LG Gram 2021 announced: 14, 16 and 17

I agree, very few people use numpad. LG should have made it Gram 17 exclusive as there is big space for it on the 17 inch laptop and let the 14 and 16 inch be with centred and big keys with sufficient space between them.

Few grams extra on cooling and speakers will also make it a fantastic laptop, LG is constantly improving and maybe these things will be fixed in the future versions.

Better screen with 500-600 nits peak HDR brightness is also needed as the current screen is stuck in-between with its saturated DCI P3 colour gamut but non-HDR screen with 350 nits brightness. So, you need to tonemap HDR to SDR for 4K HDR files but usually the media players also tonemap down to Rec.709 while Gram 2021 has DCI P3 colour gamut capability.

 

I guess I am the lonely minority. If LG decided to ditch the numpad I think I will go for the 14 inch because weight and size are more important than a really big screen for me. I have the limit of 1.2kg in my mind as to what a laptop should weigh. Also the previous 13-14 inch versions lacked in specifications compared to the current one (I think in memory, lack of thunderbolt, etc).

It totally agree that they should go for higher display brightness and I would prefer matte display but again there are many who use the laptop more for recreation purposes and prefer glossy.

Now the few extra grams of cooling and the speakers is a big debate. I don't know about the quality vs weight for the laptop speakers

About cooling, seeing how much they improved from the previous generation with very small increase in size of the heatpipe, I can assume that they have pretty much optimized their options with a single heat pipe and this super quiet single fan (the Gram is one of the quietest laptops in the market and this is also another issue to consider when discussing about better cooling). The competition around 1.6kg is getting more crowded and the Gram line is focused above all on weight. For most of the users a small improvement in the thermals will not bring noticeable gains in performance for everyday usage, but the weight disadvantage will be to the detriment of their marketing as the Gram

 

I don't think most laptop makers test a lot in hot climatic conditions. I have 40 C outside and inside the AC is set at 26C.

As you have finished all your CPU testing, can you do some testing on 4K HDR to SDR tonemapping and how it looks on this screen? Download some 4k HDR movies, you can use MPC HC/BE plus madVR, brightness can be set at 350 nits and colour gamut as DCI P3. https://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=259188&pid=2238949

 

Sorry - I am not very interested in color ballance - so I will not do it.

Notebookcheck reviewed the 14". And strangely even though it consistently (except the NVME which is a better model - seems a newer series) performed worse than the 16" tablet they scored it way better... However it looks like they forgot to activate performance mode (max 30db noise from fan) - or the 14" performance mode is less fast fan? Or the 14" has less power allowance for the CPU/GPU vs the 16 and 17"? Could be that they just changed the PL1 to lower values? Maybe 14" PL1 = 22w, 16" = 25w, and 17" even higher? Just that with the horrible job LG does in production with thermal paste most people run into thermal throttling before even on performance mode (while if you repaste with a good thermal paste like Arctic MX5 - you will hit PL1 instead of the thermal limit).

The 14" battery numbers are better too. I guess that is mostly because of missing the touchscreen. Or their 16" model did not enter C10. It is so easy to destroy C10 state by some software installation. Then especially the idle battery life is much worse. And their test also showed - screen brightness has not much to do with battery life. And strangely their unit has lower brightness in battery mode (300 vs 350 nits in the center). Guess they did not work out the details of the battery plan. Or I got around that by installing from scratch. That maybe is also why I have no difference in brightness with power saver on or off. Interesting that the 14" has a 1600:1 contrast ratio. 800 or 1600 is no good luck or bad luck. Their model is pretty recent (newer NVME). I am sure if you get a more recently produced model (check your bios version to know more or less when it was produced) they improved the panel.
Sadly there is no revision numbers whatsoever for that panel.

