The Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11 has the right idea to compete with the best budget gaming laptops: skip the flashy design extras and focus on the hardware that matters. Its RTX 5060 graphics, 144 Hz IPS display, solid keyboard, and generous internal upgrade options give budget-strapped gamers plenty to like on paper. The reality is that this configuration is compromised in the area that matters most: gaming performance. Its RTX 5060 is held back by a 65W power limit and the CPU is several generations old, allowing rival machines in the same price range to post stronger results. The LOQ is usable and practical, but at this price, it needs stronger performance to stand out.

Design of the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Aptly named, the LOQ Essentials 15 embraces a no-frills design. Aside from LOQ branding on the lid, there’s little here meant to catch the eye, which is fitting for a laptop that’s intended to deliver performance at the lowest possible cost. Lenovo reserves premium materials and styling for its Legion gaming laptops.

Fortunately, the budget considerations are mostly aesthetic, as the LOQ’s plastic chassis feels solid and has the durability you’d expect for daily home or school use. Its 0.97-inch thick profile and 5.07-pound weight don’t make it a great traveling companion are in line with competing laptops like Acer's Nitro V 16S AI, Asus’ TUF Gaming F16, and MSI's Cyborg 15. The latter is the lightest in the group, at 4.36 pounds.

Lenovo’s port selection is practical: one USB-C port (10 Gbps), two USB-A ports (5 Gbps), an audio jack, Ethernet, and HDMI. You won't get truly high-speed ports like USB4/Thunderbolt 4 at this price. The Intel AX203 Wi-Fi 6 card is another example of this laptop's economical focus, though it shouldn't hold users back.

Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11 Specifications

Gaming and Graphics on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

We evaluated the LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11 with a Core i7-13650HX processor, RTX 5060 graphics (65W), and 16GB of single-channel DDR5-4800 RAM. The processor is several years old though still packs a punch, with six Performance cores.

Playing 007 First Light at 1080p with medium lighting settings, post effects on, and DLSS set to balanced, the LOQ produced playable frame rates, ranging from the mid-50s to low-70s FPS depending on the scene. The experience was never poor, but it lacked the fluidity I expected from a laptop carrying Nvidia's latest midrange GPU.

Our benchmark comparison lineup consists of Acer's Nitro V 16S AI (Ryzen 7 260, RTX 5060 85W, $1,299.99 when tested), Asus' TUF Gaming F16 (Core i7-14650HX, RTX 5050 115W, $1,199.99), and MSI's Cyborg 15 C13WE (Core i5-13420H, RTX 5050 70W, $1,219.99).

Overall, the LOQ’s results were disappointing. With a 65W power limit, its RTX 5060 simply doesn't deliver the level of performance buyers might expect from the badge. It was routinely outperformed by the TUF Gaming F16 using an RTX 5050, while Acer's higher-powered RTX 5060 laptop also finished comfortably ahead. The result is a gaming laptop that works well enough but struggles to justify its price when similarly priced alternatives make better use of comparable hardware.

In Shadow of the Tomb Raider at the Highest detail preset, the LOQ’s 88 FPS only outpaced the Cyborg (82 FPS), while the Asus (95 FPS) and Acer (98 FPS) both pulled ahead. This story repeated in Far Cry 6 – with 75 FPS, the LOQ trailed Acer (82 FPS) and Asus (90 FPS), though it was within a few FPS of those units in Red Dead Redemption 2. The LOQ’s only real victory was Cyberpunk 2077, where it achieved 38 FPS, with the Acer (32 FPS) trailing. The LOQ was one of two laptops tested with Forza Horizon 3, where it predictably had no trouble outgunning the Cyborg, 58 FPS to 51 FPS.

To stress-test gaming laptops, we run 15 loops of the Metro Exodus stress test at RTX settings to simulate half an hour of gaming. The LOQ demonstrated stable performance throughout the test, averaging 59.79 FPS without a variance of more than one FPS across runs. During the test, the Core i7-13650HX ran at an average frequency of 2.73 GHz while the RTX 5060 averaged 1,919 MHz.

Productivity Performance on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Our LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11 is built around a Core i7-13650HX, 16GB of RAM, and a 512GB SSD.

Throughout our testing, the LOQ's outdated CPU struggled against the newer silicon in the competition, only consistently outpacing the Cyborg with its equally dated Core i5-13420H. In the multi-core portion of Geekbench, the LOQ's score of 11,300 was well behind the Ryzen 7 260-powered Acer (12,837) and couldn't touch the Core i7-14650HX-powered Asus (15,013). The Asus also dominated Handbrake, completing that test in 3 minutes and 33 seconds compared to the LOQ's 4:35.

The LOQ's average speed of 136 MBps in our 25GB file transfer is abnormal, but it also occurred on other drive benchmarks, though I never noticed any issues in loading games. The drive is a WD PC SN5000S using QLC.

Display on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Lenovo didn't cut too many corners with the LOQ's display. The 15.6-inch IPS panel pairs a smooth 144 Hz refresh rate with an anti-glare finish that minimizes reflections. While the 1920 x 1080 resolution isn't especially sharp by 2026 standards, it isn’t too hard for the RTX 5060 to drive in today’s games.

Watching X2: X-Men United and playing 007 First Light, the LOQ’s display stood out as one that’s better than typical budget laptop fare. Colors have enough punch to make game environments feel lively, and enough contrast to give darker scenes reasonable depth. Brightness is just adequate – the panel is best suited for indoor use and can't compete with the significantly brighter screen in Acer's Nitro V 16S AI. Still, for gaming, streaming, and everyday use, the LOQ's display is one of its better attributes.

Covering 86.1% of DCI-P3, the LOQ’s display proved more colorful than the Acer (77.4%) and effectively tied the others. Its 290-nit peak brightness was on par with the Asus (298 nits) and brighter than the MSI (233 nits) but not nearly as bright as the Acer (392 nits).

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Lenovo’s keyboard offers an ample 1.3 mm of travel for comfortable typing sessions. Its two-level white backlighting provides excellent visibility in low light. The number pad isn’t quite full-size but offers the expected layout. In MonkeyType, I reached 122 words per minute with 99% accuracy on the first try.

The touchpad is also well-designed, with a comfortably-sized surface and quiet physical clicks.

Audio on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

The LOQ's twin 2W speakers produce acceptable sound for a laptop. Bass is lacking, but the sound is clear enough to pick out footsteps and shell cases dropping in games. Overall, the setup works for casual gaming.

The included Nahimic app is essential for sound quality – without it, the speakers are tinny and dull. The Music preset with bass and treble boost works well all around. The Smart preset also gets the job done; my ears didn't detect much of a difference versus the Music preset. The Movie preset's virtual surround adds a hollowness that I find unnatural.

Upgradeability of the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Getting inside the LOQ is somewhat tricky. Removing the Philips-head screws is straightforward – they’re fortunately all the same size – but the bottom panel sits flush with the chassis edges, with no obvious entry points. I created one using my thumb to push in one of the rear chassis corners, which created a gap for my plastic pry tool.

Upgrade prospects are excellent, with two DDR5 SODIMM slots and two SSD slots, one M.2 2280 and one M.2 2242. The 512GB SSD in our model is M.2 2242 format and installed in the M.2 2280 slot. The M.2 2230 wireless card and the battery are also replaceable.

Battery Life on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Our battery testing consists of web browsing, running OpenGL tests, and streaming videos with the screen at 150 nits while connected to Wi-Fi. The LOQ's runtime of 4 hours and 54 minutes is short even for a gaming laptop, with the Asus lasting about two hours longer. Acer's Nitro completely outclassed it, lasting 10 hours and 17 minutes.

Heat on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

We measure laptop surface temperatures while running the Metro Exodus stress test. The LOQ's peak temperatures were 108 degrees Fahrenheit (F) between the G and H keys while the touchpad was 79 F. The highest temperature was 112 F on the bottom near the cooling fan exhaust. Internally, the Core i7-13650HX measured 70 degrees Celsius (C) while the RTX 5060 was 66 C.

The LOQ’s fan noise is noticeable while gaming, but is no louder than other entry-level gaming laptops I’ve tested. Its speakers are easily loud enough to be heard over the fans.

Webcam on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

Lenovo's webcam is a basic 720p model with a soft focus. It handles lighting reasonably well – a lamp behind me wasn't blown out – but detail is lacking and there's considerable grain. There's no physical shutter, but you'll find an e-shutter switch on the right edge.

Software and Warranty on the Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11

The LOQ includes two main apps. Legion Space shows component readouts like CPU speed and temperature, plus power profile toggles between Performance, Quiet, Balanced, and Custom. The app can also auto-disable the Windows key and auto-close specified apps when games are launched, and prioritize network traffic to apps you specify. An aim assist feature puts a crosshair in the center of the screen. The app also provides access to the Lenovo community and can be a game library.

The Vantage app is familiar across Lenovo laptops for support services, troubleshooting utilities, and system updates. System settings include battery smart charging (limits charge to 80% to extend battery lifespan). The app also has a security advisor that verifies anti-virus and firewalls are active and tells you if a Wi-Fi network is safe. The app contains upsells for Lenovo’s identity protection, system recovery, and performance tuneup subscription services.

Lenovo backs the LOQ with a one-year warranty.

Lenovo LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11 Configurations

We tested the LOQ equipped with a Core i7-13650HX processor, RTX 5060 graphics card, 16GB of DDR5-4800 single-channel RAM, and a 512GB SSD, retailing for $1,269.99 at Best Buy. It was not yet available directly from Lenovo at the time of this review.

An even more basic spec with a Core i5-13450HX and RTX 5050 is listed on Lenovo's site as "coming soon" but wasn’t at the time of publishing. All configurations include a 1920 x 1080 IPS display with a 144 Hz refresh rate and Windows 11 Home.

Bottom Line

Lenovo’s LOQ Essentials 15 Gen 11 is a reminder that spec sheets don’t tell the whole story. While it delivers an RTX 5060 and a 144 Hz display for a competitive price, its conservative GPU power limits and older platform leave it trailing rivals in real-world performance. Though it gets many fundamentals right -- its display, keyboard, and upgradeability are all solid – it’s ultimately a serviceable gaming laptop rather than a competitive one. At this price, Acer’s Nitro V 16S AI is a stronger value.

We recently toured China-based Lenovo’s new production facilities here in the US. Lenovo is the number one player in the global PC market (by shipments), with products spanning consumer, business, and enterprise sectors. But while Lenovo is a Chinese-based company, it has a significant business presence in the United States. Its U.S. headquarters, which opened in 2005, is in Morrisville, NC, right in the heart of the Research Triangle Park. The company also opened its first PC manufacturing line, a short drive away in Whitsett, NC, shortly after.

This past Friday, Lenovo took the latest step in its efforts to expand its U.S. manufacturing presence with a symbolic ribbon-cutting for the expansion of manufacturing at its Whitsett facility. The company invested millions of dollars into the facility, doubling its footprint to 890,000 square feet. There are currently 400 line workers, with the capacity to expand that number to 1,000 in the near future.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand why Lenovo is making this investment, as it comes down to two words: artificial intelligence.

Lenovo in Whitsett

As Ashley Gorakhpurwalla, Executive VP and President for the Infrastructure Solutions Group, explained, for many of Lenovo’s customers, “AI is moving from the hype cycle now into the hero cycle.” With many of its customers looking to increase reliance on U.S.-produced hardware, an “infrastructure they can trust is going to be the catalyst for that.” So, it only made sense to tap into resources and the local community it has fostered over the past two decades

“Because behind every AI breakthrough, it's powerful, powerful infrastructure,” Gorakhpurwalla continued. “As technology becomes more advanced, I think that building high-quality infrastructure closer to our customers is becoming more important than ever.”

North Carolina might not always have been at the forefront of people’s minds when it comes to technological leadership, and it’s a question that Ben Massey, VP Supply Chain for Lenovo, has often fielded. “You know, people ask me all the time, how are you going to make that work in North Carolina?” Massey explained. “The way it's going to work is that we've got an arc from the Triangle to the Triad with thousands of engineers, thousands of manufacturing people in R&D who can work in supply chain, people who can all work together to bring this technology together with speed. Faster product development to mass production, shorter customer lead times, and greater end-to-end cost efficiency.”

Lenovo’s main U.S. R&D hub in Morrisville is just over an hour's drive away from the Whitsett facility along Interstate 40. In addition, the company can pull young talent from nearby universities like NC State, Duke, UNC-Chapel Hill, and Wake Forest, along with the state’s robust community college system.

Lenovo and its local contractors were able to take the facility from an empty warehouse to a fully functioning server production line in nine months. That included the necessary electricity capacity (up to 20 MW) from Duke Energy.

By the Numbers

I was given a full tour of the Whisett manufacturing facility (along with other members of the press, Lenovo dignitaries, and local lawmakers), from start to finish. It was an impressive operation; one that I wish I could express to you in photos. However, photos and videos were strictly forbidden due to the proprietary nature of the hardware and testing equipment, and to protect Lenovo's customers' privacy.

The kitting area, where the components like processors, memory, and storage are assembled, encompasses 26,000 square feet. There are 10 kitting lines, where workers currently assemble 200 racks per week, with the capability to double that number to 400. The 50 team members in this area process over 150,000 parts per day.

There are currently seven assembly lines, residing in a space roughly double the size of the kitting area (53,000 square feet). Lenovo has the capacity to produce 1,400 server nodes per day across 28 assembly stations (one server is produced every 60 seconds).

At full tilt, Lenovo says that it will have 1,000 operators running three shifts. However, there are currently around 380. Employees get roughly 1,000 hours of training, and they rotate throughout different phases of the building process to hone their skills.

After touring the kitting and assembly lines, we moved into the testing areas, where L10 testing takes place. There are 10 thermally controlled testing pods, with 16 test racks per pod. The room is chilled using massive Computer Room Air Handlers (CRAH), each with 1 MW of cooling capacity.

In addition, there are 30 Vertiv Liebert XDU direct liquid cooling units (expandable to 50), each with a capacity of up to 300 kW, to aid with testing finished packages for customers. Lenovo explained that Nvidia GB300 racks consume 140 kW, while Vera Rubin will consume 230 kW at peak load. For comparison, the average U.S. household consumes between 1 and 1.5 kW per day. That's a lot of power coming from a rack measuring 18 inches across and seven feet tall. Lenovo’s first taste of Vera Rubin is said to be making its way to the Whitsett facility by the end of August.

We also toured where the massive freshwater pipes enter the building to fuel the cooling operations, along with the utility room, where the impressive overhead electrical conduits feed power into the site from a nearby substation. Working with Duke Energy, Lenovo was able to go from temporary power at the site to full power within 7 months.

Closing Thoughts

I’m not a native to this state; however, I’ve lived in central NC for 40 of my 46 years on this earth. So it was rather impressive to see the Whitsett facility taking shape roughly 20 minutes from my childhood home. However, the sense of pride was also clouded by the realities of the times that we live in. The proliferation of AI in nearly every facet of our lives is the entire impetus behind the need to expand server manufacturing capacity for the homeland. Companies like Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and others crave the computing hardware necessary to feed AI demands, which in turn is driving a wedge between big tech and local communities. From strains on local water supplies and power grids to the acquisition of land to build new data centers, we’re at a real crossroads where local communities, local governments, and big tech companies are each looking to have a say in how our future plays out.

TCL CSOT, a subsidiary of Chinese electronics and TV giant TCL, has been developing inkjet-printed (IJP) OLED displays since 2024, and it seems that it has finally brought it to market with the Lenovo Legion R9000P. Lenovo says that this is the first laptop in the world to feature the TCL CSOT technology, which marks a significant step towards “the commercialization of this next-generation display technology.”

This Lenovo Legion laptop will feature a 16-inch IJP OLED that can hit a 240 Hz refresh rate while also covering more than 99% of the DCI-P3 color gamut. This isn’t exactly groundbreaking when it comes to OLED monitors, but the biggest advantage that IJP OLED displays have over the traditional vacuum thermal evaporation (VTE) method is that it’s cheaper and simpler to produce, resulting in higher yields. TCL CSOT’s IJP OLEDs also promise improved brightness, which is something that traditional OLED screens struggle with. This is especially important for laptops like the Legion R9000P, which are expected to face more varied lighting conditions due to their portable nature, compared to monitors and TVs that are often placed statically in one location for most of their lifetime.

If this technology catches on, it should reduce the cost of the best OLED gaming monitors, which, arguably, offer one of the best experiences when it comes to contrast and color. Unfortunately, Lenovo hasn’t revealed the specifications or the price of the Legion R9000P, so we cannot say for sure how the IJP OLED has affected its affordability and compare it with similar models that feature a more traditional OLED display.

While this is the first time that IJP OLED is being mass-produced for consumer electronics, TCL CSOT has been working on the technology for over 10 years now. In fact, the company has been mass-producing its 5.5-generation IJP OLED since 2024 (which is presumably used in commercial and industrial products like medical displays) and has started construction of its 8.6-generation IJP OLED production last year.

Aside from Lenovo, MSI is also using this new IJP OLED panel in the just-announced MSI Pro Max OLED 271UPJW12. While the company did not explicitly mention that it used a display from TCL CSOT, its specifications exactly match. Besides that, TCL CSOT is currently the only one manufacturing OLED screens using the inkjet printing technique.

MSI Unveils the PRO MAX OLED 271UPJW12: The World's First 27-Inch 4K IJP OLED Monitor from r/OLED_Gaming

Aside from laptops and monitors, we also expect to see this technology to eventually reach TVs and smartphones. This should make high-quality OLED TVs more affordable to more users and compete against cheaper TVs that use technologies like QLED and Mini LED. It could also allow for budget phones with beautiful screens that can give flagship models a run for their money.

Lenovo has just updated its current-gen Legion 7a 16-inch gaming laptop with a new GPU config: the 12GB version of the RTX 5070 mobile. Previously, the laptop 5070 was limited to just 8GB of VRAM, but Nvidia recently overhauled it, splitting the 5070 SKU into two distinct variants. Lenovo is one of the first vendors to feature the 12GB 5070 in a retail device, but it doesn't come cheap — this new Legion 7a is listed for a whopping $3,375 on Best Buy right now.

For that money, you're getting a flagship Ryzen AI 9 HX 470 CPU, 32GB of LPDDR5X-8000 memory, and a 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD. Not to mention a gorgeous 2560 x 1600 OLED display with a 240 Hz refresh rate, solid build quality, and a plethora of cutting-edge I/O. This laptop is also the perfect recipient for the upgrade since its GPU topped out at a measly RTX 5060 before, making it less powerful than the last-gen Legion 7a devices.

Now, that RTX 5060 variant was almost $600 cheaper than this new 5070-equipped model, but it's actually expanded to a $1,000 delta right now because the 5060 SKU is on sale at the moment. When Nvidia first announced RTX 50-series laptops, it said RTX 5070 devices would start at $1,299; even if you consider the upgraded VRAM, you're paying just about double of what was initially promised to you.

In all seriousness, the Legion 7a is a premium gaming laptop with all the bells and whistles so it naturally commands a higher price, AI boom or not. The RTX 5070 in here is also rated at a 115W TGP instead of the 100W baseline Nvidia has set for the GPU. Regardless, you can still find cheaper laptops kitted with the new 12GB RTX 5070, such as Lenovo's own Legion 7i with a Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus processor.

The extra 4GB of VRAM in these devices, gained by swapping from 2GB GDDR7 modules to 3GB ones, should help improve performance in modern titles and AI workloads, especially where ray tracing is involved. Customers have already complained about Nvidia's insistence on packing 8GB video memory pools with various GPUs for years, and at this point, if you're buying a new GPU (or laptop) with that spec, you're killing any chances of future-proofing.

Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 (starts at $2,032; $2,217.30 as tested) enters the laptop market with the poise of a veteran. This series has spent years at the top of the ultralight business stack and shows no sign of slowing down. Light and refined as ever with Intel’s “Panther Lake” silicon and equipped with a class-leading keyboard, OLED display, and enterprise-ready tech, it’s every bit the flagship it’s intended to be. That said, consumer models like Dell’s XPS 14 have also raised the bar, so whether the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s refinements keep it ahead of the pack remains to be seen.

Design of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 may have received a refresh, but its design principles remain unmistakable. Squared edges, matte black surfaces, and functional lines keep it faithful to the lineage that IBM established long ago. The webcam notch is the quickest visual cue that this is a current-generation model. Lenovo’s only real design flourish is the colorful X1 badge on the lid for this flagship; lesser ThinkPads simply have the brand name.

At just 2.15 pounds, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon feels unrealistically light, to the point that I wondered if the unit I received was hollow. Rest assured, there’s a real computer inside, and the build quality is excellent. The outsides are made mostly of lightweight magnesium, with precise fitment and a premium feel. True to the product name, carbon fiber is used, mainly in the lid cover and its internal frame. Rigidity is just average, though; the palm rest and surrounding deck feel solid, but the chassis flexes more than I expected. The lid, however, is impressively stiff, and the hinges are precisely tuned for one-handed opening.

Measuring 12.3 x 8.49 x 0.6 inches, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon has a similar footprint but is much lighter than the 3.4-pound Apple MacBook Pro 14-inch and the three-pound Dell XPS 14.

Port selection is decent for an ultraportable, with HDMI 2.1, two Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C), and a headphone jack on the left and another Thunderbolt 4 and a USB-A port on the right. Intel wireless networking provides Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4. Cellular WAN is available.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 Specifications

Productivity Performance on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

We tested the ThinkPad X1 with a Core Ultra 7 355 processor, 32GB of RAM, and a 512GB PCIe 4.0 SSD. This “Panther Lake” processor features four Performance and four Low Power Efficiency (LPE).

For performance comparison, we included the Apple MacBook Pro (14-inch, 10-core M5; $2,349 as tested), Asus Zenbook Duo (Core Ultra X9 388H; $2,299.99), and the Dell XPS 14 (Core Ultra 7 355; $1,699.99). These are all premium systems that you might consider if you’re cross-shopping consumer models. The Apple and Asus use significantly stronger processors, though the ThinkPad X1 Carbon and the XPS 14 can be equipped with the Core Ultra X-series to compete in that tier if you're willing to spend even more.

On the cross-platform Geekbench 6 benchmark, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s single-core score of 2,635 points matched the XPS 14, an expected result considering they both use the Core Ultra 7 355, but the ThinkPad trounced it in multi-core, with 11,107 points to Dell’s 7,964. Neither machine proved a match for Apple’s M5, particularly in single-core. With both Apple and Asus scoring over 17,000 points in the multi-core portion, their processors are clearly in a different league.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon finished our 4K-to-1080p video transcoding test in 6 minutes and 12 seconds, more than 30 seconds quicker than the XPS 14 but not competitive with the Asus (4:22) and MacBook Pro (3:31).

Last, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon completed our 25GB file transfer test with an average transfer rate of 1,256.31 MBps, well behind the Asus’ 1,531.3 MBps and not anywhere close to the MacBook Pro’s leading 1,917.35 MBps.

To stress test productivity laptops, we run 10 loops of Cinebench 2026. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon scored 2,581 points in the first loop and stayed within the 2,500-to-2,600-point range for the remaining loops, demonstrating stable performance. The P-cores ran at an average clock of 3.73 GHz while the LPE-cores ran at 3.46 GHz.

Graphics on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

We run 3DMark Steel Nomad to gauge raw graphics horsepower. Scoring 596 points, the Intel Graphics inside the ThinkPad X1 Carbon are adequate for basic use but little else. The Arc B390 integrated chip in the Asus’ Core Ultra X9 proved far more robust, leading the group with 1,483 points, followed by the MacBook Pro with 1,122 points.

Display on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

Our ThinkPad X1 Carbon uses the 2880 x 1800 OLED panel, an upgrade over the base 1920 x 1200 IPS screen. It produces memorable visuals no matter what you’re viewing. In Dune: Part One, I noted the brilliant white sands of the desert and the inky depths of space. Disney’s Zootopia showed its deep, vibrant color that kept me watching longer than I intended. The anti-glare surface does a commendable job of reducing glare. This panel doesn’t support touch, but you can option touch versions of both the 1920 x 1200 IPS and OLED panels.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s numbers leave little doubt that it has an excellent display. Its color coverage – 82% of DCI-P3 and 115% of sRGB – were within a percentage point of the MacBook’s, just shy of Asus’ 87% and 123%, and ahead of the Dell’s 71% and 101%. Its 473-nit peak brightness is impressive considering it uses an OLED panel, which are often close to or just shy of 400 nits.

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon maintains Lenovo's standard for excellent input devices. The keyboard feels more cushioned than my older ThinkPad X13 yet still provides plenty of key travel for engaging feedback – my fingers intuitively knew when I reached the top and bottom of the keystroke. Keystrokes sound slightly rubbery, with less clack than my older ThinkPad, but still pleasant. The keyboard deck is rock solid and doesn't flex. Highly visible white backlighting makes typing in the dark a breeze.

The layout is highly intuitive, with an inverted-T arrow cluster, dedicated Home/Page Up/Page Down/End/Delete keys, and a programmable F12 shortcut key. The power button at top right is also a fingerprint reader. Classic ThinkPad users will notice Lenovo switched to the mainstream left Ctrl and Fn key arrangement, but they can be swapped in the Vantage app.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon touchpad that we tested is mechanical, but a haptic version is available as a no-cost option on customized models. The pad's top-hinged design works reliably and delivers a firm, satisfying click. The three buttons above the pad couple with the classic TrackPoint pointing solution in the middle of the keyboard. ThinkPads are the only laptops that have them anymore.

Audio on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

I listened to my test audio tracks multiple times on the ThinkPad X1 Carbon since the speakers sounded that good – who would have thought a business laptop could so easily double for entertainment?

In William Black & Luka's "Bleed 4 U", I heard crisp vocals, well-separated instruments, and detailed, impactful bass -- this setup didn't skip a beat or distort in any way when the drops hit.

The Atmos Detailed preset in the Dolby Access app (its default setting) evened out the soundstage for a clearer tone. I switched to the Detailed preset to sharpen the drum hits and vocals in a vinyl rip of "Shattered Dreams" by Johnny Hates Jazz, which also didn't show any distortion even at maximum volume. The realistic volume limit is around 80%, after which the setup doesn't get audibly louder. This setup is easily loud enough for personal listening.

Upgradeability of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

User-upgradeable components in the ThinkPad X1 Carbon are limited to its M.2 2280 SSD and battery pack; models with WAN can also have that module upgraded. Access through the bottom panel is straightforward – four captive Philips-head screws loosen it, then the clips need to be popped along the back edge, which were snugger than I thought. Lenovo maintains an excellent hardware maintenance manual and even provides a video walkthrough on YouTube.

Lenovo advertised a 9/10 iFixIt score, citing that the keyboard, daughter I/O board, and USB-C ports are also customer replaceable.

Battery Life on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon lasted 13 minutes and 10 seconds in our battery test, which consists of web browsing, running OpenGL tests, and streaming videos with the screen at 150 nits while connected to Wi-Fi.

Though not a leading time – the Zenbook Duo lasted 14:23 with one screen active while the MacBook Pro went for 18:14 – it’s still an impressive showing considering it uses an OLED panel. Dell’s XPS 14 lasted an astounding 20:41, but that’s with the IPS screen; equipped with an OLED screen and more powerful processor, it lasted only 12:23 (not shown in the charts), and that’s with a 70 Wh battery whereas the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s is rated for just 58 Wh.

Heat on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

During our 10-loop Cinebench 2026 stress test, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon's surface temperatures peaked at 72 degrees Fahrenheit on the touchpad, 94 degrees between the G and H keys, and 106 degrees on the underside. Internally, the Core Ultra 7 355 averaged 91 degrees Celsius across all cores.

Webcam on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

This ThinkPad's 1440p webcam produces an impressively sharp and well-lit picture. I could make out the wood grain on a door about 10 feet away and even the individual hairs on my cat who was looking over my shoulder. Bright lights, like windows and lamps, were properly exposed, and didn't cause my person to be underexposed. The webcam includes an IR sensor for facial recognition and the security of a sliding privacy shutter.

Software and Warranty on the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14

Lenovo’s main app is Commercial Vantage, a hub for support access, system updates, and user settings. Those settings include battery smart charging, OLED power settings (taskbar, background, and display dimming), Fn/Ctrl key swap, F12 user shortcut key configuration, and keyboard backlighting brightness. Some settings have moved out of this app into Windows Settings, such as presence detection and display color temperature.

Vantage also provides access to the Aura Edition’s special Smart Modes: Working, Gaming, Creating, Entertainment, Meeting, and Learning. The system automatically switches between the modes depending on the user’s activity. These modes are a combination of settings, some of which are or aren’t enabled for a given mode: auto-prompt VPN (launches a configured VPN client), attention timer (a time limit where notifications are silenced, with a default of 30 minutes), distracting domains (automatically blocks popular social media sites), Wi-Fi fencing (only connects to wireless networks that you designate “safe”), Dolby Audio (sets the mode to Voice, Movie, Music, and so on), and microphone noise canceling mode and listening range. If you move between different environments, like an office to a crowded café, you could tweak the settings and get some usefulness out of this, though I wouldn’t consider it an essential selling point.

As for other apps, Lenovo Smart Share lets you share content from your phone, such as photos, and assists connecting Bluetooth devices.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon comes with a one-year minimum warranty with mail-in service, though preconfigured models often include three years with onsite coverage. Coverage and service plans are available up to five years with accidental damage protection.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 Configurations

We tested a midrange ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 Aura Edition with a Core Ultra 7 355 processor, Intel Graphics, 32GB of memory, a 512GB SSD, and a non-touch OLED display, retailing for $2,217.30.

