient in this area.

photo credit: © Matt Elliott/CNET© Matt Elliott/CNET

Any design

The exterior of the Swift Go 14 is nowhere near as interesting as its insides. Its standard silver body doesn't stand out much from other laptops in its class. You probably won't know who made this computer until you see the discreet Acer logo on the cover.

The Swift Go 14 feels pretty solid to the touch, but the lid and keyboard are a bit flexible. It's nowhere near as sturdy as the 14-inch MacBook Pro or the Dell XPS 13 Plus, but both of those models cost hundreds of dollars more. The Swift Go 14 weighs 1.3kg, which is about average for its size.

photo credit: © Matt Elliott/CNET© Matt Elliott/CNET

The connectivity offers two USB-C Thunderbolt 4 ports, two USB Type-A ports, an HDMI output and a combo audio jack. It would have been convenient that the USB-C ports were distributed on the left and right edges so that you could charge the laptop on either side. Nice surprise to find a microSD card slot.

The keyboard is spacious and the keys offer good travel, but they lack firmness. The touchpad covered with a matte surface provides a smooth glide. It registers multitouch gestures accurately, but click response has too much travel, to the point of feeling mushy.

It AI ups and downs

The definition is sufficient for the size of the screen. Text and image edges are sharp. Our first experience was not very pleasant. When we first turned on the Swift Go 14, we were greeted by an animated Windows background that moved slightly when we moved the cursor. It turns out that Acer has included an app called AlterView that uses AI to turn 2D images into wallpapers with 3D effects. This can get annoying quite quickly and we were quick to disable it.

The Swift Go 14 is a rare example of a laptop whose webcam has a higher resolution than the screen with 2,560 x 1,440 pixels. Images are sharp and well-balanced on the Swift Go 14's screen and should appear even sharper to video conference callers if they have a display that can take full advantage of the 1440p camera.

photo credit: © Matt Elliott/CNET© Matt Elliott/CNET

The AI ​​features of the webcam and its microphone are much more relevant than the AlterView feature. The Purified Voice app can isolate voice in a recording. To test it, we recorded videos while listening to a podcast on a phone a few meters away. In the first video, without the noise reduction, you can clearly hear the podcast in the background. In the second video, with noise reduction enabled, the podcast voices are significantly reduced. This AI-powered noise reduction is an example of what the NPU can provide in everyday use.

A powerful webcam

The webcam uses a Windows Studio Effects AI feature that tracks and keeps the face framed when moving back and forth and side to side. It can also blur the blurred background during video calls.

Too bad that the webcam is not equipped with an infrared sensor which allows you to use the Windows Hello unlocking function by facial recognition. However, you can use the power button which incorporates a fingerprint reader.

photo credit: © Matt Elliott/CNET© Matt Elliott/CNET

Conclusion: our opinion on the Acer Swift Go 14 (2024)

The immediate advantages of the Core Ultra 7 processor are mainly reflected in long battery life and the new Arc chip which provides a clear improvement over Intel's previous GPU. When software developers start updating or introducing new apps with artificial intelligence features that take better advantage of the Meteor Lake NPU, then the appeal of the Swift Go 14 will increase. But until then, there are more attractive laptops at this price point.