NBC WiFi Websurfing Battery Test 1.3 - 150nits = 14h 14min
NBC WiFi Websurfing Battery Test 1.3 at max brightness = 300 nits = 11h 33min

https://www.notebookcheck.net/LG-Gr...ce-and-finally-more-performance.541046.0.html

 

I think they typically will score the 14-15 inch laptops higher just because they are easier to shove in a backpack and travel with. Also could depend on who reviewed them but I didn't check if it was the same person.

 

yes - it seems so. The weight of the 16" is much more impressive than of the 14". 17" too (though a bit less - as the increase is about the same as going from 14" to 16" - the 16" has the smallest bezels and best screen to boy ratio - then the 14 has the least wasted space in the chassis). They did score the chassis way higher - is the 14" that much less flexible? if they added another rubber bumber in the middle below top of trackpad - then the 16" and 17" would nearly not flex at all while using. The rest of the flex is scary to look at - but knowing it is pretty sturdy does not matter.

The weight seems not to e adjusted for screen size. The keyboard also scores better on the 14" - well I guess that is the numpad. The keyboard is identical - they just add the numpad on the side. But yeah that means not centered - that was actually the main reason for me to stick with 16" nd not order 17" besides prize. It is already really bad so out of center - but it will be worse on the 17". If they space the keyboard a bit wider - remove numpad I am sure on notebookcheck it would score 90 points for keyboard. The keypress itself is very good. I prefer it to the old 1.8mm keypress thinkpad T480s, but worse then the 2mm? T440s keypress/keyboard. That one was just ace. Then however they praise the battery life of the 14" but score it lower than the 16"... Haha does not make sense (but then I guess the 16" scores worse because they used the convertible and they do not account the scoring for convertibles.).

And really strange the 14" speakers were so much worse. Hard to believe they are the same too, aren't they.


And the written summary is also strange. They beat down on the 16" for CPU scoring higher than the 14" that they praise.. The 14" review summary feels spot on. The 16" they botched up..

 

You should really stop taking too serious the scores they attribute. I have noticed long time ago how biased or careless they can be. Important is to read between the lines and retain the information that matters to you. The fact that obviously this reviewer missed the LG performance mode is a red flag. I think also the LG Gram 14 is the only small ultrabook with the option of a 2nd SSD, nowhere mentioned in this review.
Your explanation of the difference in the keyboard score is also speculative from your part because you attribute weight to the centered keyboard which is nowhere in their criteria. it is just another subjective random scoring from their part, the reviewers of the 16 Convertible and the 14 are not the same. (By the way the i7 LG Gram 14 in their review is the leader by far in idle power consumption which contradicts your findings..)

I like the reviews in notebookcheck for all the detailed information they provide and the relative stable process in all their reviews. But their scoring is another story. And I have the impression that they have become overextended, their reviewers do not exchange much information between them any more and their scoring becomes less and less valid.

And a last word about flex on this laptop. If you are not looking actively to press and flex the laptop, it will not flex. I see what you say about the rubber foot below the trackpad or the middle, but unless you deliberately trying to press the case at the trackpad level, it will not yield. Under normal typing and usage the laptop will not flex. If of course you hammer type and press your hands on the laptop to get up from your chair than it will flex. This laptop is a huge improvement over the previous generation in terms of rigidity and it is amazing they managed to do this keeping the same weight while putting a bigger screen.

 

But their idle power is still above my notebooks i5 idle power - they get 37 hours out of the battery. I get 45 hours of idle battery life on the 16". At full idle the i7 and the i5 differ very little - that is because in C10 the cache is deactivated. However only in C10. For light load the i7 is not nearly as efficient as the i5 - and it is the light load that kills the battery life. It is not some short bursts of high consumption over a day - but all the light load. That is why the Macbook (Pro) M1 gets such a great battery life (even though I am sure besides the CPU the macbook is not as efficient as the lg gram). The ARM processors with big.LITTLE just shines on light workload. I guess it also idles at 1/3 of the power - but that is not so relevant. The thing is idle 45 hours - idle with 80% screen on still well over 20 hours on the gram. But then working actually it gets me 12-14 hours. So the CPU is by far the main consumer of power. The screen is quite far behind second.

