I’ve been using the Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI for a couple of months now - and it's easily one of the best ultra-light machines I’ve used

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: 30-second review

For many years, the Acer TravelMate series was seen as the affordable alternative to Lenovo or Dell offerings. But more recently, these machines have been getting to the punch on new platforms earlier than the competitors, and the new Acer Travelmate P6 14 AI is a prime example.

An ultralightweight 14-inch laptop built using the latest Intel Core Ultra 7 200 series processor that delivers excellent performance and power efficiency.

Typically, laptops are a balancing act between power and power consumption, but this system pulls off the almost unique trick of being quick while offering excellent longevity.

It also comes with a decent WQXGA+ display and biometric security for facial recognition and fingerprints. Those biometric features make it reasonably secure, and it even has a Kensington slot if you need to make sure nobody walks off with it.

But no design is perfect, and the limitations of the P6 AI models are that they aren’t easily upgraded, since the memory is soldered to the mainboard, and accessing the M.2 slot requires the removal of nine screws and the underside of the laptop.

Therefore, if this platform's memory and storage aren’t sufficient, this might not be the laptop for you. But for the majority of business users, this system has enough grunt and resources to make its owner productive, and with the addition of a docking station it potential is even greater. The standout features are its long battery life on a full charge and its ease of portability, but it’s strong across most key metrics.

This makes the TravelMate P6 14 AI a prime candidate for inclusion in our list of best business laptops, particularly for those focused on business travel.

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: Price and availability

• How much does it cost? From $1655/£1600
• When is it out? Available now
• Where can you get it? Direct from Acer or online retailers

Currently, there is a single SKU of the Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI (AKA TMP614-54-TCO) in the UK, and that is priced at £1,599.99 direct from Acer.

However, another SKU not offered at the Acer Store is a model using the Ultra 7 256V processor with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage, which can be found on Amazon.co.uk for £1554. While that’s a saving over the first SKU, the improved processor doesn’t offset the loss of memory and storage, since the RAM can’t be added back later.

This exact SKU isn’t available to US customers, although I did find a version with 32GB of RAM and 1TB of storage, but with a lower 1920 x 1200 resolution display for $1653.18 from Newegg.com.

Alternatives that use the same platform include the Lenovo ThinkPad T14s Gen 6, HP EliteBook X G1i 14 and HP EliteBook Ultra 14 G1i.

Starting at $1809, the Lenovo ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 is more expensive for a similarly specified system, and in the UK or Europe, it's much more costly.

From HP, the EliteBook X G1i 14 starts at only $1,239, for a lower spec model, but with the same processor, memory and storage in the Wolf Pro Security Edition, it's an eye-watering $2,339. And, its brother, the EliteBook Ultra 14 G1i, is even more at $2,489.

While deals can be had, at the time of writing, the Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI looks like an absolute bargain at this price.

• Value: 4.5 / 5

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: Specs

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: Design

• Carbon Fibre construction
• High-quality display
• Decent port selection
• No upgrade access

A major advantage of having a laptop is that it’s portable, allowing you to take it to your place of work or travel with it as needed. The TravelMate P6 14 AI makes that a much more practical proposal, weighing less than a kilogram.

Acer achieved this with Carbon Fibre construction, delivering a reasonably robust yet extremely lightweight solution.

The maximum thickness is also only 16.65mm, and most of the side profile is closer to 12mm, making it exceptionally easy to pick up and handle.

The keyboard is a membrane variety with good spacing between the keys, even if the layout doesn’t fully utilise the width of the chassis. It does sport a basic cursor cluster, but no numeric pad, and as this is a CoPilot+ system, it has a key for summoning AI help.

The only aspect of the keyboard I didn’t like was that while it had most of the extended key functions via an Fn key, there was no PrtScn key option, making screen captures a little more awkward. The keyboard is backlit, though, which is useful for working at night.

Where this machine shines more, quite literally, is with the display. There are SKUs of this model which only come with a 1080p resolution panel, but the one I tested came with a truly impressive 14-inch WQXGA+ 2880 x 1800 IPS display. It was so good that I dug out my Datacolor Spyder X2 Ultra calibrator and profiled the panel to get hard numbers on its brightness, contrast and gamut. I’ll talk about the results in the performance section, but for IPS technology, this is an exceptional panel, and definitely worth the upgrade if you have that choice.

The other points of note on this design are the ports, with two Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports on the left, along with a USB-A and HDMI out. On the right are another USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A port, an audio jack, and a security slot. That port selection will work for most requirements, though the omission of a card reader might irk some people.

One of the Thunderbolt ports is required for charging, so if you use lots of USB-C/Thunderbolt hardware, you might want to consider a Thunderbolt dock to make that arrangement less restrictive.

Where this system is less accommodating is with upgrades, since there is no easy way to access the inside other than removing many screws.

I find it telling that in the manual for this system, there is zero information about opening it up or performing any upgrade, and for all errors that relate to storage, you are encouraged to use the official channels to get it fixed.

