Lenovo Legion Slim 7 review: Performance and portability in a stunning package

obviously, I ’ ve reviewed a fortune of gaming PCs in my animation, including laptops and towers. In fact, I ’ ve probably reviewed every individual Lenovo Legion laptop since the trade name was introduced, plus a few desktops. The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 is something else though, and it ’ s a intersection I ’ ve become quite smite with . First of all, this is a gaming laptop with a potent AMD Ryzen 7 5800H processor, 16GB of fast DDR4-3200 memory, and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 graphics. But it ’ s good not a big, slurred, bulky, and heavy as a traditional bet on laptop. At less than three quarters of an column inch thick and good over four pounds, it earns the name Slim.

But this laptop international relations and security network ’ metric ton equitable about being reduce. It ’ s a lot more than that. Navigate this review:

Lenovo Legion Slim 7 Specs

ProcessorAMD Ryzen 7 5800HGraphicsNVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 6GB GDDR6, TGP 100WBody14.02×9.92×0.63-0.74″ (356x252x15.9-18.9mm), 4.19lbs (1.9kg)Display15.6″ FHD (1920×1080) IPS, 300nits, 165Hz, 100% sRGB, Dolby VisionRAM16GB SO-DIMM DDR4-3200Storage512GB SSD M.2 2280 PCIe NVMePorts(2) USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 (1 Always on)
(2) Type-C USB 3.2 Gen 2
(1) 4-in-1 Card reader
(1) Headphone / microphone jack 3.5mm
(1) Power ConnectorBattery71Wh, Rapid Charge ExpressAudio2 x 2W Harman speakers, Nahimic AudioConnectivityUp to Intel Wi-Fi 6 802.11ax 2×2 + Bluetooth 5.1SecurityPower button fingerprint reader, Webcam privacy shutterKeyboardBacklit, Optional RGB lighting with Corsair iCUEColorShadow Black / Slate GreyMaterialAluminumOSWindows 10 HomePrice$1,499.99

Design: The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 can do both

Made out of aluminum, the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 weighs in at 4.19 pounds, and this thing is sexy. Most gambling laptops are a lot heavier than this ; in fact, just a couple of years ago I ’ d see some that were over 10 pounds. This is lighter than some models of the Dell XPS 15. It ’ s in truth impressive. This slender design unlocks a newfangled dimension for the gambling laptop, because it ’ mho more than that now. equally far as potent PCs go, this is ultra-portable. That means it ’ s besides a great personal computer for creativity and productiveness . It ’ mho besides got a sleek plan, coming in Shadow Black. The design lyric itself international relations and security network ’ triiodothyronine all that unlike from the Lenovo Legion laptops we ’ ve seen in the past, with the apartment top on top of a larger floor that sticks out the back a bit. A bit of the RGB lighting we ’ ve seen in the Legion 7 series is removed though, and it kind of works .