Seing Apple M1 and seing how efficient it is at light load - I would guess the next intel generation will just trump all the current windows notebooks battery life. Even if it cannot compete with M1, it will likely use only half as much power for light load. And then finally the IGZO display may be the biggest consumer again. If Intel got down to M1 levels - what I do not think - 24 hours battery life at 200 nits on the lg gram 16 with an 80wh battery should be possible. If it meets the current announcements then 18-20 hours. However likely that many manufacturers then reduce battery size?

 

I really like notebookcheck reviewes as well overall. I also think they are overextended as there are also a ton of typos, copy-paste errors and sometimes just wrong information in there. It's like they don't have a 2nd knowledgable editor or pair of eyes read it over while researching specs. I get it, it's a rough business and time is money, and I also think they do the best job overall at reviews, it could just be better. Just the simple fact that they have things like the sustained PL1 performance in there is alone a winner, not to mention so many other details. Their review score range is also really weird.. it seems like almost everything lands between 75-90%.

I do exactly what you suggest though. I just go in for the facts and not necessarily the opinion part of it, and also take in other's findings and critique about the review itself or the product, and then consider the aspects of the laptop I actually care about and which aspects I'd be willing to compromise on.

 

Are you saying that I could plug my 2TB "SSD - SATA III 6 Gb/s, M.2 2280" into this thing? I currently have the Samsung ATIV Book 9 2014, which has two SSD slots, and it would be outstanding if I could just lift this from the Samsung and plug into the LG Gram!

 

I'm sure you can, if it's the OS drive you might have some driver and proprietary software weirdness at first at best and crashes at worst. Definitely make a backup first with macrium reflect or similar. If it's just a data drive you can do it no problem.

 

I'm reading my way through this thread from the beginning, as I'm researching the LG Gram for my next purchase. I currently have a Samsung ATIV book 9 (2014); can't believe it's lasted me this long! It's a rock-star. I too am ultra noise-sensitive, and with my Samsung, I discovered that I could set the CPU cap at 70% in advanced power settings! For everyday use, this was never an issue but it was enough to stop the fans coming on all the time (I don't mind a fan kicking in when I ask it to do something serious, but I hate it when the fans come and go during 'idle' activity. When I know I'm going to be doing serious work, I just go into advanced power settings and up the cap to 100% for the duration.

Only reason I'm looking at the gram is, my current guy has only 8 gig RAM and this is starting to be an issue. I'm also attracted by 17" as my eyesight deteriorates, and the thought of USB-C charging and docking just seems too good to pass up!

 

(again, working my way through all the reviews, trying not to reply to too many posts but every now and then someone says something I can't wait to follow up on ...).

I absolutely don't need or want the numeric keypad; but the biggest reason to not want it from my perspective is - how much trouble does the trackpad cause when typing? At least LG did center the trackpad to the main keyboard (or at least, did NOT center the trackpad on the frame) - many laptops with numeric keypads stupidly center the trackpad across the entire device, which means obvious trouble from wrist hits. Also, when using 'on your lap', is it ergonomically OK to be typing 'off to the left'? Do you offset the laptop to the right to compensate/to allow your hands to be symmetrical with your body?

 

I have two nvme V3 installed and both are full speed. Not sure if the old m2 are compatible. Also not sure if nvme v4 runs full speed.

BTW - some more reviews - kinda nothing new:
https://www.cnet.com/news/lg-gram-16-review-the-perfect-middle-ground-for-mobility/

https://www.notebookcheck.net/LG-Gr...lent-battery-life-16-10-display.543262.0.html

https://www.neowin.net/news/lg-gram...thing-you-could-want-in-a-super-light-laptop/


I really do wonder why some units (the notebookcheck lg gram 16) have worse display brightness on battery or depending on windows power profile, and others not. Is it based on bios - or on botched up windows settings? I definitely feel installing windows from scratch is a must on the gram.

