Lenovo ThinkPad L14 and L15 Gen 4 upgrade to Raptor Lake or Ryzen 7000 platforms

[Redaktion]

Lenovo's fourth-gen range of larger ThinkPad L-series laptops have made their MWC debut with up-to-date processors in both Intel and AMD flavors. Either option comes in relatively lightweight, cost-effective packages - although the new L14 and L15 have made some potential compromises to attain their attractive starting prices.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-L14-and-L15-Gen-4-upgrade-to-Raptor-Lake-or-Ryzen-7000-platforms.697549.0.html

[kuro68k]

I don't know if it's Lenovo's fault it AMD's fault, but they have got to sort this USB4 situation out.

It's 2023, launching a business laptop without thunderbolt is a joke.

[NikoB]

There are 2 factors here.
AMD lied about having USB40 in the Zen3+, the real built-in USB40 ports only appeared in the Zen4 Phoenix "4nm". Even the top 7945HX does not have them.

On all other AMD SoCs, you need to solder an external controller. It's pure greed from laptop manufacturers.

Intel also doesn't have built-in TB4 ports in the H series, only in the U/P SoC. Therefore, it is also necessary to solder the external TB4 controller. And it's for the same reason that the eGPU is faster on the i7 1260p than it is on the i9 12900HX. But apparently in this case, Intel brings money to laptop manufacturers so that they do not intentionally solder the external controller to the AMD H series and, in spite of it, they sold it to the Intel H series. Otherwise, such a vile approach cannot be explained. The cost of the external solution is the same.

Most often, an external Parade 8830 chip is soldered on the AMD H series to operate the USB40 port.