The Galaxy Book4 series offers a range of models, including the traditional clamshell and the 360 version. Among these, the Pro version stands out as the premium offering, comparable to high-end ultrabooks from well-known brands like Dell, HP, ASUS, Lenovo, and Acer. Despite its simple design, the Galaxy Book 4 Pro impresses with its slim and lightweight build, along with the vibrant Dynamic AMOLED 2X display.
The Galaxy Book 4 Pro comes equipped with a configuration that includes an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H processor, 16GB RAM, and a 512GB SSD, which can be upgraded to 1TB. Surprisingly, Samsung does not offer a 32GB RAM option, and the reason for this remains unspecified. This configuration makes the Galaxy Book 4 Pro ideally suited for everyday office tasks, sales, marketing professionals, or anyone meeting clients frequently. Its standout features, such as the weight of just 1.2kg and remarkable thinness, make the Galaxy Book 4 Pro an attractive choice for those in the market for a new laptop.
Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Pro Quick Review
Design
There is a point that is difficult to deny that the Galaxy Book 4 Pro has a design quite similar to the MacBook Air M1. When I first saw it, I didn’t notice the Samsung logo tucked away in the corner. I think this is the MacBook Air M1.
That’s right, from Samsung until now, from the first Galaxy Book model, the design has gone in a minimalist direction like this, up to now there are 4 generations of Galaxy Book, but the appearance has not changed much.
The Galaxy Book 4 Pro measures 11.6mm at its thinnest point, not quite as slender as the MacBook Air M2. Holding the Book 4 Pro in your hand, its surprising thinness and lightness become apparent.
Our Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Pro review unit, dubbed Moonstone Gray, closely resembles the MacBook’s Space Gray color. Initially, one might overlook the many similarities between these two models. For those prone to sweaty hands or whose sweat is particularly salty, caution is advised with the device’s paint finish. Frequent exposure can lead to a glossy appearance and eventual fading of the color.
The laptop boasts an aluminum finish, with the frame around the screen—known as the B side—featuring glass edges instead of plastic. This design choice, which includes curved corners on the screen, offers a unique and refreshing experience for Windows users who are accustomed to square corners.
The device’s hinge is sturdy and allows for one-handed opening. Despite its thin and light build, the hinge firmly supports the screen when typing on your lap. The maximum opening angle of the hinge is about 130 degrees.
Unlike other manufacturers, Samsung does not cut down on connection ports and still has Thunderbolt 4, USB-A, HDMI, a 3.5mm jack, and a microSD card slot.
The speaker system, branded as AKG, did not impress me during testing. But it features a notably larger sound design compared to other laptop models.
The Galaxy Book 4 Pro maintains its trademark simplicity in design, which is neither pretentious nor flashy. This understated style will appeal to those who appreciate minimalism. However, individuals who prefer elegance, versatility, or innovative design elements may find the Galaxy Book 4 Pro less appealing.
Keyboard and touchpad
The keyboard and touchpad of the Samsung Galaxy Book4 Pro do not give me the experience I expected during use. The keyboard’s shallow key travel, similar to the old MacBook‘s butterfly mechanism, can cause fatigue with long typing sessions. In return, the bounce and layout of this keyboard are not too restrictive for my hands. The keyboard backlight can automatically activate if it detects that the user is using it in a low-light environment. The appearance of the Copilot button is also one of the standards of new-age AI PCs.
The touchpad is moderately sized and offers good tracking ability. However, its sensitivity does not fully match finger movements, resulting in a cursor behavior that is distinct. Slight delay compared to a standard level. I don’t have this problem with other models, such as the recent Dell XPS series or Lenovo ultrabook models. I tried it on Galaxy Book Go, and it had the same problem. Perhaps this is a common characteristic of Samsung laptops. The easiest way to solve it is to increase the sensitivity and speed of the mouse pointer. Otherwise, pointing at small icons may result in reduced accuracy.
Display
The 14-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X panel (2880 x 1800) of the Galaxy Book 4 Pro is my favorite feature. It mirrors the technology used in Samsung smartphones, where screen quality is a recognized strength of their devices. It supports 10-finger multi-touch and is among the most sensitive touch-enabled laptop panels I’ve used.