Also seems like contrast ratio now is around 1500:1 across the board for newly produced lg grams. Then notebookcheck lg gram 16 had horrible brightness at 310 nits. (around 270 on battery). So either it is the touch version that due to the touch layer decreases contrast - or new revisions all have very good contrast.

 

No they did not - it is centered to the case - so if you think about what to type - then often you may hit the trackpad with your right hand. This will be even worse on the 17". It is one of the biggest drawbacks to the gram 16/17. Also due to the numpad the delete button, enter and back buttons are crippled small. I hate that for writing text / coding. Slowly got used to it but it is still a huge PITA. Also they did not make the arrow buttons larger by sticking out tot the bottom (saving money here clearly). The main keyboard is exactly the same on the 14,16 and 17". It is only off center for 16 and 17 with different added numpads.

typing on your lap is okay. no more problematic than if the laptop is standing on a desk.

 

I just got a bios update offered or better imposed through LG update center. As I am afraid of dimmer display on battery with maybe newer bios versions and it was not offered but said if I click okay - will be installed right now with instant reboot. If I click no it will be installed on next reboot - I took the logical step of straight uninstalling lg update center. Would be nice to hear what the new bios brings. Especially in regard to PL1/PL2 and display brightness. I fear it can only get worse based on newer reviews

 

well - uninstalling lg update center did not help. Just rebooted and the bios update to 0320 went through (dated 23.04.2021). Must have been in some place that I did not notice. However concerning screen brightness, or PL1/PL2 limits I think it made no change. However PL1 is hard to test right now with 28° temperature.

 

It's more about when I'm centering myself in front of the display that i'm not off to the side a tad on the keyboard. You can do that with a desktop, just move the keyboard. It's not like you don't eventually get used to it if you are using it every day, but I switch between 3 different PCs and it's funny sometimes for the first few minutes I'm always slightly off.

 

Looking at the picture of the LG Gram 17 on the LG website - https://www.lg.com/us/laptops/lg-17Z990-RAAS8U1-ultra-slim-laptop# it looks to me like the "Lid raising notch" - the small 'cutout' just in front of the trackpad designed to allow you to lift the lid - is off-center slightly relative to the trackpad. Assuming the cutout is itself centered (I cannot imagine it would not be) then that would suggest the trackpad is ever-so-slightly offset to the left. It's not fully 'centered' on the main keyboard (aligned with the spacebar) but it does appear to be just a bit off-center. Anyway - it drives you crazy! That's bad news. I'm a fast touch-typist and never look at the keyboard, but my wrists do often hit the trackpad. I'm just going to have to see how bad this is on a test run.

Given that you can buy this laptop in multiple language flavors (UK keyboard, US keyboard, Korean keyboard, etc) that would suggest the keyboard is at least somewhat removable. Some enterprising person should come up with a keypad-less keyboard that we could swap into the keyboard opening!

My other big concern is the reflectivity of the screen. I'll just have to check it out at my local Costco and see how bad it is. If you ever have any success applying a semi-gloss overlay, I'd be curious to see how that comes out.

Other than that, it looks like a perfect and long-overdue upgrade to my Samsung ATIV Book 9 (2014).

 

Unfortunately a replacement isn't really possible, the keys are island style with cutouts for them in the top chassis. It's not one large contiguous cutout. I'm not sure how we would source a different keyboard for it. For me it's not that bit a deal. I don't look at the keyboard either, but switching back and forth between centered keyboards and keyboards slightly shifted to the left takes me a second to orient.

 

Notebookcheck reviewed the LG Gram 16. Pretty objective review, more or less I agree with all their findings.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/LG-Gr...lent-battery-life-16-10-display.543262.0.html

Just to note, that although it is not a power workhorse, compared to other Tigerlake laptops it is situated around the middle of the bunch, it has more than enough power and beats by far the previous generations of 4 core laptops. It gets hotter than my older Gram under load, not pleasant to have it on the lap during processor intensive tasks, but manages to be very quiet most of the time and I appreciate the extra power in my daily workflow.

