Acer Swift 3, 14” FHD IPS, Ryzen 7 4700U, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, Windows 10, Silver, SF314-42-R9YN
$1,046.03
Last updated on November 19, 2024 8:49 pm Details
- AMD Ryzen 7 4700U Mobile Octa-Core Mobile Processor (Up to 4.1GHz) with Radeon Graphics
- 14″ Full HD (1920 x 1080) IPS Widescreen LED-backlit Display
- 8GB LPDDR4 Onboard Memory & 512GB PCIe NVMe SSD
- Intel Wireless Wi-Fi 6 AX200 802.11ax Dual-Band 2.4GHz and 5GHz featuring 2×2 MU-MIMO technology (Max Speed up to 2.4Gbps)
- Acer Bio-Protection Fingerprint Solution, featuring Computer Protection and Windows Hello Certification
- Comes with a FREE upgrade to Windows 11 (when available)
Specification: Acer Swift 3, 14” FHD IPS, Ryzen 7 4700U, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, Windows 10, Silver, SF314-42-R9YN
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10 reviews for Acer Swift 3, 14” FHD IPS, Ryzen 7 4700U, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, Windows 10, Silver, SF314-42-R9YN
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Acer Swift 3, 14” FHD IPS, Ryzen 7 4700U, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, Windows 10, Silver, SF314-42-R9YN
$1,046.03
Sophie Black –
I really like this computer, but the first one I received did not work properly.
For my review of the working computer please skip to the following section. First I’m going to quickly outline some warning signs I found with the lemon laptop.
– It wasn’t obvious at first, but over time the computer began to demonstrate more and more issues. First, it was recurring BSOD, especially on startup and shutdown. Then, the Bluetooth stopped working properly. Then I wasn’t able to open the start menu, or the settings, or the sound. The search feature within the Windows interface also broke. Overall it lasted about 2 weeks before it became unusable.
– Amazon very generously replaced the laptop for me and the second works much better. In fact, the visual quality of the screen, the fingerprint reader, the responsiveness of the USB ports, all of which were issues with the first laptop, are much improved on all three fronts.
I’ll just go quickly through some positives and negatives I’ve found with this laptop overall. Some of these are nitpicks but I wanted to draw your attention to some things other reviews haven’t really focused on.
The Good
– The price is great for what the market is like at the moment. Especially the size of the SSD is unusual for this price range and having a bit more space is definitely much appreciated.
– The computer can run video games. If you’re a casual gamer, it’s powerful enough to play modern games, even if on some lowered settings.
– It is so incredibly lightweight, and I personally think the design is quite attractive. Extremely portable, the charging cable is also very lightweight, but it sort of “snaps” into the computer port so it stays in place quite well.
– The battery life is good, you might be able to get 7-8 hours on it if you’re not doing anything too demanding.
– For a 14” keyboard, it’s very large and ergonomical.
– The touchpad works very well.
The Neutral
– The fingerprint reader is okay but not great – on my lemon I would get into the computer using the reader maybe 1/10 of the time. On the one that works it lets me in maybe 7/10 login attempts.
– The screen: there are contradictory accounts of how good the screen and colour quality on this computer is. First of all, before you assess yours, make sure you do all your Windows updates – the colours will improve after you’ve gone through the required and optional updates. On my lemon, the colours were slightly inaccurate, and the screen was overall too bright and lacked contrast, even after updates. On my second one the quality is just fine, so I think this is probably something that can vary computer to computer, which may account for the difference in assessments about how good the screen actually is throughout the reviews.
[SEE PICTURES: left is the new laptop, middle is the lemon laptop, right is a Dell G3 laptop for reference]
The Bad
– The sound quality that comes out of the computer is not good. It’s very tinny and is not really acceptable for listening to movies or music. It also doesn’t get very loud on maximum volume. You’ll have to use a speaker to have decent sound quality and volume.
– The backlighting on the keyboard goes off after 30 seconds. There is no way to change this.
