NEW LG Gram 16" WQXGA Intel Evo 12th Gen Laptop (Open Box)

Note: I got the 16 (blazing ddr5) /256/Xe model with 2560 x 1600 IPS, Evo 12th Gen i7 1260P. I've been buying portable computers since my Kaypro, and as a road warrior, laptops since my Toshiba T-1000. I've also got kids and a wife who used to work in design. So in addition to building PCs I have bought a LOT of laptops, easily over 50 over the past 35 years. But my now dying Thinkpad lasted so long that it has been six years since I bought one for myself. I got a chance to see this LG Gram in store and really first fell in love with the screen. It is bright, has great resolution. I also love the weight and form factor of this machine. It has a very sleek professional look and doesn't look like some plastic masquerading as an advanced alloy. Despite its sleek thinness there is virtually no flex at the palms or hinge. It has the ports I want as well. It has two USB C, both thunderbolt 4, as opposed to a single setup that I have to spend a lot of money to get a better two USB C hub/dock, nevermind the mess that would happen should I kill one port, and two USB-A 3.2. The balance of CPU and ram is optimal. Win 11 pro runs great. Before buying I wanted to make sure I could do some upgrading, so I watched some Youtubes. I already cloned boot, and swapped in a 1TB Samsung 980 as boot. I will probably swap out the original 256 to a 2tb in a year and have 3tb total. Keyboard has good action. Speakers are good as well. For my entire experience buying laptops, prices went down and capabilities went up relentlessly every year. So it was a shock when I started looking last month, given how the chip shortage has made an expensive mess for buyers. This was exactly mid budget for me. I am using the machine a fair amount, four to five hours a day and will return to note any issues should they arise. At this point I am very happy with this machine. It is a excellent combination of function and form.

It's very light, very fast, and has an impressively long battery life. What more could you want? It's not a gaming laptop. And it's not the easiest to upgrade: Memory is soldered in with no additional slots. There is room for an extra M2 but the entire bottom of the case needs to be removed to get to it (incl. all of the glued-on rubber feet. But the 16GB it does have should be plenty for anyone using it for most anything short of gaming and "content creation". It only has integrated graphics anyways so that's not what you'd use it for. What it's good for... browsing the internet, streaming videos, and all the other general use and productivity tasks... it's GREAT for. If you want a gaming laptop, this (obviously) isn't it. If you want a light, fast, efficient, quiet, cool, and refined laptop for general use, this is definitely a great option.

I have conflicting thoughts about the LG Gram. If you're reading this, you may have already gone through all the specs, the reviews, the videos, etc. to try to determine if this is the right laptop for you. So I will note only a few things that were relevant in my decision to ultimately NOT keep the laptop. 1. The weight of this thing is a marvel. If you are coming from a laptop that is 4 lbs+ and thought that was heavy, you probably won't be able to stop yourself from lifting the laptop a few times to test the weight before you use it each time. However, if you're coming from an ultrabook and you just want a bigger screen without adding weight, you may not be as impressed. That's because of the way this thing feels in the hand. If you've used any sort of premium ultrabook, the LG will feel like a plastic toy in comparison. It just always gave me a certain impression of flimsiness that I didn't love. 2. The screen is glorious for regular office work. It's bright, it's sharp, and the 16 inch real estate is amazing. I was so delighted to look at the screen and this alone made me go back and forth on whether or not to keep it. But it did so as both a pro AND a con. My laptop shipped with some excess backlight bleeding in one corner. It was about the size of a large thumb. I tried to ignore it, then I tried to work with LG to fix it, and both were more difficult than I wanted to put up with. I'm not sure if this is a common defect, but because of how thin the screen is, it felt like this could be a common failure point 3. The keyboard felt fantastic to type on. Really, the key travel felt good, almost like some kind of very weak and shallow mechanical keyboard. It was one of my favorite laptop keyboards in terms of how it felt (compared to Dell XPS, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, HP). However, because of how thin the keyboard is, I was getting some strange typing quirks, like certain keys registering even when I didn't touch them. Because I do so much typing (as you can tell from this review!) this canceled out the benefit of the keyboard. 4. This part is just a pro, not a con, but something I noticed and didn't see anyone else mention when I did my initial research. My Sennheiser 58X headphones plugged directly into the laptop and listening to Spotify sounded really, really good for some reason. Not sure of the reason - in comparison, a MacBook Pro 14 which has a high-impedance headphone jack, to my ears, didn't sound as good as this. Now if I tweak the settings on the Mac and listen to Apple Music lossless, I can get it equal or better, but it was weird that the default on the LG sounded so very good. If the screen was perfect from the start I would have definitely kept this laptop and been happy to use it as my daily driver despite the other quirks. It has so many pros and if the price is under $1,000, I don't really see any other laptops providing this much value in terms of lightness, screen size and solid specs.

