With Christmas just passed your gaming mad son or daughter might be looking for what to spend all that Christmas money just like my youngest son. Well, here at What Gadget we got lucky to review the Lenovo legion slim 7 gaming laptop.
First Impressions
This Laptop is available on Amazon as well as in retail stores like Currys. The cost of this laptop is £1399 for the 16GB version we are testing but there is a 32GB version for £1599. On a recent trip to Currys, I realised the legion slim 7 is a thinner and lighter model compared to its bigger brother the Legion 7. On closer inspection, the legion slim 7 comes with the same Ryzen H CPU paired with a more mid-range graphics card and more of a basic thermal design. You will also notice the slim 7 can only be purchased with the 16:9 FHD Screen.
If your looking for a portable 15-inch laptop that can handle everyday use or in my sons case his school work and can also provide a quality gaming set up then this laptop is worth considering. This Laptop has the following spec:
- Ryzen 7 5600H processor
- RTX 3050Ti graphics card
- 16 GB of RAM
- 512 GB SSD
- FHD 165Hz screen
Design
In terms of size the size of and weight, the slim 7 is just a little smaller and thinner compared to the larger model in fact it’s about a kilo lighter.
The slim 7 is made to last and can even be said to be dense in design. The main body of this laptop is nice and strongly made from aluminium. This laptop comes in a grey colour on the body and frame of the laptop. The only slight negative is the laptop is a bit of a fingerprint collector. On the base of the laptop, you have two grippy feet as well as a longer grippy strip at the rear of the laptop to allow it to sit sturdily on your desk.
Lenovo has also included very strong hinges which keep the screen strong strongly in place without any movement. You can also push the screen back to 180 degrees if required.
This laptop comes with a 16:9 display and comes with a bezel on the top where the built-in camera is housed. The screen is made using quality plastic which is surprising considering the cost.
The power button is positioned just below the screen and centred. My only slight issue with this is the LED located around the button is always on which if you using the laptop in a darker room for example online gaming or watching a film the light might distract some people. The LED also lights up either blue or red:
- Red – Power Profile active
- Blue– Quite Mode
On the rear of the Laptop is the PSU and two USB-A slots and moving to the sides. To the right, you have two USB-C slots and to the left side of the laptop, you have an SD card reader and audio jack. Unfortunately, there is no HDMI slot but you can purchase a USB-C to HDMI dongle if required.
Overall the design on this laptop offers a good design and premium looking laptop which could be mistaken for a more expensive laptop and this laptop has not gone too crazy with branding with the Legion logo positioned in some nice places without looking over the top.
Keyboard
When you compare the keyboard to the larger legion 7 model they both have an identical layout. The keyboard uses a rubber-dome mechanism and per-key RGB control.
The LED’s get very bright so you may want to just keep them on the lowest setting. You will also notice a dedicated caps lock indicator within the design and to light up the keys simply press the Fn button.
In terms of the layout, the main deck and arrow keys are all full-sized and provide a decent amount of space, especially around the arrow keys. The number pad keys are smaller and more compact. This layout offers one of the best layouts available on a laptop that suits the needs for everyday use especially if you are a fast typer the keyboard offers a quick and quiet offering with just the right of press force to actuate. When using the keyboard for gaming the clicks can be a little shallow compared to other gaming laptops on the market.
The Clickpad
Moving to the clickpad this is a large surface that works really well. Its position in the centre is just below the space key which sometimes means your palm might swipe over which can be a little annoying as I got the odd accidental tap. When you do make a click they are smooth without making too much noise which will please users.
Screen
The legion slim 7 comes with a 16:9 display that also comes with an FHD 165Hz panel. This FHD panel is fair better suited for the mid-tier specs with 350-nits of brightness, decent viewing angles.
In testing, you won’t notice any light bleeding around the edges and it was also appreciated how dim the screen can get on the lowest brightness setting which will please some users.
I really liked the 165Hz refresh rate as it is a good choice for those who use this for everyday work and also for the gamer in the house. Unfortunately, the 350-nits of max brightness might not be useful for very bright offices or these when the sun returns wants to work outside.
Inside the Slim 7
When you open this laptop up it comes with an AMD Ryzen 5 5600H processor paired with a 3050Ti graphics chip and 16GB memory and a decent WD SN730 PCIe x4 SSD.
In this laptop it is built on a full power AMD Ryzen Cezanne Platform paired with that Ryzen 5 5600H processor and it can handle heavy workloads with ease. The RTX 3050Ti graphics chip and can successfully compete against other gaming laptops in a similar price range.
This laptop also offers a MUX which means you opt-in the vantage control app, for a hybrid mode that enables Optimus which actively switches between the Vega or Nividia chips depending on the requirement. If you do want to switch between the two modes you will have to restart the machine.
In addition to all of this, you get 16GB of RAM which is made up of 8 GB onboard and an extra 8GB stick. Finally, you also have two full-sized 2280 M.2 slots inside this laptop and offers an extra slot when you want to upgrade further.
There are three power profiles available:
- Quiet
- Balanced
- Performance
You can switch between the power profiles with the key combo of Fn+Q but to use the performance profile you need it to be plugged in. The use of the profiles is for different power settings for the CPU and fan.
Internal Cooling
The legion Slim 7 gets a thermal module with two fans and a few heatpipes spread over the components. The chipset is supplemented by the thermal shield on the RAM and thermal pads for the SSD’s. The cooling module is similar to previous Lenovo models but just with a thinner design. This is beneficial for daily use as the fans are idle most of the time especially when on either the balanced or quiet profiles. You won’t even notice any unwanted electronic noises.
