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GadgetsLab: LENOVO THINKPAD E14 GEN 2

from 2021v21n10 - FOOD + TECH

from 2021v21n10 - FOOD + TECH, page 128

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Reviewed by Gabriel Pe

Lenovo has been steadily outputting new powerful but budget-friendly business-oriented notebooks. The Lenovo ThinkPad particularly has seen new models come out at astonishingly low prices for the tech the pack. The Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen 2 particularly, can pack a punch, all without costing an arm and a leg.

DESIGN 4 / 5

I may sound like a broken record, but Lenovo’s ThinkPads are simply an icon and the ThinkPad E14 Gen 2 is no different. Design-wise the E14 Gen 2 carries all the ThinkPad elements from its predecessors, the black body with very minimal red accents on the logo and the trackpad, the iconic ThinkPad TrackPoint nub on the keyboard, and the red LED on the logo on the cover.

The ThinkPad E14 Gen 2 features a 14- inch FHD IPS display, which isn’t the brightest nor the sharpest in the market. I found that the display was a bit dim for my liking, especially when I was working under strong light.

Like all the ThinkPads I tested before, the real value in the ThinkPad line is the great typing experience on them, and the E14 Gen 2 certainly carries the same legacy. Add to that great trackpad and suddenly I found myself independent from mice. Before I forget, the power button doubles as a fingerprint scanner, a good option for logging in.

If there’s one thing not to like about the E14 Gen 2, was the lack of I/O port choices. On the left of the device were the USB-Type C power input, a USB-A port, an HDMI port, and a 3.5mm audio port. On the right was a Kensington lock hole, another USB-A port, and the ethernet port (RJ45).

HARDWARE 4 / 5

Underneath the ThinkPad E14 Gen2 is some powerful stuff. Our unit had a 4th Ryzen 5 mobile processor (4500U) with 6 cores and 6 threads clocked at 2.38GHz but rated at 4.0GHz max. The processor comes with integrated AMD Radeon graphics. Memory-wise, ours had 8GB of RAM with 256GB of NVMe storage, but Lenovo is offering more memory and storage configurations in the market.

In terms of numbers, our unit was able to achieve a 1048 single-core score and 3719 multi-core score in Geekbench 5. It achieved 4421 in PCMark 10 with 7905 in Essentials and 7310 in Productivity, what pulled it down was its digital content creation score at 4059. Lastly, Cinebench R23 had it at 4265 points for Multi-core and 1143 for single-core performance.

The ThinkPad E14 Gen2 wasn’t made for gaming, but nonetheless I did try playing Dota 2 and Fall Guys on it. For Dota 2 low settings yielded 100+ fps, while medium settings averaged in the 70 fps, high settings would bring down the fps count to 40+ and ultra -settings was, in simple terms, unplayable. Fall Guys meanwhile averaged around 30-40fps.

USER EXPERIENCE 4.5 / 5

The Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen2 isn’t the most portable nor most powerful ThinkPad in Lenovo’s lineup, but it is one of the most affordable and most importantly, it gets the job done.

What I found interest about the ThinkPad E14 Gen2 during my time with it was that it was able to keep up with me. Its specs are pretty much mid-range and honestly, if you’re a simple user, like me, it has everything you need. But there are key areas where it was better than the standard laptop.

First, you’re the type to enjoy some nice beats after a hard day’s work, then the Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen2’s two Harman Kardon tuned speakers would be a perfect partner. These were loud yet maintain great mid and highs. I found myself enjoying Netflix and video streaming on the ThinkPad E14 Gen2 thanks to these speakers despite the pretty mediocre screen.

Second, the Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen2 was the perfect working companion.

As a tech writer, I am pretty much typing stuff every day, and as I said in all my previous reviews on ThinkPads, these guys have the best keyboard for typing. You just need to note that the Ctrl and Fn keys can be interchanged in the Lenovo Vantage app, they are interchanged by default so just check if it’s not your fancy.

The Lenovo ThinkPad Gen 2 lasted me a whole working day with a light workload. But if you find yourself needing to juice up, the included charger was light enough to be carried around and charged the device to 100% from 5-10% in two hours, pretty fast for a laptop.

VALUE 4 / 5

Priced at PHP 43,399 the Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen 2 is a ThinkPad for the masses. This budget powerhouse can do almost anything you throw at it, and for that price it’s definitely worth it.