The starting model is $2,032 at this writing, though Lenovo’s frequent sales can change the price. CPU options begin with the Core Ultra 5 335 and top out with the vPro-enabled Core Ultra 7 365. Models with the Core Ultra X7 are also supposed to be available but I didn’t see them on Lenovo’s site at the time of writing. Memory is available in 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB configurations depending on the processor. The base 1920 x 1200 IPS display can be upgraded to a 2880 x 1800 OLED panel, with either panel available with touch, though only OLED offers a 120 Hz refresh rate. A privacy screen option only comes in 1920 x 1200 display.

Bottom Line

Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 delivers everything that a flagship ultraportable should. Its featherweight chassis, best-in-class keyboard, vibrant OLED display, and competent everyday performance make it an ideal fit for professionals or prosumers who take their work with them. It even doubles as a surprisingly capable entertainment machine thanks to its impressive speakers.

While consumer rivals like Dell’s XPS 14 offer similar performance, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon remains the productivity go-to because of its superior keyboard, broader port selection, and enterprise-ready options like vPro and WAN availability. For those willing to accept a thicker and heavier machine and use macOS, Apple’s 14-inch MacBook Pro remains the performance benchmark in this category.

Overall, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 14 remains an impeccable blend of portability, polish, and practicality, a mix that earns it a place among our recommendations.

As the memory and storage chip crisis continues to squeeze the market, some PC manufacturers began looking at alternative sources earlier this year just to meet consumer demand. Notebookcheck discovered in its review of the Lenovo ThinkBook 14 G9 IPL that it came with a 512GB YMTC M.2 NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD. What’s more interesting is that the laptop is readily available in the U.S., and you can order it on Amazon for $1,124.25 at the time of writing -- although as noted above, Lenovo says the U.S. model (21UX000KUS) does not ship with a YMTC SSD.

This is the first recorded instance that a laptop from a major OEM is being sold in the United States with a YMTC SSD, which is particularly curious given that the company was added to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Entity List in 2022. While this prevented the company from acquiring goods and services that were made with or contained American technologies, it does not prevent Lenovo, whose headquarters are in China, from importing such drives into the U.S.

Major PC manufacturers have traditionally relied on established storage chip makers such as Samsung, SK hynix, Kioxia, Micron, and SanDisk, but the ongoing AI buildout has driven prices through the roof. Even Apple, which previously held significant influence over suppliers, is now seeking a blessing from the U.S. government to buy memory chips from the Chinese firm CXMT. Although it’s not on the Entity List, it’s still designated as a Chinese military company, meaning that doing business with it would carry some risk for an American company.

Notebookcheck says that the YMTC drive’s performance “is below average for an SSD in an office laptop,” meaning it could not compete against the best SSDs you can buy today. Most buyers likely won't care about this, especially since the Lenovo ThinkBook 14 G9 IPL is marketed as an office laptop for everyday use. This means that its target market will likely be unfamiliar with specifications like read/write speeds and will probably be satisfied as long as it’s faster than a hard drive.

Lenovo’s deployment of YMTC drives is particularly important because it’s one of the largest laptop brands in the U.S. by volume. In fact, even as PC shipments fell by 7% in the first quarter of 2026, Lenovo’s market share actually grew by 1.2%, making it the third largest desktop and notebook brand after Dell and HP. Since the Lenovo ThinkBook 14 G9 IPL is a relatively affordable laptop designed for office use, it would likely sell many units through enterprise purchases and help increase the adoption of Chinese storage solutions in the U.S.

Since YMTC is also listed as a Chinese military company, institutions looking to buy this particular model may face procurement challenges, especially if they operate in sensitive industries or are government agencies. However, it seems that the memory chip crisis has grown to the point where it’s willing to offer a model it won’t be able to sell in some instances. Nevertheless, this helps ensure that buyers without restrictions have a more affordable option.

Hardware enthusiasts, server administrators, and all regular readers of this site will be well aware of the ongoing "RAMpocalypse," the memory and storage shortage affecting nearly every market and raising prices across the board in the tech sector. If you were hoping for relief, don't hold your breath; at the International Supercomputing Conference this past week, Lenovo reportedly said "it will never be like it was last year." Underlining the point, one of Lenovo's presentation slides was titled "The 5 Step RAMaggeddon Survival Guide."

That comes to us by way of our German friends over at ComputerBase, who note that "never" was said with a smirk, thus implying that it wasn't meant to be taken literally. Instead, the message from Lenovo is that memory prices were unusually low in early 2025, and it will be a long time before we see comparatively low prices on RAM, flash memory, and other components, as the #1 worldwide PC OEM expects AI demand to continue growing.

According to ComputerBase's report from ISC 2026, Lenovo's broader message is that the economics of the memory industry have fundamentally changed. The company reportedly argued that even as significant new manufacturing capacity comes online beginning around 2028, demand from AI infrastructure is expected to absorb much of that additional output, preventing DRAM and NAND prices from returning to the lows seen over the past two years.

The report points to SK hynix's recently announced plans to triple its memory production capacity by 2034 as supporting evidence. Lenovo's reasoning is straightforward: the notoriously profit-hungry memory manufacturers would be unlikely to invest so heavily in expanding production if they expected a return to the razor-thin margins and oversupply that characterized parts of the market in early 2025.

In case you needed extra evidence for its argument, Lenovo also suggested that memory capacity itself is becoming an increasingly important consideration when designing and purchasing servers. While vendors have traditionally advertised the maximum supported memory capacity of new platforms, actually populating those DIMM slots has become far more expensive. New dual-socket servers are on the way next year with 16 memory channels per processor, meaning that even a relatively modest configuration can require around 1 TB of installed memory to fully utilize the available bandwidth.

Lenovo is far from the only company predicting a prolonged memory crunch, although the industry's incentives are worth keeping in mind. Micron recently told investors it expects supply to remain constrained through at least 2027, with only gradual improvement beginning in 2028, while SK hynix has warned the shortage could persist until around 2030 as AI infrastructure continues absorbing wafer capacity. Those forecasts are backed by multi-year supply agreements worth roughly $100 billion that Micron has already signed with customers, underscoring how seriously hyperscalers are treating long-term memory availability.

Even companies that traditionally wield enormous purchasing power are feeling the squeeze. Apple reportedly has sought permission from the U.S. government to source DRAM from Chinese memory maker CXMT, a Pentagon-blacklisted company, illustrating just how valuable additional memory supply has become as prices continue to climb. At the same time, memory vendors are enjoying some of the strongest pricing power (and profit margins) they've seen in years, giving them little incentive to accelerate a return to the boom-and-bust pricing cycles that once defined the DRAM market.

Ironically, one consequence of the ongoing memory shortage is that HBM is becoming more economically attractive relative to conventional system memory. DRAM manufacturers have redirected significant production capacity toward higher-margin HBM for AI accelerators, reducing the supply of commodity DDR5 and LPDDR5 while demand for both remains elevated. As a result, the premium for HBM-backed computing has narrowed, not because HBM has become inexpensive, but because traditional system memory has become dramatically more expensive. Hyperscalers were going to buy the GPUs anyway, so maximizing their utilization to reduce DDR5 requirements suddenly becomes an attractive proposition.

That shift helps explain Lenovo's suggestion that GPU-accelerated computing may now make more financial sense for some workloads. If an application can keep much of its working set in GPU-attached HBM, it may require significantly less DDR5 installed in the host system. With system DRAM now representing a much larger share of overall server cost than it did just a year ago, reducing memory capacity requirements can materially lower the price of deploying large-scale infrastructure.

Obviously, we don't know whether Lenovo's long-term outlook will prove accurate, but memory pricing has historically been cyclical, with periods of oversupply often followed by sharp corrections. With hyperscalers continuing to pour billions into AI infrastructure and memory vendors increasingly prioritizing high-margin enterprise products, the company believes the unusually inexpensive DRAM and NAND prices of 2024 and early 2025 may prove to have been an anomaly.

The Yoga Slim 7x (starts at $1,049; $1,579 as tested) is Lenovo’s latest take on a premium ARM ultraportable, aiming to deliver standout performance and battery life with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X2 Elite under the hood. Paired with a comfy keyboard, an OLED touch panel, and a sharp webcam, and this is a slick overall package provided you’re not reliant on x86 apps. Also prepare to pack a few adapters, as USB-C is the only port in town.

Design of the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Lenovo’s dark blue aluminum chassis feels premium and impressively rigid. The Slimi 7x didn’t creak or bend when I picked it up by a corner or the lid. (It’s not wise to pick up a laptop like that, but it happens.) Aesthetically, it offers an upscale, modern look though it doesn’t stand apart from the crowd outside its uncommon color.

At 12.28 x 8.7 x 0.55 inches (WDH) and 2.58 pounds, the Slim 7x has a slightly larger footprint but ducks under the weight of the 13-inch MacBook Air (11.97 x 8.46 x 0.44 inches, 2.7 pounds). Dell’s XPS 14 is heavier but slightly trimmer (12.19 x 8.26 x 0.58 inches, 3 pounds). Lenovo’s own Yoga Slim 7i (13.54 x 9.27 x 0.55 inches, 2.15 pounds) is slightly larger but noticeably lighter.

Port selection is limited to just three USB4 ports. There’s not even a headphone jack, so be prepared to take adapters. The power button and the webcam privacy shutter e-switch are on the right edge.

Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x Specifications

Productivity Performance on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

We tested the Yoga Slim 7x with its top CPU, the Snapdragon X2 Elite X2E-88-100. It features 18 cores, 6 of which are high-performance, and boosts up to 4.7 GHz on two cores. The system also features 32GB of onboard memory and a 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD.

Our comparison systems match the performance focus of this system. Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Air ($1,299) uses a 10-core M5, followed by two 14-inch laptops: Dell’s XPS 14 ($2,199) leverages a Core Ultra X7 358H while Lenovo’s Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition ($1,629) uses a Core Ultra 7 355. Asus’ 16-inch Zenbook A16 ($1,699) fills the last spot using an even higher grade of CPU than our Slim 7x – the Snapdragon X2 Elite Extreme X2E-94-100, which boasts 18 cores like the X2E-88-100 but offers a wider 192-bit (as opposed to 128-bit) memory bus for 228GB/s versus 152GB/s of bandwidth.

On Geekbench 6, the Slim 7x’s single-core score (3,822 points) was practically tied ith Asus (3,807), leaving only the MacBook Air with a higher score (4,168). The Intel-based systems were left well behind. The Slim 7x also produced impressive multi-core results, though its 20,563 points weren’t in the same league as the Asus (22,733), which uses the X2 Elite Extreme.

The Slim 7x made an excellent showing in our 25GB file transfer test, averaging 1,934.78 MBps to tie the MacBook Air (1,924.84 MBps) and land ahead of the Asus (1,744.38 MBps). The XPS 14 trailed the group (1,419.76 MBps).

On Handbrake, the Slim 7x completed the 4K to 1080p video transcoding in 2 minutes and 11 seconds, just three seconds slower than the Asus and easily outgunning the others – Apple finished in 4:41 while the Slim 7i trailed at 5:56.

To stress test the CPU in laptops, we run 10 loops of Cinebench 2026. The system started with a score of 5,926 but dropped to 5,168 on the second run, where it stayed within a few points for the remaining runs. During the test, the P2 cores ran at an average of 3.34 GHz while the P1 cores ran at 3.94 GHz.

Graphics on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

We run 3DMark Steel Nomad to gauge raw graphics horsepower. The Slim 7x’s Adreno X2-90 GPU scored 1,115 points, just behind the Asus (1,262) featuring the same silicon and bested Apple’s M5 integrated solution (1,005). The XPS 14, however, easily took the top spot with 1,446 points thanks to the potent Arc B390 graphics solution built into its Core Ultra X7 358H. The Slim 7i stood way in the back with just 513 points.

Display on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Our Yoga Slim 7x comes with a 1920 x 1200 OLED touch panel. It offers a pleasant picture overall, but isn’t a standout due to its modest brightness – an all-white screen barely makes me want to squint in a dim room. Watching Star Wars: Andor, the stormtroopers’ armor and blaster bolts didn’t pop with the intensity I expected. Colors, however, look rich, and space scenes show off OLED’s trademark inky blacks. The 60Hz refresh rate is par for the course. On the plus side, touch input feels smooth and responsive against the solid glass surface.

Lenovo offers a 2880 x 1800 OLED panel on higher-end configurations, which offers nearly twice the HDR brightness (1,100 versus 600 nits) and a 120 Hz variable refresh rate. (This panel was featured in the Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition we reviewed.)

The OLED panel on the Slim 7x offers complete coverage of the DCI-P3 gamut, matching its stablemate, the Slim 7i. Its 321-nit peak brightness, however, isn’t impressive next to the Slim 7i’s 476 nits. Not even the IPS-equipped MacBook Air matches the latter.

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Lenovo nailed the Slim 7x’s keyboard. The 1.5 mm key travel provides enough movement for your fingers to clearly tell when the key has reached the top or bottom of a stroke. The keys feel springy and snap back with a satisfying sound. Keycaps are slightly scooped with an 0.3 mm dish to help orient your fingers to the center of the key. I felt immediately comfortable on this keyboard, hitting 123 words per minute with 99% accuracy in MonkeyType on the first try. White backlighting, toggled with Fn + spacebar, provides excellent visibility.

Lenovo’s touchpad is also first-rate. Its matte surface is large relative to the 14-inch display. Physical clicks – this is a mechanical pad, not haptic – feel precise, require just the right amount of effort, and aren’t too loud.

Audio on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

The Slim 7x produces decent audio, with enough volume and fullness that you won’t regret forgetting your headphones. Clarity is a bit muffled by default, but enabling the Detailed equalizer in the Dolby Access app goes a long way towards addressing that, sharpening the soundstage.

Listening to William Black’s “Bleed 4 U”, I heard good separation between vocals and instruments, though the bass drop wasn’t that satisfying due to the lack of low-end response. This followed into Star Wars: Andor where explosions and footsteps didn’t quite have the impact for an immersive experience. Overall, though, two people in a quiet room can be easily entertained by this setup.

Upgradeability of the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Four Torx T6 screws secure the Slim 7x’s bottom cover, with the front screws (below the palm rest) shorter than the rear ones. I used a plastic trim tool to pop the clips around the perimeter, starting in the speaker cutouts. The panel still felt stuck after I did this – it turned out a foam pad in the center had some adhesive on it. A gentle lift with my fingertips finally broke it free.

As Snapdragon laptops use nearly all soldered or integrated components, upgradeability is limited – here, just the M.2 2230 SSD and the battery can be changed out.

Battery Life on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Our battery rundown test sets the screen brightness at 150 nits while the system runs web browsing, streaming video, and light OpenGL tests while connected to Wi-Fi. The Slim 7x was in a class of its own, lasting 19 hours and 25 minutes. The next longest-lasting units were the Slim 7i (16:38) and the MacBook Air (15:28). The Asus lasted just 10:26 despite also using the same capacity battery as the Slim 7x.

Not shown in the charts, we tested a second version of the XPS 14 without the OLED screen and with a standard Core Ultra 7 355, which ran for an even more impressive 20:41.

Heat on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

We measure laptop surface temperatures while running our 10-loop Cinebench 2026 stress test. Peak surface temperatures on the Slim 7x were 70 degrees Fahrenheit on the touchpad, 87 F between the G and H keys, and 100 F on the underside. The laptop felt only lukewarm to the touch. I could hear the fans running, but they weren’t loud enough to

We’re unable to report chip temperatures since the HWInfo tool we use to collect data doesn’t yet support precise enough monitoring on Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon silicon.

Webcam on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Lenovo’s 9MP webcam offers excellent video quality. The 1440p video resolution shows fine details – holding my wrist next to my face a couple feet away, I could read the rather small typeface on my Apple Watch and see the links on my necklace. Noise reduction is also superb, with no noticeable grain even in the shadows below my head. The camera furthermore works well in challenging lighting situations – it managed to expose my face properly despite a bright lamp behind me, which was also exposed properly and didn’t look like a blur.

The camera includes an infrared sensor for facial logins with Windows Hello. There’s no physical privacy shutter, but a switch on the laptop’s right edge disconnects it from the laptop, an arguably more secure solution.

Software and Warranty on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x

Lenovo’s software stack starts with the familiar Vantage app. In addition to software updates, diagnostics, and support access, it features a security advisor which verifies you have antivirus, a firewall, and are connected to a safe wireless network. Available system settings include a battery lifespan protector that caps the charge at 80% and power mode, with adaptive (the default), battery saver, or maximum performance toggles. The app also includes upsells for Lenovo’s Smart Lock and Smart Performance subscription services.

Some unwanted software is present, including a McAfee trial.

Lenovo includes a standard one-year warranty.

Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x Configurations

We tested the Slim 7x with a 1920 x 1200 OLED touch display, Snapdragon X2 Elite X2E-88-100 processor, 32GB of memory, and a 1TB SSD. Its retail price was $1,579 from Best Buy, discounted from an $1,849 MSRP.

Models start at $1,049 from Lenovo.com with a Snapdragon X2 Plus X2P-42-100, 16GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD, with a step-up $1,449 configuration offering an X2 Elite X2E-80-100 and 32GB of RAM. The range-topping $1,619 model upgrades to the X2 Elite X2E-88-100 and the 2880 x 1800 OLED display, which features a higher brightness rating and 120 Hz variable refresh rate.

The Slim 7x is priced on the lower side of Snapdragon X2 Elite laptops. Best Buy had Asus’ Zenbook A16 for $1,699 with 48GB of RAM. I also saw a 14-inch HP OmniBook Ultra featuring a 3K OLED screen for $2,049.

Bottom Line

Lenovo’s Yoga Slim 7x is a compelling case for an ARM laptop. Powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X2 Elite, it pushes performance and battery life to new heights among 14-inch ultraportables. Aside from its USB-C-only approach, it offers standout usability thanks to its comfortable input devices, lightweight design, and crisp webcam. While its OLED touch screen is perfectly usable, the visually discerning will find its optional 2880 x 1800 panel worthwhile.

Competition is tight – Apple’s MacBook Air remains a benchmark while Dell’s XPS 14, and Lenovo’s own Slim 7i offer strong Windows alternatives. But if you’re not tied to x86 software, the Slim 7x’s mix of performance, battery life, and pricing is hard to beat.

An IBM ThinkPad user boasts that they can install “(almost) all versions of Windows from NT 4 to 10 22H2,” with driver support, without resorting to virtual machine (VM) technology. The ThinkPad T43 from 2005, used by Redditor MatiHalek, was already a firm favorite among retro tech enthusiasts and well known for being IBM’s final design prior to the Lenovo acquisition. The confirmation that it can run 26 years of Windows OSes certainly adds to the T43’s considerable charms.

I installed (almost) all versions of Windows from NT 4 to 10 22H2 on my ThinkPad T43 with drivers! from r/windows

So, what did Mati actually do? In the post embedded above, you can see they posted a gallery with 10 Windows screenshots, most of which show an iteration of the System > About control panel as evidence of the version of Windows installed and running. This gallery will take many readers on a journey down memory lane as the Windows UI evolves through the eras.

Mati says that they didn’t use VMs to install any of these Windows versions. They were all real software-to-metal installs on the single-core Pentium M CPU, though it wasn’t always an entirely straightforward process getting Windows to behave. We’d assume most difficulties would be due to support and drivers for graphics and storage interface hardware.

The Redditor didn’t install the 26 years of OSes sequentially in a strictly experimental fashion. “When I got this laptop, XP was installed, so I decided to dual-boot Vista with that XP. Then I did the upgrade path Vista-7-8-8.1-10RTM,” they explained. Subsequently, Windows 22H2 wrinkles forced them into doing a clean install for this pretty recent OS from Microsoft. However, modern OSes don’t appear to be Mati’s passion as “after that, I wiped the hard drive and multi-booted 98, NT 4, and 2000.” They end their post by indicating they will be keeping this 20th-century OS trio on the IBM ThinkPad T43, simply out of preference. It's probably the most responsive choice, given the hardware.

IBM ThinkPad T43 hardware

As we mentioned in the intro, the ThinkPad T43 was the final laptop from IBM’s stables, before Lenovo took the reins. Mati was correct to assert that it originally shipped with Windows XP, and it launched just a few months before Vista hit the scene.

Key components of the T43 were as follows:

• Intel Pentium M processor
• ATi Mobility Radeon X300 or X300SE graphics
• 14.1-inch screen in resolutions up to 1,400 x 1,050 pixels
• Support for up to 2GB of DDR2
• Storage config between 40GB and 100GB HDD
• Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, and modem connectivity options
• Ports included 2x USB 2.0 ports, a parallel port, VGA, S-Video, a PC Card slot, and a docking station port

Beyond the hardware tech specs, the IBM ThinkPad T43 earned a lot of praise due to its durable, perhaps legendary, build and keyboard quality. It isn’t light for a 14-incher in 2026 terms, of course, weighing in at approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 pounds).

Do any readers still cherish an IBM ThinkPad T43? If so, do you still run an older version of Windows like Mati does, or have you moved to an alternative OS like Linux?

A Lenovo-branded G02 retro handheld launched in China earlier this month, coming in at an affordable $63.56 on AliExpress compared to the thousands you have to pay for the Lenovo Legion Go 2. There were some questions if this was a legitimate Lenovo product or just another hardware manufacturer using the logo of a prominent brand, but a Lenovo employee in the company’s Product and Licensing department reportedly confirmed to Retro Dodo that it was an official, white-labeled device the company intended to sell only in China. More interestingly, they have unearthed that the handheld ships with thousands of copyrighted games, mostly from Nintendo.

“The G02 device is produced through a regional brand licensing agreement meant for the China market only and is not part of Lenovo’s official global product portfolio,” the company told the publication. “As such, products developed through these agreements may differ from Lenovo products sold through authorized channels.”

However, it wasn’t the handheld’s branding that caught Retro Dodo’s attention — instead, it was the fact that it came with thousands of copyrighted titles out of the box, most of them from Nintendo. It’s unclear if these games are licensed at all; after all, Nintendo is famously protective of its intellectual property, and it’s unlikely that it would readily allow a third-party hardware manufacturer to include Nintendo titles. Furthermore, the Japanese company built a reputation as a litigious company, targeting anyone that poses a threat to its IP.

The G02 is just a white-labeled device, meaning that its manufacturer just signed a deal with Lenovo to use its name for marketing purposes. However, the maker of the Legion Go handhelds still approved the regional licensing deal, even though we’re unsure if it reviewed the final product before it went on sale. One possibility is that the factory behind this retro handheld console loaded these ROMs after approval to boost sales, even though its AliExpress product page does not advertise that it comes with these games. Another alternative hypothetical scenario is that the developers behind this console accidentally included all the titles they were using to test the device in the general release.

Whatever the case, this could become a legal problem for Lenovo. After all, even if it’s just a white-labeled device made by a third-party manufacturer, it still carries the company’s branding. The company, in theory, could do some damage control to prevent this from becoming a bigger issue, like recalling the affected products or remotely deleting them, if possible. But the fact that Nintendo games were likely distributed outside of official channels would catch the attention of the Japanese company’s lawyers.

The Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition is back to fight for its space on our list of the best laptops.. It’s been roughly a year and a half since we last tested a Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition, and a lot has happened during that time. For starters, our particular review unit features a 14-inch POLED panel instead of a 15.3-inch screen, and it features Intel’s new Core Ultra 3 Series “Panther Lake” processors.

Intel’s Aura Edition initiative is aimed at fielding laptops that are thin, lightweight, and deliver superior battery life. The Slim 7i impresses on all three fronts, while delivering a crisp display and premium build quality.

Design of the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

The Yoga Slim 7i made a lasting impression before I even laid eyes on it. The shipping box that contained the review unit was incredibly light; so light, in fact, that I thought maybe the laptop had gone “missing” on its way to my house. However, once I pulled the Slim 7i out of the box, I was taken aback by its featherweight design, weighing just 2.15 pounds. For comparison, the 13.6-inch MacBook Air weighs slightly more at 2.7 pounds.

Part of the reason for the extremely lightweight design is the use of a magnesium alloy in the chassis (which Lenovo says is designed and tested to MIL-SSTD-810H standards), finished in “Seashell,” which is basically off-white. In addition, the laptop is only 0.55 inches thick, which further contributes to the feeling of litheness.

The centerpiece of the Yoga Slim 7i is a 14-inch, 2880 x 1800 POLED touch display with a glossy finish. To protect the precious POLED panel, Lenovo covers it in Gorilla Glass 3.

Unlike the most recent Yoga Slim 7i we tested, the 2026 model drops the HDMI 2.1 port and adds another Thunderbolt 4 in its place. As a result, the Yoga Slim 7i now has three Thunderbolt 4 ports: two on the left side and one on the right. All three ports support up to 65-watt USB Power Delivery and DisplayPort 2.1. Interestingly, the HDMI port isn’t the only casualty with this redesign; the 3.5 mm headphone jack is also missing. It’s a curious omission for the Yoga Slim 7i, and one that will likely garner some backlash from the Yoga faithful. The USB-A port has also been abandoned, which means those reliant on compliant accessories will need to live the “dongle life” that Mac and Dell XPS users have grown accustomed to.

The only other items of note around the chassis are a dedicated power button on the right side (I fumbled around the keyboard deck for the power button for a few seconds at first) and an E-shutter switch for the 5-megapixel webcam.

The Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026) measures 12.31 x 8.42 x 0.55 inches and weighs 2.15 pounds. The Dell XPS 14 measures 12.19 x 8.26 x 0.58 inches and weighs 3 pounds, while the HP OmniBook X Flip 14 measures 12.32 x 8.60 x 0.58 inches and weighs 3.11 pounds. Finally, the 13-inch MacBook Air (M5) measures 11.97 x 8.46 x 0.44 inches and weighs 2.7 pounds.

Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026) Specifications

Productivity Performance on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

The Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026) is powered by Intel's Core Ultra 7 355 processor. The chip features 8 cores (4 performance, 4 efficiency), a base frequency of 2.3 GHz (performance cores), and a Max Turbo Boost frequency of 4.7 GHz (performance cores). Lenovo pairs the processor with 32GB of dual-channel LPDDR5x-7467 memory and a 1TB M.2 2242 PCIe 4.0 SSD.

In the Geekbench 6 CPU benchmark, the Yoga Slim 7i with its Core Ultra 7 355 processor achieved a single-core score of 2,729 and a multi-core score of 11,555. This result compares quite favorably to Dell XPS 14, which uses the same CPU: it mustered 2,685 on the single-core benchmark and just 7,964 on the multi-core benchmark. Among the Intel-based competition, the Omnibook X Flip 14 (AMD Ryzen AI 7 350) upped the ante with single- and multi-core scores of 2,889 and 13,106, respectively. However, Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Air (M5) ran away from the competition, delivering a blistering 4,168 in single-core and 17,067 in multi-core.

The Windows machines were evenly matched on our 25GB file transfer test, with both the Yoga Slim 7i and the OmniBook X Flip 14 getting pretty close to the 1,700 MBps mark. The XPS 14 crossed that line, achieving 1,730.36 MBps. The MacBook Air was faster still, recording 1,924.84 MBps with its 1TB SSD.

Our Handbrake test transcodes a 4K video to 1080p, and here the Yoga Slim 7i completed the task in 5 minutes and 56 seconds, the slowest in the group. Interestingly, the XPS 14, which uses the same processor, was the fastest of all four systems, finishing in just 4 minutes and 30 seconds.

We ran Cinebench 2026 for 10 loops to stress-test the Yoga Slim 7i. The system started in the 2,465 to 2,485 range, before settling in the upper 2,500’s for the remainder of the runs. The internal fans were audible during the stress test to keep the system cool.

The four P-cores on the Core Ultra 355 ran at an average of 3.87 GHz, while the four E-cores clocked in at 3.49 GHz during the Cinebench 2026 stress test.

Graphics on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

The Yoga Slim 7i features integrated Intel Graphics, with 4 Xe cores operating at a maximum dynamic frequency of 2.5 GHz. During the 3DMark Steel Nomad benchmark, the Yoga Slim 7i scored just 513, putting it slightly behind the XPS 14.

The MacBook Air was the overachiever in this group, nearly doubling the Yoga Slim 7i’s score at 1,005.

Display on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

Lenovo ships the Yoga Slim 7i with a vibrant 14-inch POLED display panel, covered in Gorilla Glass 3 with a glossy finish (like most OLED panels). The display has a WQXGA+ (2880 x 1800) resolution and a maximum refresh rate of 120 Hz.

Since we’re looking at an OLED panel here, it should come as no surprise that the colors were lush, while blacks were as deep as you could imagine for a laptop. OLEDs aren’t often known for going over the top with panel brightness, but the Yoga Slim 7i more than held its own, delivering 476 nits, the highest among the assembled laptops (the MacBook Air was in second at 458.8 nits).

That strong showing filtered over to the color gamut coverage, where the Yoga Slim 7i reached 120.6 percent of DCI-P3 and 170.3 percent of sRGB. But figures were second only to the OmniBook X Flip 14.

I used the Yoga Slim 7i’s display to watch the first trailer for Coyote vs. ACME, which deftly combines computer-generated cartoon graphics with real-world settings and human characters. From the light and dark blues of the Roadrunner’s feathers to the red and orange explosions through (this trailer does, after all, feature the silly antics of Wile E. Coyote), the POLED panel handled the presentation with aplomb.

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

I found the keyboard on the Yoga Slim 7i comfortable to type on, though the key surface felt a bit smoother and slipperier than what I’m used to. I wouldn’t say that it distracted from my typing experience; it just felt different. The one thing that I would be concerned about, however, is the white finish on the keys. I can only imagine how grimy the keys will look after a few months of constant use once the oils from your fingers permeate through the surface.