As I am writing this I am at the terrace at a house at a Greek Island (on holidays). I had the sun above the laptop, so no reflections on the screen (if you are on battery you have to deactivate the battery saver to get full brightness). After a while I had to get back in the shadow, because the black color was absorbing so much heat, that everything was burning on the keyboard. Just to say that I think the idea of working under the sun is overrated. You need always some shadow to be productive with a laptop and under the shadow, even the annoying glossy monitor of the Gram will do the job pretty well in full brightness.


And a last comment about the trackpad.

Yes it is very slightly off center when I compare it to the notch, so a bit more centered relative to the space bar and probably done for those that don't like that with the numpad the trackpad used to be off center. But with the size of the recent trackpads, I find this centering argument irrelevant, they are so easy to access and the palm rejection on my Gram is perfect.

 

So for the ThinkPad tablet LG gets it right. Semi glossy, and high enough brightness plus factory calibrated. Why can't they out a bigger version of that panel with 100 percent dci-p3 colors in the gram?
https://www.notebookcheck.com/Test-...e-brilliert-mit-WQXGA-16-10-LCD.539173.0.html

 

I also wish they did. I just got back indoors after working a bit outside and fighting with the reflections. But as I already wrote, working under the sun is overrated, the laptop (and my head..) got again too hot from the sun rays and I could not handle to stay any longer outside.

I think LG has their specification sheet, get the minimum brightness acceptable and avoid the risk of scoring worse battery times with a brighter panel. As they improve slightly every generation, I guess in two years the next Gram will be even better.

 

Semi glossy like the yoga would be perfect. Have this on my big screen and clarity is nearly the same, but reflections cut a lot. MacBook gets this right too.
Outdoors even in shadow or overcast the gram is not usable well.
I wonder if there are any quality screen protectors getting semi glossy right. I doubt it.

Anyone know about glasses cutting reflection, but not ****ing up colour or brightness that would do? So no damn blue light filter

 

There's actually 17 inch 32 GB version too for sale at Costco: LG gram 17" Intel Evo Platform Laptop - 11th Gen Intel Core i7-1165G7 - 2560 x 1600 Display | Costco

What's interesting is that it isn't mentioned anywhere in reviews. You can't find it directly in LG catalog, but if you search by model (17Z90P-K.ADC9U1) you can find it: LG gram 17” Ultra-Lightweight and Slim Laptop with Intel® Evo 11th Gen Intel® Core™ i7 Processor and Iris® Xe Graphics (17Z90P-K.ADC9U1) | LG USA

Also, this is silver version TB4, same as 17 inch black version. 17 inch 16 GB ram silver model has TB3.

p.s. I've seen it only at Costco, nowhere else.

 

This must be 17z95n not 17z90p - If it's tb3. If it's tb4 they actually introduced a new config

 

What a pity hackintosh is now dead due to M1. This would have been a decent replacement for my dying MacBook 17.

 

I just discovered that LG renewed the 15inch version with the new processors and ports but just FullHD screen. On LG's site I saw that it is also touchscreen.

https://www.amazon.com/LG-Gram-15Z9...d=1&keywords=lg+gram+15&qid=1627370181&sr=8-3
The link on Amazon, 32Gb!!! If I had waited a bit more.. But I am pretty spoiled now by the 16/10 ratio in my 16inch.

 

Agree, there's no way I'm going back to 16:9 on my laptops.

 

Question for Gram 16 owners: There is another Page Down button in the Number Pad shared with the number 3 key, can we set it up such that it works as Page Down button as default? Maybe something can be done via LG control centre or we have to install some software like SharpKeys?

Also what is the amount of RAM reserved for igpu? Seen some OEM's have this at 512 MB and some at 1-2 GB RAM.