– There is no numerical pad (if this is something that’s important to you, keep in mind it’s not present here).
– The headphone port can be finnicky in terms of getting the sound to come through properly.
– The bluetooth cuts in and out sometimes.
– Only 2 regular USB ports.
Overall, it’s good for the price and I’m happy with it. I would recommend it, even if there’s a possibility you get a lemon. Amazon’s customer service is generally really great – I was able to replace the lemon within two days.
** 4 MONTH UPDATE ** The laptop is still holding together well, though a couple of things have distinctly remained an issue.
1. The power cord does not stick into the laptop plug as easily as it did at first – the cord can easily become dislodged from the laptop and it makes an obnoxious beeping noise whenever it’s plugged in or removed.
2. The bluetooth craps out a lot – streams and sound quality can stutter over the connection and this means this laptop’s bluetooth capabilities, in my experience, are not particularly useable. In combination with the poor sound quality and volume, this makes it difficult to watch movies or listen to music.
3. I still get a fair number of BSOD’s, especially on startup and shutdown – it’s often a driver error and I can’t seem to fix this even though I’ve downloaded the latest driver updates from Acer’s website. I often receive these errors if I simply shut the lid rather than fully turning the computer off, so I’m just now in the habit of manually shutting down every time. I’ve never lost data but this trend is a bit concerning.
Otherwise everything has remained decent.
** 6 MONTH UPDATE **
The hinge on the right side of the laptop began breaking down, and eventually cracked the frame of the screen to the point where wires were sticking out and the hinge did not work properly without bending the plastic. As the laptop was now out of Amazon warranty, I had to get it repaired through Acer, but they were remarkably efficient with repairing and sending it back to me. The whole process of mailing and repair (since repair centres are closed) took less than 3 days total. The representatives on the phone were also very helpful. They ended up replacing almost the whole computer for me free of charge.
Basically, there continue to be issues with this computer, though both Amazon and Acer have been good in terms of facilitating repairs. However once it exits the one year warranty I expect this computer to have problems that aren’t as easy and inexpensive to fix.
Definitely this is a buyer beware situation. The computer’s internal system still works well 6 months later and still I’m happy with it overall, but the hardware is clearly cheap and the laptop is not built particularly well, given the number of issues I’ve had with it already.
Alejandra V. –
Al principio todo iba bien con el equipo, cumpliendo exactamente un mes desde mi compra el equipo ha comenzado a fallar, primero se queda congelada la imagen puede durar horas y por mas que intente no se puede desbloquear, la unica opcion es apagarla directamente desde el boton. Luego el audio comenzo a fallar una estatica muy molesta cada que la laptop se esta cargando, no importa si tengo o no audifonos puestos el audio simplemente no funciona. Se adelanta y atrasa el audio sin control.
Se apaga cuando se intenta conectar a otro dispositivo a traves de bluethoot.
Estoy sumamente decepcionada de esta compra, lo peor es que no es un precio economico para el pesimo producto que manejan.
NO MALGASTEN SU DINERO, no soy la unica con estos problemas, internet esta lleno de foros de gente quejandose de este producto.
First t1m3r –
All was going well for the first couple of days but now the fan on this thing has now decided to make this constant noise and sometimes vibrates the whole laptop. Feels like it heats up easily even tho I’m just on chrome and the battery just depletes so fast even when I’m on better battery or on battery saver mode. Other than that it’s an alright laptop I may have gotten a bad one. I don’t know if I could get a replacement Or refund because I took all of the stickers off and added one and the box is gone.first time I have bought from amazon
J McDaniel –
I try really hard not to do same-day delivery reviews, no matter how great I think the product is because you can never tell on that first day what might go wrong later. However, I am actually confident and happy enough with this one to go for it. If I make amendments later, they won’t likely be anything that changes this rating. (updated 6/19/20 – one week, using it for work in web design and content creation, still love it)
I needed a business-appropriate laptop. My requirements for this were pretty simple: something with a sharp but conservative appearance, MOBILE (not heavy or bulky), but also just as powerful (or capable of being just as powerful) as my much larger personal laptop. It came down to this and the Lenovo Flex. I chose this because the design was all metal, and I liked Macbook Airs when working as an Apple systems manager for their durability, style, and mobility. It’s just a shame the RAM is not upgradeable (it’s soldered). The RAM on the Lenovo Flex is not upgradeable either, though. It also comes with a weaker processor (Ryzen 5, which isn’t quite on the i7’s level). I doubt anyone will need more than 8 to 16GB of RAM in the lifetimes of these laptops. I knew that if I got a Ryzen 5 that would just make me want the Ryzen 7 processor more (you can never upgrade processors in a laptop). So, despite toting less RAM, Swift still came out as the winner both in design and performance when I compared it up close to the Flex online.