My only other comment about the keyboard would be that I’m not a fan of the half-height up/down arrows, which are flanked by full-size left and right arrows. I’d prefer all of the directional keys to be full-size, even if it came at the expense of a narrower right Shift key.

Using my go-to keyhero.com typing benchmark, I hit 89 words per minute with 96 percent accuracy, which is about average for me (I’m no fast-typing dynamo).

The keyboard deck and the touchpad, which I found highly responsive, are also covered in the same off-white color. The touchpad measures 4.72 x 2.95 inches and is buttonless; it uses a haptic mechanism for registering clicks (similar to MacBooks). I found that my fingers glided easily over the surface, and responsiveness was “just right” without requiring additional tweaks in Windows 11.

Audio on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

The Yoga Slim 7i features a four-speaker sound system comprising two 2-watt woofers and two 2-watt tweeters. The speaker grills flank the keyboard, and are precision-machined into the deck.

Sound quality was surprisingly good and vibrant for such a thin machine. Even more shocking was the amount of bass that the speakers were able to produce without seeming overpowering. I was bopping to the classic, “What a Fool Believes” by the Doobie Brothers, and could feel every bass line and drum hit with clarity. Michael McDonald’s soulful voice shined through, proving this classic is just as impactful nearly 50 years later.

To my delight, as “What a Fool Believes” finished playing, my YouTube Music playlist kicked over to “Fantasy” by Earth, Wind, and Fire, and I was again blown away by this ultraportable system. The rhythm guitars, bass, and staccato horns — it all came together beautifully. You can use the Dolby Settings app to select Dynamic, Game, Movie, and Music profiles to suit your audio tastes.

Upgradeability on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

The bottom panel of the Yoga Slim 7i is affixed with two eight screws and friction clips. With a well-placed finger between the panel and the gap in the display hinge, it popped off.

Unfortunately, the LPDDR5x memory is soldered on, so there’s no way to upgrade it. And while the 2242 M.2 SSD is technically replaceable, it is hidden behind the heatpipe system that also covers the CPU and memory. If you want to replace the SSD, do so with caution.

Battery Life on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

The Yoga Slim 7i proved to be a winner in our battery life test. The system lasted a healthy 16 hours and 38 minutes during the test, which encompasses web browsing, video streaming, and WebGL tests with the display set at 150 nits of brightness.

Interestingly, the Yoga Slim 7i’s result was over an hour longer than the perennial endurance champ: the MacBook Air.

Heat on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

We measured the surface and internal temperatures of the Yoga Slim 7i while running the Cinebench 2026 stress test. Surface temperatures were measured with a laser thermometer, while the process temperature was measured using internal sensors.

The Core Ultra 7 355 processor measured 83.4 degrees Celsius. The keyboard registered 91 C, and the touchpad came in at 76.9 C. The bottom measured 94.2 C at its hottest point, while the hottest overall temperature (106 C) was at the top of the keyboard deck near the display hinge, where hot air exhausts.

Webcam on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

Lenovo includes a 5-megapixel webcam on the Yoga Slim 7i, which is mounted above the display. A tiny hump is integrated into the display lid to accommodate the camera hardware (which includes an IR sensor for Windows Hello facial recognition).

I had no issues with the webcam’s performance, as color reproduction, sharpness, and clarity were on point. There were also no issues handling my overabundance of LED-based track lighting in my home office. Skin tones were also quite accurate, which is often an issue with my darker skin tone.

The Yoga Slim 7i includes an E-shutter switch mounted on the right side of the chassis. This can be used to electronically enable or disable the camera.

Software and Warranty on the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026)

Our Yoga Slim 7i is an “Aura Edition,” meaning it has several smart features designed to make your life easier. The laptop includes Smart Modes (Working, Gaming, Creating, Entertainment, Meeting, Learning) that can be accessed within the Lenovo Vantage application. Based on the mode you select, the system can automatically configure settings (e.g., attention times, noise cancellation, or VPN access).

The laptop includes Smart Modes (Working, Gaming, Creating, Entertainment, Meeting, Learning) that can be accessed within the Lenovo Vantage application. Based on the mode you select, the system can automatically configure settings (e.g., attention times, noise cancellation, or VPN access).

Aura Smart Care provides real-time access to Lenovo technicians for troubleshooting, while Aura Smart Share lets you easily share media between a PC and a smartphone (including iPhones).

You’ll also find the usual assortment of Lenovo-branded apps, including Vantage, which gives you control over power settings, Smart Modes, and other customization options. Vantage is also where you’ll find controls for presence detection, which I had to disable because it would put the system to sleep if I walked away for more than 30 seconds.

But there's also some bloat: McAfee Security is installed by default, along with Adobe subscription apps, and a 90-day trial to the Dropbox 100GB plan.

The Yoga Slim 7i comes with a one-year warranty.

Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (2026) Configurations

Our Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition is equipped with an Intel Core Ultra 7 355 processor, 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a 2880 x 1800 POLED display, and it retails for $1,629.99.

You can customize the system if you wish: an upgrade to Windows Home Pro costs $50, while going from a 1TB SSD to a 2TB SSD will set you back $190.

Bottom Line

The Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition is a standout machine, made even more impressive by its ultra-thin chassis that barely weighs over 2 pounds. Lenovo has also delivered on visuals with a gorgeous 14-inch 2.8K OLED touch display and a bangin’ quad-speaker audio system. If that wasn’t enough, the Yoga Slim 7i also delivered over 16 hours of runtime, even besting the mighty MacBook Air.

However, that thin and light frame means that compromises had to be made on performance. The Core Ultra 7 355 came up short in our synthetic CPU test and real-world encoding tests (where it landed in last place). And when the CPU was being worked, the system fans were quite audible. Lenovo has also taken away some legacy ports that many people have come to rely on, including HDMI, USB-A, and even the 3.5mm headphone jack.

With a price tag of just over $1,600, the Yoga Slim 7i is not a cheap ultraportable by any means. However, if you can look past the CPU shortfalls and fully embrace Thunderbolt 4 connectivity, you won’t be disappointed with its portability, display, or endurance.

In a quest to build a thinner device, Lenovo has finally abandoned one longstanding feature that made the ThinkPad P series stand out from the competition — the use of a magnesium subframe, also dubbed the “roll cage,” to add strength and rigidity to the laptop model. Notebookcheck spotted the change, which marks the end of an era that began with the ThinkPad T60 in 2006, the company’s first ThinkPad model after taking over from IBM in 2005.

Magnesium alloy is widely used in premium laptop models because of its relative lightness and comparable rigidity, but it’s often used as a material for the external chassis. The ThinkPad P series was a different beast, though. Lenovo built this line of laptops as mobile workstations and ensured that it had the rigidity to face the physically most challenging of situations. While the magnesium roll cage added to the overall thickness of the device, it was something that Lenovo and its users were willing to compromise on in exchange for the reliability and durability that it offers.

“People will hold their machines in one corner of the keyboard, or the palm rest area, and that becomes a stress area,” Al Makley, Lenovo Executive Director of Workstation Development, told AEC Magazine. “So, we have to understand how is that area flexing, what is it in contact with on the motherboard, are you going to stress components? So, we look at the amount of flex in that area.” Lenovo Industrial Designed Sam Patterson also told AEC, “It does require some compromises on overall size – it adds a millimeter or two to the X, Y and Z dimensions, but it’s one of those things that’s not worth compromising on, because its value to the customer is so high. When you have a system that is this powerful, it becomes heavy quite fast, so managing the body and managing the strength of this chassis is difficult, so a roll cage is the logical thing to do.”

Aside from having the roll cage in the base of the laptop, its screen also features a magnesium subframe at the back of the display. “16 inches is a lot of panel, and you don’t want to get those videos on YouTube where someone’s bending it and going, ‘What is going on with this flex?’” adds Patterson.

Unfortunately, Lenovo’s latest P16 model, the ThinkPad P16 Gen 3, replaces the magnesium subframe with one that’s integrated directly in the frame. It’s unclear why Lenovo went ahead with this design change just to shave a few millimeters off the workstation’s dimensions. It could be that the company is trying to save on every ounce of expense as the memory chip shortage is taking a toll on computing.

After all, the P-series is already an expensive piece of kit, with the base model P16 Gen 3 starting at nearly $3,000 with just an Intel Core Ultra 5 245HX, an Nvidia RTX Pro 1000 Blackwell laptop GPU, 16GB of DDR5-4400 RAM, and a 512GB PCIe 4.0 SSD. The top-of-the-line trim features an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX, with an Nvidia RTX Pro 5000 Blackwell laptop GPU, 128GB of DDR5-4000 RAM, and a 4TB PCIe 5.0 SSD. However, this costs an eye-watering $9,500 — something that’s just out of range for most common buyers.

All these specs might seem underpowered for the price, but companies are paying for the reliability that it delivers. But unless Lenovo developed a new manufacturing technique that allowed it to retain rigidity without the magnesium subframe, then this move to save a few dollars might actually be counterproductive to what its customers expect. If you find this to be too much for your needs, Lenovo also makes more reasonably priced devices with the latest Intel hardware, or you could pick a model from our list of the best laptops for productivity, portability, and battery life.

E-waste is a serious problem, and while laptops and PCs can rapidly become obsolete after only a few years of use, there’s a natural desire to keep these machines running for much, much longer. One intrepid YouTuber has salvaged an old Lenovo ThinkPad X230 laptop, circa 2012, and given it a ‘modern upgrade’ by swapping out its tired TN panel for a $25 IPS alternative that significantly improves the display quality.

When it comes to LCD technology, TN panels are the most basic form. This original tech, while offering fast response times, often delivered poor color accuracy and contrast levels, along with the worst viewing angles compared to its rivals. Most modern LCD displays and gaming laptops ship with an IPS or, if it’s budget, a VA panel. IPS is the best all-rounder, and for $25, it isn’t a bad upgrade on a 14-year old laptop.

The YouTuber, onionboots, explains in a recent video his quest to see how a “near-perfect” ThinkPad X230 could be improved. One of the “few” modifications that they’ve not tried on their Thinkpad-centric YouTube channel is an upgrade to an IPS display. A common complaint, he notes, is that the stock display panels included in the X230 had “plenty of critics.”

This laptop, which shipped with 3rd Gen Intel Core i5 and i7 CPUs and up to 16GB of DDR3 RAM, typically came with a 12.5" LED-backlit anti-glare display with a 1,366 x 768 screen resolution. While one of the options available included upgrading to a higher-resolution display that bumps it to full HD, it requires soldering to the motherboard which onionboots doesn’t “quite trust [himself]” to do. Instead, he used a compatible IPS panel from the same period, using the same plug-in connector and the stock 1,366 x 768 resolution.

Most of the disassembly (and reassembly) of the X230 and its sibling, the X220, is “so easy” that onionboots “would almost call it fun.” After considering a $70 display, onionboots instead uses an almost identical alternative from eBay that lacks screw brackets to save the $45 difference. The display works and, for the money spent on this LG display from 2012, onionboots notes what a “visually noticeable upgrade” it is, giving him ideas to upgrade his X220 with the same upgrade.

He does note issues with the rigidity of the upgrade, believing that the missing display brackets lacking in the $25 purchase would help to keep the whole display assembly rigid and more secure, and while he can “live with the flex” himself, others may prefer the more expensive upgrade. He also notes some minor quality-of-life issues, such as mild ghosting, that he believes are simply typical of a panel of its era.

Enthusiasts like onionboots prove that there’s plenty of life left in old electronics. While plans for a whole series of upgrades, including a keyboard mod and a firmware jailbreak, are on the backburner for at least a few weeks, it’ll be interesting to see what other upgrades this YouTuber is able to make to this ThinkPad in the future.

IDC on Thursday sharply slashed its expectations for the PC and tablet markets, citing memory shortages, rising prices for 3D NAND, DRAM, and other components, and intensifying supply chain disruptions amid the AI sector boom. While unit shipments are expected to decline significantly year-over-year, higher average selling prices (ASPs) are projected to push total market value slightly upward.

The firm now expects global PC shipments to drop 11.3% in 2026 compared to 2025, a steep revision from the -2.4% decline projected in November 2025 and -8.9% in January 2026. In absolute numbers, this means PC sales will decline by 32.17 million units, from 284.7 million in 2025 to 252.53 million in 2026. To put the 32.17 million PC number into context: Apple shipped 25.6 million computers last year compared to 41.1 million systems for Dell.

Tablet volumes are also set to contract, and IDC forecasts shipments to fall 7.6% this year. Last year, vendors shipped 151.9 million tablets (up 5% compared to the previous year), with Apple leading the pack by a significant margin. If the new IDC forecast holds, then this year the market will decline by 11.54 million to 140.36 million systems. To put the number in context, Apple sold 17.1 million iPads in Q4 2025, while Samsung sold just 6.4 million units.

Even though unit shipments of PCs and tablets will decline, IDC expects market revenue to increase due to rising device prices. The firm estimates that the PC market will expand by 1.6% in value to $274 billion in 2026, while the tablet segment will grow by 3.9% to $66.8 billion.

"The era of bargain-priced PCs and tablets is behind us for now, as rising ASPs and component costs shift the market’s balance of power," said Jitesh Ubrani, research manager for IDC’s Worldwide Mobile Device Trackers. "Memory shortages will persist well into 2027. While we anticipate some easing of prices beginning in 2028, the market is unlikely to return to the pricing levels seen in 2025. Instead, we expect a new normal defined by structurally higher ASPs and a corresponding softening in long-term demand."

IDC noted that, at the time it compiled its forecast, the conflict in the Middle East had not yet escalated to its current level, adding another source of risk for global technology supply chains and economic development. Therefore, the analysts may revise their forecast downwards.

"The overall tech industry, as well as many others, continues to face uncontrollable headwinds that, when compounded, result in massive disruption," said Ryan Reith, group vice president, Devices and Consumer. "The lists of industry and geopolitical events that continue to grow is making decision‑making — and even survival in some sectors — nearly impossible. What has turned all of this from a million‑dollar question into a trillion‑dollar question is the complete uncertainty around when these pressures will subside."

Lenovo has made laptops with rollable screens and folding screens, but now it's bringing flexible panels to gaming handhelds (at least, as a proof of concept). The Legion Go Fold Concept utilizes a POLED screen that flips out from 7.7 inches to 11.6 inches.

The prototype, which we went hands-on with before its MWC 2026 announcement, is significantly smaller and lighter than Lenovo's current Legion Go laptop lineup. The system defaults to a 7.7-inch handheld mode with the display folded in half. The screen can then be folded vertically so that you can have something else running on the other half. Lenovo representatives suggested you might put game guides, YouTube playthroughs, or chat there.

But unlike the existing Legion Gos, you can attach the controllers to all four sides. If you unfold the display and rotate it 90 degrees, you can get a "horizon" full screen that lets you play games on the entire 11.6-inch panel.

In addition, Lenovo showed off the concept with a wireless keyboard that can be used with the device to operate like a Microsoft Surface, allowing for full access to Windows 11 with a mouse and keyboard. You could also use this for gaming, as the right controller works as a vertical mouse, allowing for standard first-person shooter controls.

For the first time, Lenovo also has a piece of plastic to go between the two controllers, allowing them to act as one piece when disconnected from the PC (just like Switch Joy-Cons). The right controller also features a screen, though I can't say looking at the time or silly characters is terribly useful. I did, however, appreciate the introduction of trigger stops to the controllers.

For the concept, Lenovo is opting for Intel's Core Ultra 7 258V "Lunar Lake" chips with 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD. The screen has a resolution of 2435 x 1712 when it's unfolded. My hope is that Lenovo finds a way to get Core Ultra Series 3 chips with Intel's B390 graphics in, though Lenovo claims that the 258V can run at low TDPs to get the most out of the 48 WHr battery.

The idea is interesting, but the current state of the hardware is still quite early. While the hinge mechanism felt solid enough when it was closed, there was noticeable floppiness while it was open. The controllers were impressively light at 230 grams, but they almost felt like toys. For a machine I'm going to be folding, unfolding, and rotating around, I hope Lenovo can make it feel more sturdy if it approaches a full release.

I also worry that this only folds with the plastic OLED display facing the outside. That makes sense for the goal that Lenovo is trying to accomplish. But this is a plastic-covered screen, and if I'm using this as a portable laptop, then switching to gaming, I could be using this for the majority of my day. I hope a launch version, if it materializes, comes with a nice case to protect the screen.

There were some software hitches, too, in the early device. Lenovo didn't show us the system running a game, but I did open a copy of Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. The game would only run with the screen open full-screen, and vertically, as the software wasn't there for me to adjust it to Lenovo's various screen settings. While this is an early device, Lenovo's rollable that did hit the market, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable, didn't allow you to change either resolution or screen orientation. So I would like to see Lenovo get this part of the feature set working.

I found the keyboard to be a bit difficult to set up, but others with me checking out the Legion Fold quite liked the idea, as it would let them use the system as a full Windows 11 laptop to do work when they're not gaming.

There is no potential price or release date for the Legion Fold just yet. Lenovo has been toying (and working) quite a lot with foldable screens recently. It had two generations of the ThinkPad X1 Fold, and brought a previous concept, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable, to market. Since then, it's been showing off gaming concepts, with a Legion Pro rollable with a screen that extends sideways, before revealing this foldable handheld. Time will tell if either Legion product shows up on shelves.

Some of Lenovo's laptops have one screen. Some of them have two. With a new concept device shown at Mobile World Congress 2026, the company is suggesting that it can split the difference with a "selectively modular" system that lets you move parts around based on the way you use the system.

The PC is built around a metal base with a single built-in top display. On both the deck (where the keyboard would normally attach) and the back of the display, Lenovo has added its Magic Bay to connect accessories with pogo pins. This gives you a lot of flexibility, allowing you to put the second screen on the keyboard deck, similar to a Yoga Book 9i or an Asus ZenBook Duo. When you don't need a dual-screen experience, you can swap it for a keyboard.

You can also place the second screen on the lid of the laptop, which Lenovo suggests is good for presentations or even using the system with the lid closed. I found this made the prototype way too top-heavy, and I feel like you could accomplish the same thing with an external display.

Clearly, Lenovo saw some of that, because the second display can be used with a kickstand and a USB-C cable to use it like the best portable monitors. The magnetic stand they had on hand was pretty flimsy and finicky, so if this makes it to release, I'd like to see something sturdier.

But you can't do anything you want. I tried putting the keyboard on the lid of the system, and while it fit, I couldn't actually type. (Honestly, fair.)

The other modular parts are the ports. There's room for two, with one on either side of the notebook. There are small divots in the modules that let you pull them out and insert new ones. Your options are USB-C, USB-A, and HDMI. Unlike Framework's laptops, which use USB-C adapters, these attach directly to the motherboard. Lenovo also has a fixed USB-C port and 3.5 mm headphone jack in the concept unit.

In some ways, the idea of the Modular AI PC is enticing. I don't always need or want two screens, so the ability to have it and then switch to a lightweight laptop on the go feels like a good idea. But I was also slightly overwhelmed with all of the parts in front of me. With Framework, you pick your internals and change those at most once a year or so. With this, you change your externals to suit your needs, which could be once a day, but also possibly even more often. It definitely seemed like a neat way to pack all your gear up in one place.

Lenovo was powering the concept unit with a Core Ultra 7 255H, 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a 33 WHr battery. That last one is a bit concerning, as it's far smaller than what you typically see in the best ultrabooks, and I'm worried about how long that battery could power a pair of OLED touch displays.

That being said, the battery is only really theoretical right now. Lenovo hasn't suggested any price or release date for a project based on the concept, so it has plenty of time to make changes — and make the keyboard work on the back of the display if they want to give me a laugh.

Lenovo is updating laptops across its enterprise, gaming, and productivity lines at Mobile World Congress. The new machines include ThinkPads in a striking blue colorway, and a Legion laptop using one of the new AMD Ryzen "Strix Halo" chips announced at CES earlier this year.The new ThinkPads are headlined by a new T-series, the ThinkPad T14 and T14s Gen 7, the T14s 2-in-1 Gen 2 and T16 Gen 5.

The T14 and T16 clamshells have a renewed focus on repairability, including a battery that can be removed with just your fingers. Intel-based models will use LPCAMM2 memory. These systems will use Intel Core Ultra 3 with vPro or AMD Ryzen AI Pro 400 processors. The T15s will have options with AMD, Intel, or Qualcomm's new Snapdragon X2 Elite processor.

The T14 and T14s are getting a new "cosmic" blue color option, which is rare for a ThinkPad. (Diehards can rest assured, the TrackPoint is still red.) It's subtle enough that it might appear black in dark rooms, but it is a fetching new addition for offices that might like a bit of color.

Lenovo is also updating the ThinkPad X13 Detachable, which only gets a refresh every few years. This version is also being bumped up to Panther Lake, with an improved keyboard with 1.5 mm of key travel and support to dock a pen in the keyboard. That’s similar to what Microsoft has been doing for the past few years on its Surface.

Gaming and Consumer

There's a single gaming laptop: the Lenovo Legion 7a. It's a 15.3-inch portable using an AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 392 processor, similar to the Asus TUF Gaming A14 we saw at CES, along with an OLED screen.

The system weighs 1.65 kg (3.67 pounds), which is lightweight for a gaming rig. But despite the lack of conventional discrete graphics in a gaming laptop, the Legion 7a won't be cheap; it will start at $2,299 when it launches in July.

Lastly, Lenovo's Yoga line is seeing spec bumps in the Yoga 9i 2-in-1 Aura Edition (starting $1,949 in May), Yoga Slim 7i Aura Edition (starting at $1,449 in April), and Yoga Pro 7a (starting at $2,099 in August), which will also use a Strix Halo processor in the AMD Ryzen AI Max + 388.

Lenovo (via CRN) has sent a letter to partners warning them of price hikes on select PC and server configurations coming in March due to a shortage of DRAM and 3D NAND memory, which will consequently increase costs, reports CRN. In a February 2 letter to partners, North America channel chief Wade McFarland outlined new ordering deadlines and repricing conditions that affect both the Intelligent Devices Group (IDG), which sells client devices like desktops and notebooks, and the Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG), which sells servers.

The warning applies to 'certain products and configurations' within Lenovo's commercial IDG lineup, which includes a broad range of products, from smartphones to high-end ThinkPad laptops. Lenovo instructed partners to place their orders with distributors by February 25 and ensure they reach Lenovo no later than February 28 to receive their products at current prices, subject to availability and shipment timing. Lenovo explicitly stated that any orders received before February 28, but not shipped by March 31, 2026, will require repricing.

On the server side, ISG shortened quote validity to 14 days in its internal bidding system and 30 days on the external platform used by resellers and distributors. Lenovo announced that select larger ISG deals, both in backlog and in active quoting, have already been repriced due to cost increases. In addition, Lenovo suspended the new customer bonus nomination program on January 26. This program granted partners up-front discounts for securing Lenovo contracts with new customers, but in the current market situation, any up-front discounts can hurt Lenovo more than they benefit it.

The cost pressure on Lenovo is a consequence of 3D NAND and DRAM shortages and price hikes across the industry, driven by demand from the AI sector. Although large PC OEMs tend to secure memory through long-term supply contracts, CRN reports that Cisco, HPE, and now Lenovo have all adjusted their hardware pricing structures and ordering policies accordingly.

Channel reaction has been mixed. Camden Haley of Connection expects higher prices for some commercial PCs next month but praised Lenovo for providing clear order dates and sticking to communicated timelines, contrasting that approach with other OEMs that have repeatedly revised policies. Yet, the chief executive of another Lenovo partner, who remained anonymous, argued that the March 31 shipment condition effectively gives Lenovo the ability to reprice backlog orders if supply delays occur, though he expressed understanding of the supply environment.

U.S.-based Almeida Law Group, which specializes in class-action litigation, has filed a lawsuit against Lenovo, alleging that Lenovo transferred large amounts of data to China. According to the lawsuit [PDF], the company’s actions violate the U.S. Department of Justice’s Data Security Program, which prevents the transfer of large amounts of sensitive personal data to “countries of concern” or “covered persons.” Lenovo has denied the allegations.

“The DOJ Rule was thus implemented to prevent adversarial countries from acquiring large quantities of behavioral data which could be used to surveil, analyze, or exploit American citizens’ behavior,” the lawsuit said. It also added, “In direct violation of the DOJ Rule, Lenovo—through its automated advertising infrastructure and associated databases—transmits Plaintiff’s and potentially millions of other American consumers’ data to China.”

The Plaintiff here refers to one Spencer Christy of San Francisco, California, and “all other similarly situated,” with the case alleging that Lenovo and its Chinese parent company linked his “browsing activity to his identity, track his behaviors, and build detailed profiles reflecting his interests, locations, habits and other private attributes.” It further said that the data is more than just an invasion of privacy, but “a direct threat to national security as it greatly increases the potential for coercion, reputational harm, and/or blackmail.”

Lenovo is far from the only company gathering such data, but the U.S. entity’s parent, Lenovo Group Limited, is incorporated in Hong Kong, with its headquarters located in Beijing, China. Furthermore, its largest shareholder is Legend Holdings Corporation, a Beijing-based investment firm established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a state institution of the People’s Republic of China.

So, aside from being based in one of the “countries of concern,” it also falls squarely under the “covered persons” provision of the DOJ regulation which include “individuals who either reside in ‘countries of concern’ or are controlled by entities in those countries or (ii) entities that are organized or chartered under the laws of, or have their principal place of business in, a country of concern, or are owned 50% or more by such entities.” More than that, the lawsuit asserts that Lenovo Group is subject to Chinese regulations like the National Intelligence Law, Cybersecurity Law, and Data Security Law, which compel individuals and institutions to cooperate with the authorities when asked for data.

When asked for comment, Lenovo told The Register, “Any suggestion that Lenovo improperly shares customer data is false. We take data privacy and security seriously and comply with all applicable data protection laws and regulations globally, including stringent U.S. requirements. Our data practices are transparent, lawful, and designed to protect our customers.”

Intel has finally pulled back the curtain on Panther Lake, and in addition to a major process milestone with 18A, Intel is packing in the largest integrated GPU it has ever shipped in a handful of new X-series SKUs. These SKUs, including the Core Ultra X9 388H that Tom’s Hardware was able to test ahead of release at CES 2026, include 12 cores on Intel’s latest Xe3 graphics architecture and boast performance that can rival a discrete RTX 4050, at least according to Intel’s claims.

Testing the graphics performance in-person, Panther Lake is undoubtedly impressive, not only because of its raw capabilities, but also its clear efficiency. We aren’t able to publish power numbers today, but subjectively, Panther Lake delivered easily the coolest gaming experience I’ve seen out of a laptop, barely even getting warm during an hour and a half of heavy-duty benchmarks in a Lenovo reference design.

The silicon quality and process advancements are obvious, and Intel’s claims aren’t full of hot air. Panther Lake reaches that entry-level segment that Intel is targeting with its X-series parts, and does so with remarkable efficiency. The asterisk is software. Even in the benchmarking session, software issues crept up with a handful of popular titles Intel had pre-installed on the machines, which will only become more pronounced when extended to a larger sample of titles.

We’ll have full test results for Panther Lake once systems arrive on January 27 globally, including firm power and temperature numbers, along with productivity results. For now, we’re looking at some quick and dirty tests in games, along with the experience of using Panther Lake in the flesh.

Meet our Panther Lake test system

Intel set us up with a reference system made by Lenovo. You can see the system information above. This is an IdeaPad Pro 5 running the top-end Core Ultra X9 388H chip from Panther Lake, along with 32GB of memory. For testing, the system was perched on a stand for better airflow, and the games were running off of an external PCIe Gen 4 NVMe SSD connected via USB-C.

The native resolution for the display is 2880 x 1800, but I ran tests at either 1920 x 1080 or 1920 x 1200 depending on support in-game, along with XeSS upscaling (settings for each will be noted in the benchmarks below). This is in-line with the benchmark data Intel itself has shared on Panther Lake. Keep in mind, however, that upscaling works better with higher output resolutions. You’ll see a performance drop climbing up to native resolution, but with upscaling, the drop isn’t as severe as you’d expect.

Although we can’t publish power results, Intel confirmed that the Core Ultra X9 388H has a maximum turbo power of 65W (PL1) with a short-term limit of 85W (PL2). That’s power for the entire SoC, not just the integrated graphics. The performance results here for the SKUs sporting 12 Xe3 cores; the vast majority of the Panther Lake lineup only includes 4 Xe3 cores, with only the X-series SKUs getting the full 12.

As we dig into the benchmarks, keep in mind the limited time we had available for testing these systems. Most games only got a single benchmark pass as we tried to test as many titles as possible within an hour and a half. You should take the numbers as rough approximations of the performance you can expect ahead of launch, not the final word on the gaming prowess of Panther Lake.

Testing Panther Lake’s gaming performance

Now what you came for — the benchmarks. Broadly, you can expect frame rates nearing 60 fps in recent titles with Panther Lake at 1080p, with some assistance from XeSS upscaling. Multi-frame generation is available in titles that support XeSS 2 or newer through an override in Intel’s driver software. We didn’t look at frame generation when gathering performance results. However, in Spider-Man 2, we quickly looked at FSR frame generation and saw positive results. Given the limited availability of XeSS frame generation, FSR 3 (or newer) seems like the more practical route for frame generation on Panther Lake outside of tools like Lossless Scaling.

We tested two more titles, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and Battlefield 6, but we weren’t able to capture performance data; more on that in the next section.

Overall, the average frame rates are solid considering the settings. With upscaling assistance, 60 fps is achievable even in relatively demanding titles like Baldur’s Gate 3, while heavily titles like Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and Doom: The Dark Ages fall slightly short of that mark while still providing a smooth experience for an efficient mobile platform. Actually playing a game like Doom: The Dark Ages brought out the experience Intel has been talking about. When you’re playing, the fluctuations below 60 fps aren’t apparent, and the complete lack of heat leads to a mobile gaming experience that’s refreshingly clean. Fan noise wasn't bad, either. In a room with about two dozen people with only a minor murmur, you couldn't hear the fans spinning.