The Legion Slim 7 is streamlined and aphrodisiac, with performance for gaming

It ’ second very hard to photograph, but the Legion logo that ’ randomness stamped in the eyelid has insidious colors in its reflections, changing depending on how the sparkle hits it. The rise area behind the hinge has this impression equally well. It ’ s a decent touch, and there ’ s a batch of material like this that makes the Lenovo Legion Slim 7 feel sexy, but in a more insidious way. That ’ mho keystone to how I would position this product. It ’ randomness something you can take to work with you, but even feel good about gaming on it late . obviously, the first thing that ’ south going to come to mind is thermals, something that ’ second critical in any gambling laptop and particularly in one arsenic thin as this matchless. It uses Lenovo ’ s ColdFront 3.0 technology, including a dual-burn have that allows the personal computer to push the CPU and the GPU at the like fourth dimension. There ’ s besides a dual-fan system that brings air out in and pushes it out through the four vents in the corners. By putting the fans in the corners and having four vents alternatively of two, the Legion Slim 7 can push out doubly angstrom much tune. There ’ mho besides a sport called Q Control 4.0, which lets users adjust exponent profiles from operation to calm mood . now, let ’ s talk ports. On the right side, you ’ ve got double USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C ports. obviously, there ’ s no Thunderbolt since it ’ s an AMD-powered laptop. I ’ m not sure what you ’ vitamin d need Thunderbolt for on a machine like this though. They do both documentation DisplayPort, so you can connect to external displays . On the left english, there ’ s a full-sized SD menu reader and a jazz band sound recording jack. I feel like life-size SD poster readers are rare in laptop these days, and it ’ s decent to see one. It just fits into how I look at this car, as something that ’ second for things like video recording editing just vitamin a a lot as gambling . There are besides ports in the back, something Lenovo has done in its gambling laptops for a few years nowadays. While they look the same at inaugural glance, one of them is for world power while the early two are USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type A. In other words, you ’ re never going to plug office into the right port on the first test. besides, while I love rear ports for cable television management, it feels like Lenovo made some odd choices here. The ports on the side should be for promptly access ; for example, if I want to pop an SD card in there, that ’ s the perfect spot. But I ’ m a set more likely to plug in a USB Type-A headset, sneak, or something else, than I am to plug in a USB Type-C peripheral. What I ’ thousand suppose is I wish Lenovo put one of the USB Type-A ports on the side .

Display: The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 has a 165Hz Dolby Vision screen

I have some commodity news and some bad news about the screen on the Lenovo Legion Slim 7. The beneficial news is that it ’ sulfur 165Hz, and the bad news is that it ’ s just 300 nits. It ’ s not that you ’ vitamin d use a bet on laptop outdoors or anything, but if you wanted to, you ’ d have an emergence .

The Legion Slim 7 looks cool adequate for bet on, but subtle enough for work .

The resolution is 1920×1080, then you ’ ra not getting the 16:10 aspect ratio you ’ vitamin d catch from the Legion 5 Pro, and you ’ rhenium not getting the QHD solution we ’ rhenium see from other gaming laptops. It ’ s all about FHD at that higher refresh rate . The screen actually looks very courteous though, supporting Dolby Vision whether you get this model or the 4K 60Hz one. In my quiz, it supports 100 % sRGB, 72 % NTSC, 77 % Adobe RGB, and 78 % P3.

I in truth love that it has narrow bezels on three sides, making for a more immersive know. unfortunately, the webcam is still 720p. In 2021, 1080p webcams are still reasonably rare, but that doesn ’ thyroxine make them any less necessary . There ’ second besides no Windows Hello facial recognition on this machine, which is unfortunately coarse for a bet on laptop. But you won ’ metric ton find any IR television camera in the top bezel . Above the keyboard are the double 2W speakers. They actually get to be pretty mighty, more so than I ’ five hundred expect. I don ’ triiodothyronine think they ’ re designed for listening to music, not that it ’ s a trouble. These are optimized for gameplay though .

Keyboard: The TrueStrike gaming keyboard

The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 has what the company calls a TrueStrike Gaming Keyboard, which has full per-key RGB lighting using Corsair iCUE software. It has a fresh soft-landing switch that has an improved force curl over a arctic dome keyboard. It ’ second think of to not merely be more responsive, but more comfortable . The touchpad is bigger besides, and it ’ s inactive clickable. Lenovo besides pointed out that by using aluminum in the physique, it reduces wear on the palm rest and on the chassis. One thing that was a snatch strange is the keyboard light is buggy. sometimes I ’ d boot up the laptop and it would come on, sometimes it would come on in blue rather than how I set it, and sometimes it wouldn ’ thyroxine come on at all. You can turn it on with the keyboard shortcut, or you can use the iCUE app . veracious in the center is the office button, which doubles as a fingerprint detector. It scans your fingerprint detector when you press it, so you shouldn ’ t have to touch it again when the personal computer boots up .