I worried a bit when I read a review that complained about the screen and graphics on Swift being almost unusable. But I clearly had nothing to worry about. Those professional reviewers sometimes can get so snobby with hardware, they set the bar higher than anyone in the real world would ever set it.
The screen is semi-matte. I have very sensitive eyes, sensitive enough that I often have to wear blue light blocking glasses to deal with sunlight, bright indoor lights, or computer light. Even the slightest flicker is noticeable to me in a very uncomfortable, painful kind of way that strains my eyes. There’s the tiniest amount of flicker in this display. It is NOTHING like the reviews have been describing, which made me afraid I wouldn’t be able to use this laptop. It’s VERY easy on my eyes after switching the AMD Radeon settings to Enhanced and High Res (which simultaneously smoothes and sharpens up the text, making it more legible). It also does NOT have a glossy, highly reflective screen. The screen is semi-matte at the worst (honestly, it’s not even that much), and it’s full matte once it’s turned on. Evidently Acer has switched displays after the complaints (they tend to be good about doing things like that). It gets super bright, and the colors are close to true as far as I can tell – only publishing something is going to reveal the truth there, which I haven’t done yet. But again, I can’t believe what a close call it is to a Macbook Air.
The graphics performance: It’s not a gaming laptop, though I’m sure it is good enough to play most games on medium and would be PERFECT for a student. It’s definitely strong enough to perform smoothly for graphic artists, photographers, and anyone that tends to keep a ton of tabs open in their browser. Smooth scrolling and rendering, no lag or glitching.
I cannot compliment the Ryzen 7 processor enough. I am moving from an 8th gen i7 and the Ryzen 7 is WAY more responsive and less prone to freezing or errors. I can very easily believe it maxes out at 4ghz. Those eight cores handle multitasking like a true champ.
I was worried the RAM would give me some issues with work because it’s only 8gb and it’s also underpowered to help boost battery performance. So far, I’ve been surprised to find that this low-powered RAM actually keeps up with me despite my issues with never exiting or closing windows, lol.
The keyboard is extremely comfortable if you have small to medium-sized hands. There is some time to adjust to the smaller form factor. Large handed people will immediately hate the keyboard because it’s compact. This being said, it IS a large keyboard as far as COMPACT keyboards go, and it is 100% identical to the keyboard on the Macbook Air. Same feel and everything. Backlit keys, which you can switch on or off. Something SUPER cool is that Acer figured out how to include a Numlock and number keypad on it by marking some of the letter keys with numbers, then adding a Numlock. (check my pictures)
If you turn on the manual equalizer in the audio settings and crank it up, the speakers actually get really loud, and they’re nice that way too (no rattle, no stress on the drivers). By default though, I can easily see tons of folks complaining about the speakers not getting loud. They don’t get loud at all by default. With the equalizer maxed out, I would compare them to a mini Bluetooth speaker.
In short, don’t buy this for audio unless you’re planning on connecting it to different speakers. For normal casual usage, like watching YouTube videos or streaming movies, the built-in speakers should be just fine.