Although the performance holds up, the software backing it has some issues. XeSS works and is available in a broad range of titles, but the quality of the implementation varies wildly. In F1 2025, it can go toe-to-toe with FSR 2 or 3 upscaling; in Cyberpunk 2077, the visual artifacts are immediately apparent. Intel still has a lot of work to do on XeSS, particularly when it comes to unifying the quality you can expect across titles.

We tested Spider-Man 2 with FSR frame generation, XeSS Quality, and 1080p resolution, which you can see the performance of in real-time in the video above. This provided a much better experience and clearly showed off the capabilities of Panther Lake without the drawbacks of Intel’s software ecosystem. Some of those drawbacks are too big to ignore. However, in many titles, moving over to FSR or Lossless Scaling can bring Panther Lake to life in a way that the limited support for XeSS 3 can’t.

The average frame rates are solid, but consistency is a bit different. There were titles where the consistency was great, such as Cyberpunk 2077, while others, like Baldur’s Gate 3, struggle. And there are still games that will prove too demanding for Panther Lake without heavy assistance from both upscaling and frame generation as evidenced by Monster Hunter Wilds.

Questions linger about Intel’s software stack

Intel has done a lot of work stabilising its Arc driver releases, and today, they’re much more robust than what we saw just a few years ago with the initial release of Alchemist GPUs. Still, I have some concerns about the software when it comes to using Panther Lake in a wider swath of games.

In addition to the titles above, we tried to test Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and Battlefield 6, both of which we weren’t able to gather data for because Intel’s PresentMon — the monitoring tool available to us for testing — wasn’t able to hook into the game. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 also reduced the resolution to just 900p each time we toggled to fullscreen mode; a well-known bug in this game that shows up across GPU vendors.

In areas Intel can more directly influence, there were still issues. Monster Hunter Wilds had an unplayable level of stuttering on the first benchmark pass, while the quality of XeSS in Clair Obscur devolved into a shimmering mess while falling short of a 60 fps average. These, thankfully, aren’t issues in the driver, but it takes the claims about Intel’s all-in-one graphics ecosystem down a peg when looking at the real-world experience.

Although we didn’t focus on frame generation, others in the room did; just behind our station, another journalist spent the better part of 45 minutes troubleshooting Intel’s multi-frame generation overrides in the driver without success. The performance of Panther Lake is solid, and I’m confident in it when combined with tools like FSR and Lossless Scaling. You can expect some bumps in the road if you stay fully within Intel’s ecosystem, however.

That shouldn’t overshadow the impressive performance of Panther Lake. The performance is stunning considering the hardware, and even moreso when factoring in power and temperatures. We’re looking forward to sharing those results with you when we can, but broadly, Intel’s claims about Panther Lake hold up. It’s a relentlessly powerful and efficient SoC that hits a sweet spot few other chips can touch. Hopefully our initial testing results hold up once we can dedicated dozens of hours to putting Panther Lake through the full gauntlet.

Lenovo is updating its expansive productivity laptop lineup at CES 2026, including both its famed ThinkPad business notebooks and its consumer and creative-oriented Yogas. While Lenovo is aligning itself with all three big processor companies, Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm, its top-end systems all have one thing in common: Intel's new Core Ultra Series 3 "Panther Lake" processors.

Those systems are what Lenovo calls "Aura Editions," which the company uses to showcase AI-focused tools, like "Smart Modes" that can detect what you're doing and change settings, or "Smart Share," which lets you share photos and videos with selected devices.

ThinkPads and Business Laptops

The flagship ThinkPads are the X1 series. This year, the X1 Carbon and X1 2-in-1 are debuting new "Space Frame" chassis, which rearrange the interiors of systems so that components can be placed on either side of the motherboard. The company says this space efficiency also allows for higher sustained performance due to better cooling, as well as easier repairs with replaceable parts including the battery, USB ports, keyboard, fans, and speakers.

Lenovo says that these systems will have up to 20% increased heat dissipation due to updated thermal architecture. Both systems also come with a new 10MP camera with a 110-degree field of view.

Meanwhile, the ThinkPad X9 15p Aura Edition — a take on the laptop we called the prettiest business PC — is also jumping up to Panther Lake, including Intel Core X9 processors. The system features what Lenovo says is the largest ThinkPad haptic touchpad (135 x 85 mm), and will also get a 10MP camera.

These Aura PCs aren't cheap. They will all go on sale in March, with the X1 Carbon starting at $1,999, the X1 2-in-1 beginning at $2,149, and the ThinkPad X9 15p launching at $1,999. Interestingly, all of these laptops will come with both Windows 11 and Linux as configuration options.

In addition, Lenovo is bringing its motorized hinge-toting "Auto Twist" concept, which debuted as a concept at IFA in 2024, to a real laptop in its small business line, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 7 Auto Twist, which will go on sale starting at $1,649.

Yogas and Consumer Laptops

On Lenovo's consumer side, there are two dramatically different categories of device. The Yoga Pro 7i and 9i Aura Edition are both focused on creatives, with up to Intel's Core Ultra 9 386H processor and Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070. The Yoga Pro 9i has an option for a Tandem OLED display, a six-speaker sound system, and uses a power adapter going up to 245W (the 7i provides up to 140W over a standard USB Type-C connection). These will launch in Q2 starting at $1,799.99 for the 7i and $1,899.99 for the 9i.

The other extreme is the Yoga Slim 7i Ultra Aura Edition, a 14-inch white system coming in at less than 2.2 pounds. You'll still get up to an Intel Core ultra X9 with up to 12 Xe graphics cores and 9600 MHz RAM, as well as a new matte texture that Lenovo says will reduce fingerprints. This system will start at $1,499.99 in Q2.

Lenovo also has Yogas with AMD and Qualcomm processors. The latest AMD Ryzen AI 400 chips will power the Yoga Slim 7a, while the Snapdragon X2 Elite and X2 Plus will come to the Yoga Slim 7x. These are both 14-inch devices with 2880 x 1800 touch screens, designed for mobility and power efficiency. The Slim 7x will start at $949.99 in Q2, while the 7a is only being sold in select markets.

Lenovo continues to experiment with rollable-screen OLED laptops here at CES 2026, and its latest Legion Pro concept laptop is sure to pique the interest of on-the-go gamers. Its 16-inch display fits nicely in the Legion Pro 7i chassis it's built around. But open the laptop up, and its screen expands sideways, in both directions, to become either a 21.5-inch "Tactical Mode" screen, or an even more immersive ultra-wide 24-inch "Arena Mode" display. The current firmware has you hit Fn and the arrow left/right keys to expand or retract the screen. Hitting the keys twice skips the middle mode and completely extends or retracts the screen.

The ultra-wide form factor has been popular among desktop gamers for years, but has been extremely rare in gaming laptops due to size constraints. But Lenovo is trying to make that an issue of the past with the Legion Pro Rollable — or at least it will if the company takes this concept further and creates a retail version.

Of course, you'll need some serious CPU and GPU power to push those extra pixels. But the Legion Pro 7i that this concept is built around tops out with a mobile RTX 5090 and Intel's Core Ultra CPUs. While I of course don't know how much a finished version of this rollable concept will cost, I am sure there are quite a few gamers who would love to be able to carry around a 16-inch laptop that can deliver a screen up to 24 inches diagonally.

Lenovo's press release positions the Legion Pro Rollable as a device for esports competitors who can "carry small but train big" as they travel to and from events. And sure, I can see that, but I'm pretty sure there's a larger market as well for more casual gamers and road warriors who would love a screen-morphing portable with a screen that can get very large when you need it, while rolling back to a 16-inch size so it can fit in your backpack.

In a hands-on with the concept device, the screen looked very much like a product in development. The bezels were chunky and some of the screen edges didn't line up right. It works, but I didn't get to try a game on it. The main thing Lenovo seems to need to do is to work on the tension mechanism to hold the screen taught. They have this in the ThinkPad rollable concept (see below) with two motors and steel cables, so they know how to do it. But in the Legion, the screen looks a little wavy.

The sample I tried also made a pretty loud creaking noise, though Lenovo representatives told me it was a quirk of the unit I tried. I saw others that didn't have the same issue.

The other thing that I couldn't really tell was how much weight this might add. Probably not a huge amount, but the base laptop they used here was already a powerful and heavy system.

ThinkPad Rollable XD Concept

The ThinkPad Rollable XD is a more traditional vertical rollable concept that expands from a 13.3-inch screen to 16 inches. But rather than house the unseen parts of the screen in the base, this design has it wrapping around the top of the lid, giving you a dynamic "world-facing" display when the laptop is closed, or you haven't expanded the primary screen.

Of course, the screen needs to be protected, and Lenovo worked with Corning on a dual-sided Gorilla Glass Victus 2 screen cover with a 180-degree bend that wraps around both sides. And while there are other ways to control the expanding screen mechanism (like using your voice), you can swipe on the top edge of the display to move it up or down. When it's expanded, you can see the motor mechanism on the back. I like that the company left some of the complex engineering on display, though I doubt this kind of choice would make it to a final product.

Lenovo also touts AI features under the hood of the XD concept, like "live translation, voice assistant, multi-modal, and lid-controlled interactions." But I think one of the most interesting things about the XD concept is that it's a ThinkPad, unlike previous rollable concepts – and the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 that the company brought to market last year. Perhaps the switch to arguably the company's flagship brand is an indication that the company sees a serious, productivity-focused future for the expandable screen tech it's been dabbling with for a few years now.

At the very least, housing the whole screen and the sliding mechanism in the lid should make it easier to take screens like this and add them to more laptops. And as someone who has taken a portable monitor and a mechanical keyboard to CES in previous years, pairing an expandable screen with one of the best laptop keyboards available has me at least a little more interested than I was before.

Lenovo is giving AMD’s Ryzen Z2 Extreme official SteamOS support for the first time. The Legion Go 2 launched in October last year, bringing the Z2 Extreme to the mobile gaming market and fixing many of the issues with Lenovo’s first handheld outing. Now, you can get it with official SteamOS support, combining the best aspects of the Legion Go 2 and Lenovo’s Legion Go S.

SteamOS is available directly from Valve for a DIY install, and Linux distros like Bazzite do a good job emulating Valve’s handheld interface. However, official support brings some perks. As we saw with the Legion Go S, SteamOS provides significantly better performance across games than Windows 11, even when comparing the exact same hardware inside the same chassis.

AMD’s Z2 Extreme is still at the heart of the Legion Go 2 with SteamOS. It’s an eight-core chip that leverages three Zen 5 cores and five Zen 5c cores, the latter of which trade peak clock speed for a space-optimized design. The Zen 5 cores can boost up to 5GHz while the Zen 5c cores top out at 3.3GHz. It defaults to a 28W TDP, though it has an adjustable TDP range from 15W up to 35W. The gaming grunt comes from the integrated RDNA 3.5 GPU, which sports 16 CUs.

Alongside AMD’s chip, Lenovo offers up to 32GB of LPDDR5x memory and 2TB of storage, plus an additional 2TB available through the microSD card slot. The memory is clocked at 8000 MT/s for the 32GB model and 7500 MT/s for the 16GB model. Lenovo is using the same OLED screen featured on the Windows 11 version of the Legion Go 2, which is an 8.8-inch screen with a resolution of 1920 x 1200, a 144Hz refresh rate, 10-point touch support, variable refresh rate, and a certification for VESA’s DisplayHDR True Black 1000.

Everything about the SteamOS Legion Go 2 is identical to the original model, short of the operating system. You still get dual USB 4 ports for charging or accessories, detachable controllers, a touchpad, six programmable buttons, and Hall Effect joysticks.

Lenovo says the Legion Go 2 with SteamOS should be available in June, starting at $1,199. The Legion Go 2 with Windows 11 is listed at $1,349 for the 32GB model, so the 32GB model of the SteamOS version should land somewhere around that price. It’s worth highlighting that the SteamOS version of the Legion Go S has a slightly lower price than the Windows 11 version, so hopefully that trend continues with the Legion Go 2. But with the way RAM prices are right now, who can predict what pricing might be like in six months?

Refreshed Legion laptops with new AMD branding

Lenovo is refreshing its Legion 5 and 7 ranges, and for the first time ever, properly noting configurations that come with an AMD CPU. Lenovo usually notes configurations with an Intel processor with an “i,” such as the Lenovo Legion 5i, while the AMD configuration would normally be called the Lenovo Legion 5. Now, Lenovo is adding an “a,” turning the Lenovo Legion 5 into the Legion 5a.

Naming aside, Lenovo is updating the Legion 7a, Legion 5i, and Legion 5a. The higher-end Legion 7a includes one of AMD’s new Ryzen AI 400 ‘Gorgon Point’ CPUs. The laptop carries up to an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 470, which features 12 cores (4x Zen 5 / 8x Zen 5c) and an RDNA 3.5 iGPU with 16 CUs. You can also pack in up to an Nvidia RTX 5060 mobile GPU, 64GB of LPDDR5x-8533 (capped at 8000 MT/s), and 2TB of storage split across two M.2 2242 PCIe Gen 4 slots.

Although the design of the Legion 7a remains mostly unchanged, Lenovo claims the laptop is 10% lighter and up to 5% thinner than the previous generation.

The Legion 5 range tops out slightly lower. The Legion 5i carries one of Intel’s new Panther Lake CPUs, the 16-core Core Ultra 9 386H. It’s not technically the flagship SKU, which is a title claimed by the Core Ultra X9 388H with its beefy integrated GPU. The Core Ultra 9 386H is almost identical outside of the GPU, however, sporting 16 total cores split across four performance cores, eight efficiency cores, and four low-power efficiency cores, along with a 4.9 GHz maximum boost clock on the P-cores.

For the Legion 5a, Lenovo is releasing two versions – one tops out with a new Ryzen AI 9 465 with 10 cores and 12 RDNA 3.5 CUs, while the other uses the older Ryzen 7 250; a Zen 4-based chip with eight cores. All three configurations top out with an RTX 5060, up to 32GB of DDR5-5600 memory, and 2TB of PCIe Gen 4 storage.

You can configure all of the laptops with one of Lenovo’s TrueSight OLED displays. The Legion 5 models use a 15.3-inch panel with a 2560 x 1600 resolution and 165Hz refresh rate, while the Legion 7a comes with a 16-inch panel with the same resolution and a 240Hz refresh rate. The Legion 5s carry a VESA DisplayHDR True Black 600 certification, while the Legion 7a holds a coveted DisplayHDR True Black 1000 badge.

Lenovo says all four variants should be available by April. The Legion 7a starts at $1,999, and the Legion 5a starts at $1,499 with Gorgon Point and $1,299 with Hawk Point Refresh. The Legion 5i is slightly more expensive, starting at $1,549.

In addition to Legion refreshes, the budget-focused LOQ range is getting a refresh with the LOQ15AHP11, starting at $1,149 with an AMD Ryzen 7 250, as well as up to an RTX 5060 mobile GPU and 32GB of DDR5-5600 memory. It’s a name bump alone, as this model already carries these same specs. Lenovo revealed the LOQ15IPH11, as well, which features one of Intel’s new Core Ultra 7 356H CPUs. However, Lenovo isn’t selling this model in the U.S.

A motivated Lenovo Legion Pro 7 (16IAX10H) owner has successfully gotten their system’s speaker issues fixed after setting up a bug bounty program on GitHub. Nadim Kobeissi, a Linux user, was fed up with the gaming laptop’s “tinny and muffled” speaker output and suspected an issue with the Realtek codec on the open-source OS. Kobeissi posted the project in October with $500 of their own money, and five others pledged their own funds, bringing the total to $2,000. Now the issue has been solved, and the fixer is getting $2,000 from the community that developed around this rallying call.

Bug bounties have proved to be a worthwhile avenue for even the biggest developers to explore – Apple, Google, and Microsoft are among the big-dollar program organizers. In this instance, it is interesting to see this level pulled on a much smaller scale, but for a quick and successful fix.

Kobeissi fired up support for this GitHub-based bug bounty program, which kicked off in October. “We are a bunch of Linux users with the Lenovo Legion Pro 7 (16IAX10H) and we are sick and tired of our speakers not working properly,” the frustrated Legion user wrote. They added that they “also suck at writing Linux kernel audio drivers,” before promising “we will send you a lot of money,” for a fix.

You can see, above, that the Kobeissi ended up being the second-biggest contributor (money wise) to this bug bounty program. It ended up raising a nice, neat $2,000 for the solution finder.

Kobeissi also did their best to help any potential fixer, with a few educated guesses about the source of the Legion Pro 7’s speaker audio annoyances. Chief suspect was the incorrect detection of the Realtek ALC3306 codec. But there was also an issue with “no integration between the codec and the amplifiers in the audio pipeline,” in this laptop, which sports both Tweeters and Woofers.

The bounty-fix is for everyone!

The fix for this audio issue was posted on GitHub just a couple of days ago, indicating the time from the beginning of the bug bounty program to a solution was approximately a month. Kobeissi provides a step-by-step guide here, which affected users can follow.

This guide works for Linux kernel version 6.17.8. Moreover, the guide will get updates for future kernel versions “until the fix is fully integrated into the kernel,” notes the bug bounty organizer. If when you follow the fix process, “Your audio should now work correctly and permanently. This fix will persist across reboots with no additional steps required,” says Kobeissi.

Developer Yakov Till, AKA Lepsus, is largely credited with the fix (for “95% of the engineering work”). They get the monetary reward and heartfelt thanks of those who pledged to support the bug bounty.

We conclude by pondering whether this kind of private bug bounty, organized to eliminate computing annoyances, could set a trend.

There is a lot of activity in the sub-$1,500 gaming laptop market, and that is excellent news for gamers looking to score a performance bargain. Lenovo's Legion LOQ 15 is a spec-bump entry into this segment, featuring a familiar chassis but a newer AMD Ryzen 7 250 processor, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 GPU (115W TGP), and a $1,299 asking price.

While the fundamentals are sound, Lenovo made some curious choices here, such as 16GB of single-channel DDR5, a modest 512GB SSD, and a limiting 60 Whr battery, putting this system in an odd space between budget and mid-range systems. Read on to see how those decisions affect performance compared to the tough competition in this space.

Design of the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

I reviewed the previous iteration of the Legion LOQ 15 in December 2024, and this new model doesn’t break new ground in design. In fact, as far as I can tell, the chassis is identical to last year’s model right down to the gray color and port layout. However, that’s not a bad thing, because I find the laptop looks clean and attractive.

To keep costs down, the Legion LOQ 15 is constructed of high-quality plastic all around, including the lid (which is adorned with LOQ branding and a Lenovo placard). The primary chassis/keyboard deck, as well as the lid, has a metallic silver finish, while the display bezels are dark gray. Lenovo doesn’t take any real design risks with the laptop, although I do like that the power button and the surrounding three-segment LED ring are shaped like the “O” in the LOQ logo.

My criticism of Lenovo’s sticker bombardment with the previous LOQ 15 fell on deaf ears, because there are still three stickers (AMD Ryzen, Nvidia GeForce, and Lenovo eSupport) next to the Lenovo placard on the lower right corner of the keyboard deck.

The I/O ports remain unchanged, meaning you’ll find a USB Type-A, USB-C, and a 3.5 mm jack on the right side. A physical switch for turning the webcam on or off sits between the USB-C port and the 3.5 mm jack. The remaining ports are located on the rear I/O panel, where you’ll find a proprietary Lenovo power port, an Ethernet jack, two additional USB-A ports, and HDMI.

I was taken by surprise when I first booted up the Legion LOQ 15. I attempted to connect the 6 GHz band on my Wi-Fi 7 router to download updates and utilities for the laptop, only to find that it couldn’t find any of my 6 GHz SSIDs. I navigated to Device Manager to see that Lenovo is using a MediaTek MT7921 Wi-Fi 6 card. In this day and age, I’d expect at least a Wi-Fi 6E card, and many new laptops have already transitioned to Wi-Fi 7. Luckily, upgrading to a newer wireless adapter is a relatively cheap and easy upgrade for the Legion LOQ 15.

The Legion LOQ 15 measures 14.17 x 10.19 x 0.94 inches and weighs 5.12 pounds. For comparison, the Acer Nitro V 16S AI measures 14.08 x 10.39 x 0.79 inches and weighs 5.5 pounds, while the 16 Aurora is 14.05 x 10.45 x 0.89 inches and weighs 5.64 pounds. Finally, the MSI Katana 17 HX weighs 5.95 pounds with dimensions of 15.66 x 10.85 x 1.09 inches.

Lenovo Legion LOQ 15ARP9 Specifications

Gaming Performance on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

Our Legion LOQ 15 review unit features an AMD Ryzen 7 250 “Hawk Point” processor (8 cores, 16 threads) paired with 16GB of DDR5-5600 memory (1 x 16GB SODIMM) in a single-channel configuration. The chip has a base clock of 3.3 GHz and can boost to a maximum of 5.1 GHz. The laptop also uses a GeForce RTX 5060 GPU, which in this configuration has a maximum boost clock of 1,455 MHz and a maximum TGP of 115 watts. The RTX 5060 drives a 15.6-inch 1080p IPS display with a maximum refresh rate of 144 Hz.

My go-to game for testing new gaming laptops is Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, and the Legion LOQ 15 was no exception. At the native 1080p resolution with the Ultra preset, I averaged just under 100 frames per second (FPS), depending on the level of on-screen action.

Beginning with the Shadow of the Tomb Raider benchmark (Highest settings), the Legion LOQ 15 put up a strong showing with 105 frames per second (FPS) at 1080p resolution. That was good enough for second place, putting it slightly ahead of the Nitro V 16S AI (RTX 5060, 85W TGP) and the 16 Aurora (RTX 5060, 80W TGP). Understandably, the Katana 17 HX was the leader of this group (RTX 5070, 115W TGP) at 119 FPS.

It was a similar story with Cyberpunk 2077 (Medium settings), as the Legion LOQ 15 tied the Nitro V 16S AI with 32 FPS at 1080p, just barely edging out the 16 Aurora, which garnered 30 FPS. The Katana 17 HX was ahead of the field with 39 FPS at 1080p.

The tables were turned in the Far Cry 6 benchmark (Ultra settings), which saw the Legion LOQ 15 pull up the rear by a fair margin. It only managed 73 FPS at 1080p resolution, whereas the Nitro V 16S AI and 16 Aurora stretched to 82 FPS and 81 FPS, respectively. The Katana 17 HX again showed its graphics muscle, achieving 94 FPS at 1080p.

The three RTX 5060 laptops were clustered tightly in the Red Dead Redemption 2 benchmark (Medium settings), with the Legion LOQ 15 and Nitro V 16S AI both scoring 68 FPS. The 16 Aurora was just a head with 70 FPS, while the Katana 17 HX left the others in the dust at 85 FPS.

Finally, the Legion LOQ 15 stretched its legs a bit in the Borderlands 3 benchmark (Badass settings), as it achieved 88 FPS compared to 82 FPS for the Nitro V 16S AI and 83 FPS for the 16 Aurora. The Katana 17 HX flexed its RTX 5070 muscle once again, achieving 101 FPS at 1080p.

Metro Exodus is our tried and true benchmark for stress-testing gaming laptops, and we run each through 15 runs to monitor clock speeds and temperatures for the CPU and GPU. Using the RTX preset, the Legion LOQ 15 averaged 71.23 FPS at 1080p resolution. The CPU cores averaged 3.88 GHz, while the RTX 5060 averaged 2.42 GHz.

Productivity Performance on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

Our Lenovo Legion LOQ 15 review unit features the Ryzen 7 250 processor, 16GB of DDR5-5600 memory (single-channel), and a 512GB SSD.

The Legion LOQ 15 didn’t quite have what it takes to hang with the rest of the crowd in Geekbench 6. While its single-core score of 2,548 was in the same ballpark as the rest of the laptops, it significantly lagged behind on the multi-core benchmark (9,713). For comparison, the next-closest competitor, the Acer Nitro V 16S AI (Ryzen 7 260), scored 12,837 in multi-core, while the 16 Aurora led the field with 13,815 (Core i7-240H). Both the Ryzen 7 250 and Ryzen 7 260 are 8-core/16-thread CPUs with a 5.1 GHz boost clock, but the latter has a higher maximum configurable TDP (54 watts versus 30 watts).

Our file transfer test, during which we copied 25GB of mixed-media files, saw the Legion LOQ 15 come in second place at 1,378.45 Mbps, behind the Nitro V 16S AI (1,838.88 Mbps).

The Legion performed relatively poorly in our Handbrake test, where we transcode a large 4K video file to 1080p. The Legion LOQ 15 took 4:56 to complete the task, compared to 4:32 for the third-place Nitro V 16S AI (which uses a Ryzen 7 260). The 16 Aurora led all contenders with a time of 4:15.

Display on the Legion LOQ 15

Lenovo has fitted the Legion LOQ 15 with a 15.6-inch 1080p IPS display, which I found to have good overall picture quality. The display features a matte, anti-reflective finish, which is typical in this price range. It helped to reduce reflections without hurting color performance. The panel maxes out at 144 Hz, which is identical to that of the Katana 17 HX.

In addition to a handful of games I played, such as Indiana Jones and the Great Circle and Forza Horizon 5, I also watched several movies, including the latest Superman release on HBO Max. I had a close eye on the red and blue hues, as they are the primary colors of Superman's iconic suit and cape. The colors were vibrant and well-saturated, with no distracting color shifts when viewing off-angle.

Black levels were also well-maintained, although they weren't quite as dark as those I've experienced with more expensive OLED panels.

The LOQ performed slightly better than the previous generation that we tested last year on our instrumented tests. It covered 81.1 percent of DCI-P3 and 114.4 percent of sRGB, placing it ahead of all other competitors, albeit by only a few percentage points. Our light meter showed that the IPS display reached an average of 315 nits, putting it just a step ahead of the 16 Aurora (312.2 nits), but well behind the Nitro V 16S AI (391.8 nits).

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

As was the case with the preceding Legion LOQ 15 I tested, I love the keyboard on our review unit. Lenovo has always been an excellent purveyor of keyboards, especially on its ThinkPad business laptops. Each key has 1.5 mm of travel, and there's enough space on the relatively large frame to squeeze in a number pad (which I appreciate for data entry). You get full-size directional keys, which is a blessing since some laptop manufacturers attempt to cram in half-size keys to save space. However, if you’re into fancy RGB effects, you won’t find them here. The Legion LOQ 15 has a single-zone white LED backlighting.

I use Keyhero.com to measure my typing speed, and unsurprisingly, my result of 89 words per minute with 96 percent accuracy was nearly identical to last year's result.

Lenovo hasn't improved the touchpad, so my complaints with last year’s models remain the same: the top quarter of the trackpad doesn't register a click due to the top-hinged design, and the surface doesn't lend itself to smooth finger gliding.

Audio on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

Our Legion LOQ 15 review features two 2-watt speakers, which sound a bit below average for this class. However, given the price point of our review unit, it's understandable that Lenovo didn't put much thought into the design and performance of the speakers.

Bass is non-existent, gunfire effects in games sounded tinny, and music just wasn't enjoyable. My favorite song of all time is "The Dreaming Tree" by The Dave Matthews Band, but Dave's vocals just didn't resonate with me with the Legion LOQ 15’s speakers. His voice remains calm throughout the song, which should allow the soft bass line to emerge in the background. However, with the Legion LOQ 15's speakers, the bass line is barely audible as Dave sings. The included Nahimic software didn’t make a noticeable improvement in the sound, no matter what profiles I selected.

Upgradeability on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

Accessing the inside of the Legion LOQ 15 is accomplished by first removing the ten screws that hold the bottom panel. With the screws removed, I used a small plastic spudger tool to pry the panel away from the main chassis.

With the panel removed, you'll see the M.2 2242 installed on the right (it will accommodate 2280 SSDs as well). There's also a second M.2 slot, which allows you to install longer 2280 SSDs, sitting empty below the left exhaust fan in the picture above.

Below the second M.2 slot is the MediaTek Wi-Fi 6 module, while the two SODIMM slots are situated in the center of the chassis — only one was occupied on our review unit.

Battery Life on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

The Legion LOQ 15 is by no means a battery endurance champion, as evidenced by its performance compared to its peers. During our battery test, which consists of web browsing, video streaming over Wi-Fi, and conducting OpenGL tests with the screen brightness set at 150 nits, our review unit lasted just 6 hours and 50 minutes. Only the Katana 17 HX had a shorter runtime (6:21), while the Nitro V 16S AI delivered nearly three and a half more hours of endurance (10:17) compared to the Legion LOQ 15.

You can chalk that performance up to the relatively small 60 Whr battery, compared to the competition, which uses batteries ranging from 75 Whr to 96 Whr.

Heat on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

We measure laptop skin temperatures on gaming laptops while running the Metro Exodus benchmark utility over 15 loops. Fan noise was very apparent during stress testing, as is the case with most gaming laptops. However, that's an issue that is easily resolved by wearing a pair of the best gaming headsets.

The center of the touchpad measured 74.1 degrees Fahrenheit, while I measured 95.7 F between the G and H keys. The underside of the chassis registered 97.9 F, while the hottest part of the laptop was near the right exhaust fan (116 F).

During the Metro Exodus stress test, the CPU package measured 57.3 degrees Celsius (C). Meanwhile, the RTX 5060 chimed in at 67.9 C.