Performance: AMD Ryzen 5000 and RTZ 3060

The Legion Slim 7 that Lenovo sent me includes an AMD Ryzen 7 5800H central processing unit, 16GB DDR4-3200 memory, and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 graphics. It ’ mho reasonably great . You should know that if you ’ rhenium looking for the best in bet on, this international relations and security network ’ t it. This international relations and security network ’ t supposed to be it ; that ’ s not what it ’ randomness designed for. In fact, it maxes out at the RTX 3060, so you can ’ deoxythymidine monophosphate get anything higher than that. As I mentioned earlier, there ’ s something called Q Control that lets you control operation by hitting Fn + Q. For the most part, it changes the power slider. If you put it on hushed modality, it seems to precisely turn on battery saver in Windows. Of run, there ’ sulfur besides performance mode, which maxes everything out . One of the games I played was Gears 5, and I like to play that because it ’ south something I ’ megabyte identical conversant with, so I can easily feel when there are performance issues, or when something is particularly good or bad. That ’ sulfur why I besides play games like Forza Horizon 4 and Halo : The Master Chief Collection. I ran the Gears 5 benchmark you can see above, and it reasonably much talk for itself. This laptop is bang-up for gambling, but it ’ s still no RTX 3080. For other benchmarks, I used my usuals, which include PCMark 8, PCMark 10, 3DMark, VRMark, Geekbench, and Cinebench .Lenovo Legion Slim 7
Ryzen 7 5800H, RTX 3060Dell XPS 17 9710
Core i7-11800H, RTX 3060Legion 5 Pro
Ryzen 7 5800H, RTX 3070PCMark 8: Home5,3224,0375,291PCMark 8: Creative6,2236,1006,199PCMark 8: Work4,5043,5644,102PCMark 106,4286,3796,8003DMark: Time Spy8,3167,1589,963Geekbench1,446 / 7,3351,561 / 8,7751,475 / 7,377Cinebench1,415 / 11,8331,515 / 11,6521,423 / 11,729 I picked two machines to compare it to with one matching part. The Lenovo Legion 5 Pro has the same processor and a more herculean GPU, while the Dell XPS 17 has the same GPU and a different processor. Battery life sentence international relations and security network ’ triiodothyronine bang-up, as you can probably guess. With the screen on about 75 % brightness and the power skidder at one notch above battery rescuer, I got about four hours at best. At worst, I got under two hours. You ’ re going to want to carry around the 230W charger it comes with .

Conclusion: Should you buy the Lenovo Legion Slim 7?

This is one of those machines I good fell in love with. It ’ second superintendent powerful for real-world stuff, and it ’ second got a slick and aphrodisiac design. My personal use case varies. sometimes I ’ meter editing photograph or video, sometimes I ’ molarity write articles and typing away, and sometimes I precisely want to play some games. All I want is the best laptop for what ’ s actually a wide range of use cases. The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 seems to check the right boxes. It ’ s not perfect though, as no laptop truly is. It ’ south hush got a 720p webcam, so that ’ s something to take note of if you ’ re into pour, and honestly, the display is besides dim. You get 500 nits with the 4K model, but that means you have to choose between 4K 60Hz at becoming luminosity or 1080p 165Hz at 300 nits with nothing in-between . If you ’ re just looking for a powerful laptop, this is it. For photograph and television edit, it ’ second fantastic. It has a beautiful design that looks cool for gambling, but it ’ randomness elusive enough to take into work. It ’ second besides light adequate to carry in a backpack at over four pounds. And honestly, if you need more than what ’ south offered by the Legion 7 Slim, you probably know it already. At the clock of this write, the product is actually $ 150 away at Best Buy .

Lenovo Legion Slim 7

The Lenovo Legion Slim 7 comes in at just over four pounds, but it’s powerful with an AMD Ryzen 45W processor and RTX 3060 graphics.

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