Acer TravelMate Spin P4 Review – Security First

Today, we’re gonna be diving into the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 review. It’s a productivity laptop with safety and security mind with a build quality that meets the MIL-STD-810H rigidity standards and comes with Windows 10 Pro. The latter means that it has built-in features like BitLocker, which allows for additional protective measures via encryption right down to hard-drive level to safeguard your data without you lifting a finger. Let’s jump right into it, shall we?

Unboxing the Acer TravelMate Spin P4

Let’s kick off our Acer TravelMate Spin P4 review with the unboxing. Inside the box, you will find the following items:

• User guide
• International Travelers Warranty guide
• Warranty card
• Charging brick
• Power cable
• The Acer TravelMate Spin P4 laptop itself

Appearance

The Acer TravelMate Spin P4 differs from their typical ultraportable offerings as this is a business laptop. While there may be some similarities, this is why it looks different from their Acer Swift, Spin, and Aspire series laptops. Looking at the lid, you’ll get a clean matte finish with the Acer logo on the top-right. You can get a good feel of its aluminum-magnesium build here.

Open up the lid and you’ll see a 14-inch Full HD IPS display, white-backlit chiclet keyboard, the Intel Core i7 sticker, and a trackpad. It’s worth noting that the bezels are relatively thin on the sides but thick on the top and bottom. You get a webcam with privacy shutter on the top bezel whereas the bottom bezel houses the company logo. Right above the keyboard and below the bottom bezel, you have the laptop’s top-firing speakers.

On the left side, you have the proprietary charging port, RJ45 LAN port, HDMI port, two USB-A ports, and a USB-C port. As for the right side, you have a stylus slot, power button which doubles as a fingerprint scanner, LED indicators, microSD card reader, combo audio jack, and Kensington Lock. There’s nothing on the rear except for a view of the hinges and rear air vent.

Flipping over to the bottom, you have 3 rubberized stands consisting of two small ones on the bottom left and right and a long one on top. Then you also have air vents and the usual product stickers. You can see 11 exposed screws here along with one hidden one behind the Warranty Seal sticker.

The Acer TravelMate Spin P4 adopts a simplistic design that differs from their other ultraportable offerings. It has a nice, sturdy build, which makes it easier to believe that it fits the MID-STD-810H standard as soon as you feel and carry it. Having 360° hinges is a plus point as well here but we’ll dive more into that in the User Experience section.

Specifications

CPU	Intel Core i7-1165G7 @ 2.8 GHz (up to 4.7 GHz Boost), 12M, 4C/8T, 10nm SuperFin, 28W TDP
RAM	8GB DDR4 (Can be upgraded up to 32GB)
GPU	Intel Iris Xe
Storage	512GB NVMe PCIe SSD
Connectivity	Wireless Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX201 2x2ax (2.4GHz and 5GHz) Bluetooth 5.0 Wired 1 x USB Type C port (USB 3.2 Gen 2, DisplayPort, Thunderbolt 4, USB Charging 5V/3A, DC-in 20V/60W) 2 x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Port (one supports power-off USB charging) 1 x MicroSD card reader 1 x RJ45 LAN
Display	14″ Full HD (1920 x 1080) IPS display with multi-touch support 1 x HDMI 2.0
Audio	2 x Speakers Array microphones 1 x 3.5mm combo audio jack
Others	Chiclet keyboard with white backlighting Full HD webcam with camera shutter, supports Windows Hello TPM 2.0
Power	65W power adapter 3-cell Li-ion battery
Dimensions	325 x 236 x 17.9 mm
Weight	1.53 kg

Performance

Starting off our benchmark suite with CrystalDiskMark, you can see that SSD storage used by the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 is pretty fast. You should be able to enjoy fast loading speeds / booting times as well as transfer speeds. For those of you wondering, this is the 512GB Samsung PM991 NVMe SSD.

Moving on to Cinebench R15, the Intel Core i7-1165G7 powering the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 performed admirably. It had one of the highest single core scores in our list of benchmarked laptops, with multi-core lagging behind high performance machines. The latter part is to be expected since it’s more energy-efficient.

A similar pattern can be seen in Cinebench R20, but it’s interesting to see how it managed to outperform an Intel Core I7-1185G7 laptop. It’s shaping up to be a very capable productivity device.

Moving on to Unigine SuperPosition in the 4K Optimized benchmark, the score is quite low but that’s to be expected. This is a graphically-intensive benchmark and the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 uses the Intel Iris Xe. The score would be higher if it had a discrete GPU, even something as simple as a GTX 1650.