Webcam on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

Lenovo includes a 1080p webcam on the Legion LOQ 15, and it’s actually quite good. I don’t know if Lenovo was able to secure a different supplier this time around compared to last year’s model, but the problems I previously had with skin tones were nonexistent on this review unit. In addition, images appeared clear and bright without any graininess or aggressive background processing. Overall, I was very impressed, especially at this price point.

Also, there is a physical switch on the right side of the chassis that lets you quickly enable or disable the webcam, which is a nice touch.

Software and Warranty on the Lenovo Legion LOQ 15

The headlining software included with the Legion LOQ 15 is Legion Space, which is an all-in-one utility that allows you to manage power profiles for your CPU and GPU. The main menu also displays your system's vitals, including RAM/CPU/GPU utilization, temperatures, and fan speeds. You also have quick access to your installed games, and can even purchase new games from Lenovo's store, though most gamers will probably continue to use Steam, Epic, and GOG.

Other preinstalled software packages include Lenovo AI Now, Lenovo Now, Lenovo Subscription Marketplace, Lenovo Vantage, Nahimic (sound profiles), and Smart Connect (stream content between other Lenovo and Motorola devices).

The Legion LOQ 15 comes with a one-year manufacturer's warranty from the factory.

Lenovo Legion LOQ 15 Configurations

Our Legion LOQ 15 review unit came equipped with a Ryzen 7 250 CPU, 16GB DDR5-5600 memory, a 512GB SSD, GeForce RTX 5060, and a 144Hz 15.6-inch 1080p IPS display. The configuration is listed on Lenovo’s website as “Coming Soon” with a price tag of $1,299.

With that said, another configuration available on Lenovo’s website includes a Ryzen 7 250, 16GB DDR5-5600, a 1TB SSD, and an RTX 5050 GPU for $1,189.99. There’s yet another configuration available on Amazon that is nearly identical in specifications to our review unit, with the only difference being that it has a 1TB SSD instead of a 512GB SSD – it’s priced at $1,389.

Bottom Line

The Legion LOQ 15 delivers solid gaming numbers, often outpacing other RTX 5060 laptops due to its 115W TGP. However, the laptop also struggled in some productivity tasks, especially where multi-threaded performance was crucial.

Compounding matters is the relatively short battery life, which is over three hours shorter than the Nitro V 16S AI. While I have high praise for the 15.6-inch IPS display, the speakers were mediocre. There’s also the matter that there’s only 16GB of single-channel DDR5 memory and a small 512GB SSD, which will quickly fill up with games.

Recommending the Legion LOQ 15 comes with a huge disclaimer. The laptop is showing up as not yet available on Lenovo’s website with an MSRP of $1,299. That price should be a non-starter for the features that you get. However, if you can find the laptop for closer to $1,000 (once it becomes available), many of its sins could be forgiven.

For the last few years, most of the best PC gaming handhelds were running on the same chips. But with its new Lenovo Legion Go 2, Lenovo is using the latest AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme, while also making plenty of upgrades to the design.The new Legion Go still has detachable controllers and an 8.8-inch screen. But now, that screen is OLED (albeit with a lesser resolution than last time around), and the system has better ergonomics. But it's still bulky, heavy, and our unit was $1,349.99 as tested (though it does seem like the market may follow with increased prices). Still, the Z2 Extreme does offer some performance benefits, particularly at 1280 x 800pIf you want a slew of hardware features, the Legion is an obvious, if expensive, way to go. If you're willing to have a simpler experience without OLED and detachable controllers, there are still plenty of options on the handheld market that cost less, though admittedly few with the Z2 Extreme just yet.

Design of the Lenovo Legion Go 2

There's no doubt about it: The Legion Go 2 is a thick, bulky handheld. That mass allows for the connection to the removable controllers, and hopefully, we'll also find that it allows for strong cooling.Lenovo's "TrueStrike" controllers still resemble Nintendo's Switch Joy-Cons in that they disconnect from the system and control it wirelessly, but that's where most of the comparisons end. These controllers are bulky, though Lenovo has improved the ergonomics from the original, and they fit more comfortably in my hands thanks to more rounded edges. There's still a standard Xbox-style A/B/X/Y layout with offset joysticks. On the rear, the left controller has two buttons, while the right controller has one (as well as two customizable buttons to use in mouse mode).

The controllers now have Hall effect joysticks that should prevent drift, and a redesigned D-Pad sits on a pivot disk. The buttons are a bit less tactile than I'd like, but I got used to them quickly. Beyond the two rear buttons on each controller, the right controller also features three customizable buttons through Legion Space, and it still features a mouse sensor for the "FPS mode" from the previous generation, with an included base. In short, the controller sits in base vertically, letting you grip the controller like a joystick, while moving it like a mouse.

FPS mode works, but I rarely found it my go-to mode, as I tend to be sitting without a desk when I'm playing on a handheld. If you do use it, you'll have to do a lot of button remapping. In several games I played, certain commands didn't have a default mapping. You can create as many profiles as you want, but if you play lots of shooters, you'll want to save lots of presets and switch between them before games.

I do wish the right control stick were slightly lower on the controller. On a standard Xbox controller, the stick is under the buttons like it is here, but ever so slightly more to the left. When I played Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4, my thumb rubbed against the stick when I was pressing buttons to jump and do tricks.

What did take me a bit of time to get used to was the sheer number of menu and options buttons. The left controller has four (one for Legion Space, one for the Xbox-style view button, and dedicated buttons for Alt-Tab and showing the Windows desktop), while the right side has a more standard two for quick settings (I used this a lot) and an Xbox Menu button.

I still wish there were a regular Xbox button for Game Bar (there is a shortcut to act as one, however).

The right controller still has a touchpad, but there isn’t a corresponding one on the left side. I much prefer the Steam Deck's option to have both, if you're going to go that route at all.

Lenovo's controllers connect to the system with Pogo pins. Each controller slides into a rail system and then disconnects with a push button. The disconnect is easy enough, but I sometimes had a hard time sliding the controllers back in, and ended up scratching some paint on the rail on the right controller. The system also comes with a cover for one set of pins to cover the right rail in FPS mode. I do wish it included two covers for people who use both controllers disconnected often.

On top of the system, there's a USB4 Type-C port, volume rocker, and the power button, which now also doubles as a fingerprint reader. All of the other ports — another USB-C port, a 3.5 mm headphone jack, and a microSD card slot — are on the bottom of the system. This is a good layout, allowing you to charge and attach a USB-C peripheral at the same time. The fingerprint reader is useful, but it's a bit of a stretch to reach when holding the system in handheld mode.There are RGB circles around the joysticks, providing a bit of customizable decoration. While colors can be changed in the Legion Space app, the light rings can also be used to show how much battery is left (based on a series of blinking patterns) and if the controllers are connected.

The back of the system has a sturdy kickstand that covers most of the width of the console. You won't have any worries about this thing falling over. Above the kickstand are a series of vents, which suck in cool air, run it over the Z2 Extreme, and then exhaust through vents on the top. These were far enough from my hands that I didn't even think about them when playing games.

At 11.64 x 5.38 x 1.66 inches with the controllers on, it's thicker than the original Go, but ever so slightly smaller in other dimensions. The Asus ROG Ally X is substantially smaller at 11.02 x 4.37 x 1.45 inches, while the Steam Deck OLED is the widest of the bunch at 11.73 x 4.6 x 1.97 inches.

At 2.03 pounds with the controllers, the Legion Go 2 is heavier than the original Go (1.88 pounds), the Ally X (1.49 pounds), and the Steam Deck OLED (1.41 pounds). While some people may prefer the large screen and controllers, I felt the weight immediately and would sometimes end play sessions with tired hands and wrists.

Lenovo Legion Go 2 Specifications and Components

The Legion Go 2 is the first PC gaming handheld that we're testing with AMD's Ryzen Z2 Extreme processor. Like the Z1 Extreme before it, this is an 8-core, 16-thread processor, but it's now using three Zen 5 cores and five Zen 5c cores.The Z2 Extreme has a max boost clock of up to 5 GHz on the Zen 5 cores, (3.3 GHz on the Zen 5c cores) and a base clock of 2 GHz. (That max boost is actually 0.1 GHz slower than the Z1 Extreme). While the Z2 Extreme shares a 28W TDP with its predecessor, it has a 15-35W configurable TDP, which is higher than the Z1 Extreme's 9-30W cTDP. The 16-core GPU is a bump up from the 12-core GPU in the Z1 Extreme, and now it uses more recent Radeon RDNA 3.5 graphics.

The 32GB of RAM in this Legion Go 2 review unit should help it, as the CPU and GPU share the RAM. It's a step above what we saw in the Asus ROG Ally X, which used 24GB of RAM.The 1TB drive that Lenovo includes is an M.2 2242 SSD, but if you want to upgrade on your own, the slot can fit standard-length M.2 2280 drives.

Lenovo's 74 WHr battery is a big increase over the 49.2 WHr cell in the original Legion Go. The Ally X has a slightly larger 80 WHr battery.

Gaming and Graphics Performance on the Lenovo Legion Go 2

The Z2 Extreme and its integrated 16-core Radeon RDNA 3.5 graphics offer a boost over Z1 Extreme and the custom chips in the Steam Deck. I don't think it's inherently worth upgrading if you have one of those systems, though it should allow for some slight boosts in quality.

Out of the box, Lenovo's default thermal mode is "Performance," though there are also "Quiet" and "Balanced" options. The default fan option is "smart," which features a gentle curve, though you can adjust it. In our benchmark testing, we test handhelds plugged in and unplugged to see performance differences. We ran the Legion Go 2 unplugged at the default performance setting. Plugged in, I used a custom mode with a 35W TDP and a 45W burst, along with fans running full speed. That TDP increase tended to show bigger improvements at lower resolutions.

In a note for reviewers, though, Lenovo suggested that performance mode is recommended when plugged into the wall. So while we're reviewing at defaults, you'll probably want to step down to at least balanced mode when unplugged for longer battery life.

Note that while we ran our benchmarks at 1280 x 800 and 1920 x 1200, we had to adjust those to standard 1080p and 720p for the Asus ROG Ally X, which has a 16:9 screen, unlike the Legion Go 2, Legion Go, and Steam Deck.

When I played Tony Hawk's Pro Skater at 1280 x 800 on performance mode at high settings, the game ran between 73 and 93 frames per second. Marvel's Midnight Suns easily hit a 60 FPS cap I instituted on medium settings when I had thermals on balanced mode.

On the Shadow of the Tomb Raider benchmark at medium settings, the system ran at 66 frames per second at 800p unplugged and 75 FPS plugged in at a slightly higher TDP. At 1200p, it ran at 42 FPS unplugged and 47 FPS plugged in. This showed a large improvement over the previous generations at 800p.

Using Cyberpunk 2077's Steam Deck Preset, the Legion Go 2 again made strides at 800p at 47 FPS unplugged and 57 FPS plugged in. At 1200p, the game was playable, but this was one area where this system lost to the original ROG Ally X.

The trends continued in Red Dead Redemption 2's lowest (favor performance) settings using Vulkan. The game ran at 65 FPS unplugged at 800p and 80 FPS plugged in. At 1200p, it ran at 46 FPS and 50 FPS, respectively.

You probably won't be using a handheld to play Borderlands 4, so we gave Borderlands 3 another run (medium settings, DX11). Shocker: more gains at 800p, hitting 76 FPS plugged in and 67 FPS unplugged. At 1200p, it ran at 50 FPS unplugged and 56 FPS with the TDP boost plugged in.

We also ran our 15-run Metro Exodus stress test. For handhelds, we drop this down to low settings at 720p while plugged in. Given the results, we may need to reconsider that in the future to make it more stressful. The Legion Go 2 ran the game at an average 123 frames and was largely consistent between the runs.

The Zen 5 cores ran at an average of 3.8 GHz during the test, while the Zen 5c ran at 2.74 GHz. The integrated GPU averaged 1.963.47 MHz.

Lenovo Legion Space on the Lenovo Legion Go 2

At its best, Lenovo's Legion Space is the best software I've seen that attempts to mask Windows 11's flaws for gaming handhelds. At its worst, I had it freeze on me mid-game. Windows 11 is still just not great without a mouse and keyboard.

Then again, Microsoft's handheld gaming mode for Windows 11 is likely to come to the Legion Go 2 next year (or you could try to run a leaked version now), so this may all be moot in a few months.

Legion Space can show system stats, let you adjust and calibrate controls, and launch installed games. It often launched in the background when I booted the system up, though sometimes it would come to the foreground, oddly enough. There's also a store to buy games through Lenovo, but I prefer to stick to the big launchers.

The part I enjoyed most was the quick settings menu, which acts like what we've seen on the Steam Deck and ROG Ally X. But among Windows devices, the Legion Go 2's menu was the most responsive, easiest to navigate, and has the most useful shortcuts. I used it a surprising amount.

It also has the system's performance profiles. While the system defaults to Performance mode out of the box, enthusiasts may appreciate the custom option that lets you make adjustments on a watt-by-watt basis.

There are also numerous shortcuts for everything from taking screenshots to increasing or decreasing power consumption. The shortcut to see all of the shortcuts is the Legion Space button + LB.

The one big problem I had with Legion Space was trying to remap controls while in a game. It was too much, and the software kept freezing up and telling me to update my controllers (there was no new firmware for the controllers.)

It might be more helpful for Legion Space to always launch on boot, but it's easy enough to open with a touch of a button on the left controller.

Of course, this all runs with Windows 11, which means all of its shortcomings. To set the devices up, you'll need to use lots of usernames and passwords for launchers, all of which require poking at the touchscreen unless you connect a keyboard.

Display on the Lenovo Legion Go 2

The Legion Go 2's 8.8-inch display has seen some changes since the last generation of Legion Go. While the last screen was very pretty, this one uses OLED technology for more vivid colors and deeper blacks. The 1920 x 1200 resolution is a drop from 2560 x 1600 on the original Go, but in general I'm OK with this, as the integrated graphics available aren't capable of running too many games at that resolution anyway.

And the screen is beautiful. Games look great. In Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4, the Tokyo tournament level is filled with neon pink, purple, and blue ramps and rails that contrast with the cement of streets and bike lanes. The OLED screen made those colors scream, and those ramps looked great as I had skaters do grab tricks over them. In Marvel's Midnight Suns, Doctor Strange's red cape contrasted against Venom's symbiote skin in an early game mission.

The Legion Go did very well on our measured tests, covering 135.8% of the DCI-P3, by volume, and 191.7% of the sRGB space, far and away beating the rest of the field. And while it's definitely usable at 445 nits of brightness, it's dimmer than the non-OLED Go, as well as the Asus ROG Ally X and Steam Deck OLED. (The original Steam Deck can't hold a candle to any of these screens.)

When the screen's brightness is way up, it looks incredible. When you have it turned down, you start to notice how glossy reflective it is. When I took a break from work to use the system to play some games at my desk, which is next to a window, it wasn't as pleasant to use. But if you want to save battery by turning down the luminosity, you'll have to deal with it.

Battery Life on the Lenovo Legion Go 2

The bad news is that despite being thicker and bringing a bigger battery, the Legion Go 2 won't last through a cross-country flight for most games.

At one point in my testing, I spent an hour and a half playing Marvel's Midnight Suns at what I thought were pretty generous settings. I set the screen to 800p and played the game at 720p; knocked the power profile down to balanced; set the screen to just 30% brightness, which was still usable in the dark room I was playing in; limited the frame rate to 60 frames per second; and played on medium settings in the game.

After an hour, I was down to 66% of battery. By the full hour and a half, I was down to 50%, with the system estimating I had an hour and 28 minutes remaining.

Another time, I spent an hour playing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4. This time I had the screen at 50% brightness and 144 Hz, but still at 1280 x 800. When I was done, 54% of the battery remained, with the Legion predicting I had 1 hour and 51 minutes remaining.

Battery life will depend heavily on what games you play and the settings you play them at, but that initial three-hour window for a game with fairly light recommended settings isn't a great look. If you play a 2D game like Stardew Valley or Dead Cells, sure, expect more. If you run Cyberpunk 2077 as hard as you can to get playable frame rates on the Legion, expect less.

Audio on the Lenovo Legion Go 2

The 2W stereo speakers on the Legion Go 2 do a decent job, but they have one disadvantage: they're on top of the handheld. That means they point just a little bit away from you.

Still, they were more than loud enough. Full volume easily filled a small room, and I was more than comfortable at 60%. When I played Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4, the system was challenged with both music and game sound effects. The vocals and guitars on KennyHoopla and Travis Barker's "hollywood sucks//" sounded clear, even under the sounds of grinding on rails, wheels rolling, and skaters yelping in pain as they fell. The only thing that really suffered was the deepest low end. In this case, it was the drums in the background song, and you don't hire Travis Barker if you don't want great drums.

Heat on the Lenovo Legion Go 2

I measured skin temperatures while running our Metro Exodus stress test. The system stayed cool where it was important.

The controllers each measured roughly 84 degrees Fahrenheit. It makes sense these would stay cool, as they're technically separate units, even though I had them attached to the system for the test.

The hottest point on the rear of the system reached 98.3 F, near the vents. My fingers didn't reach there. The hottest point was the exhaust by the top vent at 106.3 F, though again, it's far from where I would grip the system in handheld mode.

During the test, the CPU averaged 65.5 degrees Celsius, while the GPU cores averaged 62.9 C.

Upgradeability of the Lenovo Legion Go 2

Before you open the Legion Go 2, you're best off removing the controllers to prevent wobble. Once they're off, there are eight Phillips head screws screws on the back to remove. Two of those are underneath the kickstand, so you'll want to lift that to its maximum angle. Those two screws are very recessed, so you'll need a thin screwdriver, which I didn't have on me. What we do know, we've been able to find from Lenovo's detailed maintenance manual.

Once those are out, you'll need a pry tool to loosen the clips and remove the back.

While you can swap out the M.2 SSD, it's not immediately visible. You also have to remove the battery and the fan to get access, which isn't as easy as some competitors. Once you do that, a single screw holds down the M.2 2242 SSD, just like any other PC. While Lenovo is using an M.2 2242, the slot supports M.2 2280, which is more common.

Lenovo Legion Go 2 Configurations

There's no good way to say it — the Lenovo Legion Go 2 is a very expensive gaming handheld. As tested, with the Z2 Extreme, 32GB of RAM, and 1TB SSD, the Legion Go 2 is a whopping $1,349.99. Lenovo includes a carrying case this time around, which is a nice addition, but the handheld should have more storage for this price.

A cheaper configuration at Best Buy is $1,099.99 with the base Ryzen Z2, 16GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage.

Earlier this year, Lenovo said the Legion Go 2 would start at $1,049, so we're likely to see variants with different amounts of RAM, storage, and Z-series chips.

All that said, handheld prices have definitely increased since we worried about the $799.99 price tag on the Asus ROG Ally X last year.

Microsoft and Asus' ROG Xbox Ally X, with the same Z2 Extreme, is going to be $999. We're hitting the point where you can get a decent gaming laptop for the price of a handheld. For the price of our review unit, you could get a $499.99 Nintendo Switch 2 and a top-end $649 Steam Deck OLED with 1TB of storage — a total of $1,148.99 — and still afford multiple games.

Bottom Line

There is a definite audience for the Lenovo Legion Go 2. People who want the most powerful AMD Z-series variant (and forgetting about a few rare Strix Halo handhelds), an OLED display, and want to be able to disconnect the controllers from the system like a Nintendo Switch.

For $1,349.99, though, you really need to want all those things. On the other hand, the Legion Go 2 offers some of them exclusively. No other major brand has detachable controllers, and the only other significant handheld from a major company that has an OLED screen is the Steam Deck OLED. In the Windows world, it's really the only one, unless you get into smaller brands like Aya Neo.

The Z2 Extreme does bump performance up over the Z1, but the biggest gains are still at 1280 x 800p. I'm of the opinion that if you have a handheld and you like it, it's not a must upgrade, but if you haven't, you'll get solid performance with the right settings.

The system is heavy, though, at over two pounds, and the battery drains pretty quick, even at low screen brightness levels. If you want all of these features and have $1,349 to spare, though, the Legion Go 2 is perhaps the most full-featured system out there. But cheaper competitors are good enough that I'd suggest at least giving them a look first.

Several gamers have had their Lenovo Legion Go 2 pre-orders canceled by the company after it said that it could not ship its latest handheld console on time. Many had been asking about the delay on the handheld, and the company answered the issue on its AMA Reddit post, saying, “The truth is pre-orders for the Legion Go Gen 2 has substantially exceeded our projections, leading to unforeseen delivery range extensions.” It also added, “That said, we will need to cancel some pre-orders placed directly on Lenovo.com. We don’t believe in holding onto customer payments for products we can’t ship in a timely manner.”

We’re the Lenovo Legion team - Ask Us Anything about the Legion Go Gen 2! from r/LegionGo

This disappointing news has hit several gamers, who won’t be getting their handheld at all, at least for the foreseeable future. Despite that, a few users will still receive their consoles, but at a much later date. According to TechPowerUp, there are reports that device shipments have been moved from the original early-October shipping date, as promised on the pre-order form, to early to mid-November. The company did offer a 10% discount coupon to affected users, but they can only use it for their “next Lenovo purchase.”

The Lenovo Legion Go 2 is the company’s follow-up to its original gaming handheld and is powered by a Ryzen Z2 Extreme chip replete with an OLED screen. It’s a direct competitor to the upcoming Asus ROG Ally 2, which doesn’t have a release date yet, although Asus is expected to deliver the ROG Xbox Ally and Xbox Ally X on October 16. MSI also has its own AMD Z2 Extreme-powered handheld in the Claw 8, which has outperformed the Intel chip in the previous iteration of its handheld and is scheduled to arrive in the coming weeks.

All this pre-order brouhaha is bringing back memories of electronics shortages, particularly with the launch of the PlayStation 5 and the various problems consumers faced when buying the latest GPUs. Thankfully, Nintendo seemed to have solved the problem with the launch of the Switch 2, which beat the Switch 1’s opening month by a million units in just four days. Lenovo said that it’s working to deliver consoles to retailers and customers, so availability should improve in the coming weeks. Hopefully, this will materialize so that we can avoid scalpers taking advantage of the situation and selling the gaming handheld at ridiculous markups.

Typically, the best ultrabooks don't rock the boat too much. They might have lighter designs than previous years or improve performance with new chips. But the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable is a unique device, with a rolling screen that turns a “short” 14-inch display into a very tall 16-inch diagonal experience.

It's the type of device you would expect to see shown off at a trade show like CES (where it debuted) and then never seen again — except that for $3,299.99, you can actually own it.

It isn't the most performance-focused computer for the money. You can buy powerful gaming laptops for the same price. But no other computer yet offers this functionality, even if there are a few first-generation hiccups. It's surely the most interesting laptop I've used all year, if not longer.

Design of the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

Out of the box, the ThinkBook looks like a pretty standard (if not dull) laptop, with a two-toned silver design. The screen has some odd bezels, wider on the sides than on the top and the bottom. The power button, which also features the fingerprint reader, is on the right side.

The aluminum deck is sturdy and features a backlit keyboard. The left side of the notebook features the laptop’s sole trio of ports: a pair of Thunderbolt 4/USB Type-C ports and a headphone jack. That's not a lot of ports for any laptop, especially one seemingly meant for productivity, but I suppose something had to go in order to make room for the display.

The laptop is 11.95 x 9.08 x 0.78 inches and weighs 3.72 pounds, which is hefty for a 14-inch PC. But this laptop is also a 16-inch PC, thanks to its rollable display, which makes the ThinkBook far more interesting than it looks at first.

The system comes with a 65W GaN charger. It's rare the charger gets a mention in our reviews, but it's great to see the latest charger technology, including a removable USB Type-C cable, in a premium machine. Other laptop vendors should do this more often, and Lenovo should bring it to more of its own machines.

Display on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

With the ThinkBook's screen rolled up, you get a 14-inch, 2000 x 1600 screen with a 5:4 aspect ratio. Unrolled, you get a far taller display, measuring 16.7 inches diagonally with a resolution of 2000 x 2350 and an 8:9 aspect ratio. The screen is a POLED (plastic OLED) display with a 120 Hz refresh rate.

To let the screen unroll, you push a button on the keyboard. And the first time you try it, it feels absolutely awesome. Unfolding a foldable the first time feels futuristic. Having a motor do it for you feels magical.

The motor isn't terribly loud, but it does take time to roll and unroll — about 9 seconds from button press to full extension or contraction. I'd like to see that cut in half, though I don't know what that would do to durability. When Lenovo announced the laptop at CES, it claimed 30,000 hinge openings and closings and 20,000 screen rolls up and down. That's a lot of rolls and openings, but it's also a number you basically never have to think about with a traditional laptop design.

The plastic OLED screen looks really nice, and performs pretty well, too. The screen measured 150% of DCI-P3 coverage by volume, and 211.7% of SRGB, easily surpassing the Yoga Book 9i Gen 10's impressive dual panels. At 381.4 nits of brightness, however, it falls behind the Yoga Book and the MacBook Pro.

The thing is, though, it's not really great for multimedia. Even at 14-inches, the trailer for Superman had thick black bars on the top and bottom. Those increased to obscene amounts with the taller 16-inch screen unrolled.

What these aspect ratios do allow for is strong multitasking. Having the homepage of New York Magazine or Tom's Hardware showed an almost overwhelming amount of text. But with the screen extended, I could use the top half for a Google Doc while using the bottom of the screen to keep an eye on Slack, or have the Tom's Hardware's morning meeting up at the top of the screen while still getting some work done on the bottom. And there are uses for tall displays; some coders love a desktop display turned vertical to show more text. This does that in a laptop.

I even used it to try playing Ikragua, an old bullet-hell game designed to be played vertically. Unfortunately, in much of my gaming, parts of the game were cut off despite the fact that it should have fit on the screen. This is no gaming device, simply because of that issue. Of course, it also doesn’t have dedicated graphics.

And for all its impressive unfurling, there are limitations to the screen. For one, it's not a touchscreen, despite the many foldables that use similar technology, all featuring touch capabilities. I don't feel that all clamshell laptops inherently need touchscreens, but there's something about a screen this tall that feels like it invites it.

Additionally, the hinge only goes just past a 90-degree angle. This seemingly supports the display and rolling mechanism, ensuring it rolls and unrolls at ideal angles, but it feels quite limiting. It's not good for lying back on the couch with the system in your lap. (The system also can tell if you have the angle below 90 degrees and won't make adjustments.)

You have to be careful with the screen. If you attempt to shut the laptop with the 16-inch display unrolled, you'll be greeted with a faint but annoying alarm until you open the system again.

You also can't change the resolution or screen orientation in Windows 11 on this laptop. While I doubt many people would actually change it, it's surprising to get a pop-up that says "The current model does not support resolution adjustment" as Windows reverts to the native resolution whether you tell it to or not. (You can still change scaling, though Lenovo warns it could cause problems with the ThinkBook Workspace app).

The other issue is that at certain angles, you can see where the screen bends to fit in the laptop. This isn't terribly different from the way you can sometimes see the crease on foldable phones, but it doesn't feel terribly premium.

Besides pushing the button on the keyboard, Lenovo has an opt-in feature that lets you use your hand and the time-of-flight sensor to raise and lower the screen. It sounds like a magic trick, but in practice it's extremely finicky. You need your hand in the perfect spot, then the sensor needs to recognize your hand, and only then do you move it up or down. The keyboard button, on the other hand, is foolproof.

Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Specifications

Productivity Performance on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

There's only one configuration of the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable. The fancy screen is backed by an Intel Core Ultra 7 258V processor, 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD. If you're buying this, it's mostly for the display.

The bump to 32GB of RAM is nice, but otherwise the specs are all pretty similar to what you can get in cheaper ultraportables. This price can get you a big, gaming-ready GPUs. With this laptop, you’re getting ultrabook internals and an innovative screen, and you’ll have to live with integrated graphics.

Here, we're comparing the ThinkBook Plus to Lenovo's own Yoga Book 9i (Intel Core Ultra 7 255H), with dual screens that also lets you work tall, as well as the 14-inch MacBook Pro and HP OmniBook X Flip 14, both of which are more typical laptops with Apple's M4 and AMD's Ryzen AI 7 350, respectively, and cost far less.

On Geekbench 6, the Rollable earned a single-core score of 2,694 and a multi-core score of 10,847 – the lowest of the bunch, including Lenovo's dual-screen foldable, which uses an H-series chip.

The Rollable copied 25GB of files at a rate of 1,075.92 MBps, just about in line with the Yoga Book, though the HP OmniBook was far faster.

It took the Rollable 7 minutes and 13 seconds to transcode a 4K video to 1080p, more than 2 minutes slower than the OmniBook (the M4 won here at 4:27).

We stress-tested the system using Cinebench 2024. The PC was largely stable, with scores settling in the high 490s, without signs of throttling. The CPU's P-cores averaged 2.62 GHz during this test, while the E-cores measured 2.99 GHz.

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

The Rollable's scallop-shaped keys are great to type on. While I've seen some snappier keys on some of Lenovo's ThinkPad lineup, this keyboard was comfortable and balanced, letting me hit 110 words per minute on the monkeytype typing test with my standard 2% error rate.

I have no complaints about the haptic touchpad — a computer with a rolling screen doesn't need more moving parts. It's responsive to gestures and to clicks.

Audio on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

Maybe it's the extra bit of thickness the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 needs to fit a screen, but it also allows for surprisingly powerful speakers in an ultrabook. As I worked, Linkin Park's "Two Faced" screamed through my apartment with clear vocals, clashing drums, strong guitars, and even a hint of bass on the low end. You rarely find that on a business machine.

The song's rapping and yelling were prioritized over sung vocals, but a quick change to the "balanced" mode in Dolby Access helped account for that, though it did lessen the bass.