 

292MB is reserved for the IGPU I think.

 

That must vary depending on type of program used i guess.

Any answers for this keyboard question?: There is another Page Down button in the Number Pad shared with the number 3 key, can we set it up such that it works as Page Down button as default? Maybe something can be done via LG control centre or we have to install some software like SharpKeys?

 

OP quoted the model number as: 17Z90P-K.ADC9U1

Both on LG website and Costco.

 

Thanks for this great info slavisv!

It is LPDDR4X ram, so it is soldered (not 2020 model). Both Costco and LG site mention 32GB! But on one of the questions LG mentions this:

Ops, that comment was apparently posted in relation to:
Originally posted on 17Z90P-K.AAB8U1, which is a different model!

So this is 32GB! Black available somewhere?

 

Great find. I was waiting for 32GB version.

 

but you cannot order the 32GB version anymore I think. Technically it's no problem for LG to solder 32GB Ram - but I guess this was a Costco special. However all 2021 have TB4 (note while they mention TB3 on the lg site, the always have a check at TB4 yes).


A rather recent problem - maybe unique to the black version. The paint around the edges tends to break under use - so I had to sandpaper it down because it became sharp and hurting. In general LG should have invested 1m in order to bevel of the front edge (same bevel everywhere like at the point to lift the lid. Macbooks are horrible in the regard too however. Sometimes thinking about trying to find a thin tape to tape off all the front edge - but not sure what would stick well.

 

BTW - with the newest Throttlestop 9.4.2 beta (not 9.4) you can finally get rid of the 25W PL1 32 seconds limit!
You can set PL1/PL2 MSR limits to the desired values on the TPL windows - then check "Sync MMIO" box and apply. Boom that 25W limit is gone.

Happy benchmarking - it's now 100% your cooling solution and nothing else that will determine the power of your Gram. Well so most importantly the temperature - above 25-2 degrees ambient temperature - on my 16Z90P the improvements are marginal. At 15 degrees you can expect 10% higher benchmarks!


My values were: 25 PL1, 60PL2 and 32 seconds. I've changed it to 34w PL1, 38W PL2 and 15 seconds. So after 15 seconds it drops from 38 to 34W - there is no sense at all in a higher than 38W PL2, because the cooling cannot handle it. 20 seconds at 38W is a good compromise. That togeter with Prochoot at 97° instead of 90° gives you a plenty fast gram.


I do wonder if really someone has less than 25W in PL1 MMIO values - the benchmarks and remarks posted make me assume so.
As I'm right now in Cyprus with hot temps - no way to properly benchmark this thing. Holding it into aircon air flow makes it clear however that the limit is gone for good.

 

292 MB is the minimum. Converting some videos with Handbrake I saw IGPU shoot up to 10GB. Yeah HEVC video editing makes me really want to have 32GB RAM. 16GB is not enough for 4K HEVC video editing with Davinci Resolve (at least with the free version that is not using hardware acceleration - gotta buy premium for that). Actually before I put a 10GB swapfile Davinci Resolve would love to BSOD my gram.
Since years actually, video editing/video playback is the prime factor to upgrade computers (as I don't game).

 

So here is the absolute limit of the lg gram at 16° aircon outflow temperature without performance mode it drops to around 28.5w - with performance mode it stabilizes at around 32.5-33w.


As the tiger lake is not that efficient at higher wattage - the differnce is only 100 points by enabling performance mode. The bottleneck are the heatpipes - not the cooler. A second heatpipe likely would yield another 100 points or so. Actually I think I will set PL2 duration to 2 seconds at 38w, and PL1 at 34w - so that it doesn't heat up soo much.

I guess the 17Z90P i5 could score a tiny bit higher - due to more volume - but then it has identical heatpipe so I guess no way. At 25° room temp with performance mode it goes to 1900 points. In winter at 0° outside I'm sure 2400 points are in easy reach with the MMIO limit disabled. 25 degrees are about the sweet spot for 25w cooling. but at 20° room temp removing the 25w limit has significant difference on my gram as I know (yes repasted with Arctic MX5).

