LG gram Pro 17 17Z90TP performance evaluation

[John Ratsey]

First an explanatory note about model numbers. LG has used a fairly consistent system for model numbers which is used here for brevity. The model being reviewed is 17Z90TP. The 17 is for screen size, Z seems to be Intel clamshell (but so is U, while T  is two-in-one), I haven’t figured out 90, T is the model year 2025 or perhaps the hardware generation as LG also released some RU models in 2025 with 2023 Intel hardware, the P is an optional extra letter which indicates the Pro versions (some 2025 models also have L versions with Lunar Lake chips). My 2024 gram Pro is model 17Z90SP.

 

I already owned the 2024 17” gram Pro (and before that the 2022 17” gram). The notebook normally serves as a compact desktop computer. I like the 17” screen size without the bulk of most 17” notebooks (usually gaming machines) but with the capacity to hold two SSDs. LG’s 17” IPS panel is very good quality. The main limitation of LG’s slim format is the cooling system. This was partly addressed by the introduction of two fans in the 2024 gram Pro which had a noticeable performance improvement compared to the 2022 model, but two fans can make more noise than one.

 

In December 2025 I bought the 14” LG 14Z90T and was impressed that it could perform as well as my 2024 17Z90SP despite the latter’s two fans (see this mini review). I like my notebooks to be both efficient and quiet and I therefore tried the 2025 17” gram (17Z90T) which had the same internal hardware (except for 32GB RAM instead of 16GB) as the 14” but discovered that it under-performed (see my comments here). It was returned for a refund. Since then I’ve been watching out for a 32GB version of the Pro model (ie two fans) of the 2025 17” gram at a reasonable price and found one which had been returned to Amazon UK. I quickly discovered that this 17Z90TP performed more in line with my expectations.

 

This notebook is model 17Z90TP-G.AD88A1 which has the Arrow Lake Intel® Core™ Ultra7 255H CPU, Intel® Arc™ graphics, 32GB of 8,400MHz RAM, a 1TB SSD and a 17” WQXGA (2560 x 1600) IPS display. The weight, according to my digital scales, is 1.326kg which is slightly lower than the advertised 1.369kg but more than the 1.277kg that I measured for the 2024 gram Pro. I won’t go into all the details as much is the same as the 2024 model. My interest is in the performance difference.

 

Externally the gram 17Z90TP looks the same as the 17Z90SP. There are different stickers on the palm rest and the right Ctrl key on the keyboard has been replaced by a Copilot key. The display is the same top quality matte LG IPS panel. I could see that, unlike on the non-Pro gram 17, the vent holes in the bottom matched the fans:

 

Getting the bottom off the gram Pro is relatively easy: Remove the four rubber feet, remove four screws and then carefully prise off the base (the non-Pro gram 17 uses a different design with more screws). Internally there is the same overall layout. The fans look different but have similar size and the heat sink in the newer gram also covers the memory chips which are rated at 8.4GHz. The 90Whr battery in the newer gram Pro is the same physical size as the older 77Whr battery. Above is the 2025 gram Pro, below is the 2024 gram Pro.

 

 

The 90Whr battery was an unexpected bonus as the LG UK specs, replicated by the retailers, say 77Whr. The LG global specs for this model might be the cause of the confusion as they show 77Whr in the summary and 90Whr in the detailed specs. It seems that no one checked. 90Whr, however, is standard for the version of the 17“ gram Pro with the Nvidia GPU.

[John Ratsey]

It's time to do some testing which is made more complicated because the user-selected fan speed controls the CPU performance in longer tests. LG’s design logic is to specify different power limits in the BIOS according to the cooling mode option selected by the user using either the LG “My gram” app or the Fn+F7 key combination.