• Design: 4 / 5

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: Hardware

• Intel Core 7 Ultra 258V
• ARC 140V GPU
• Perfect for webcam use

As I’ve mentioned in other reviews, Intel's Core Ultra 7 258V is a slightly odd computer platform. Built for the AI PC era, with a dedicated NPU capable of delivering up to 47 TOPS of performance, it earns this system the CoPilot+ rating, if that’s of interest to you.

It utilises a hybrid architecture that doesn’t use hyperthreading, combining performance and efficiency cores, keeps thermals in check and extends battery life.

However, some reviewers have been critical of the direction that Intel took the Core Ultra series. Where it appeared that overall performance, especially multi-threaded performance, was sacrificed for power efficiency.

If we compare this system to a modern AMD Ryzen AI 7 350, this chip is slightly faster at single-thread performance, but gets utterly trashed when multi-threading. And when compared to the Ryzen AI 395 Max+, it is metaphorically nuked from orbit for raw performance.

The flipside of that coin is that where most Ryzen AI 7 laptop batteries offer around the 13-hour mark of continual use, those that use the Intel Core 7 Ultra 258V typically offer 18 hours or more.

Therefore, this chip is a good choice for those who need battery life, but possibly a less desirable one for those who need raw computing power. All laptops are compromises, and this one went with battery life as its priority.

It’s also worth saying that while the ARC 140V GPU is good enough for more office tasks, it lags behind where AMD is with its Radeon 8060S, and those who want more GPU power might need to wait for the Core Ultra 300 series to deliver something with more video punch.

What this platform does offer is a decent number of PCIe lanes, enabling it to support dual Thunderbolt 4 ports, a PCIe 4.0 M.2 slot for the storage, and another M.2 slot for the WiFi module.

If audio is all-important, this system does have DTS X spec stereo speakers, and it has multiple microphones with AI noise reduction, making it perfect for conferencing. One microphone is next to the 5.2MP webcam, and the other is on the front edge of the machine. And, if you want to use a professional podcast configuration, the audio jack can also be used as an external microphone input.

From a hardware perspective, aside from the possible limitations of the Intel Core Ultra 200 series, this is a solid specification that addresses the widest possible number of potential users. Easier upgrades and more Thunderbolt ports might have been nice, but not everyone wants or needs those things.

• Hardware: 4 / 5

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: Performance

My chosen perspective for these benchmarks is the HP EliteBook Ultra G1i, a machine that uses the identical Intel Core Ultra 7 258V processor.

This could have been a remarkably tedious comparison, with all the numbers within expected variations. But what it shows well is that with mostly the same hardware, it is possible to adjust the defaults in a way that favours a particular operational aspect.

Looking holistically at the 3DMark, CineBench24 and GeekBench results, the numbers are close, with the EliteBook having a modest advantage in graphics power.

However, the headline story here is that by pulling back on CPU and GPU power a little, Acer has gained an impressive advantage in power consumption thanks to LPDDR5 memory, among other factors.

That’s translated into another 2 hours and 45 minutes of running time, or 15% more running. Admittedly, the Acer has 65Wh over the 64Wh battery of the HP, but that’s not enough to swing that time extension on battery. For those curious, it takes about 90 minutes to fully recharge from exhaustion using the provided USB-C PSU.

Acer might have chosen a better SSD, one that makes more of the PCIe 4.0 interface, but again, it might be that the Kingston OM8PGP4102Q is a frugal power solution.

Because I was impressed with the screen display, I also decided to run a full Datacolor analysis on the panel and see how it stood up.

It delivered 99% of sRGB, 77% of AdobeRGB, 79% of P3, 72% of NTSC, and 57% of Rec2020. Which, for IPS screen technology, is beyond respectable.

The only weakness of this design is that, like most laptops, the backlight is centrally positioned, and the middle is about 10% brighter than the edges.

Conversely, its 497 nits of brightness and 1520:1 contrast ratio put this at the top rung of screens I’ve seen on laptops that weren’t OLED.

Overall, if you are looking for a well-balanced design with exceptional battery life and a great screen, the Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI is a significant box ticker.

• Performance: 4.5 / 5

Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI: Final verdict

Sometimes, computer platforms stand out for a single feature that outshines the rest, putting them head and shoulders above competitors.

That’s not the case here. What makes the Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI great isn’t one big thing. It’s a host of much smaller features that come together, Voltron-style, to deliver a system that’s distinctively practical without being mundane.

In short, it does what most laptop owners genuinely want, and cares less about the things that they would generally consider nice-to-haves. And, it does it at a price that won’t break budgets, since it doesn’t implicitly require docking stations for home and work.

There are more powerful laptops around, mostly using AMD Ryzen AI platforms, if you need that level of computing power, but for the majority of business customers, the Acer TravelMate P6 14 AI has the right blend of performance and practicality.

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