On the performance profile, the system allows the GPU to run at 90W max and the combined CPU+GPU increases to 125W. The terminal module can handle this but the fans have to work harder reaching 47dB which results in the laptop feeling hot. A way to prevent this is to use a laptop stand to let some natural airflow. Consider something like Targus Chill Mat.
Connectivity/Audio
The legion slim 7 comes with a wireless 6 and Bluetooth 5 via an AX1650 chip. This performed very well without any disconnection issues.
Moving to the Audio you get two speakers placed on the base of the laptop and sounds via the grills on the angled laterals, which prevents them from being muffled. The overall sound quality is only average with just 75dB. The mids and highs are ok but the lows are affected. You also get vibrations in the frame when the volume is at higher levels. So keep the sound at 80% max or lower the prevent the vibrations.
There is also a camera as mentioned positioned at the top of the screen its HD quality but does a job. There are also the mics that are placed under the screen. This can be a little annoying if you are typing while on a conference call.
Battery Life
Inside this slim 7 model, you have a 71Wh battery which is decent for the fact it’s a 15-inch laptop but a little smaller compared to the average batteries that come in other laptops. However, the efficient AMD platform and FHD screen help this laptop last for a fair while on charge. However, if you want to switch from 165Hz to 60Hz you need to do this manually via the display settings.
In testing, you got excellent runtimes that are head and shoulders above other laptops in this price range. To keep the laptop fully charged you get a 180W power brick which is lightweight to place in your bag when travelling. The power brick is USB-C supported and will charge the slim 7 in just over 2 hours from 0% to 100% battery.
Performance/Benchmarks
We first run tests of the CPU by running the Cinebench R15 test for 15+ tests in a loop with a 2-second delay between each run. The Ryzen 5 processor stabilizes at 68W of sustained power on the performance with full clocks of 4GHz and temperatures in the low 90’s paired with fans spinning at 46dB and this ensures max performance.
We then ran all the benchmark tests on the performance profile in Vantage, the system set on dGPU mode and the screen set in its normal FHD resolution. Here the results:
- 3DMark 13 – Fire Strike: 13024 (Graphics – 14624, Physics – 20780, Combined – 5473);
- 3DMark 13 – Port Royal: 582;
- 3DMark 13 – Time Spy: 5984 (Graphics – 5837, CPU – 6984);
- Uniengine Superposition – 1080p Extreme: 3385;
- Uniengine Superposition – 1080p Medium: 10406;
- Handbrake 1.3.3 (4K to 1080p encode): 37.52 average fps;
- PassMark 10: Rating: 7004 (CPU mark: 18922, 3D Graphics Mark: 12704, Disk Mark: 21400);
- GeekBench 5.3.1 64-bit: Single-Core: 1420, Multi-core: 6386;
- CineBench R15 (best run): CPU 1670 cb, CPU Single Core 224 cb;
Our tests indicate the balanced profile limits the GPU but this is because you are after better temperatures and lower fan noise. The Quite profile provides a greater limit to both the CPU & GPU which is not ideal for intensive loads.
Overall the Ryzen 5 with 3050Ti configuration of the legion slim 7 performs very well considering the hardware it runs on. Improvements I would recommend maybe considering upgrading the graphics chip to the 3060 chipsets and this will improve performance. The AMD Ryzen 5 5600H CPU is adequate for everyday use and multitasking.
Gaming Performance
Now here is the fun part testing the gaming performance of this laptop and we tested using all three power profiles. The games we tried was COD, Red Dead Redemption.
When playing Red Dead the 3050Ti Graphics card performed well but is limited if you want to run more detailed games you will notice its downfall.
When testing between the three power profiles. When switching to the Quite profile it will make it unusable. Switch to the balanced profile and this keeps the DGPU at 60W with fans at 43dB. When switched to performance lifts the GPU power to 90W and the games we tested raise the fans to 47dB. This translates to 10% higher frame rates in the games we have played. The only negative is the components run much hotter in performance mode with the CPU as hot at 95C and GPC reaching up to 83C this pushes the laptop to its thermal limits.
You will understand that when gaming this does not do too good on the battery so I recommend using the laptop with the power adapter. Overall I would say your best to use the balanced power profile as the performance profile causes too much to overheat.
Verdict
The Lenovo legion Slim 7 offers a decent price point at £1399 for a gaming laptop. It provides so many positives from the premium design to the 15-inch format and long battery life all positives when buying a laptop. The 16:9 FHD display offers decent gaming abilities. This laptop is an option for creators and offers an alternative to other premium 16-inch mid-range models.
Negatives are few such as the power button always being switched on which might annoy users watching a film in a dark room but it’s hardly a deal-breaker.
So if your looking for a premium design laptop that is decent on price but suitable for the gamer or just for everyday use then it’s well worth considering as it’s an excellent laptop at this price.
Product Rating:
Design: 5.0 out of 5.0 stars5.0
Display: 5.0 out of 5.0 stars5.0
Performance: 4.0 out of 5.0 stars
Gaming Performance: 4.0 out of 5.0 stars
Battery Life: 5.0 out of 5.0 stars5.0
Value For Money: 4.0 out of 5.0 stars
Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5.0 stars – 4.5 Stars
Available for £1399 for the 16GB version via Lenovo.com
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Lenovo Legion Slim 7 best laptop ever!