The same can be said in 3DMark Time Spy, though this one doesn’t seem as bad since it came very close to breaking the 1,000 mark. It would be fine for some light gaming, though you will need to sacrifice graphics quality by a significant amount for a smooth gaming experience.

In PCMark 10, the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 is shaping up to be a very capable laptop, having a good overall score with notable achievements for Essentials and Productivity. It’s no surprise that it scored relatively low for Digital Content Creation as that requires a discrete GPU to achieve a good score. It’s certainly comparable to most ultraportable productivity laptops you can find today.

As usual with this kind of laptop, you’d expect the battery life to be excellent. From the PCMark Modern Office endurance test, it lasted 8 hours and 6 minutes (486 minutes), which is good but I expected it to be a little better. Perhaps the battery capacity could see some improvements but it should still serve most people well.

If you’re looking for a different kind of laptop, check out our Acer Enduro N3 review of the Acer by clicking right here.

User Experience

The Acer TravelMate Spin P4 is a business-oriented productivity laptop designed for those who want to work anywhere with ease. It’s powered by the Intel Core i7-1165G7 with Intel Iris Xe graphics. As for memory, you have 8GB DDR4 RAM and 512GB NVMe PCIe SSD. While it’s plenty, I would personally like to have it upgraded to 1TB SSD and 16GB RAM for that added peace of mind.

As for the display, the 14-inch Full HD IPS display works great. You get punchy colours, good viewing angles, and touchscreen support. The bezels could be thinner, but it’s not a dealbreaker in my opinion. In case you’re wondering, it has a 360° hinge which allows for greater usage flexibility. This laptop comes with a stylus along with a dedicated silo to store it. It’s great for jotting down notes or writing in general, but it’s not the best for drawing.

The Acer TravelMate Spin P4 has a decent array of ports. You get a USB-C port which supports charging and DisplayPort output, two USB-A ports, a microSD card reader, an RJ45 LAN port, a combo audio jack, and an HDMI port. For most people, this is more than enough so you don’t need to have a dedicated dock to make it more usable. If anything, I just wished that it used a full-sized SD card reader instead.

As for the keyboard, we have a chiclet keyboard with no Numpad. You get short travel distance but the keyboard feels a little mushy. It’s great that it has white backlighting in case you use it in a dark area. I just wished that the keyboard has a more tactile feel for a more comfortable typing experience. The trackpad is there and it works fine but there’s nothing to shout about.

This laptop does have a fingerprint scanner, which doubles as the power button. The initial scanning when I first sign in the laptop seems to work fine but after that, it seems like the laptop refuses to read my finger input at times. It’s not that I’m getting errors but rather, it just refuses to detect every now and then. This particular review unit may have a defect, and may reflect differently for retail units. When it does work, it’s worth noting that it recognizes very quickly.

One nice touch they included with the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 is the webcam privacy shutter. In case you’re worried that people might be spying on you, the privacy shutter completely closes the webcam so no one can see you. It’s an added bit of security for a better peace of mind. The webcam itself works fine but do use it in a place with at least decent lighting for a good experience.

In the sound department, the Acer TravelMate Spin P4’s speakers work surprisingly well. While the bass is completely flat, you get some clear highs with decent volume. The top-firing design certainly works wonders here. Personally, I feel like it’s geared towards hearing people talk, like during conference calls for example, which is understandable as this is meant more for work after all.

While the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 is designed with portability in mind, it feels noticeably heavier than the other Acer ultraportable laptops. 1.53kg is light but the weight feels rather concentrated, and it feels like they could have done more to shed some weight off of it. Perhaps its due to some augmentation as it did pass the MIL-STD-810H standard for rigidity, and it’s a solidly built laptop for sure.

Acer TravelMate Spin P4 Verdict

The Acer TravelMate Spin P4 is an attractive choice for professionals who want to remain mobile while still being productive. You get good performance, good battery life, a decent array of ports, great display with touchscreen support, 360° hinge for added versatility, MIL-STD-810H standard build quality, built-in active stylus, good speakers, and built-in webcam privacy shutter.

However, it’s not the perfect business laptop by any means. The laptop could be lighter, bezels should be thinner, keyboard feels rather mushy, and the touchscreen isn’t fit for drawing. It’s still a pretty solid choice nonetheless, but if at all possible, do upgrade to 16GB RAM at least so you can maximize your productivity potential.

At the end of our Acer TravelMate Spin P4 review, I award this laptop with our Silver Pokdeward.

Big thanks to Acer Malaysia for sending us this laptop for the purposes of this review. If you’re interested to purchase this business laptop, click right here or use the button below:

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