Lenovo's First 14" Legion Gaming Laptop Rocks OLED Display, RTX 40 GPU And AI
Lenovo has a new gaming laptop on the horizon with some features that are a first for its Legion line. Chief among them is form factor—the Legion Slim 5 (14", Gen 8) is the first-ever Legion gaming laptop to feature a 14-inch class (14.5-inch) display, with a redesigned keyboard to accommodate the compact size. It's also the first laptop in the Legion ecosystem to boast an OLED panel.
OLED technology is typically reserved for premium productivity laptops and a spattering of higher end gaming notebooks, usually with a premium price to match. Here, however, you're looking at a starting price of $1,439.99—fairly reasonable for a gaming laptop, though we don't yet know what the baseline specs entail to properly evaluate the value proposition.
We do have some concrete specs on the OLED panel, though. Lenovo says it features a WQXGA+ (2880x1800) resolution with a 16:10 aspect ratio, 120Hz refresh rate, and 100% coverage of the DCI-P3 color space. It sounds like Lenovo might offer at least two different versions, as the datasheet it provided us mentions it being "up to VESA TrueBlack 400 certified," along with support Dolby Vision for HDR content.
As for the core hardware, this is an AMD-based system that will be offered with up to a Ryzen 9 7940HS processor (8C/16T, 4GHz to 5.2GHz, 16MB L3 cache), which is a mobile Zen 4 Phoenix CPU, and up to a GeForce RTX 4060 8GB GPU (105W, 2,370MHz boost clock) for graphics.
It will also come outfitted with up to 64GB of LPDDR5X-6400 RAM and a 512GB or 1TB PCIe 4.0 solid state drive. A fully loaded config will undoubtedly push that starting price up by at least several hundred dollars, but we'll have to wait and see precisely how much.
Also notable is an AI infusion of sorts. The Legion Slim 5 (14" Gen 8) sports a dedicated LA1 AI chip that works in conjunction with Lenovo's AI Engine+ software to intelligently tune the laptop based on how you're using it. This can be geared towards increasing performance to achieve a higher FPS while gaming, or to maximize battery life from the 4-cell, 73.6WHr battery, to name a couple of examples. Lenovo says the algorithm "grows more intelligent over time as it adapts to user habits."
There are a welcome array of ports and I/O features on this laptop despite its small size...
Left Side
- 1x USB Type-C (USB 3.2 Gen2 + DisplayPort 1.4 + 140W power delivery)
- 1x USB Type-C (USB 3.2 Gen2 + DisplayPort 1.4)
Right Side
- 1x 4-in-1 SD card reader
- 1x E-shutter button
- 1x 3.5mm audio combo jack
Rear
- 1x DC-in
- 1x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A
- 1x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A (always-on 5V2A)
- 1x HDMI 2.1
Rounding out the list of amenities are Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.1 (or higher) wireless connectivity, a pair of 2W speakers with Nahimic audio, a backlit TrueStrike keyboard with 1.5mm of key travel and swappable key caps, and Windows 11.
Lenovo says it will be shipping the Legion 5 Slim (14" Gen 8) this month, followed by retail availability in September 2023.