I'm not fully sure about this anymore - but maybe you still need to increase PL1/PL2 in the hidden/advanced bios settings. (press CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+F7 inside bios )

 

You can actually unlock overclock in the bios - but as the CPU is locked - there is no way to actually overclock.


However the new Sync MMIO option you can use to set any values now - If in bios the PL1/PL2 is set to disable, then you can set any value for PL1 and PL2 using throttlestop. Else it will depend on the nominal/up/down set in bios.
Also I found out how to set fan in bios. The problem is that there are only three steps - off, state1 and state2 - and the activation temperature is fixed in 7°C steps. You can set fan to any speed 0-100% for state1 and state2 (and somewhere there is really hidden a way to have fan always on).

Here is how Turbo Power Limits window in Throttlestop should look like - to give you full power (note the performance mode now does not matter at all - it only decides your fan speed).


You can unlock or lock the PL1/PL2/PL3 and PL4 value in bios. However PL3 and PL4 is not adjustable within throttlestop. Not even sure what PL3 does - PL4 is default to 105watts - thats for a couple of miliseconds. If you replace the cooling in the lg gram for something more performant with more heatpipes - now you could get the max possible turbo of your CPU (1135G7 would be 4200 two cores, 3800MHZ all core turbo with no time limit, 4700/4200 - however especially for the i7 you will need really good cooling - but then the caveat still is - if you really need that power tiger lake H series is your solution. It can be undervolted and will run more efficient except for idle where it needs likely around 0.2-0.3 watts more. Seems most H series tiger lake can underolt by 70-80mv - that's a lot and decreases power consumption by around 15-20% for the same output. The i7 U series has no reason for existence. It needs more power than i5 U, and is only slightly faster in single core tasks, multi core only if you have over 45W of cooling capacity - but then you should bet an H series processor in first place which is 80-90% faster on multicore and maybe 10% on single core vs I7 U series. And at loads the i7 U needs 35watts due to high frequency the i7 H can likely get away with 22-23w due to twice the cores, and lower frequency plus undervolting. Without undervolting maybe 27-28w)

Important settings in bios to enable Throttelstop to fully work, you need to set TDP Boot Mode to Deactivate, and TDP Lock to disable - the Nominal TDP is then your boot values before Throttlestop takes over (Throttelstop is still needed as you cannot adjust MMIO values in bios):

 

Oh yeah, do not update to Windows 11, I did it and now I am seriously thinking of downgrading. It*s a pile of **** simply with no advantages whatsoever. You can mostly fix the crippled taskbar and even more crippled start menu, but even after 3 days it's sucking battery like crazy. Even with power save mode every couple minutes windows decides to compute some random crap, index some stuff or whatever. It's minimum 30% less battery life and 5-10° hotter CPU due too all the time it spends going crazy.

I'm giving it more days but otherwise it's Windows 10 until 2025. 11 right now is a PITA. The only advantage is that they switched on performance mode in edge by default - well and a bit more modern looks not that I would need them... Nothing you cannot have with Widows 10 too right now. I somehow think it must be possible to get 11 to work okay - but so far it just sucks.


Yes if you upgrade to 11 and had not enabled performance mode in edge, you will see less battery use while surfing with edge. Performance mode really works well and kinda halves the CPU use of edge. Explorer, Windows Desktop Manger, Antimalware Service - constantly doing something. And yeah - currently with Windows browsing with any browser but edge with performance mode on - will suck your battery. With edge and performance mode 11-15 hours are usually possible (with 8 hours of them screen full brightness). If you use Chrome/firefox it will be minimum 2-3 watts more per hour while surfing. The gram doesn't have a high refresh rate display - adaptive refresh rate likely will be windows 11 exclusive - so not backported to 10. So for gaming notebooks with 120-144hz displays - Windows 11 is a must. For everyone else stay the F**k away for now.