The system has two power limit values. PL1 is the maximum long duration power which can be supplied to the CPU and PL2 is the short duration power limit. HWiNFO reports this information for the Intel 255H CPU:

 

Those are the static (ie base value) power limits which LG designers considered appropriate for the notebook’s thermal performance. There are also dynamic power limits which change according to the cooling mode and can be seen using HWiNFO’s sensor data. I have summarised these and compared them with the corresponding values for some other LG notebooks. I have ignored the AI cooling mode because one initial test showed slower than the low fan setting. Perhaps it measures the ambient noise.

 

It can be seen that LG have given the 2025 gram Pro higher PL1 values than both its predecessor and the other 2025 models with the same CPU. The difference on the low fan setting is substantial. More power should enable higher performance until the CPU reaches the maximum allowable temperature of 105°C.

 

[John Ratsey]

For performance testing I started with the old and simple wPrime for which I have results going back many years and which measures the basic CPU performance. The 32M tests, which only last a few seconds on modern hardware, don’t vary much. Two outliers on the 1024M test are the 17Z90T with its poor design of the cooling vents and the 2024 gram Pro on the low fan (and low power) setting. The 2025 gram Pro on low fan isn’t far behind the 14” gram or the 2024 gram Pro running at the normal fan setting. LG seem to have selected a good power value for this low fan setting while there’s marginal performance gain in return for the much greater noise of the high fan setting.

 

The next benchmark to be examined is Cinebench. The older Cinebench 15 tests are completed relatively quickly on newer computers but are representative of short duration tasks. Cinebench 23 keeps running for at least 10 minute and is a better indication of thermal performance limits during longer duration tasks.

There’s not much difference in the Cinebench 15 results for the Arrow Lake 14” gram and 17” gram Pro while both are well ahead of the non-Pro gram 17. There’s also not much difference in the single core performance of any of the notebooks in my summary table. In fact, the 14” gram leads the field for this test. I suspect that this is due to the lower power limit keeping the CPU running faster for more time before reaching a thermal limit which triggers a slowdown.  In Cinebench 23 the same pattern is noticeable for the single core test but the 17Z90TP is well ahead of the others for the multi-core test. On the low fan setting it’s faster than the 2024 gram Pro at the normal fan setting. 

The next set of tests is Geekbench 6 where the single core test results are all close together with the 14” Arrow Lake gram being slightly faster than the 17” gram Pro for the same cooling option. The 17” Arrow Lake gram Pro pulls ahead on the multi core tests and also on the graphics tests, perhaps helped by more and faster RAM. This notebook, on the low fan setting is faster than its predecessor at the normal fan setting. More speed with less noise!

[John Ratsey]

The same pattern of the 2025 gram Pro on low fan being faster than the 2024 gram Pro on normal fan is also seen on the Passmark benchmark test.

 

Finally, I ran some 3D Mark tests although I don’t normally have a need for 3D graphics. The results follow the trend of the 2025 gram Pro on the low fan setting being faster than the 2024 gram Pro using the normal fan setting.

I carried out some battery testing using my normal method of playing an MP4 movie. At 60% display brightness the average power drain over 8 hours was 5.3W. Lowering the brightness to 35% reduced the power drain to 4.4W. Illuminating that big display is what uses the lower. I have little doubt that the computer is capable of spending a working day of normal office usage without needing a power socket. It can’t match, however, the 14” gram where the power drain for the same test is less than 3W but higher CPU usage will have a bigger proportional effect on the latter machine.

While talking of power, LG ships the UK models of its notebooks with a power brick which has a separate mains cable which adds a lot to the travel weight. The computer will, however, work off almost USB-C PSU which has a 20V output. It will complain if the PSU rating is less than 65W but this has no adverse effect on performance. If needed, some power will be taken from the battery. The photo below compares the LG 65W PSU with an Anker 65W PSU plus 3m USB-C cable.

In conclusion, it appears that my objective of having a notebook similar to my 17” 2024 gram Pro which can match its performance but with less fan noise is satisfied by the 2025 version. Perhaps the Panther Lake 2026 gram Pro will be even better but it might also be more expensive.