Upgradeability of the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

Given the complexity of this device, I was shocked that there were any user-replaceable parts.

The base of the notebook is held on with eight Torx screws (a T5 bit fits just right). Removing them, I was able to pull the bottom off from a well-placed space near the chassis’ palm rest.

The inside of the system is packed around the surprisingly wide 66 WHr battery. That cell is removable, though Lenovo recommends disconnecting the Wi-Fi antenna before taking it out, as the cables go right around the top of it (and over the ones that connect the battery to the motherboard). The SSD is also user-replaceable if you want to add more storage. The RAM is soldered.

Be careful while working inside this system, though. You can see some of the springs and rails that power the motorized display. I'd hate to lose a screw in there.

Battery Life on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

An extra two inches of screen real estate (and the accompanying pixels) affects battery life. Rolled up to 14 inches, the ThinkBook ran for 9 hours and 28 minutes on our battery test, which includes web browsing, light WebGL testing, and video streaming with the screen set to 150 nits. With the screen unrolled out to 16 inches it ran for 8:43.

Both are longer than the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i Gen 10, with two screens, and the HP OmniBook X Flip 14, a convertible with one display. Apple's M4 and a mini-LED display, however, won out by far at 18 hours and 31 minutes.

Heat on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

To measure skin temperatures under load, we took heat readings while running our Cinebench 2024 stress test. The center of the keyboard measured 98 degrees Fahrenheit, while the touchpad was cooler at 92.3 F. The hottest point on the bottom of the notebook was near a vent at 113.5 F.

Internally, the CPU measured an average of 70.01 degrees Celsius during the same test.

Webcam on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

The webcam on the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6, despite having a 5MP lens, is just OK. In video calls, I saw some grainy artifacts despite the high-resolution image.

But the tall screen on the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable adds a benefit: making it very easy to look at the camera. The angle changes slightly between 14 and 16-inch modes, but with the screen unrolled, you can look right at the camera.

The webcam features a shutter switch directly on top of the camera bump. I'd prefer a button on the keyboard, but this works fine.

Software and Warranty on the Lenovo ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable

Lenovo has several pieces of software designed specifically for the rollable, though I'll be frank — I don't think any of them are strictly necessary.

The big one is ThinkBook Workspace, which lets you add mini apps like your reminders, to-do-list, and calendar from your Microsoft account. The app also features a user guide, an awkward secondary virtual display, and access to Smart Copy, a clipboard manager. You can also pin your own apps to Workspace's thick title bar. Personally, I preferred using Windows 11's Snap Layouts to put apps where I wanted them on the screen. One of the first things I did with Workspace was prevent it from launching every single time I extended the screen (there's an easy enough keyboard button for it).

ThinkBook Workspace has a ton of buried settings, many of them turned off by default. If you want a fun animation to play while you extend the screen (which I wouldn't recommend, as it covers your work), or to try enabling the feature to raise the screen with your hand, you'll have to dig.

There's also Lenovo AI Now, a local AI app that lets you feed documents into your "personal knowledge base" to find or easily digest information without using the cloud. Lenovo requires an account for this app, which is a shame, since the point of it is that it uses local computing.

Just like Lenovo's other devices, Vantage is on board for warranty information, easy access to your serial number, battery, and device settings, system updates, and an advertisement for McAfee Secure VPN.

There's also Lenovo Smart Meeting, which makes adjustments to your camera, background, or replaces you with a temporary avatar if you have to leave a meeting. There's also Smart Connect to add Lenovo or Motorola phones and tablets to your PC. Lenovo Now attempts to foist upsells and partner offers on you, and I think for a $3,300 laptop, you shouldn't have to deal with that.

Lenovo sells the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 with a one-year courier or carry-in warranty, which can be increased for a longer duration or to include more services for additional charges.

Bottom Line

When my colleagues and I see futuristic concepts at trade shows like CES, they tend to stay concepts. But Lenovo made the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable real, and it's by far the most interesting laptop I've reviewed in a long time.

It's a good enough performer for typical productivity tasks like writing, spreadsheets, video conferencing, and basic coding. But with the $3,299.99 price tag, you're really paying for that rolling screen and all of the engineering behind it.

In truth, there's nothing like it. Perhaps the closest options – the initial slate of foldable laptops that included the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Fold 16 – are either no longer available or are several generations of chips behind. This device also offers a traditional laptop keyboard and touchpad, unlike the more powerful Yoga Book 9i with dual screens.

You could buy any number of traditional laptops with similar specs and add in one of the best portable monitors on top of it for a lot less money. But if you're OK with more moving parts in your laptop and you want more screen when you need it, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable sure is easier to carry. If that’s worth the considerable extra expense (and extra weight) for you, then the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 Rollable is worth considering.

Lenovo is not a company that likes to play it safe when it comes to its products. It consistently pushes the boundaries of what form factors are possible with its products, as seen in the eye-catching ThinkPad Plus G6, which features a rollable screen.

As Lucas Rossi, Executive Vice President of Lenovo and President of the Intelligent Devices Group, told us in a roundtable discussion at IFA, "I think we have the credit for the company that takes more risks. Meaning, we try, we experiment, and there are… projects that never see the light. But many times, the experiments that fail seed for the experiment that makes it happen."

Lenovo showed off its first foldable laptop concept in 2017. At the time, the ideas and technology behind that foldable project couldn't immediately be incorporated into a production product. However, the intellectual property would eventually find its way into the Moto Razr smartphone, "which is now selling in the millions," according to Rossi.

With that in mind, it's possible that we'll see the fruits of Lenovo's labor with the ThinkBook VertiFlex Concept and Smart Motion Concept in future products.

Lenovo ThinkPad VertiFlex has a display that rotates from landscape to portrait mode

With a few exceptions, the aspect ratio of a laptop’s display is fixed. In modern laptops, you’ll find laptop displays that usually have a 16:9, 16:10, or 3:2 aspect ratio in a landscape orientation.

However, the ThinkBook VertiFlex, which leaked last week as “Project Pivo,” features a 14-inch display that can rotate without you needing to stow the keyboard (like a 2-in-1 convertible). Instead, the lid contains a pivot point that allows the screen to rotate from its standard landscape orientation to portrait mode. And there are no motors involved. You just grab the corner of the screen and pull it up until it pivots into vertical mode.

Lenovo says that this capability for an on-demand portrait mode allows the display to become more ergonomic, letting you see more text on the screen when editing documents or displaying code. The portrait mode also comes in handy when mirroring your smartphone to your laptop using Lenovo’s Smart Connect software. Then, when you want to watch a movie or play a game, you just pivot the screen back into its default landscape orientation.

The switch (in software) from landscape to portrait is instantaneous, and the ThinkBook VertiFlex is still in ultrabook territory, weighing just 3.06 pounds with a thickness of just 0.7 inches. That’s not as thin or light as the best ultraportable laptops, but it’s not too far off.

Lenovo’s Smart Motion Concept is a dock with AI aspirations

Computer docks are usually pretty dull. Typically, they’re in a long rectangular or stubby book-shaped form factor and sit on your desk to connect your various peripherals, laptops, and storage devices. The Smart Motion Concept still has that standard dock functionality, with the usual assortment of USB, video, and Ethernet ports, but it also serves as a stand for your laptop.

But Lenovo adds a dash of AI to its Smart Motion Concept by using your laptop’s built-in webcam and a motorized gimbal system to track your head movements and alter the position of your laptop, in conjunction with the stand, to keep it at the peak of ergonomic efficiency using a motorized gimbal system.

The dock can even take input from your laptop’s microphones to track where your voice is coming from when you’re speaking.

It's eerie to see the Smart Motion Concept working in person as it turns and adjusts its height as you move from side to side or up and down. In practice, it works similarly to last year’s Lenovo Auto Twist AI PC concept. But building this functionality into a dock makes more sense, since you won’t have to toss out all those expensive motors and the motion tracking when it’s time to upgrade to a new laptop.

There’s no guarantee that either the ThinkBook VertiFlex Concept or the Smart Motion Concept will make it to production. However, compared to some of the more outlandish concepts we’ve seen in the past, both concepts should have relatively little resistance in the on the potential path to production and a product you can actually buy.

IFA 2025 is upon us, meaning that there are tons of product announcements coming from the biggest name in tech. Lenovo has a large presence here in Berlin,, with plenty of fresh offerings from its Legion family of mainstream gaming hardware.

Lenovo’s new gaming monitors are an OLED triple threat

Lenovo is adding to its impressive gaming monitor lineup. That expansion includes three Legion Pro models announced this week at IFA 2025: the Lenovo Legion Pro 32UD-10, 27UD-10, and 27Q-10. The Lenovo Legion Pro 32UD-10 and the 27UD-10 are most closely related, with the primary difference between the two being screen size: 31.5 inches for the former and 26.5 inches for the latter. Both monitors feature 4K (3840 x 2160) "PureSight" OLED panels. The refresh rate tops out at 240 Hz for both, along with a 0.03 ms response time.

With its 31.5-inch panel size, the Legion Pro 32UD-10 offers pixel density of 140 pixels per inch (PPI), while the smaller Legion Pro 27UD-10 is more dense at 166 PPI. Lenovo lists that each monitor covers 99% of sRGB and 99% of DCI-P3, while offering a 1,500,000:1 contrast ratio. The monitors are also DisplayHDR TrueBlack 400 compliant, with peak brightness of 1,000 nits. Both monitors support USB Type-C (x1), DisplayPort 1.4 (x1), and HDMI 2.1 (x2) connections (there's also an integrated hub with three USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A ports).

The last monitor on the docket for Lenovo is the Legion Pro 27Q-10. This is another PureSight OLED panel, but this time with a QHD (2560 x 1440) resolution (109 PPI). The maximum refresh rate ratchets to 280 Hz while maintaining the same 0.3 ms response time. The contrast ratio, typical/maximum brightness, and gamut coverages are identical to the previously mentioned "UD" monitors.

You don't get USB-C display options with the Legion Pro 27Q-10, but it does support DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.1. You also get a built-in USB hub for connecting peripherals like a keyboard or mouse.

The Legion Pro 7 gaming laptop pairs a mighty Ryzen 9 9955HX3D with an RTX 5080

If you’re looking to level up with mobile gaming, take a look at the new Legion Pro 7, which is sporting an impressive suite of hardware. The CPU goes up to anup to an AMD Ryzen 9 9955HX3D “Fire Range” Zen 5 chip. That potent processor is backed by up to a GeForce RTX 5080 “Blackwell” discrete GPU (175-watt TGP). Your on-screen content should look great thanks to a relatively large 16-inch 2560 x 1600 OLED panel with a 240 Hz refresh rate and 0.08 ms response time. Lenovo says that the panel has a typical brightness of 500 nits and is TrueBlack 1000 certified.

Lenovo allows you to configure the Legion Pro 7 with up to 32GB of DDR5-5600 memory (2x 16GB) and up to a 2TB PCIe 5.0 SSD.

This wouldn’t be a premium gaming laptop without some “extra” design flourishes, so the Legion Pro 7 includes per-key RGB lighting. Not only does the keyboard have 100% anti-ghosting capabilities, but all of the key caps are swappable.

Although we wish that all laptops came with a 1080p webcam as standard equipment, the Legion Pro 7 comes with a 720p webcam on entry-level systems. However, you at least have the option to upgrade to a 5MP sensor if you want improved image quality.

Lenovo equips the Legion Pro 7 with three USB 3.2 Type-A ports, two USB 3.2 Type-C ports, an HDMI 2.1 port, an audio combo jack, and an Ethernet port. For audiophiles, there's also a four-speaker audio system with Nahimic tuning. Finally, the Legion Pro 7 supports all the latest wireless standards, including Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4.

The Legion Pro 27Q-10 and 27UD-10 will launch in November, priced at $699 and $999, respectively. The Legion Pro 32UD-10 will bow in October for $1,099. The Legion Pro 7 will land stateside in November with a starting price of $2,399.

Lenovo, in its least surprising move yet, is working on a concept laptop with a rotating screen that can switch from a conventional landscape orientation to a portrait one — making it the ultimate doomscrolling machine.

This leak comes courtesy of Evan Blass, a reliable name in the industry, who claims Lenovo is set to unveil this device next week in Europe at IFA 2025. The video below was posted by ZDNet just a day after the initial leak.

Think of this as the spiritual successor to the LG Wing, which had a similar mechanism. While the Wing can swivel from a regular 21:9 phone to a dual-screen apparatus with a vertical display, Lenovo's "Project Pivo," as it's dubbed—or "VertiFlex" as it might be called at the show—does not possess such capability.

Pivo is just one rotating display attached where a non-rotating one would go, so when it is in its portrait position, you get large black bars on the side that might impede your multitasking goals. Still, it could help with reading or writing documents, or perhaps even video editing with multiple timeline tracks. The durability and maybe the cost are still lingering questions best left unanswered.

Regardless, it's a cool concept and the latest one in a long line from the company. Lenovo has previously showcased a laptop with a rollable display, one featuring a transparent MicroLED screen, and an AI-powered laptop chassis equipped with a motorized hinge that follows you around. Shockingly, that concept has found new life with Project Ballet, which is a smart laptop stand that uses sensors (and AI, of course) to physically move and position it around you for maximum ergonomics.

An early prototype of what seems to be the successor of Lenovo’s Legion Go handheld console has been spotted in China. The information comes from Reddit user Worth_Spot, who claims that following the shutdown of Lenovo’s manufacturing plant for the handheld console, the factory has begun offloading a number of developer units on Chinese second-hand marketplaces.

The pre-production unit of the Legion Go 2 can be seen in an in-depth video on YouTube, which was originally posted on BiliBili. The device features a similar-looking design to the previous-gen model with detachable controllers and a large 8.8-inch display. According to the video, the display features an OLED panel made by Samsung Display with support for HDR content. It also has a lower 1920 x 1200 resolution (compared to the original Legion Go), a 144 Hz refresh rate, and support for VRR (variable refresh rate) for smoother gameplay with reduced screen tearing and stuttering.

The unit is said to be powered by an AMD Ryzen Z2 processor based on the Zen 4 architecture with an 8-core/16-thread CPU design, and a 12-core Radeon 780M GPU based on RDNA 3. During the showcase of the Legion Go S series handhelds earlier this year at CES, Lenovo had confirmed that the Legion Go 2 would be available with up to a Ryzen Z2 Extreme processor.

The video also claims that the device will come with a 1TB of PCIe Gen 4 SSD along with 32GB of LPDDR5X memory clocked at 7500 MHz, and a 74Wh battery. Other reported features include support for Wi-Fi 6E and Windows 11 pre-installed with dedicated software features for gaming, including a game library integrator, on-screen stats, and various settings to tune the performance. It will once again include an integrated kickstand, a trackpad for easier navigation, while one of the detachable controllers can be used as a mouse. While there is no official confirmation, the video suggests that the Legion Go 2 will launch in September with a price tag of $1,000.

The Lenovo Legion Go isn’t exactly a new handheld console, but it can still hold its own with its Z1 Extreme chip, 16GB RAM, and 512GB SSD. This gaming device was priced at $699.99 for these specs, but is now available for just $499.99 on Amazon right now — this slashes 30% off its MSRP and gives you $200 in savings. Although it’s not marked as a Prime Day 2025 item, this is still one of the best prices we’ve seen for the Legion Go, with its all-time low record beating the current price by just $17. Because of this discount, the original Lenovo Legion is now cheaper than the less powerful Legion Go S, armed with an AMD Z2 Go chip, which is around $90 more expensive now at its current $589.99 sale price on Amazon.

• Check out all the gaming laptop deals in Amazon's Prime Day Sale

The biggest advantage the Lenovo Legion Go has over its competitors (primarily the Asus Ally ROG X) is that it has a larger 8.8-inch screen display, making it an ideal alternative for those who prioritize immersion over portability. Aside from that, it comes with two USB-C ports, allowing you to charge the device and connect to an external display simultaneously. Its detachable controllers (one of which converts into a mouse for FPS gaming) mean that you don’t need to bring an additional controller with you for large-screen gaming, making it the perfect device if you like playing your favorite titles on your hotel room TV after a long day sightseeing.

If you want more graphics performance, both USB-C ports are USB4 and are compatible with Thunderbolt 3/4 enclosures. You can also get the Lenovo Legion Go bundled with a USB-C hub if you want to turn it into a gaming PC or workstation when you’re at home.

Although not the latest and greatest in gaming handhelds, the Lenovo Legion Go is a pretty compelling offer for just $499. It can be a bit more affordable, but the last time it hit its all-time low price was months ago — around December last year. So, if you’re not willing to wait for the holiday season to get your hands on a decent gaming console, now is the time to get the Legion Go.

We are working hard to find the best computer hardware deals for you this Amazon Prime Day. We cover the hottest deals in real-time at our Best Amazon Prime Day Deals Live page. If you're looking for more savings, check out our Amazon Prime Day deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, or CPU Deals pages.

Digging through some old boxes in our lab, I came across something I didn't know we still had: a Lenovo ThinkPad T570 from 2017, adorned with an IT inventory sticker from Tom's Hardware's prior corporate owner (well, before it rebranded), and a broken screen.

It has an Intel Core i5-7300U, 8GB of RAM, a 256GB SSD, and, perhaps most importantly, a hot-swappable 24 WHr lithium-ion battery. We used to use this system for display testing.

Posting my find in our Slack chat led to a ton of nostalgia (did you know you can have nostalgia for something less than a decade old? Ends up you can!).

"Removable battery?" asked monitor editor Brandon Hill. "What year is this??? "

"Dual batteries in a Thinkpad [sic], those were the days!" Linux guru Les Pounder opined.

"I miss them," Editor-in-Chief Paul Alcorn wrote. " I had a ThinkPad and carried three batteries with me to events. For like 5 years!"

They are right—— these hot-swappable batteries were awesome. But they don't need to come back.

Relegated to specialty laptops

ThinkPads weren't the only laptops with hot-swappable batteries, but they surely popularized the idea. Road warriors could keep their spreadsheets blazing by turning the laptop over, pulling two switches, popping out a battery, and plopping in a new one that would feel like part of the chassis. There were even bigger, extended batteries that jutted out to provide more longevity. A smaller battery inside the laptop would keep running while you performed the swap, so you didn't lose any work.

When Paul says he had three batteries, I know he's telling the truth because I sat next to him at trade shows where he fumbled in his bag for extended cells.

I, too, waxed nostalgic for a bit. Today, these types of batteries are largely limited to rugged laptops, like the Dell Pro Rugged line, Panasonic Toughbooks, or anything from Getac. You know, the types of laptops you'd find on a construction site or in a cop car. Years ago, I may have suggested that this type of battery was important for repairability.

But then, when I plugged in the old T570, I didn't use the ThinkPad's dedicated charger. I didn't look around to see if we had another hot-swappable battery. I used USB Type-C.

USB Type-C has made backup batteries universal

And while the rest of my team might wax nostalgic for these batteries, I don't. At the time, they made a ton of sense, but USB-C has created a ton of affordable external batteries that can be plugged into any laptop.

No, it's not as sleek to have a cable attach a portable battery to a laptop. But that portable battery can charge any laptop because they don't have proprietary shapes to fit into a specific chassis. That means that I can take my external battery and use it across multiple laptops. I can give it to friends, family, or colleagues who use different laptops. And they can charge my phone, too.

I also realized I don't need battery top-offs as often as I used to. In the last few years, chips (especially those based on ARM) have gotten far more efficient, and components like OLED screens that guzzled battery life are a bit more under control. I'll never ding anyone for giving me an option for high-capacity batteries to top off in an emergency or low-power LCD displays. But in the last few years, I've found myself scrambling to plug in less often than I used to.

Internal batteries should still be repairable

That being said, internal battery repair still matters. In fact, if any company wants to bring back the hot-swappable battery bay to thinner laptops, it should be explicitly in that effort. No one should ever have to rely exclusively on external batteries. I long for how easily the battery came out of my early 2008 white plastic MacBook without removing the rest of the case.

Every internal laptop battery should be user replaceable. Every manufacturer should sell aftermarket batteries. The USB-C batteries don't change that.

But living in 2025, it's tough for me to get nostalgic about external batteries that were proprietary to any laptop or brand. USB-C has a ton of problems, but one thing it has done right is enabled an ecosystem of batteries and chargers.

So my colleagues can look through rose-colored glasses at the past. I'm just glad I can use whatever battery I want to top off my devices.

Every now and again, a tech deal can really change your life in a very immediate and critical way. That happened to me just this weekend ,when I purchased the Lenovo M9 tablet at Best Buy for $79 and gave it to my six year old daughter.

For months, I had been pushing aside a growing problem. My daughter loves watching videos on YouTube Kids, but she can't run the YouTube or YouTube Kids apps on her Amazon Fire for Kids tablet.

So my daughter would frequently come to me and ask to borrow my phone so she could run those apps. Being a doting dad and a sucker, I let her borrow my phone and she even learned how to unlock it herself and launch the apps.

However, lending your phone to a kid is not without its issues. And here's where the problems started.

I missed a lot of alerts on text messaging apps, including Slack, which I use for work. My daughter would bring me the phone if I was getting a call, but she would just swipe away notifications if they appeared while she was using my handset.

I ended up late to get some messages and this became more and more of a problem. But I didn't want so spend a lot of money just so my daughter could watch YouTube Kids. Then I saw a sale.

The Lenovo M9 tablet is now just $79 at Best Buy. This 9-inch tablet is has a 1340 x 800 resolution screen, a MediaTek Helio G80 processor with 8 cores, 3GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage. It charges over USB-C and seems to have a long battery life.

The M9 is not an Android tablet that runs standard Google apps such as YouTube and YouTube kids. Unlike many Android tablets, it has Google Kids Space that provides a custom child-friendly UI with parental controls baked in.

I bought the tablet via Best Buy's in-store pickup so I could get it in time for the weekend.

So my daughter got a tablet that is kid-safe, she gets to watch her favorite videos and I got my phone back so I can get alerts from work right away. It's a win-win for $79. The tablet seems light, bright and fast enough for what she's doing with it.

Whether you're shopping for a kid or an adult, this $79 Lenovo M9 deal is hard to beat.

The export tariffs enacted in April are expected to raise retail prices by 11% to 70% across different categories, cut consumer spending by $123 billion annually, and shrink U.S. economic output by $69 billion, according to a report by Trade Partnership Worldwide (TPW), published by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) on Wednesday.

There are a couple of catches: the report, which evaluates how recent U.S. tariffs will affect prices of 10 widely used technology products in the U.S., assumes that all tariffs will come into effect, and that there will be full pass through to retail buyers.

On April 2, the Trump administration introduced a tariff program under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act that included a 10% general rate on all imports and increased rates for 57 countries by between 11% and 50%. A 10% universal tariff went into effect on April 5, while higher rates were applied to specific countries starting April 9.

A pause was placed on the elevated country-specific tariffs on April 10, though the baseline 10% tariff remained. On April 11, electronics and semiconductor-based products were temporarily spared from these new tariffs, but a Section 232 probe into the broader electronics supply chain launched on April 16 brought renewed tariff risks, with early 25% duties already applied to materials such as aluminum and steel, as well as vehicles. Perhaps most importantly, tariffs on goods from China (except electronics) surged to 145%.

The TPW study modeled a scenario where the 90-day hold on tariffs ends in July, and higher rates resume on affected goods. Products not complying with the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) trade rules would face stacking tariffs (i.e., up to 50%), whereas Chinese goods could be hit with combined rates of 145%. The analysis covered batteries, client PCs (desktops and laptops), displays, game consoles, tablets, TVs, headphones, and various computer accessories.

Game consoles and PCs

Game consoles face the steepest projected increase, with average tariffs climbing from 0% to 130%. Because 87% of these devices come from China, which would be subjected to a 145% rate, prices could rise by as much as 69%, or $428 more per unit, the report says. As a result, imports could fall 71%, and domestic production, which makes up only 1% of the market, would rise by just 62%. Consumers are expected to cut back purchases by 73%, resulting in a $12 billion drop in their overall purchasing power. The U.S. economy would lose $10.4 billion annually from this single category alone.

Laptops and tablets are projected to become 34% more expensive. For now, these items are exempt from country specific tariffs, but they could still be taxed under the Section 232 review. Nearly 79% of laptops and tablets are made in China and for now there are no manufacturing capacity in the U.S. to replace gigantic assembly facilities in China.

As a result, TPW expects average price hikes of up to $269 for laptops and $152 for tablets. Imports would decline 47%, while domestic output would increase only 5%. The result would be a $23.8 billion annual loss in consumer spending power and a $12.3 billion reduction in GDP.

Desktop computers are largely sourced from Mexico and other countries rather than China, but they would face a price hike from 0.3% to 42.3% because of tariffs. With limited U.S. production capacity (under 9% growth expected), prices could increase by 24%, adding about $287 to the average retail cost of $1,193. Imports are forecast to drop 53%, and consumption by 42%. The result would be a $13 billion loss for consumers and a $5.1 billion hit to GDP.

TPW did not conduct a research on how tariffs affect computer components. For now, these items are exempt from country specific tariffs, but they could still be taxed under the Section 232 review. However, if graphics cards and motherboards continue to be sourced from China and are not exempt from tariffs at some point, they are are subject to combined U.S. tariffs reaching up to 145% or more — similar to those applied to other China-made tech products such as game consoles and computer accessories. This could raise the retail price of a $500 graphics card to over $1,200 and a $200 motherboard to nearly $500 — assuming full cost pass-through. Given China's dominant role in assembling these components, short-term diversification of supply is limited, meaning most of the tariff burden will fall directly on U.S. consumers. As a result, PC builders and gamers would face significantly higher costs, potentially delaying upgrades or reducing demand across the DIY computing sector.

Taiwan-made graphics cards and motherboards would also face substantial price increases, though less severe than China-made ones, depending on how tariffs are applied. If they do not qualify for duty-free treatment under the USMCA and are not explicitly exempted, they may face a 25% tariff and a 25% Section 232 tariff (if electronics and semiconductors are included), totaling a potential 50% tariff (as these tariffs stack).

This would increase a $500 graphics card from Taiwan to around $750, and a $200 motherboard to $300, assuming full pass-through. Since Taiwan is a major supplier of high-end motherboards and graphics cards, the impact would still be significant but not as extreme as for Chinese products. U.S. buyers would still see elevated prices, but these goods may become more attractive relative to China-made ones, depending on how the final tariffs end up stacking. But can Taiwan satisfy the needs of the U.S. market?

Displays and TVs

Displays are 67% sourced from China, so they would be hit with average tariffs of 43.3% (10 to 25% on all imports and 45% to 145% Chinese imports, so the average is 43.3%) or more, up from 0.5%, raising prices by 32% or $111 per unit. Imports would fall by 48%, and U.S. production would rise by only 10%. This category alone could lead to $5.1 billion in lost consumer power and a $2.8 billion economic decline.

Unlike computer monitors, TVs are largely sourced from outside of China, but they would still see tariffs increase to 22.4% from 1.6%, raising average prices by 11% — or $57 per unit. Imports would decline by 15%, domestic output would rise only 2%, and the resulting loss in consumer spending power would be $1.9 billion, with a $1.6 billion GDP reduction, according to TPW.

Mobile electronics and accessories

As 78% of smartphones are imported from China, they are projected to face a 39.5% average tariff rate under the combined measures. This could push up consumer prices by about 31%, or $255 more than the current average of $826. The absence of domestic production means alternative supply will be difficult to secure quickly. Imports are projected to drop by 48%, and purchases are expected to fall by the same amount. As a consequence, this shift would erase $31.2 billion in spending power and lead to a $17.9 billion economic loss, TPW believes.

Connected devices, including smart speakers, smart watches, wearables, and Wi-Fi-connected gadgets, would become 22% more expensive, according to the report. While countries like Vietnam have been gradually increasing production of devices such as Apple's AirPods in the recent years, Chinese companies still produce a substantial share of these items. Consequently, TPW says import reductions of 40% are likely, with a 6% increase in U.S. production. Consumers would pay $81 more for smartwatches, $20 more for fitness bands, and $10 more for speakers. Total loss in consumer power would reach $18.3 billion, and economic output would contract by $7.8 billion.

Speakers and headphones, around half of which come from China, would face 86.6% average tariffs, up from 0.9%, raising prices by 22%, according to TPW. Headphones would cost $5 more, speakers $60 more. Imports from China would drop 99.8%, and total imports would shrink by two-thirds. Production in America would grow by 24%, while consumption would fall 39%, yielding a $2.5 billion reduction in consumer power and a $1.5 billion GDP loss.

Computer accessories like keyboards, printers, mice, and docks would see prices rise by 25%, with average tariffs moving from 1.5% to 39.5%, TPW believes. Imports would drop nearly in half, and production in the U.S. would climb by just 12%. Printers could cost $58 more, and the total reduction in consumer buying power is projected at $13.1 billion. The broader economy would contract by $7.6 billion.

Finally, lithium-ion batteries for consumer electronics, most of which come from China, would see tariffs rise from 5.9% to 117.7% — raising prices by nearly 18%. Imports would fall 71%, and local production would grow by 16% at best. Prices would rise up to $16 per unit, causing a $2.4 billion loss in consumer power and a $2.0 billion impact on GDP.

While the tariffs aim to stimulate U.S. manufacturing, the study shows they'll mainly impact consumers, who will face significantly higher prices amid limited domestic production gains to offset them.

PC makers have been preparing to reduce reliance on hardware produced in China for years, and large computer suppliers like Dell and HP seem to have diversified their supply chains. For smaller system integrators, the situation is more complex.

Recent U.S. government-imposed taxes on Chinese imports are driving up the cost of computer parts and there's only so much they can do. Puget Systems published a blog post explaining that while it can absorb some of the price changes caused by tariffs, it will inevitably have to pass the higher costs on to its clients.