The lid is very well hinged. The screen is reinforced as well. Dropping it may cause some cosmetic damage, but it should hold up in most cases. At the worst, you’ll be looking at a little cosmetic damage (scratches, dings) and a busted screen. Which is better than what you could face with the typical plastic body. I once dropped a plastic body laptop off the back of my car (I was an idiot and left it on the hood). It totally destroyed the body… the laptop still worked, but there was bare PCB board everywhere. It was ugly, lol.
Now, there are complaints about battery life on this, but I haven’t had any problems. I also didn’t go with default settings in some key areas, though. I changed the Radeon settings to focus more on battery life than performance. Then I changed the power settings to best battery life. Now, I don’t consider this to be much, especially with my huge collection of background apps, but considering complaints saying the battery wouldn’t last more than an hour… hmmm. I’m not seeing it. I’ve been on battery for an hour now, and have 12h 46m remaining after charging to 98%. I’m guessing the expected battery life will hang somewhere between 4.5h and 6h on medium.
Overall, it’s a great machine and an awesome value in my book. I have no idea why the pro reviewers thought so poorly of it (though they did give it respect as a budget laptop). Maybe they were comparing it to more expensive laptops instead of comparing it to other models in this price range….? Or maybe the older version of this was really that bad.
Whatever. I’m sticking with this because IT WORKS.
Update: Two months later… it’s still running like the day I got it. I’m actually shocked that it continues to perform so well on 8GB of energy saving RAM. I am guessing the difference lies in a combo of using a better processor and using a solid state drive. My other laptop has an A12, which is quad core and goes up to 3ghz – this Ryzen 7 is octacore and goes up to 4ghz.
The Care Center app has a function in it to make the battery only change to 80% when it’s plugged in (saves the battery cells from being burned out). So despite using it plugged in all the time, I have not lost any battery health. It still goes for six hours or more off battery.
tvqueen13 –
I can’t believe that I got a $1500 laptop for $900! It is the latest 4700U Ryzen 7 AMD processor, 8 GB RAM, 512 GB hard drive storage, 14″ Full HD widescreen LED backlit display, raised keys on the backlit keyboard, and up 11.5 hours of battery life. I used it from morning to night before the battery ran down to 15% and I got a warning to plug it in. It is so lightweight that I can hold it in one hand, even though I have fibromyalgia. It is super slim too, very easy to hold and use. The processing speed is amazing! I can’t say enough good things about this laptop, I just love it!
Amazon Customer –
Taking a look at the specs of this laptop, you would expect it to be incredible, especially for this price point. Taking a look at the online reviews shows that the screen isn’t the best, and it takes a few more hits, but even so it looks like an amazing deal. After using it, in my opinion it’s worth the money, but not as fantastic as it appears.
TLDR: Look at what you want in a laptop before buying this one. For me it works fine but there are a few key drawbacks that might affect different tasks you would want to use this laptop for.
The PRO’s
+ Build Quality is fantastic, with sturdy metal and a keyboard I surprisingly quite enjoy using.
+ Big PRO: The Ryzen 4700U processor is a beast, and the snappiest processor I’ve used. Productivity use such as coding, taking notes in class, running other professional programs like the Microsoft suite or Zoom are handled easily and perfectly.
+ Big PRO: A 512GB SSD for this price is incredible! And it’s even a really good SSD at that.
The CON’s
– The screen is as bad as they say, even after calibration. It’s only slightly better than my old laptop I bought for $350 a few years ago. However, as someone who doesn’t use the laptop for video editing, it’s not a big issue for me, but everything does look more green/blue than it should.
– I’ve had software problems with this laptop that I would not have expected from a pre-built laptop, especially from a company like Acer. I have problems with apps being fuzzy (not scaling to the display properly), problems with Cortana and the Windows Start menu, and problems with the screen not immediately waking from sleep. These problems are rare and/or not too impactful, but still annoying.