And yes of course I disabled the Windows Insider program right after update and disabled telemetry services and other hogs. I'm more and more thinking of just using Ubuntu and windows in virtual Machine for the programs that I miss. Ubuntu runs great on the Gram and doesn't need constant optimization so power use is staying down.

 

BTW - if anyone has access to reset bios easily - to me it seems undervolt is not working via bios settings - but everyone wanting to try:

setup_var CpuSetup 0x13B 64 (100mv undervolt - 64 in hex = 100 in dec)
setup_var CpuSetup 0x13D 0x1 (voltage offset minus, default is plus)


(location taken from the current bios:
0x7B117 Suppress If {0A 82}
0x7B119 QuestionId: 0x202 equals value 0x1 {12 06 02 02 01 00}
0x7B11F Numeric: Core Voltage Offset, VarStoreInfo (VarOffset/VarName): 0x13B, VarStore: 0x3, QuestionId: 0x203, Size: 2, Min: 0x0, Max 0x3E8, Step: 0x1 {07 94 D0 05 D1 05 03 02 03 00 3B 01 10 11 00 00 E8 03 01 00}
0x7B133 Default: DefaultId: 0x0, Value (16 bit): 0x0 {5B 07 00 00 01 00 00}
0x7B13A End {29 02}
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It does not seem to do anything - but if you dare - a value of C8 (200) would if it works surely lead to instabilities - if not outright refusing to boot - hence the need to be able to reset the bios - but I could not find out if this is possible: https://superuser.com/questions/167...ing-the-usinng-the-bios-on-a-lg-gram-computer - here someone complains it is not working so I won't dare setting unsafe values). As I could not find any difference in benchmarks with 100mv undervolt and positive or negative offset - I guess the tiger lake U series simply is not responsive to this setting. tiger lake H this setting would work. A 100mv undervolt should decrease temps by 10% or so and increase battery life by 10%. Sadly it is not working (on H series 80-100mv undervolts seem to be stable, likely the same on U but it isn't possible)

 

I bought the white colour Gram 16, it looks stunning in white.

 

What do you think? considering the 16", not sure about white.

 

The colours are coming off quite easily on heavier use. Best would be silver without colour... I think. But white may be better than black because if the colour is removed the difference isn't too big. I filed down the colour on the way edges because it broke a bit then became uncomfortable for my wrist

 

Go for it, best laptop in the segment. Excellent screen, keyboard and touchpad. Lots of ports too which is a rarity in premium thin and light laptops nowadays. It is the perfect upgrade from your Samsung Notebook 9.

There are three colour options: Black, White and Silver. So, you can choose what you like, all of them look good.

 

Thanks, I see nothing else that really fits at this point.

 

Just if someone wonders about CMOS reset. It seems enough to fully deplete the battery and wait some time. My laptop must have crashed/not entered sleep and then bios was reset.
I did try to boot a couple of times from depleted battery, maybe that's when the bios reset happened.
It did take some time then even with power to actually boot. At first I ran into some bootloops wondering if the laptop is broken.

Btw after 6 months quite intense battery use battery is at 92.25 percent (new was like 97-98) or 73800 mWh. It definitely degrades a bit faster than more conservative batteries from Dell or Lenovo business notebooks.

Of course un attaching the battery and pressing the power on button a couple of times should work too for CMOS reset. There seems to be no CMOS battery present.

 

I am liking this numpad keyboard now, using it for the big arrow buttons and also the Page up/down and Home/End buttons.

 

I am glad you do. I love the numpad since the beginning. Most 15inch laptops and above always had numpads till Apple came and decided it is uncool and not beautiful and since then everybody decided that they cannot work properly if the keyboard and the trackpad are not 100% centered. Now that Apple decided that laptops can be a bit thicker (with the new Macbook pros) everybody is also ok with it. Ridiculous group think.