China produces a large portion of global electronics, so its impact on the computer market is hard to overestimate even though large companies like Apple, Dell, and HP are expanding production in other countries — including Vietnam, which isn't subject to U.S. tariffs. In early 2025, two separate 10% taxes were added on nearly all goods made in China — one on February 4, the other on March 4 — resulting in a combined 20% increase.

Additionally, goods that were temporarily exempt from a separate 25% charge set in 2018–2019 may lose that exemption on June 1, potentially bringing the total increase to 45% for some items, such as the best graphics cards.

"We absorb initial cost changes on many components," wrote Jon Bach, president of Puget Systems, in the blog post. "We adjust our pricing when ongoing long-term costs are clear, and absorb differences otherwise. This reduces noise and prevents us from making many nickel-and-dime changes."

Starting April 1, Puget Systems will adjust pricing based on updated component costs. Graphics cards and accelerators, due to their high cost, are being hit hardest — prices are going up by 10%, despite already being under a 20% tariff. That rate could jump to 45% on June 1, pending policy changes, Puget warns.

Puget also warns that parts like graphics cards can be expensive to buy at launch due to shortages. When combined with additional tariffs imposed by the U.S. government, graphics cards may get too expensive for many potential buyers.

Network and storage controllers are increasing by 20%, along with chassis and power supplies, as these are generally produced in China. CPU coolers and fans are also expected to rise around 20%, though their overall impact on system pricing is minimal.

For motherboards, initial changes will be held off, as parts come from various countries and it is still unclear how original design manufacturers will handle pricing under the new tariffs, so any adjustments will depend on how costs evolve. CPUs remain unaffected since most are not sourced from China.

SSDs and hard drives are seeing about a 10% price increase, mainly due to shifts in the broader supply network rather than tariffs on core components like NAND chips or media platters. Memory is also expected to rise around 10%, though recent spot market price drops may reduce the impact.

Costs for Puget's own services, such as warranties, will remain at the existing level as the company only changes in response to internal business expenses, typically tied to inflation and staffing.

In addition, some suppliers have raised prices more than necessary, using uncertainty as a reason to drive urgency and increase revenue. This kind of behavior is not limited to one industry and affects prices throughout the entire supply chain. Because the supply network is so layered, predicting costs can be difficult.

There's hope for some future relief if suppliers reduce prices, and those savings would be passed on. But that's something that would happen at a future date. In the meantime, Puget Systems stockpiles hardware, which helps to manage shortages and delay price hikes.

In addition, great relationship with suppliers and manufacturing partners also help: Puget can often get information about upcoming changes straight from the source and prepare.

But there's only so far such measures can reach, and with how quickly everything is changing, eventually Puget will be paying higher costs. At that point, it will need to pass those costs along to its customers. For now, Puget encourages customers to share their upcoming needs, make purchases early if possible, and factor possible price jumps into their budgets.

Update 5/10/2024: The source report originally stated that Lenovo planned to move all PC production to India. However, that article was amended to reflect that Lenovo is only increasing PC production in India to serve the local market. Lenovo plans to produce all PCs for the Indian market in the country within the next three years. Lenovo's other operations remain unimpacted. We have corrected the article below accordingly.

Lenovo is expanding its PC manufacturing in India over the next three years, the company announced at Tech World India 2025, and is preparing to do the same for its AI GPU servers in Pondicherry, India.

According to a DigiTimes Asia report detailing the news, Lenovo has produced 12 million units in India and plans to increase that to nearly 17 million to meet incoming domestic and international demand. Lenovo says it now manufactures about 30% of the PCs sold in India inside the country, with plans to expand that to 50% next year and 100% in three years. 

The company's plans to produce 100% of its PC products for the Indian market in India within the next three years require a local supply chain. Lenovo's far-flung operations in other parts of the globe include 30+ manufacturing sites, like China, Brazil, Germany, Japan, Mexico, and the US, among many others. Those operations remain unimpacted by the increased production in India. 

IDC has revised its expectations for the personal computer market, lowering its forecast for 2025 and beyond due to U.S. tariffs on China-made goods and reduced consumer demand. But the PC industry has tailwinds as well as headwinds, so sales of PCs will increase in 2025 compared to the prior year.

Global PC shipments are now projected to reach 273 million next year, growing 3.7% from 2024 — slightly less than previously estimated by IDC. PC growth is expected to slow further, remaining under 1% annually through 2029. On the other hand, workstations are expected to maintain steady demand. PC makers pin their hopes on AI-powered PCs, yet the category has struggled to gain traction so far; IDC expects to see stronger adoption by 2026 as the technology matures and the ecosystem around them improves.

Sales of tablets are projected to struggle, with shipments predicted to drop 0.8% in 2025 to 143.3 million and gradually decline to 141.6 million by the end of the decade mainly due to market saturation among consumers.

"Price hikes stemming from tariffs in the US combined with subdued demand are leading to a negative impact within the largest market for PCs," said Jitesh Ubrani, research manager with IDC's Worldwide Mobile Device Trackers. "However, the weakness amongst consumer demand is universal as macro issues persist. There are still some silver linings though: workstation volume should remain healthy, along with near-term tablet demand in China boosted by consumer subsidies."

Consumer PC and tablets shipments are set to rise slightly by 0.2% in 2025, totaling 236.7 million units, but demand remains weak due to price hikes in the U.S. linked to tariffs as well as economic conditions in the rest of the world.

Meanwhile, the commercial sector — excluding education — will expand to 138 million PC and tablet units, or by 4.3%, in 2025 (possibly driven by the end of Windows 10 support) and maintain modest long-term growth at 0.8% annually. IDC notes that while the transition to Windows 11 is influencing purchasing decisions, budget constraints may push some businesses to rely on extended Windows 10 support instead.

The education segment, which will initially grow to 41.7 million PCs and tablets this year, or by 6.7%, is expected to shrink in the long run, with a compound annual decline of 2.1%.

Japan stands out as one of the few regions experiencing strong growth, as companies and smaller businesses are quickly replacing older systems before Windows 10 support ends in October. While expansion is set to slow after this surge, an ongoing education-sector initiative is expected to provide continued support for the market, according to IDC.

"In light of so many challenges around the world, Japan is a much-needed source of double-digit growth this year. Enterprises there as well as SMBs have been quickly replacing PCs in advance of the Windows 10 End Of Service in October," says Bryan Ma, vice president of Devices Research. "Growth rates naturally come down next year, but at least there is still a large education project to absorb some of the landing."

Lenovo is set to unveil a series of new devices at the upcoming Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2025, with the ThinkBook Flip AI PC emerging as a standout. Renowned leaker Evan Blass has shared renders of this upcoming laptop, showcasing a unique rollable and foldable OLED display that reimagines traditional laptop design.

The ThinkBook Flip features a dual-hinge mechanism, allowing the screen to fold outward and effectively double its vertical size when fully rolled out. This design should provide users with an expanded workspace, ideal for multitasking or viewing extensive content without relying on external monitors. When the additional screen space isn't needed, the top half can be folded back, converting the device into a conventional laptop form factor. This flexibility also enables the upper portion to function as a secondary display, facilitating content sharing during presentations or collaborative sessions.

Unlike previous foldable devices such as the ThinkPad X1 Fold, which was essentially a foldable tablet with a Bluetooth keyboard, the ThinkBook Flip comes with a built-in keyboard. The device's minimalist design includes flat edges which should include essential ports like USB Type-C and USB Type-A, although it is not very clear from the leaked renders. Additionally, there is a webcam positioned within a notch at the top of the screen.

While specific hardware specifications remain undisclosed, it is expected that the ThinkBook Flip will be equipped with Intel's forthcoming Arrow Lake-H or Lunar Lake processor options. There is also speculation about potential AMD variants, possibly integrating Strix Point-based Ryzen AI 7 series chips. Essentially, it could end up being a high-performance device catering to both professional and creative users.

Lenovo has been experimenting with foldable and rollable display technologies for some time. At CES (Consumer Electronic Show) last month, the company unveiled the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6, featuring a rollable display that could expand vertically with just the wave of a hand.

Notably, the leaked ThinkBook Flip AI PC aligns with previous reports, which highlighted Lenovo's plans to introduce a range of new devices at MWC 2025. Among the anticipated releases are nine new laptops and a hybrid 2D/3D 34-inch curved monitor.

The monitor, bearing Lenovo's Legion gaming brand, is expected to target professionals and gamers alike, offering a larger alternative to the existing ThinkVision 27 3D. The leaked laptops include models such as the IdeaPad Slim 3x, featuring a 15-inch screen and likely powered by a Snapdragon X chip, and the ThinkPad T14s 2-in-1, marking the first 2-in-1 form factor in Lenovo's flagship ThinkPad T-series.

Other models, like the ThinkBook 14 2-in-1 Gen 5, ThinkBook 16p Gen 5, ThinkPad T14 Gen 6, ThinkPad T16 Gen 4, ThinkPad X13 Gen 6, and the Yoga Pro 9i Aura Edition, are expected to offer incremental upgrades with newer chips and components. Notably, the ThinkPad T14s Gen 6, a 14-inch laptop powered by a Snapdragon X chip.

There’s been a lot of activity in the handheld gaming PC market in the past few years following the introduction of the Valve Steam Deck. Since then, there’ve been interesting alternatives, like the Asus ROG Ally and the Lenovo Legion Go. Thanks to the release of AMD’s new Z2 Go processor based on Zen 3+ architecture, Lenovo has responded by launching the Legion Go S, which makes a clean break from its forebear in design.

You’ll first notice that it no longer apes the Nintendo Switch with detachable controllers. Instead, it features an all-in-one design reminiscent of the ROG Ally and Valve Steam Deck. It also has a smaller display, measuring 8 inches across instead of 8.8 inches.

The Legion Go S remains a relatively heavy and bulky device, even without the mechanisms required to support detachable controllers. Several other regressions compared to its predecessor should also be considered before settling on the Legion Go S as your go-to device for handheld PC gaming.

Design and Comfort of the Lenovo Legion Go S

While they have the same fundamental mission, there are many differences between the Legion Go S and the preceding Legion Go. While the Legion Go is built using a mixture of matte grey aluminum and plastic, the Legion Go S is an all-plastic affair. The chassis is finished in molded white plastic, while the buttons and triggers are all finished in black. The heavy use of plastic imparts a less premium feel than its predecessor, but it’s still a solid and well-built machine.

The curvier design is more comfortable than the Legion Go, which has more of an angular shape. After hours of playing on the Legion Go S and the original Legion Go back-to-back, the former left my hands and fingers less fatigued.

Another difference I noticed immediately is that the Legion Go S no longer includes a built-in kickstand. The kickstand on the Legion Go facilitated propping the system up when using the controllers while detached (like the Nintendo Switch). However, since the controllers are now integrated into the chassis, perhaps Lenovo felt including a kickstand was no longer necessary.

The Legion Go S has also regressed in another way: its display. While its predecessor featured an 8.8-inch 2560 x 1600 display, the Legion Go S shrinks to 8 inches while reducing the maximum resolution to 1920 x 1200. Personally, I’m okay with the size and resolution reductions, as gaming at 2560 x 1600 with the Z1 Extreme and especially the Z2 Go is pushing the limits of usability.

The Legion Go S measures 11.77 x 5.02 x 0.89 inches and weighs 1.61 pounds, while the Legion Go is 11.76 x 5.16 x 1.60 with a weight of 1.88 pounds. For comparison, the Asus ROG Ally is 11.04 x 4.38 x 0.84 inches and 1.34 pounds, while the original Steam Deck is 11.73 x 4.6 x 1.93 inches and 1.47 pounds.

The Legion Go S’ primary controls mimic an Xbox controller, with ABXY buttons on the right side and offset joysticks. There’s also a D-pad below the left joystick and a small touchpad below the right joystick. Four programmable buttons flank the upper portion of the display. The two on the right are quick settings and menu buttons, while the two on the left correspond to Legion Space and view buttons.

You’ll find the usual LB/LT and RB/RT along the top of the Legion Go S, and there are two additional programmable buttons on the back of the unit (Y1 and Y2). The distance that each trigger travels is adjustable using individual dials on the back of the device. There are two USB 4 ports, a 3.5mm headphone jack, volume up/down buttons, and a power button on the top of the Legion Go S, while the bottom is home to a microSD reader.

Lenovo Legion Go S Specifications

Gaming and Graphics on the Lenovo Legion Go S

The Legion Go S uses a new AMD processor: the Z2 Go. In just about every way, this is a downgrade in performance compared to the Z1 Extreme found in the original Legion Go. The Z2 Go uses Zen 3+ architecture and features four cores and eight threads (a 3 GHz base clock with a 4.3 GHz turbo frequency). For comparison, the Z1 Extreme found in the ROG Ally and Legion Go is based on Zen 4 with eight physical cores capable of executing 16 threads. The Z2 Go features an integrated 12-core Radeon 680M GPU versus the 12-core Radeon 780M found in the Z1 Extreme.

The Legion Go S offers four performance profiles that are accessible using the options button: Performance, Efficiency, Custom 1, and Custom 2. When unplugged, I used the default Performance profile, which also uses the Performance profile in Windows 11. For plugged-in tests, I used the Custom 1 profile to adjust the TDP to a maximum of 40 watts.

In general, the Legion Go S is about 10 percent faster than the Legion Go on battery power but anywhere from 10 percent to 20 percent slower than the Legion Go when plugged in and using the 40-watt TDP power profile.

On the Shadow of the Tomb Raider benchmark (Medium settings, DX12), the Legion Go S maintained a roughly 10 percent advantage at 800p and 1200p over the previous Legion Go (43 fps at 800p) while running on battery power. However, when the device was plugged in and made full use of the 40-watt TDP profile, the Legion Go S trailed the Legion Go by 25 percent. Performance while unplugged was also right in line with the Steam Deck.

Switching gears to Cyberpunk 2077 (Steam Deck preset), the Legion Go maintained the status quo on battery power, while giving up significant ground to both the Legion Go and the ROG Ally while plugged in. While those latter two devices maintained 49 fps and 55 fps, respectively, the Legion Go S could only manage 35 fps at 800p and a slide show-esque 18 fps at 1200p.

Forza Horizon 5 (High settings) again saw a significant disparity between the Legion Go S and the Z1 Extreme competition, namely the ROG Ally and the Legion Pro. The Legion Go S maintained a healthy 56 fps at 800p on AC power, but that was a far cry from the Legion Go (75 fps) and the ROG Ally (72 fps).

The Legion Go S maintained over 30 fps regardless of whether it was on AC or battery power at 1200p in Red Dead Redemption 2 (Lowest graphical settings). However, dropping the resolution to 800p while plugged in allowed performance to rise to 52 fps. Still, under the same conditions, the Legion Go led all competitors at 67 fps.

Our final gaming benchmark is Borderlands 3 (Medium graphics settings, DX11), and the delta between the Legion Go S and the Z1 Extreme-equipped competitors tightened up a bit. While plugged in, the Legion Go S maintained 50 fps at 800p and 33 fps at 1200p. The Legion Go, however, managed 60 fps at 800p and 42 fps at 1200p.

Windows 11 on the Lenovo Legion Go S

The Legion Go S comes preinstalled with Windows 11 out of the box, with display scaling set to 200 percent by default at its native 1920 x 1200 resolution. With these settings, the taskbar looks massive, which aids in using the touch screen. However, the taskbar icons are so large that if you have more than one running app, the other open apps are relegated to a separate pop-up menu.

I ran into multiple other problems using the device. The on-screen keyboard would often fail to appear when I needed to input text into an entry field. This happened in apps like Steam and the Epic Games Store. Even more infuriating were instances in the Steam app where I’d click on a text box to type something and the on-screen keyboard would appear and then immediately disappear.

Navigating while using your finger and multi-touch works as expected with the Legion Go S. However, Lenovo also provides a tiny touchpad beneath the right joystick to use as a mouse. It works in a pinch, but I prefer using the touch screen. One quirk that I’ll mention is that using the touchpad in games was a frustrating experience. While I could move the cursor around easily, pressing down on the touchpad to register a click would cause the mouse to veer off course. As a result, I could never hit the target accurately. This annoyance didn’t occur in non-gaming apps.

Another peculiarity with the touchpad is that by default, force feedback is enabled via the Lenovo Space app. That means that whenever you put your finger on the touchpad to move around the screen with the cursor, the whole unit vibrates with a loud, annoying buzz. I navigated into the Legion Space app to find that, by default, touchpad vibration is set to Medium. Although Weak was more tolerable, I turned off the touchpad vibration so I wouldn’t have to deal with it.

One downside to Lenovo’s cost-cutting on the Legion Go S is no kickstand. That means you can’t prop up the device to better use it as a standard Windows 11 PC with a mouse and keyboard.

Legion Space on the Lenovo Legion Go S

Legion Space is an all-encompassing app that gives you direct access to Legion Go S settings, lets you launch games, and provides customization options for the integrated controllers. It is accessible by pressing the Legion Space button to the right of the left joystick. Let's look at each section of the app as it appears (from left to right).

The My tab gives you access to your Lenovo account, while the Store tab lets you buy popular games via Steam, GOG, and Gamesplanet. The Library tab shows currently installed games and apps on your system. The games are presented as large tiles; you can directly launch them from this tab. Lenovo Space pulls your game information from the usual suspects like Steam, Rockstar Games Store, and Epic Games Store.

Perhaps the tab you will use the most is Settings. Front and center are three large dials that display the current fan speed, CPU temperature and frequency, and GPU temperature and utilization. You'll also see VRAM speed and the amount of system memory currently in use.

At the bottom of the screen, you'll find a Performance button, which allows you to adjust the Performance modes (Performance, Power-Saving, Custom 1, and Custom 2), Thermal modes, and fan profiles. Display allows you to adjust the screen brightness, display scaling, and resolution (1280 x 800, 1600 x 1000, and 1920 x 1200), and refresh rate (60 Hz or 120 Hz). There are also buttons to just audio settings and check drive status (and update drivers for the SSD). The Controllers tab allows you to customize the joysticks, change RGB settings, dial in the triggers, and remap buttons.

The Options button brings up a Quick Settings overlay, which gives you access to oft-used settings from Legion Space. You can adjust power modes, fan profiles, display resolution, touchpad settings, rumble settings, and more from here. It's great to have these controls easily accessible via an overlay, even while playing games.

Display on the Legion Go S

Compared to the Legion Go, the new Legion Go S uses a smaller and lower-resolution display. The display is nearly an inch smaller diagonally, now measuring 8 inches instead of 8.8 inches. In addition, the maximum resolution has fallen from 2560 x 1600 to 1920 x 1080. Holding both devices side-by-side, the difference in size wasn’t that much of an issue for me. I’d also say that the resolution downgrade wasn’t as much of a hindrance either, as I primarily played at 1280 x 800 resolution for newer games. Objects on-screen at 800p also looked a tad sharper on the smaller 8-inch display of the Legion Go S.

You’ll still find an IPS display here, which is no match for the infinite contrast of the Steam Deck OLED’s panel, but it’s still quite good. The refresh rate tops out at 120 Hz, down slightly from the 144 Hz maximum possible with the original Legion Go.

I played with the display set to 50 percent brightness to extend my gaming sessions on battery power. Games still looked bright and attractive at this setting, so I didn’t bother venturing higher unless I was plugged in. I’m a big car racing aficionado, so I enjoyed playing Burnout Paradise Remastered, Forza Horizon 5 and Forza Motorsport. The vivid colors of the fictional and real-life tracks looked great, as did the car models in all their photo-realistic glory.

Burnout Paradise Remastered is an ancient (but still enjoyable game), so I could play at 60 with ease at 800p. Even cranking the resolution to 1200p saw 60 fps without issue.

Given the step backward in size and resolution for the panel, we weren’t surprised to also see regressions in color performance with our colorimeter. While still good in this grouping of handheld gaming PCs, the 84.8 percent coverage of DCI-P3 and 119.7 percent coverage of sRGB couldn’t quite keep up with the Legion Go or Steam Deck OLED. However, its performance did surpass the ROG Ally.

We measured 455.5 nits for brightness, which puts it in last place among this group, but not by much. As I mentioned earlier, there’s more than enough brightness for gaming purposes.

Battery Life on the Lenovo Legion Go S

Regarding battery life on handheld gaming PCs, your mileage will greatly vary. Depending on the resolution, refresh rate, and detail settings selected, you can see wide swings in battery life. Things get even more complicated when you start tinkering with power profiles to eke out an extra bit of performance (or battery life).

Our PCMark 10 Gaming suite benchmark showed that the Legion Go S lasted an hour and 42 minutes, 17 minutes less than the Legion Go. In actual games, I played Burnout Paradise Remastered at 1280 x 800 resolution at 60Hz using the Performance profile. After an hour, my battery was down to 40 percent. The system ran out of juice entirely after about an hour and 45 minutes. Switching to the Power-saving profile allowed the game to run for a little over two hours.

Audio on the Lenovo Legion Go S

The speakers on the Legion Go S are decent, and that’s probably good enough for this class of gaming devices. As I skew more towards automotive games, I’m looking to hear raucous engine sounds, squealing tires, and the sounds of metal crunching as I bump (or crash) into other cars.

There was plenty of depth to the engine sounds in games like Forza Horizon 5 and the sound effects of “taking down” cars in Burnout: Paradise was satisfying to my ears. Although I don’t imagine using the Legion Go S as a music-listening device, it did well handling tunes like Guster’s “Center of Attention” with its prominent drum beats and keyboard riffs.

However, I spent most of my time playing the Legion Go S with a pair of headphones on to keep me fully immersed in the action.

Upgradeability of the Legion Go S

Cracking the chassis open on the Legion Go S wasn’t difficult, but it was a little nerve-racking. Three screws on the bottom edge must first be removed. Next, the top black plastic panel piece covering the power button, volume buttons, and USB-C ports can be pried off with a plastic spudger tool. Then, you’ll have to remove another central screw and then two more screws that keep the triggers in place. Carefully remove the triggers without breaking the retaining clips, and then pry off the back panel. You will now have access to the interior of the chassis.

After all that work, you can access the M.2 slot, which accepts 2242 or 2280 SSDs. This is a huge advantage for gamers who want more options when upgrading storage, as 2280 options are more plentiful than 2242 SSDs. Our slot was prepopulated with a 1TB Micron 2280 PCIe 4.0 SSD. That’s about all there is to say about physical upgrades, although you can likely replace the battery when the need arises.

Heat on the Lenovo Legion Go S

One benefit of the redesigned chassis is that the Legion Go S never felt too hot to handle during gaming sessions. The console is designed to inhale air through the back of the chassis and then exhale it at the top. The fans were audible in Performance mode while gaming, but the sound wasn’t objectionable. Cranking the speakers to a reasonable volume was enough to cancel the fan noise.

While playing Forza Horizon 5, Legion Space reported that the Z2 Go CPU and Radeon 680M GPU ran at 55 degrees Celsius (131 degrees Fahrenheit).

Lenovo Legion Go S Configurations

The Lenovo Go S costs $729.99, and that configuration gets you an 120Hz 8-inch 1920 x 1200 IPS display, 32GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. Currently, this is the only version that’s available to purchase. However, Lenovo will make available a much cheaper version priced at $499. To achieve that lower price point, this version of the Legion Go S will run SteamOS and will feature 16GB of RAM along with a 512GB SSD.

Lenovo gives the Legion Go S a one-year manufacturer warranty.

Bottom Line

It’s hard to recommend the Lenovo Legion Go S in its current state. On battery power, the Legion Go S is around the same speed or slightly faster than the Legion Go. However, when you crank up the power profile to obtain peak performance, the Legion Go S is up to 20 percent slower than the Legion Go.

By going with an all-in-one design without detachable controllers, the Legion Go S is slightly lighter and more comfortable than the Legion Go. However, you lose the versatility of having detachable controllers and the built-in kickstand. The Legion Go S also has a smaller, slower, lower-resolution display that isn’t as bright or as colorful.

Perhaps the most damning criticism, however, is pricing. The Legion Go S is priced at $729 configured with 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD. The Legion Go with 16GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD is $749. With only a $20 differential between the two, I find it hard to recommend the Legion Go S in its current form. Perhaps if it were priced close to $600, it’d be a better bargain. But for now, I think you should wait for the incoming $499 SteamOS version, which will land in the spring.

Hardware leaker Evan Blass just shared alleged photos of Lenovo’s lineup for the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2025 show, which will run from March 3 to 6. The X (formerly Twitter) post shows off nine new laptops and a 3D curved monitor. We’re unsure if this will be the complete roster of products the company will bring to Barcelona, but it does show off some attractive laptop models and a monitor that we haven’t seen before.

The biggest thing that caught our eye is the supposedly hybrid 2D/3D 34-inch curved monitor. This is similar to Lenovo’s already existing ThinkVision 27 3D, which is a glasses-free 2D/3D compatible display, but offers a larger curved screen. It’s likely focused on professionals who are also into gaming, especially as this display sports the company’s Legion gaming brand. However, we don’t have further information about this display, so we’ll have to wait until March to get its specifications.

Aside from that, we also get two new laptop models and a slew of next-generation iterations of existing options. For the former, we see the IdeaPad Slim 3x, which features a 15-inch screen and will likely run on a Snapdragon X chip, and the ThinkPad T14s 2-in-1, which will be the first time that Lenovo’s flagship ThinkPad T-series will have a 2-in-1 form factor laptop.

As for the latter, we see the ThinkBook 14 2-in-1 Gen 5, ThinkBook 16p Gen 5, ThinkPad T14 Gen 6, ThinkPad T16 Gen 4, ThinkPad X13 Gen 6, and the Yoga Pro 9i Aura Edition, which are mostly incremental upgrades featuring newer chips and components versus predecessors. Lenovo will also apparently showcase the ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 at MWC — a 14-inch laptop powered by a Snapdragon X chip — that’s already available on its website.

Lenovo has an extensive laptop lineup, and it is also at the forefront of innovation. For example, it offers a ton of 2-in-1 laptop models, giving users the best of both worlds. It also introduced a laptop with a 14-inch display that expands to 16.7 inches with its rollable OLED screen. Aside from these laptops, the company launched two new mini-PCs at CES 2025 powered by Snapdragon X chips, sounding out the market for equipping this relatively powerful laptop processor in a small desktop PC.

If you’ve read my latest monitor reviews, you can see that I’m addicted to OLED panels. Their gaming performance and image quality are simply on another level. However, I also understand that many users don’t want to spend $650 or more on a 27-inch display for one of the best OLED gaming monitors. So, it is fortunate that I am also addicted to finding value.

Lenovo caters to the bang-for-the-buck crowd with its products, which nearly always deliver high performance and quality at a reasonable cost. The best way to save money when building a gaming rig is to embrace FHD 1920x1080 resolution, which leads to high frame rates and low input lag.

A perfect example is the Legion R27fc-30. It’s a 27-inch VA curved panel with 280 Hz, Adaptive-Sync, HDR and wide gamut color. Let’s take a look.

Lenovo Legion R27fc-30 Specs

The qualifier here is the R27fc-30’s low price. At this writing, it sells for around $195, or about a quarter of the cost of a premium OLED. Resolution is FHD 1920x1080 and the native refresh rate is 240 Hz with a 280 Hz overclock available. It’s certified for FreeSync and runs G-Sync without issue, but it is not currently certified by Nvidia. A precise overdrive delivers smooth motion almost completely free of blur at 280fps. And that framerate won’t require a $1,500 video card to achieve.

The R27fc-30 is unusual in that it’s curved with a 1500R radius. Curved 16:9 monitors are somewhat rare, but they offer the same screen area as a flat monitor with slightly less width. I use a 32-inch curved screen and by bringing the sides closer to the center, I can see more of the desktop without moving my head or eyes’ focus point.

The panel is of the Vertical Alignment (VA) type, with a claimed 3,000:1 contrast. My R27fc-30 sample measured better, with over 4,500:1, thanks to excellent black levels, which give the image a lot of texture and depth. You also get a wide color gamut, with over 85% coverage of DCI-P3. HDR10 is supported, with peak white levels over 407 nits and decent dynamic range. Color accuracy is firmly in the calibration-not-needed category, with excellent out-of-box measurements that stick close to established standards.

The R27fc-30’s gaming experience is good, supported by an excellent overdrive and a 280 Hz overclock. The only bummer is that the overclock stays engaged for just 30 minutes before reverting back to 240 Hz. I’ve seen this on every overclocked Lenovo monitor recently, and it is annoying, to say the least. With a short black screen delay, it will switch back, right in the middle of a frag session.

Build quality and styling are not short-changed here. The stand is a solid affair with industrial styling and blue accents. There are no LED lights, but you get a decent pair of internal speakers. Another sacrifice at the altar of value is USB ports, they’re missing as well.

For less than $200, the R27fc-30 rocks the price/performance ratio. As you’ll soon see, it delivers remarkable performance in all areas important to gaming.

Assembly and Accessories

Lenovo embraces the current trend towards recyclable packaging with the R27fc-30’s contents well protected by molded pulp and a little flexible foam supporting the curved panel. You won’t need tools to assemble it, but the panel attaches to the stand with four large thumbscrews which you’ll need to fish out of the accessory bag. That bag also contains an IEC power cord and a DisplayPort cable.

Product 360

The R27fc-30 is simply styled and matches the aesthetic of other Legion series products I’ve reviewed. The panel has smooth areas unblemished by sculpting or other molded-in features. It says Lenovo on the front trim and Legion on the back in screened-on lettering. A small LED shows the power status at the lower right while the control keys and joystick are in the back.