Samsung laptops are equipped with panels made by Samsung that offer impressive specifications. They cover 100% sRGB, 98% AdobeRGB, and 100% DCI-P3 color gamuts, with a peak brightness of 400 nits across the entire screen. They achieve a delta E below 1, ensuring high color accuracy, consistent gamma, and excellent contrast across light and dark areas.
More importantly, the Galaxy Book 4 Pro has a pretty good anti-glare coating (in cooperation with Corning). Despite being a mirror screen, the Galaxy Book 4 Pro outperforms other laptops’ mirror screens I’ve experienced.
Curving the screen’s four corners enhances the user experience, giving a smartphone-like feel. The design, along with Windows’ native square windows, enhances the full-window view’s aesthetic appeal. This improvement is reminiscent of the transition from the 10.5-inch to the 11-inch iPad Pro. However, the screen’s bottom border is noticeably thick. A slimmer border would greatly improve the design.
Performance
Our Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Pro review model packs Intel Core Ultra 7 155H, 16GB LPDDR5x RAM, and 512GB PCIe 4.0 SSD. The new processor is more powerful than the Intel Alder Lake generation.
The device’s regular operating clock speed is not particularly high. This persists even after enabling the best performance mode and conducting multi-core Cinebench tests. But the highest clock speed is only about 3GHz, and the temperature is high. The temperature has reached the threshold of 100 degrees Celsius.
The Galaxy Book 4 Pro’s ultra-thin design struggles to manage the heat generated by the Core Ultra 7 155H during use, affecting its long-term performance. Though the Core Ultra 7 155H momentarily exceeds 55W, it quickly stabilizes at 30W. Despite this reduction, the temperature remains above 90 degrees Celsius.
The Galaxy Book4 Pro maintains a high single-core clock speed of 4.7GHz, yet the temperature remains unchanged. However, this laptop doesn’t outperform others with the Core Ultra 7 155H in Cinebench R23 and R24 scores.
Samsung no longer uses 1 fan for its 13 and 14-inch laptops but switched to 2 cooling fans and 2 copper pipes, but the efficiency has not improved much. If you don’t do heavy tasks, the device is completely fine and cool, but on the contrary, the device will get hot and the hottest area is the hinge area. It remains cool during operation, with only the hinge area heating up, while the rest of the typing area stays comfortable.
In terms of performance, Samsung faces significant challenges with its ultrabook design. While you expect an ultrabook to effectively deliver on its core functionalities, Samsung’s pursuit of an excessively thin and lightweight design compromises the device’s performance.
Other features
Samsung’s AI capabilities match any laptop model of 2024. The Copilot key instantly activates the Windows 11 AI assistant, allowing for smooth operation of an LLM directly on the device. You just need to choose the right LLM model, and the parameters are not too large (I find that for laptop models, less than 13 billion parameters is the appropriate number if you need to run LLM directly on the laptop).
If you are also using a Samsung phone, the combination of laptop and phone is something that other brands will be jealous of, except Apple. If you also use a Samsung phone or tablet and log in to the same account, you will have a seamless experience between these devices, typically Multi Control.
In Samsung’s ecosystem, you can also receive incoming calls on any device connected to the same Samsung account. On the Microsoft Store, many Samsung applications serve that ecosystem. In particular, in the Windows market, few companies do as much and connect as coherently as Samsung.
Samsung Galaxy images and documents can be quickly synced with a laptop via OneDrive, or by downloading the Gallery app. If you take RAW photos with the Galaxy, Expert RAW can auto-transfer them to the Galaxy Book via Wi-Fi Direct.
Battery
The Galaxy Book 4 Pro’s 63Whr battery surprisingly lasts for 7 hours on screen time. This performance is comparable to a 14-inch laptop model with an OLED screen and a larger 75Whr battery. Samsung also equips the device with fast charging capabilities, 35% within 30 minutes and 50% in just over 40 minutes.
Final line
Having had a previous unsatisfactory experience with a Samsung laptop, I find the new Galaxy Book 4 Pro to be a marked improvement. The highlights for me are its high-quality screen and slim, lightweight design, which make it especially convenient for travel. For professionals who frequently meet with clients or work in sales and marketing, the Galaxy Book4 Pro is an excellent choice.
The Galaxy Book4 Pro models start at $1,449.99 on Amazon.com and £1,489 on Amazon.co.uk. Upgrading to a configuration with 1TB SSD increases the price to $1749.99.
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