In the last few years, I’ve felt like Chromebooks have hit a plateau. ChromeOS is a quirky but mature platform at this point, and Google has continued to add smart and useful features on a regular basis. But the hardware has felt pretty stagnant, with a few exceptions. Most Chromebooks at this point are utilitarian devices that get the job done but inspire little excitement, and I’ve found most Intel-based Chromebooks don’t get me through a day of work before the battery dies.
But earlier this summer, Lenovo released a new Chromebook with the ARM-based MediaTek’s Kompanio Ultra 910 chip, rather than the usual Intel fare. And now Acer is doing the same with the latest Chromebook Plus Spin 514, a laptop that Acer says should get up to 17 hours of battery life — a figure that only this model and the aforementioned Lenovo can hit. Previously, the MediaTek-powered Chromebooks available ran on weaker mobile chips that didn’t have nearly enough power, but the Kompanio Ultra 910 is a completely different beast. The combo of performance and efficiency the Spin 514 offers makes it one of the best Chromebooks I’ve used in a while.
Hardware design
The Chromebook Spin 514 feels like many Acer laptops I’ve tried over the years (CP514-5HN is the identifier for this particular model, but we’re just going to call it the Spin 514 from here on out). It’s solid and well-built while still also feeling fairly utilitarian. It doesn’t quite hit “premium” laptop standards, but it’s on the nicer end of the Chromebook spectrum. I’m a fan of the silver color scheme as opposed to the rather dull grey most Chromebooks come in, and the laptop’s lid has a nicely chamfered and polished edge, giving it some visual flair.
It’s also a relatively slim (0.61 inches) and light (3 pounds) laptop. It’s not pushing the envelope, but it’s also more svelte and portable than a lot of cheaper Chromebooks. “Almost premium” isn’t a bad place to be. The same goes for the keyboard and trackpad — they’re both spacious and comfortable, and the keys have plenty of clicky travel. It’s not the best keyboard I’ve ever used, but one that I’m happy to tap away on for hours at a time. The 1,920 x 1,200 touchscreen is bright, sharp and colorful, quite pleasant to look at for long sessions. However, it also has pretty large bezels above and below the display. Again, almost premium.
The Spin 514 has solid connectivity options, as well. On one side you’ll find two USB-C 3.2 ports and a headphone jack, while the other side goes old-school with two USB-A 3.2 ports. I wish that there was one of each on each side so that you could plug in a charger on the left or the right, but alas. My only real quibble is that if you’re using a monitor with the laptop plugged into power, both USB-C jacks are taken up. An HDMI connection would have been helpful for that common scenario.
As the name implies, the Spin 514 has a 360-degree hinge that lets you use it in a tablet mode, with the touchscreen as the main input. I’ve long believed these convertible laptops aren’t really offering any useful solution for the vast majority of people, and I still feel the same way. But the hinge feels great; Acer has a ton of experience in this department. And the USI 2.0 stylus I had on hand worked without any need for pairing or setup, which was convenient. If you’re the kind of person who would take advantage of that, the Spin 514 does the trick.
Overall, the Spin 514 lands just about where I’d expect for a $700 laptop in terms of hardware quality. It’s utilitarian in a good way — there were no major letdowns in my testing aside from the speakers, which have very little bass and sound rather harsh when listening to music.
Configurations and performance
Before diving into how the Spin 514 worked for me, a quick word about configurations. The version I tested retails for $700 and will be sold through Best Buy. This setup has the aforementioned MediaTek Kompanio Ultra 910 alongside 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage space. Acer itself will sell a $750 model with a 2,880 x 1,800 display and 16GB of RAM, but it should be otherwise identical to the model I’m testing.
ChromeOS runs well enough on the various Intel chips that are commonly used. One of my longstanding favorite Chromebooks, the Lenovo Ideapad 5i, still uses a Core i3 from early 2023, and it gets the job done. But the move to MediaTek’s ARM-based Kompanio Ultra 910 has raised the performance bar, as the Spin 514 is probably the most responsive Chromebook I’ve tried. There’s nary a hint of slowdown or hiccups that still happen on Intel-based models if you have too many windows or apps open. Tabs rarely need to be reloaded and pop back up quickly on the rare occasion that they do. Music or video playback never skipped regardless of what else I was doing, and Android apps like Lightroom worked swiftly and smoothly as well.