The stand is where most of the Lenovo specific styling cues appear. There’s a honeycomb pattern on the back of the upright, and the base is a triangular lattice that looks like framing for a commercial building. A bit of blue lines the cable hole and the edges are finished in a polished black. A metal Lenovo badge appears on the base in view of the user. Ergonomics include 5/22 degrees tilt, 30 degrees swivel, and a 5.3-inch height adjustment. Unusually for a curved screen, you get a 90-degree portrait mode.

The inputs are labeled with tiny white letters and include a DisplayPort 1.4, and two HDMI 2.1 along with a 3.5mm headphone jack. The internal speakers play politely while consuming three watts apiece. There are no USB ports nor is there any LED lighting.

OSD Features

Pressing the R27fc-30’s joystick brings up a well-organized OSD with five sub-menus. The joystick covers all monitor functions, but two additional keys take you straight to the input selector or Game Settings menu.

The first menu is Game Settings, and it has everything related to video processing, along with a selection of seven picture modes. Standard works well for all content and includes calibration controls which you’ll find in the Color settings menu.

Video processing options include an excellent overdrive that removes almost all motion blur on its third level. You can run level four if you engage the 280 Hz overclock. The caveat is that the R27fc-30 will revert to 240 Hz after 30 minutes to maintain stability. Given my experience with overclocked monitors, this is unnecessary. I have yet to find a single one that would not run reliably for hours at a time. If you are a fan of backlight strobing as an alternative to Adaptive-Sync, the R27fc-30 includes MPRT. It is only on or off so there are no pulse width adjustments. It cuts brightness by around 40% and has an obvious phasing artifact that in my tests rendered it useless. I much preferred G-Sync with overdrive at 240 and 280 fps. The only other gaming aid is a frame rate counter; there are no aiming points or sniper modes.

You can calibrate the R27fc-30 with a set of RGB sliders and gamma presets. Instead of power values like 2.2, it shows offsets. In my tests, Default was the best setting. If you want to select an sRGB color gamut, that option appears in the color temperatures. It is reasonably accurate but does not allow for adjustments outside of brightness.

Lenovo Legion R27fc-30 Calibration Settings

The R27fc-30 can be enjoyed without calibration, but a few tweaks to the RGB sliders make a tiny improvement. I recommend the default Standard mode for all SDR content. HDR engages when set to Auto, and it has no image adjustment options. An sRGB gamut option appears in the color temperatures, and it is fairly close to the mark with just a bit of bonus red and blue. The native gamut is very colorful and covers just over 85% of DCI-P3. My recommended SDR settings are below.

Gaming and Hands-on

Most concerns about budget monitors center around resolution, and in the R27fc-30’s case, I can relieve any worries. FHD at 27 inches is 82 ppi, which doesn’t seem like a lot, but honestly, it doesn’t make as much difference as you’d think. Textured objects are well rendered with clear and fine detail, and distant elements are crisp and clean. Once the action reaches high intensity, the difference is even smaller because the R27fc-30’s motion resolution is superb.

I found the need to switch back to 280 Hz every half hour annoying, but at least I could do it without exiting Doom Eternal. A few times, while in the midst of battle, the screen went black for two seconds, which was inconvenient. But then I could hit pause and switch back to the overclock. This is a feature that Lenovo could get rid of or at least give users the choice to disable.

Aside from that, the R27fc-30’s gaming feel is superb. Motion blur is barely visible, and the overdrive has no artifacts. MPRT is less clean though with phasing and a brightness reduction that has no adjustment. Pulse width would be a nice choice to add. But the combination of 280 Hz, overdrive and Adaptive-Sync is a winner. I enjoyed precision aiming, well-managed movement and easy avoidance of incoming fire. Run and gun maneuvers were simple to achieve, and I was always able to put my targets within the game-provided reticle. I noticed the lack of aiming points and sniper aids but that wasn’t a deal-breaker.

For day-to-day work, the R27fc-30 is well-suited. 27 inches is an ideal size and is the largest screen I’d use in FHD resolution. I didn’t notice the dot structure mainly thanks to the extremely tight pixel gaps. Even when viewed closely, I had a hard time seeing individual pixels. The picture is further enhanced by excellent contrast and vivid accurate color. It was nice to have a usable sRGB mode available as well.

Takeaway: In the sub-$200 genre, the R27fc-30 among the best. It delivers superb gaming in casual and intense titles alike. Precise video processing means a smooth-moving image with almost no blur. The overclock that only lasts 30 minutes is a pain but it’s easy to reengage without exiting the game. Overall, the R27fc-30 is a supremely capable monitor that has excellent gaming performance for the money.

I’ve rounded up a group of speedy FHD displays to compare the R27fc-30’s performance. They are Lenovo’s R25f-30, BenQ’s XL2566+, Gigabyte’s GS27FA and GS27FC and AOC’s 27G15. Refresh rates range from 180 to 400 Hz.

Pixel Response and Input Lag

Click here to read up on our pixel response and input lag testing procedures.

Response and lag numbers don’t always go hand-in-hand with refresh rates. In this group, the BenQ and Lenovos sit atop the response chart at three and four milliseconds respectively. But the Gigabyte GS27FA’s 190 Hz doesn’t give it an advantage. 280 Hz means that you’ll see almost no motion blur even without overdrive. The R27fc-30 has a very good one, so it has very smooth operation at both 240 and 280 Hz.

It also excels in the lag test, posting 20ms of total delay. That’s only 1ms slower than the 400 Hz BenQ, which is certainly impressive. However, the 25-inch Lenovo R25f-30 is the most impressive, at 18ms. Is it worth giving up 2ms for a larger screen? For all but the most skilled gamers, I’d say yes. The R27fc-30 is one of the quicker monitors I’ve seen for less than $200.

Test Takeaway: The R27fc-30’s gaming performance is well above the norm for inexpensive screens. 20ms of total lag is among the best I’ve recorded overall, without reference to price, refresh rate or screen technology. If you’re looking for a competition-ready display for less than $200, the R27fc-30 is a serious contender.

Viewing Angles

The R27fc-30 delivers viewing angles typical of the VA screens I’ve tested. At 45 degrees to the sides, the image has a green/red tone with slightly reduced gamma and a 30% reduction in brightness. It’s just as well that few users will be sharing a 27-inch screen. The top view is very dim with the same color shift and 50% less light output.

Screen Uniformity

To learn how we measure screen uniformity, click here.

My R27fc-30 sample showed exceptional screen uniformity with just a 4.72% deviation from the center zone. That is well below the visible threshold. It means you can’t see any glow or bleed, just even tones from edge to edge. I saw no variation in other brightness levels or in any color patterns either.

To read about our monitor tests in-depth, please check out Display Testing Explained: How We Test PC Monitors. We cover brightness and contrast testing on page two.

Uncalibrated – Maximum Backlight Level

Lenovo claims 350 nits for the R27fc-30 and my sample exceeded that with 365 nits of peak brightness. That’s about average for the category where most screens max out between 300 and 350. There is more than enough light for any indoor environment, but you’ll want to avoid the sunniest windows for optimal image quality.

The R27fc-30 takes the win for contrast with excellent black levels and a 4,537.2:1 static ratio. LCDs don’t get much better than that. Only an OLED has more dynamic range. This is excellent performance.

After Calibration to 200 nits

Calibration adds a few points to the contrast value which is now at 4,556.8:1. The R27fc-30’s excellent black levels are the reason for this. It even manages to outdistance its stablemate R25f-30. The GS27FC and 27G15 come close but for ultimate contrast, I’d pick the R27fc-30.

It also wins the ANSI test, which is a little more like real-world content. 3,730.4:1 is one of the best scores I’ve recorded. The R27fc-30 is only exceeded by a few VA screens and any OLED display.

Test Takeaway: The R27fc-30 puts down some of the best LCD contrast numbers I’ve seen of late. With over 4,500:1 static and more than 3,700:1 intra-image, it delivers a deeply vibrant image with convincing blacks and bright highlights. For less than $200, it doesn’t really get better than this.

The R27fc-30 doesn’t sacrifice color accuracy for cost. It can be used without calibration if you prefer to just set brightness to taste. Stick to the Standard mode for all content. And if you need sRGB, that choice is in the color temp menu.

Grayscale and Gamma Tracking

Our grayscale and gamma tests use Calman calibration software from Portrait Displays. We describe our grayscale and gamma tests in detail here.

The R27fc-30’s first chart shows no visible grayscale errors. The 100% point comes close to the threshold but doesn’t pass 3dE. And the remaining values are all less than 2dE. Gamma tracks just under the 2.2 line with slight dips (too light) at 10 and 90%. These errors are nearly impossible to see in actual content.

Calibration further reduces grayscale errors and tightens gamma at the 90% point. This gives bright highlights a little more detail. You might see a few light spots in shadow areas but from a gaming standpoint, that just means it’ll be a little easier to see in the dark. These are minor nitpicks at best. This is excellent performance.

sRGB grayscale tracking is also without visible error and the gamma tracks similarly with a dip at 10% brightness. If you’re using the R27fc-30 to color grade, the sRGB option is completely usable.

Comparisons

The R27fc-30’s 1.19dE default grayscale error is an excellent result. It’s well below the visible threshold so you can forgo calibration if you wish. A few tweaks of the RGB sliders bring the error lower to 0.62dE, enough to win the day. With calibration, none of the monitors have visible errors, so A/B comparisons are a wash.

The R27fc-30 has very small gamma errors, which contribute to its value range of 0.15. However, it is closer to the 2.2 standard than the others. As I said, these are minor issues that have no significant impact on image quality.

Color Gamut Accuracy

Our color gamut and volume testing use Portrait Displays’ Calman software. For details on our color gamut testing and volume calculations, click here.

The R27fc-30’s default color chart shows a few small anomalies. Perimeter coverage is good, with plenty of blue and red. Green falls a little short, which is typical of wide-gamut displays at this price point. However, there is slight undersaturation in the mid-tones. This doesn’t have a major impact on the image, but it’s better to be a little overzealous in this test.

sRGB hits its targets with accuracy and only shows a bit of extra red at the 100% point. The R27fc-30 is fine for color grading if you need that ability.

Comparisons

The group is fairly tight in the color error comparison with only the BenQ being an outlier. The R27fc-30 sits in the middle with a largely invisible 2.45dE value. It’s a tad short of 100% green and some inner points are undersaturated. But these are minor issues. The overall color rendition is very pleasing to the eye.

With 85.54% coverage of DCI-P3, the R27fc-30 is about average for its price category. As you can see, it’s right in the middle here. Only a slight green deficiency keeps it from a higher number. For less than $200, you won’t find more color than what you see here. sRGB coverage is at 104.18% due to an oversaturated red primary.

Test Takeaway: The R27fc-30 is very colorful for the money with good coverage of DCI-P3 and a usable sRGB mode. It doesn’t need calibration, which is a plus for sub-$200 monitors, and solid gamma tracking means the picture is vibrant and lively. There is truly nothing to complain about here.

Our HDR benchmarking uses Portrait Displays’ Calman software. To learn about our HDR testing, see our breakdown of how we test PC monitors.

The R27fc-30 supports HDR10 seamlessly with an automatic switch. There are no image controls available, but I found decent accuracy anyway. The BenQ XL2566X+ is omitted here because it doesn’t support HDR operation.

HDR Brightness and Contrast

The R27fc-30 is the only screen to break the 400-nit barrier. Though it doesn’t have a VESA certification, it peaks at a respectable 407 nits. This is enough for a bright and vibrant HDR image with textural highlights and deep blacks. The only bummer is that there’s no dynamic dimming option for even more contrast. But being a VA panel, it sits only a hair below the AOC for top honors. None of these displays have extra contrast for HDR content so they are essentially on equal footing. The GS27FA is definitely the wrong choice if HDR quality is a priority.

Grayscale, EOTF and Color

The R27fc-30 nails my HDR color tests with visually perfect grayscale tracking, an EOTF that stays on the reference line and superb color tracking. I have no complaints. In the DCI-P3 test, every measurement is on or close to target. BT.2020 is much the same except for the perimeter where the color ends at 85% red, 60% green and 95% blue. Since the inner points are right there though, you’ll see a lot of what the creators intended in all HDR content.

Test Takeaway: Though there is no dynamic dimming, the R27fc-30 renders good HDR that is color-accurate and well-stocked with detail and texture. Among budget monitors, it has high contrast and better accuracy than most. For less than $200, it’s hard to complain.

For budget gaming monitors to be successful, they must prioritize the right elements so important items aren’t left out. A high refresh rate and precise video processing are musts. Image quality comes from high contrast and accurate color. A wide gamut is nice, too.

The Lenovo Legion R27fc-30 has all of that. Its 280 Hz overclock plus precise overdrive succeeds in producing clear motion resolution and smooth gaming. It doesn’t need calibration and its gamut covers over 85% of DCI-P3. For less than $200, that’s a definite win.

My only beef is that it needs to switch back to 240 Hz every 30 minutes. I’ve harped on this a bit, but hopefully, that will inspire Lenovo to at least add the option of turning the feature off. I haven’t had stability issues with any overclocked monitor I’ve reviewed for the past 10 years, and only Lenovo does this. That aside, the R27fc-30 is a great gaming display.

The only other thing sacrificed are USB ports but that is far from a deal-breaker. At the current price of $195, it delivers remarkable gaming performance and a colorful accurate image. The Lenovo Legion R27fc-30 is a great choice for budget gaming systems and is very much worthy of consideration. Definitely check it out.

Lenovo has revealed that it has designed a hand grenade-inspired external SSD. The design pays tribute to the recently released China blockbuster war movie Operation Dragon, also known as Operation Leviathan or Operation Hadal in some territories. Frequent fliers will probably want to avoid weapons-styled computer accessories and electronics like this, to prevent any unnecessary delays when passing through security.

A machine translation of the blurb in the above image reads: "Lenovo Crowdfunding - Savior Tactical Mobile SSD. Officially authorized hardcore aluminum alloy grenade shape. USB 3.2 high-speed protocol. Compatible with multiple specifications of SSD." There follows the logos for Lenovo Legion and Operation Hadal.

The top-linked official Lenovo crowdfunder page also indicates that the new grenade SSD is primed for crowdfunding success. Lenovo's project is 69% funded with several days left, and quite a few reports in Chinese language tech media today highlight this absurd product. It is therefore likely to be an explosive success (ba dum tss).

We don't have the specs for this Y599 (approx. $82) crowdfunded product except the few mentioned above. However, the grenade-styled external SSD is expected to feature 1TB of storage, perform data transfers at up to 1,050MB/s, and feature a USB Type-C interface. These specs are based on the assumption that the tactical SSD uses an existing Lenovo Legion (AKA Savior in China) portable SSD as its foundation.

A short history of weaponry styled PC components

Lenovo's war movie-inspired SSD isn't the first ill-advised design choice we have seen foisted upon the PCs and electronics market. Gigabyte has previously been guilty of producing motherboards with heatsinks that have been known to trigger airport scanners.

Perhaps Gigabyte's best-known airport security check impediment was the G1 Assassin 2 motherboard. This Intel X79 chipset board featured a "redesigned distinctive signature heatpipe design… that it is as deadly to heat as it looks." It looks like a pistol, and it even has a skull biting a bowie knife on the grip. New Zealand airport security ruined one of these motherboards with their investigations in 2015.

Gigabyte would release an almost as audacious design with its Gaming G1 Sniper socket LGA 1366 motherboard. This featured a banana-mag heatsink design with a 'bullet' protruding from one end.

MSI also has a penchant for military-themed motherboards, but its Bazooka, Mortar, and the like have always avoided weapons-shaped heatsinks.

Still, a portable SSD is probably more likely to be carried by someone onto a plane, so Lenovo's 'Tactical SSD' maybe even a worse idea than Gigabyte's Assassin and Sniper products.

AMD recently announced the Ryzen Z2 Go APU, so there are a lot of questions about the amount of performance it brings to the table compared to the Ryzen Z1 series. Thankfully, our curiosity was fulfilled by Fps VN when they shared the FPS test results of the Lenovo Legion Go S versus the Asus ROG Ally X across three games with different power settings.

Lenovo launched the Legion Go S, featuring the Ryzen Z2 Go APU. It has half the cores of the Z1 Extreme and uses a Zen 3+ architecture (instead of Zen 4). It also has lower base (3.0 GHz vs. 3.3 GHz) and boost (4.3 GHz vs. 5.1 GHz) clocks. Nevertheless, Lenovo chose it for its latest gaming handhelds, so we’re curious to see how it performs against the previous generation's top-of-the-line AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme chip.

Before diving into the numbers, let’s first look at the general specifications of both devices. The Lenovo Legion Go S, launched at CES 2025, is powered by an AMD Ryzen Z2 Go processor with 16GB LPDDR5X-6400 memory. It sports a 512GB PCIe 4.0 storage SSD and an eight-inch, 120 Hz, 1920x1200 IPS display. On the other hand, the Asus ROG Ally X, launched in mid-2024, uses an AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme chip with 24GB of LPDDR5 memory. It also has a 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD for storage and uses a seven-inch, 120 Hz, 1920x1080 IPS screen.

The data show that the Z1 Extreme on the Asus ROG Ally X consistently outperformed the Z2 Go installed on the Lenovo Legion Go S. This is expected since the Z1 Extreme has double the cores and higher clock speeds than the Z2 Go. It also has double the L3 cache, and its 780M integrated GPU is newer than the 680M on the Z2 Go.

However, the difference between all three titles was minuscule, averaging around 4 FPS more on the ROG Ally X versus the Legion Go S. According to the benchmarks, the Ryzen Z2 Go delivered approximately 10% lower performance than the Ryzen Z1 Extreme.

We expected a larger gap between the two, considering that the Ally X has 8GB more memory and a slightly smaller screen with a lower resolution (therefore fewer pixels to run). However, AMD and Lenovo seem to have optimized the Z2 Go to deliver this kind of performance despite the power limitations imposed by handheld consoles' size and portability.

The Asus ROG Ally X is priced at $799, while the Lenovo Legion Go isn’t far behind at $729. If we look at absolute numbers, the Z1 Extreme-powered Ally X offers better performance than its newer competitor. However, gamers might be swayed by the larger screen on the Legion Go and the lower price tag, especially as most people won’t likely see the 4FPS difference between these handhelds.

According to IDC, the global shipments of PCs totaled 262.7 million units in 2024, which was 1% higher than the previous year, a very modest growth. All leading PC makers, except Dell, managed to sell more client computers than in 2023 and slightly increased their market shares, essentially eating the lunch of smaller PC makers.

Lenovo led with a 23.5% share for the entire year, shipping 61.8 million units, a 4.7% increase. HP retained its somewhat distant second position with 53.0 million shipments, growing 0.1%, while Dell shipped 39.1 million units, down 2.2%. Apple’s shipments rose to 22.9 million, up 4.5%, and Asus saw the largest growth at 6.4%, reaching 17.9 million units. Shipments from smaller vendors declined 2.1%, reflecting consolidation among major players.

"Though the market has been experiencing a slower return to growth, there was some room for optimism in Q4 as government subsidies in China led to better than expected performance within the consumer segment," said Jitesh Ubrani, research manager with IDC's Worldwide Mobile Device Trackers.

Ubrani commented, "Beyond that, the U.S. and some European countries also showed strong performance due to end-of-year sale promotions, as well as enterprises continuing on the path of upgrading hardware before the end of support for Windows 10 which is scheduled for October 2025."

PC shipments increased by 1.8% in the fourth quarterThe fourth quarter saw a 1.8% increase in PC shipments, reaching 68.9 million units. IDC believes this growth was driven by government subsidies in China, year-end sales in the U.S. and Europe, and enterprise hardware upgrades ahead of the October 2025 end-of-support date for Windows 10. While this marked a slow recovery, challenges like economic uncertainty, tariff risks, and high costs for new AI-enabled PCs tempered optimism.

Lenovo maintained its market leadership in the fourth quarter, achieving a 24.5% share with 16.9 million shipments, up 4.8%. HP followed with 19.9% and 13.7 million units but saw a slight decline of 1.7%. Dell held 14.4% in Q4, with a flat performance. Apple showed the highest growth, at 17.3%, as its shipments rose to 7.0 million, a good but not record result. Asus also performed well, growing 11.7% with 4.7 million units shipped, leaving behind Acer.

The outlook for 2025 is mixed. There are obvious opportunities for PC makers in corporate upgrades ahead of Windows 10's end of support and AI PCs in the consumer space. However, the combination of economic instability, potential tariff increases, and evolving customer demands makes forecasting and planning difficult, to put it mildly. Still, the industry seems cautiously optimistic about long-term growth potential.

"The overall macroeconomic concerns seem to be overshadowing some of the progress and excitement around AI PCs. However, we maintain the view that the impact that on-device AI will have on the industry will be positive, even if the inflection point is delayed," said Ryan Reith, group vice president with IDC's Worldwide Device Trackers.

Reith added, "When the industry is trying to push new AI PCs that come with higher cost at a time when use cases are still being vetted and budgets are tight, that is clearly going to be a challenge. But on-device AI for PCs is inevitable, therefore, right now it is about suppliers trying to be patient as their customers are dealing with headwinds unrelated to these technology advancements."

As leading PC makers try to reduce their reliance on manufacturing in China, they sometimes expand production capacity in unexpected places. Lenovo Group said on Thursday that it would build a PC and server assembly factory in Saudi Arabia that will primarily serve markets in the Middle East and Africa. The project is backed by a $2 billion investment from Alat, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF).

The PC and server assembly plant in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) will be quite large: it will employ thousands of people and produce millions of PCs per year when it comes online in 2026, according to the company. Lenovo also plans to establish local research and development (R&D) operations "for fully end-to-end 'Saudi Made' products," which possibly implies tailoring products to local market needs. At the same time, a $2 billion computer assembly factory is a large industrial facility potentially with huge capacity. Without a doubt, this will be one of the most extensive high-tech facilities in the region and one of the major computer plants in the world.

The factory should significantly boost Lenovo's footprint in the Middle East and Africa, which will be instrumental to the company's growth as these markets are expanding rapidly. In addition to the factory, Lenovo will establish a regional headquarters in Riyadh, serving the Middle East and Africa.

By building a manufacturing facility that makes servers in Saudi Arabia, Lenovo will evade U.S. restrictions on supplying high-performance hardware for AI and HPC applications to China. As a result, it will boost its server production capacity without relying on plants located in Asia. For Saudi Arabia, building one of the world's largest PC and server manufacturing facilities is an instrumental way to diversify its economy beyond oil and modernize the country, which aligns perfectly with the country's Vision 2030 project.

"Through this powerful strategic collaboration and investment, Lenovo will have significant resources and financial flexibility to further accelerate our transformation and grow our business by capitalizing on the incredible growth momentum in KSA and the wider MEA region," said Yuanqing Yang, Chairman and CEO of Lenovo. "We are excited to have Alat as our long-term strategic partner and are confident that our world-class supply chain, technology, and manufacturing capabilities will be a benefit to KSA as it drives its Vision 2030 goals of economic diversification, industrial development, innovation, and job creation."

Lenovo already has production facilities in Argentina, Brazil, China, Germany, Hungary, India, Japan, Mexico, and the USA. By building a $2 billion production facility in Saudi Arabia, the company further increases its diversified global manufacturing footprint to remain the world's largest maker of PCs.

CES 2025 is in full swing, and the announcements from some of your favorite hardware manufacturers are pouring in. Yesterday, we saw the announcement of Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 50 Series GPUs, new laptop CPUs from Intel, and a fresh slate of enthusiast processors from AMD.

Today’s announcements are just as exciting, with fresh systems from Lenovo, new hardware from Razer, new Wi-Fi 7 routers, and various odds and ends from every corner of the tech sector.

Lenovo unleashes new handhelds, 2-in-1s, and laptops

The handheld gaming PC market has been surprisingly active in the past couple of years, and Lenovo is keeping interest alive with its Legion Go S. This new handheld PC is powered by AMD’s newly announced Ryzen Z2 processor or the familiar Ryzen Z1 Extreme. You no longer get detachable controllers (a la the Nintendo Switch), but you do get an 8-inch 1200p 120 Hz display, up to 32GB of DDR6-6400, 1TB of storage, and a 55.5 WHr battery. The Legion Go 2 is available with either Windows 11 or SteamOS and will be priced from $499.

Lenovo is also ways looking for new ways to innovate in the portable space, and its latest line of Yoga convertibles is no exception.

The Yoga Slim 9i has learned a trick we've previously seen on Android smartphones: a camera mounted under the display. The 32 MP webcam is embedded in the display near the top bezel and is not visible when the camera is not in use. However, when you enable the camera, the pixels above the camera become transparent enough to provide enough light to function as a webcam.

In addition to the trick webcam, the Yoga Slim 9i is powered by a Core Ultra 7 258V processor, up to 32GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. It also has a 2880 x 1800 display with a 120 Hz refresh rate. Pricing starts at $1,849.

The Yoga Slim 9i is joined by the Yoga Book 9i (Gen 10), which features dual 14-inch 2880 x 1800 OLED displays mounted to a 360-degree hinge. Prices start at $1,999 for this system, which can be equipped with a Core Ultra 7 255H Intel Evo Edition CPU, 32GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. If you prefer a more value-conscious 2-in-1 ultraportable, the Yoga 9i Aura Edition starts at $1,599 and includes a 14-inch 120Hz OLED display paired with a Core Ultra 7 259V processor.

Other new systems from Lenovo include the ThinkPad X9, which is available in 14- and 15-inch display sizes. It's MIL-SPEC 810H rated for durability, and 2.8K OLED displays are available across the board. Intel Core Ultra 7 processors are available, as are up to 2TB PCIe 4.0 SSDs and up to 32GB of RAM.

Finally, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6 goes fully wild, thanks to its ability to expand its 14-inch display to 16.7 inches. It achieves this thanks to a rollable display that unfurls vertically. The display resolution jumps from 2000 x 1600 to a maximum of 2000 x 2350 in its fully extended position.

Once you get past the trick display, the ThinkBook Plus Gen 6's other components are standard fare (Core Ultra 7 Series, up to 64GB LPDDR5x, 66 WHr battery). However, the system won't come cheap, thanks to its $3,499 starting price.

• Lenovo’s Legion Go S handheld is powered by AMD’s Z2 Go, runs SteamOS or Windows
• Lenovo's new Yoga 9 laptops include an in-display webcam, dual 14-inch OLED Book 9i with a bigger battery
• Lenovo’s new ThinkPad X9 laptop ditches the TrackPoint and familiar keyboard in favor of MacBook aesthetic
• Lenovo is bringing its rollable, expandable-screen laptop to market – ThinkBook Plus Gen 6’s display gets taller with the press of a button or the wave of a hand

New Wi-Fi 7 routers from Asus and Netgear

Artificial intelligence (AI) is creeping into every sector of the hardware world, and wireless routers are no exception. Asus is even going so far as to put an actual dedicated neural processing unit (NPU) onboard its ROG Rapture GT-BE19000AI Wi-Fi 7 routers. Asus claims that the NPU helps to "enhance" local processing speeds and reduce latency for gamers, resulting in overall increases in efficiency. There's also an onboard Micro Control Unit (MCU), which takes over primary tasks when the network is at idle.

Other routers on deck from Asus include the RT-BE58 GO, a dual-band Wi-Fi 7 travel router with 4G/5G support, and the ZenWiFi BD5 Outdoor, which extends your wireless coverage outdoors (it's IP65 rated for water and dust resistance and supports POE).

Netgear also introduced a new router for CES: the Orbi 870. The Orbi 870 slots between the Orbi 770 and Orbi 970 and offers a tri-band Wi-Fi 7 setup and up to 9,000 square feet of coverage. The router features one 10 Gbps WAN port along with 4 2.5 Gbps LAN ports. Each satellite is equipped with four 2.5 Gbps LAN ports. A two-node system is priced at $999, while a three-node system will set you back $1,299.

• Asus ROG Rapture GT-BE19000AI launches as world’s first AI-powered gaming router with built-in NPU
• Netgear Orbi 870 tri-band Wi-Fi 7 mesh router announced at CES

Snapdragon X Elite desktops invade CES

For decades, the PC desktop market has traditionally been a two-horse race, with Intel and AMD vying for top honors. However, 2024 saw a newcomer in the form of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X family of Arm processors for laptops. While there have been previous attempts to creep into the PC market with Arm-based processors, Snapdragon X is the most credible threat to date.

Now, Snapdragon X is heading to the desktop with thanks to companies like Lenovo with its ThinkCentre Neo 50q QC and IdeaCentre Mini x. Not to be left out, Geekom also showed off the QS1 Mini PC, which measures just 135.5 x 115.5 x 34.5 millimeters and runs the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 processor.

• Geekom introduces new Mini PCs at CES 2025 — Snapdragon X Elite, Ryzen AI 9, and Core Ultra 9 all represented
• Snapdragon X Arm chips are coming to the desktop PC market

Everything else....

We can't possibly go into extra detail on every single product that we saw at CES in this wrap-up article, so we'll direct you to our extensive coverage from Day 1 with the following stories.

• Micron's new PCIe 5.0 SSD promises longer battery life
• Razer's PC-adjacent CES lineup includes a monitor stand, lights, and a chair with integrated heating and cooling
• MSI announces a plethora of new cases, coolers and accessories at CES
• Raspberry Pi Baby Logger helps keep track of feeding, sleeping and everything in between
• MSI shows off cable-free panoramic PC at CES 2025
• Gigabyte launches 27 RTX 50-series models at CES 2025
• Asus’s new Zenbook A14 weighs just 2.18 pounds, boasts 32 hours of endurance
• AMD quietly introduces Ryzen 5 9600 — non-X variant brings back Wraith Stealth cooler
• Here's a look at all the sexy silicon AMD launched at CES 2025