Purchased this for use as a university student as well as some light gaming. There is something seriously wrong with this computer when after a couple months of use it crashes basic apps such as Word, can’t handle three apps open at once (Chrome with 10 tabs, Word, Outlook), cannot reboot (froze multiple times), cannot launch task manager, and consistently uses nearly 100% of its CPU and over 70% of memory when doing simple tasks. Glad I bought the extended warranty. It’s a piece of garbage. I did like how light it is and how fast it charges, but that does not make up for the issues described above. Also screen wobbles a lot and has too much glare. Had to adjust the brightness setting in Intel actually as default settings were way too bright. Just ask yourself this— Why spend over $1,000 on this computer if it could have serious issues within months? Don’t waste your money. Cannot emphasize this enough.

Amazing product, especially at under $1,000.00. In my opinion, the LG Gram is the only option on the market if you're seeking a thin and light device w/ a large display & solid performance. No other laptop does it all while being this light w/ this large of a display. This is my third LG Gram, despite already owning a 2021 Macbook Pro 16" M1 Pro and a 2022 Macbook Air M2. Just like the Mac, in my opinion, there's no other device quite like the Gram! For reference, I'm coming from the LG Gram 17 (10th gen i7; Costco-exclusive model 17Z90N-R.AAC8U1), which was nice but it had a tiny bit of coil whine, and its display was way too glossy - I had to purchase an aftermarket antiglare screen cover to use the laptop. However, this device was perfect out of the box - antiglare screen is just right and no coil whine! Very satisfied w/ the purchase.

The battery life is about 20 hours when searching the web and using non taxing software like word and powerpoint. I wanted the computer for school/work and it works super well. There are so many ports so no adapters are needed and charging is back to full in a little less than an hour. The display randomly brightens and dims but I think that is a setting i haven’t found. Is a big improvement over my previous MacBook pro that was about 5yrs old. Since I use Excel a lot the number pad is very helpful, and lastly the computer is super lightweight and barely ever sounds like and airplane taking off.

