Friday, September 17th 2021
Gigabyte Unveils its New U4-series of Ultralight Notebooks
The Ultrabook name seems to have faded away, but the concept has clearly not gone anywhere and Gigabyte has announced its new U4-series of what they simply call ultralight notebooks. This is also the first 14-inch notebook series from Gigabyte in a while, since the company has focused on 15.6 and 17.3-inch models over the past couple of years' with the last 14-inch model from the company being the AERO 14.
The U4-series is quite a different beast, as the AERO 14 was still weighing in at 1.89 kg, whereas the U4 is almost half that at 990 grams. If you're a sucker for sturdy products, then this might be what you've been waiting for, as Gigabyte claims it meets the MIL-STD 810G specification, which means that the product has gone through "simulation-testing has been conducted in eight harsh working environments, including extreme altitude, temperature and humidity, mechanical vibration, sand and dust, salt fog, etc."
So far it seems like Gigabyte is only offering a single processor option, which consists of an Intel Core i7-1195G7 CPU, which is a quad core part with a top boost speed of 5 GHz and Iris Xe graphics. The U4 comes with 8 GB of soldered down DDR4 memory and there's a spare expansion slot for a single DDR4 SO-DIMM, for a maximum of 40 GB of RAM in total, although Gigabyte claims 64 GB.
Somewhat more unusual, especially for a notebook that only measures 17.2 mm at its thickest point, is the inclusion of a pair of M.2 slots, one with support for PCIe 4.0 NVMe drives and one with support for SATA or PCIe 3.0 NVMe drives. It's not clear which type the U4 ships with as standard and there might be different SKUs in different regions.
Not quite as impressive is the 1920x1080 resolution of the 14-inch IPS-level panel, as there are plenty of similar notebooks with higher resolution displays. Beyond it being an "anti-glare" display, Gigabyte provides zero details, so we have no idea what to expect in terms of brightness. The keyboard is backlit and Gigabyte has added a "wider" touchpad without going into details about its size.
Most notebooks in the ultra thin segment tend to lack connectivity options, but the only thing really lacking here is an Ethernet port, as Gigabyte has included a Thunderbolt 4 port with USB4, DisplayPort and 35 W USB-PD charging support, as well as one each of a USB 3.2 Gen 2 and a USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port, an HDMI 2.0 port, a 3.5 mm combo audio/mic jack, a microSD card slot and DC jack. There's also an Intel AX201 Wi-Fi 6/Bluetooth 5.2 card thrown into the mix, as well as a nondescript HD webcam. Finally we have a pair of speakers and a dual-array microphone with noise cancellation. Windows 10 Home or Pro is also part of the package.
The battery is rated at 36 Wh which is said to be good for up to 8 hours of usage and the 65 W power adapter can charge 45 percent of the battery in 30 minutes. The U4 measures 322x216.8 mm (WxD) and is 14.9 to 17.2 mm thick and weighs as mentioned 990 grams. No word on pricing, but Gigabyte claims it has an affordable price point, which presumably is relative in this case.
Source:
Gigabyte
The U4-series is quite a different beast, as the AERO 14 was still weighing in at 1.89 kg, whereas the U4 is almost half that at 990 grams. If you're a sucker for sturdy products, then this might be what you've been waiting for, as Gigabyte claims it meets the MIL-STD 810G specification, which means that the product has gone through "simulation-testing has been conducted in eight harsh working environments, including extreme altitude, temperature and humidity, mechanical vibration, sand and dust, salt fog, etc."
Somewhat more unusual, especially for a notebook that only measures 17.2 mm at its thickest point, is the inclusion of a pair of M.2 slots, one with support for PCIe 4.0 NVMe drives and one with support for SATA or PCIe 3.0 NVMe drives. It's not clear which type the U4 ships with as standard and there might be different SKUs in different regions.
Not quite as impressive is the 1920x1080 resolution of the 14-inch IPS-level panel, as there are plenty of similar notebooks with higher resolution displays. Beyond it being an "anti-glare" display, Gigabyte provides zero details, so we have no idea what to expect in terms of brightness. The keyboard is backlit and Gigabyte has added a "wider" touchpad without going into details about its size.
Most notebooks in the ultra thin segment tend to lack connectivity options, but the only thing really lacking here is an Ethernet port, as Gigabyte has included a Thunderbolt 4 port with USB4, DisplayPort and 35 W USB-PD charging support, as well as one each of a USB 3.2 Gen 2 and a USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port, an HDMI 2.0 port, a 3.5 mm combo audio/mic jack, a microSD card slot and DC jack. There's also an Intel AX201 Wi-Fi 6/Bluetooth 5.2 card thrown into the mix, as well as a nondescript HD webcam. Finally we have a pair of speakers and a dual-array microphone with noise cancellation. Windows 10 Home or Pro is also part of the package.
The battery is rated at 36 Wh which is said to be good for up to 8 hours of usage and the 65 W power adapter can charge 45 percent of the battery in 30 minutes. The U4 measures 322x216.8 mm (WxD) and is 14.9 to 17.2 mm thick and weighs as mentioned 990 grams. No word on pricing, but Gigabyte claims it has an affordable price point, which presumably is relative in this case.
27 Comments on Gigabyte Unveils its New U4-series of Ultralight Notebooks
Intel only.
Single fan.
Neither of those things are good, but both of them in the same laptop means that this is a hard pass from me.
/s
Realistically, I suspect it's possible to get a prebuilt config with 32GB soldered, and another 32GB SODIMM added by the user. Either that, or the marketing/PR department screwed up.
Isnt that the same size cell as the ones in surface pros? My chromebook is about the same thickness but has a 45wh unit,a nd that's an 11.6" machine.
or is being an enthusiast by definition is always asking for diminishing returns...
I'm not asking for 4K here, but 1080p is not what I want at least.
I presume you have a 640x480 resolution screen on your phone, as anything higher would drain the battery too fast?
It's more important than ever on a laptop that the screen aspect matches the content aspect since laptop IPS panels exhibit some of the worst black levels and backlight edge bleed in the industry. The last thing they need is
black barsblotchy grey light leakage.Disliking one extreme does not mean someone automatically support the other extreme. Belive it or not, it is possible to think going over 1080p on a small display is a total waste without demanding resolutions go back to the stone age. There is this addage of "good enough", and for many screen resolutions are "good enough" that putting in more only results in higher costs and detrimental system performance.
And now we are starting to complain about Smartphones only having 1080p, wtf ??!
Do you know that a 720p res on a 6.5inch ( average screen size of today ) give you more pixel density than 4k on a 24 inch computer screen!
But no we mus have moooore, everything or nothing, come on...
We all have different preferences.
Can we have a review?
I am very doubtful that the 5Ghz can be sustained for more than a second on this laptop. While this is only a quad core processor, but to hit 5Ghz even on a single core is going to need a much bigger heatsink that what is offered here. Just hope Gigabyte don't make an exploding laptop too.
Screen resolution wise, I think it is ok for a very slim laptop because it helps to preserve battery life for people on the go.