– The BIGGEST CON by far is the thermals. The laptop has amazing specs as I mentioned above, but it can’t use them to their full potential because the components get too hot and have to cut back on speed. The fans are noisy and run at full speed often. I regularly experience temps of 70°+ while web browsing, and 90°+ while (light) gaming or other more intensive tasks.
To me that is a huge letdown, as this laptop does not perform heavy tasks like it should. The processor is limited by the cooling of the laptop and can’t really do all that it’s has the potential to do.
Overall, I am disappointed by the low upper limit of the hardware, but for my needs as a tech-savvy college student looking for a good laptop for classes, it’s perfect. It’s light and portable, sturdy, fast, and cheap. Even the gaming/heavy use cases are…. acceptable, even if they aren’t what they could be. I recommend this laptop to many people, but it’s not for everyone.
Jared –
Really nice laptop for the price, 500GB NVMe SSD, 8-core Ryzen 4700U, great (for integrated) video card. You can charge/power it using the USB-C port if you have a USB-PD adapter that’s 45W or more (45W is when they switch to 20V). Very quiet even at full load, I know noise is subjective, but I am super picky about fan noise. The SoC (CPU/GPU) seems to always max out at 17W no matter what you throw at it, which does limit its multi-core performance, but keeps the noise / heat / battery life reasonable.
You can run Debian on it. I couldn’t get Buster (10, stable at time of review) to install, but Bullseye (11, testing) works well. Buster didn’t have the Intel AX wifi driver and I couldn’t get the one from backports to load. Apparently you need the 5.7 kernel for the Ryzen 4000 series power-states to work well in Linux anyway (pretty important for a laptop). Once I installed Bullseye, I was left with a black screen, had to switch to an alternate console with Ctrl+Alt+F2 and run “sudo apt update” and then “sudo apt install firmware-linux”. Then rebooted (sudo shutdown -r now) and all was well. I guess it was either the amd64-microcode or more likely firmware-amd-graphics that I needed for X to work. If this doesn’t work for you, make sure /etc/apt/sources.list includes “main contrib non-free” at the end of each line, as opposed to just “main”. You can edit it with “sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list”
Ivan Barakumba –
Purchased the Acer notebook for my son and it’s by far better than I was expecting:
– Very light – perfect for the backpack
– Fast nvme 500GB SSD – windows boot and login are very fast. Touching the fingerprint reader logs you in almost instantly.
– Fast Ryzen 7 CPU – the 8 core cpu is faster on perf tests than my Dell XPS 15 i7 notebook.
– Cool and quiet during use
– Good keyboard, mouse pad
– Very sharp and bright non-reflective display – I was originally skeptical about the screen quality based on the reviews saying that it’s less bright than others… Actually the screen is so bright that we need to keep it at about 15-20% when working at home even during the day. Sharpness/pixel density is the same as on my 4K 27″ LG monitor. The reflection handling is very good.
– Very nice set of ports – the HDMI is actually v2.0 so my external 4K monitor is running at 60Hz refresh rate – smooth mouse and window rendering.
– Price/quality is very good – notebook looks and feels very nice and snappy… I looked at many other more expensive alternatives and couldn’t find anything I liked in the price range of up to $1200…
Honestly I’m engineer and I’m rarely impressed by the latest and greatest hardware but this is very pleasant surprise. Great job AMD and Acer!
Dewy –
This is the best bang per buck you can get for a latop. Intel has really lagged AMD in recent years, and the newest Ryzen chips are a beast, cpu-wise and graphic-wise. My only complaint about the latop is that the wireless adapter died within 2 weeks. Since I had upgraded the latop to a larger hard drive (2 TB), sending this unit back wasn’t an option. Instead I sucked it up and bought a new wireless AX card from amazon. Everything works great now. For those of you that like to upgrade you laptops, note that both the hard drive and the wirelesss card can be removed and upgraded. The RAM/Memory cannot, as it’s welded onto the motherboard.
londoncommuter –
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Great product but started making a loud humming noise today. It lasts for only a minute or 2 and then dies down and then theer is STILL a less loud noise