Update after a year and a half: I bought this laptop because it had good specs at a much lower cost than Dell XPS. Biggest positives are super light weight and easy user upgrades (installed a second SSD myself in minutes). But a year and a half of use have also highlighted what you give up to save money. 1) The fan cranks up to high speed under fairly light loads -- not just on Zoom, but when a browser tab has any sort of video playing. Something as simple as a video ad or a small video on a news site will crank the fan to high. 2) The system will pause when confronted with fairly simple tasks, like highlighting a lot of objects on a PPT slide to set up animations. A consequence of having only 16GB RAM? 3) And this one is huge, the battery dies after just 35 minutes on a Zoom call, even if I turn the screen brightness all the way down. A battery that has such poor life after only a year and half is a huge drawback. When I first got the LG Gram 16, I went into settings and accepted the recommended battery saver option of not charging past 80%, in order to maximize battery life, but the battery is still shot in less than two years. So I guess my next step is to see whether the battery is as easily replaced as the hard drive. We'll see. ORIGINAL REVIEW: Positives: + Impressive specs (i7, 16GB RAM, 16 inch screen) for about $100 + Incredibly thin and light -- hard to appreciate just how thin and light until you pick it up + Numeric keypad, if you do a lot of number work + Excellent array of ports (2 x USB-A, 2 x USB-C, HDMI, headphone/mic, microSD), which is rare in light laptops these days (most have just just a couple of USB-C, so you have to carry a dock, which sort of defeats the purpose of thin and light) + Super easy to add a second 256GB SSD if you need more storage (double storage for about $30) + Matte screen doesn't reflect (seems like most laptops have glossy touchscreens these days, but I don't need touchscreen functionality and prefer the easier viewing of a matte screen that doesn't reflect the windows and lights behind me) + LG brand (I have good luck with LG) Negatives: - So thin and light and plastic that I fear I won't get the same life I get with ThinkPad, Dell, and Apple computers - Screen seems really washed out compared to all my other laptops and external screens. This is my biggest issue with this laptop. Makes it uncomfortable to work for long, and hard to create documents where subtle color differences matter. I've tried the usual display adjustments, but no luck. The difference between the laptop screen and my external monitor is striking. Very disappointing for an LG product (they make some of the best displays in the world). - Keyboard feels cheap. Limited travel and wobbly keys. Hard to type on for extended periods. Cheaper feel even than my $200 Chromebooks. Bottom line: Impressive specs and performance at a very good price. Incredibly thin and light. But display and keyboard are very disappointing and will keep this from becoming my favored laptop.

The various LG Gram laptops are my new go-to recommendation for clients needing an ultralight laptop that's not slow as a dog. The 16 incher that I'm reviewing here is narrower than some 15 inch laptops. Be aware this is mostly plastic which saves on weight and cost. But if you're gentle with your laptops and don't abuse them there's no reason this won't last for all it's natural life. 16 GB RAM in plenty for Windows 11. And it has two NVMe SSD slots (one empty) inside so you can replace/add SSDs to store a lot of stuff. I generally yank the included 512 GB SSD and replace with a 2 or 4 TB SSD. For one client, I put in two 4 TB SSDs. Use TLC SSDs, they'll last longer than QLC or PLCs (google it).

This laptop is Is the pinnacle of LG gram laptops. It is sturdy with a metallic alloy alloy feeling to it. It comes with the Intel core i7 12th generation 1260P processor, 16gb ddr5, IPS 16” screen, 256gb of ssd. NOT touchscreen. Graphics are powered by intel xe- which can easily keep up with most graphic demand but don’t expect to play any new titles. It’s still very light, coming in 2.6 lbs. At a price of $1000usd I feel like it should have at least 512gb of space. The keyboard is nice and reactive. It has a number pad which definitely helps with productivity. They keyboard does smudge easily tho. Fan is quite and unlike previous model it has a vent at the bottom. The fan speed and reaction can adjusted by the lg software. The lg software can also just the battery to charge at 80% at all times. Preserving battery life. All in all it’s a great mobile work lap top that can do light gaming and handle big programs like photoshop without any hick ups. Can you find betters specs with similar Price. Sure you can but it won’t be 2.6 pounds which is the main selling point of a LG gram.

I order this laptop in November and it had a defective touchpad. LG chat stated it would only take a few days to repair and sent me a return tag. A month later I was still waiting for the repaired laptop to be shipped and I no longer could return it to Amazon. I chatted with LG again and insisted on a new replacement laptop since the first one was defective and there was a delay on fixing it. After several more contacts with LG they finally agreed to replace the unit. The second laptop arrived and it would NOT initiate windows and asked me for an installation disk. Again I called LG and they walked me through a reset but that didn't work either. They stated there was a problem with the Windows installation and again had me return the laptop. They would NOT replace this laptop because they already sent me a new one, so I waited for another couple weeks and several more chat sessions they had back ordered the hard drive; it was defective. I finally got the repaired laptop back but it was missing the charger and cable. More chat sessions later they finally ordered me a charger and cable. The cable arrived but no charger. After a couple more chat sessions they stated the charger was backordered. It's been over three months and I still don't have a working laptop. This is the most inept company I've ever work with. I will never buy another LG laptop.