Lenovo Legion Slim 5 14APH8 laptop review: 120 Hz 2.5K OLED sweet spot

[Redaktion]

The Legion Slim 5 14 is the smallest and most travel-friendly Legion laptop yet and its OLED display is certainly a standout feature not found on most other gaming laptops. However, it's missing a key feature that gamers ought to be aware of.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-Legion-Slim-5-14APH8-laptop-review-120-Hz-2-5K-OLED-sweet-spot.753466.0.html

[Poster]

Almost made my to-buy list but one major oversight that prohibits me from considering this as my all in one daily  driver.
Lenovo not implementing usb4 in this more expensive laptop compared to their Ideapad pro 5 with thunderbolt is absolutely disgusting.
So no multiple 4k @120Hz monitors for work and no eGPU expansion for later upgrading to better current or future Gpu's for play. I would have also preferred a So-Dimm slot for memory upgrade.
I can also point out the screen flickering. I just want to avoid it, but with current oled tech, it's not possible

[LL]

19 sec in Blender GPU Classroom test. That seems to be too good to be true.

[NikoB]

Lenovo not implementing usb4 in this more expensive laptop compared to their Ideapad pro 5 with thunderbolt is absolutely disgusting.

7840HS has 2 built-in USB40 ports, but Lenovo did not bring them out. Congratulations to the buyers - you will still pay AMD for this logic in the SoC, but Lenovo will simply cheat you.
As it is, the laptop is nothing interesting, it's noisy, the amount of RAM is just ridiculous, especially for $1,500. And a small SSD. The screen, as usual, has a reduced color resolution for AMOLED with such a pixel structure. And of course it flickers and glares a lot, increasing fatigue.

As it is, the laptop is nothing interesting, it's noisy, the amount of RAM is just ridiculous, especially for $1,500. And a small SSD. The screen, as usual, has a reduced color resolution for AMOLED with such a pixel structure. And of course it flickers and glares a lot, increasing fatigue.

Lenovo is such a greedy company that it didn't even solder the lpddr5 7500 supported by Zen4 Phoenix series, installing only extremely outdated 6400...

[Logoffon]

16:10, 2880 x 1600 pixel

I think you got numbers mixed up, as the official specs list it as 2880 x 1800.

But with that absurdly high resolution for such a small panel size, combined with burn-in prone panel, this laptop has automatically gone off my consideration list.

[toto1234]

7.5h of battery with a 2.8K OLED and that kind of hardware ?

I know that battery test on all review outlets are BS,but you'll be lucky to have even half that number.

I used to own a 2022 Asus G14, rate at 10h (lol) mix usage battery life and I never got more that 5 or 6 just web browsing

[MelMelMel]

Lenovo is such a greedy company that it didn't even solder the lpddr5 7500 supported by Zen4 Phoenix series, installing only extremely outdated 6400...

The 7500 Mhz RAM is allready on few Lenovo laptops, but the motherboard does not support faster than 6400 Mhz, so it runs at 6400 Mhz. I actually would like to see some Luxmark 3.1 or 4.0 OpenCL tests, how single or dual RAM module affect Render Speed. Because Legion Slim 7 has 16GB soldered and 48GB upgradable, only first 32GB runs in quad channel (7zip allready has 40% speed loss when quad channel is lost. This really s***, because Slim 5 does not have USB 4 but supports fully quad channel memory, but i need to add 24+ GB eGPU.

One software dev pointed out that Oled can save energy with dark theme, but the reflections are worst with dark theme.

I also don't Like Lenovo politics how they force me to buy windows license when i want high resolution colour accurate screen. Or force feed me an 4GB GPU when i don't accept 7640HS and liked to get 7840HS. My work files are way bigger, my last file needs 27Gb vRAM

[Thunder]

I am satisfied now with the new OLED Yoga Air 14s ultrabook. Enough for those who are not gamers and the majority of users and to have an ultrabook with the latest technologies at a reasonable price of $1,100 published here on Notebookcheckk
The Ryzen 7 7840S limited to 30W TDP is only 5% slower than a Ryzen 9 7940HS which can boost to 54W. This variant is exclusive to Lenovo and the Yoga Air 14s ultrabooks with 1TB of storage and 32GB LPDDR5- 6400 RAM. are available for

[Ednumero]

The screen, as usual, has a reduced color resolution for AMOLED with such a pixel structure.

The display has the same color resolution as IPS panels with the proper and familiar RGB-stripe matrix. There is one red, one green, and one blue dot per pixel, however oddly they may be shaped or shifted.

There are no OLED laptops I have seen reviewed on this platform whose panels did not have full color resolution. This is only an issue in phones, and in some tablets.

[Aj]

According to PSREF the monitor should support AMD Freesync

[HeyPablo]

I just initiated a 14 day window return for this laptop due to false ref to FreeSync in PSREF.

Using Hybrid mode or iGPU only, FreeSync always shows as not supported in AMD Adrenalin software. HWINFO shows that no FreeSync range is defined for the internal display. So the 120Hz panel is wasted without a VRR solution.

[carmaster]

The Legion Slim 5 14" has a few major problems;
-RTX 4060 is the max GPU;
-no USB-C 4;
-no G-Sync.

But, Lenovo could be smart and make a Legion Slim 7 14".

Much like the Slim 5 to Slim 7, all they would have to make:
-chassis fully out of aluminum;
-add one USB-C 4.0;
-add the option to have a mini-LED panel (they could even use the one from the Yoga Pro 9 3k 165hz mini-LED)
-RTX 4070 option, though the temperatures might get too toasty.

Inscrease the price by a couple €€ and it could make a pretty good machine. Nice built, RTX4060/70 with R7840HS/R97940HS, 16GB, 32GB or maybe even 64GB.

Though, it would still have the problem of the trackpad being crooked, btw LENOVO fix that. People that have OCD cant look at this laptop!

[Kyuu]

Are you able to confirm with Lenovo whether this laptop is supposed to support VRR on the display or not? The specs page on Lenovo's site claims VRR. Your reference to no G-Sync, and others to a lack of FreeSync support, seems to contradict this. So either it's an error on the website's specs, or perhaps there's an issue with the drivers that could be rectified?

[slashyslashy]

Are you able to confirm with Lenovo whether this laptop is supposed to support VRR on the display or not? The specs page on Lenovo's site claims VRR. Your reference to no G-Sync, and others to a lack of FreeSync support, seems to contradict this. So either it's an error on the website's specs, or perhaps there's an issue with the drivers that could be rectified?

I opened a repair ticket with Lenovo to ask this very question (specification error vs. fixable via firmware). So far it has just been polite but unhelpful back and forth troubleshooting, but the issue has been 'escalated internally'. Hopefully I will have an answer soon.

[vvhitevvizard]

no Thudenderbolt 4 = no buy. Sorry, Lenovo.