Perhaps more importantly than how it performs today is the fact that the Kompanio Ultra 910 should keep the Flip 514 feeling snappy and powerful for years to come. There’s just more room for this chip to handle increasing performance demands over the years. Benchmarks from the Android version of Geekbench 6 help illustrate this: the Spin 514 scored 2,526 on the single-core CPU test, 7,687 on multi-core and 18,020 on the GPU test. For comparison, Acer’s recently-released Chromebook Plus 514 with an Intel Core 3 chip scored 1,150, 4,407 and 5,932 respectively. I don’t think that benchmarks like Geekbench are a be-all end-all of anything, but it’s at least one metric to illustrate the benefits of moving away from Intel.
I’ve long groused about the relatively mediocre battery life on Intel-powered Chromebooks, and this is another place where the MediaTek chip helps out tremendously. The Spin 514 looped video playback in my test for just over 14 hours before running out of battery. My daily workflow of tons of Chrome tabs, various chat apps, YouTube Music, Todoist and a handful of Android apps definitely used more resources, but I could still get through a full work day with battery to spare. That’s not something I’ve said about many Chromebooks recently. The only caveat is that battery life will almost surely take a hit if you opt for the model with the higher-resolution display.
ChromeOS and Gemini
I wrote a lot about the ChromeOS and Gemini experience last year when I reviewed Samsung’s Galaxy Chromebook Plus, and basically everything I said then applies here. But to recap: ChromeOS is quite mature and stable at this point, and Google has built in a lot of smart features over the years to make it more than “just a web browser” as it was referred to previously. Of course, ChromeOS is still a primarily web-based system, with Android applications giving you access to things you might not find in the browser. There are also plenty of web apps that are well optimized for ChromeOS, and Google Docs has a comprehensive offline mode at this point. ChromeOS also pairs nicely with Android phones and adds features like shared notifications and streaming of some apps directly to your laptop.
Of course, Gemini is also a big part of the equation — but if you’re not a big fan of AI tools, it’s also quite easy to ignore. There are little prompts around the OS, but nothing that really drags your attention away from what you’re working on. And if you do want to dive into what Gemini is all about, a Chromebook like the Spin 514 is a good option because you get 12 months of Google’s AI Pro plan for free. That usually costs $20/month and provides 2TB of Drive storage along with Gemini 2.5 Pro in search and the Gemini app, Gemini in Gmail and Google Docs, access to the Veo image- and video-generation tool and more. Given that 2TB of Google Drive storage costs $10/month on its own, this is a solid perk. But it’s also worth remembering that once that year ends, you’re on the hook to pay for that plan yourself.
Pricing and final thoughts
My only real quibble with the Spin 514 is its price. At $700, we’re pushing the top of what anyone should spend on a Chromebook. While the more powerful chip and long battery life will be worth it for some people, Acer itself is providing some strong competition with its standard Chromebook Plus 514 which came out this summer. It has an Intel chip, so battery life and performance aren’t at the same level as the Spin 514, but it’s also literally half the price at $350. If you’re only going to be away from a charger for a few hours at a time, it’s hard not to recommend that device instead. I’ll be publishing more details about that laptop in our guide to the best Chromebooks very soon if you want to know more.
So while this might not be the Chromebook I’d recommend to everyone, it is a strong contender for the best premium Chromebook you can buy. If you’re looking to use this laptop all day, every day, it may be worth shelling out the extra cash for the improved performance, battery life and longevity you’ll get from the Spin 514.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/acer-chromebook-plus-spin-514-review-the-new-chromeos-sweet-spot-090014823.html?src=rss https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/acer-chromebook-plus-spin-514-review-the-new-chromeos-sweet-spot-090014823.html?src=rssInicia sesión para agregar comentarios
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