Joined in 2023 
82 
63 About this deal
Performance from the 11th Gen Core i5 CPU is perfectly adequate for performing basic productivity tasks or streaming web videos. I never experienced even a hint of sluggishness while browsing with multiple tabs open or installing apps over the course of several days of testing. The generous 16GB of memory likely helps significantly in this regard; it's the same capacity we typically see in 2-in-1 laptops that cost twice as much. High-resolution QHD displays produce images with crisp and clear colors that look accurate and realistic. Thanks to the device's ultra-narrow four-corner bezels, the screen is kept in sharp focus. The speakers are way better than what you would expect from a laptop in this price range. It helps a lot that they are faced upwards, and apart from the fact that they are impressively loud, they also deliver a sound stage that is both wide and fairly balanced with okay bass response, considering their size. They can't compete with a good pair of speakers or headphones, but they will do just fine for watching YouTube videos or a TV show as long as loud and dramatic sound isn't the main focus. The Lenovo Flex 5i was disappointing on the battery rundown test, coming in last with 10 hours and 36 minutes. Not that 10-plus hours is terrible, but the longer the better. All the others lasted for between 12 and 13 hours, with the Yoga 7i coming in just one minute shy of 14 hours. If you’re familiar with last year’s slightly smaller model, you’ll see many familiar features. In fact, this isn’t a radical redesign although moving up from a 13.3-inch display to a 14-inch panel does give a little more room in the chassis. This time around there are larger speaker ports alongside the keyboard, for example. These house 2W speakers are tuned with Waves MaxxAudio. The sound quality isn’t bad and the loudness is high for a laptop of this size and price.
On the right edge, there are two USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A ports, a rarity on ultraportable laptops these days, and handy for connecting one of the vast number of devices that haven't yet moved to USB-C. The right edge also hosts a full-size SD card reader and the Flex 5i's power button. Side-mounted power buttons are easier to use when the laptop is propped up like an easel, but be careful not to accidentally press the button when you grasp the Flex 5i on its sides. There are no Thunderbolt 4 ports, but we don't expect one at this price. (Photo: Molly Flores) All tests were run on the latest Chrome OS 92 Stable Channel, with hyper-threading enabled, and in Guest Mode on a freshly booted machine. All flags were set to the default settings, save for the hyper-threading option.There’s also a fingerprint reader and a pair of stereo 2-watt speakers with Dolby audio. Audio quality is adequate for general use, and certainly for webcam sessions. However, when listening to music at volume, you’ll get some distortion, as with many budget portables. The two P-cores in the 1235U are capable of multi-threading and can run at a maximum turbo power of 4.4GHz. The eight E-cores are capable of a maximum 3.3GHz. The CPU’s base power is 15 watts, while the maximum turbo power is 55 watts. The Flex 5i also supports Rapid Charge Boost, regaining two hours of use from the 52.5Wh battery on just a 15-minute charge.
The Ideapad 5 laptops are light and easy to carry around. You can get away with a 14-inch screen if you don't need a larger one, so long as you're fine with that size. There are a variety of options for the 5 Series: 13.3" QHD (2560 x 1600) display and IPS (2560 x 1600) display, both of which are capable of streaming HD content. You would be surprised at what you get, Lenovo offers the most luxurious display you'll ever see on a budget-friendly. Beautiful colors and wide viewing angles are just some of the benefits of IPS panels, which also offer lightning-fast response times and minimal input lag. A more efficient power supply, faster pixel switching, and improved image processing have made IPS popular for gaming monitors. Windows On the GoLenovo’s long-standing IdeaPad lineup of laptops has oftentimes made some excellent affordable candidates, and hopefully, that can extend into their lineup of Chromebooks with their latest fusion – the aptly-named Lenovo IdeaPad 5i Chromebook. The sound quality on the IdeaPad 5i Chromebook Gen 6 is decent. It’s not the greatest but does offer plenty no matter what you’re playing. Since the speakers are front-facing, you’re getting the most out of the sound quality versus what you would if the speakers were at the bottom of the laptop. From this jumping off point, the touch screen and its multiple alignment options (including tablet, laptop, and “tent” mode) offer lots of versatility.
Obviously, gaming isn’t a focus for this laptop and our 3D benchmarks show that it doesn’t exactly excel in that department. But while playing Fortnite with no other players onscreen, the fps rises to 40-50, which looks OK on paper, but it fluctuates a lot and there are a lot of dropped frames. When things start to get heated the frame rate can drop to the low 20s, which would be considered unplayable by most people. The new chassis material adds rigidity and having USB Type-C ports on both sides of it is fantastic. Putting all of those on one side should be a criminal offense, in my opinion. I liked the continued inclusion of a physical slider to disable the webcam. The webcam itself is average at best, but serviceable.In PCMark 10 we get a score of 4811, which is way more than the score Intel Core i7-1065G7 is listed with (3179), and the latter is a chip that is commonly used in laptops in the same price range as Lenovo IdeaPad 5 14”. There is really no doubt that you are getting a lot of performance for your money here. When you take a device with you everywhere, it makes a good first impression. You can choose a color that best suits your style with numerous options. With a 360° hinge, the IdeaPad devices can be used as a laptop or tablet. Lenovo uses 360-degree steel-encased hinges, and this design allows the user to work in four different modes at one time. Take your laptop or tablet anywhere you want to, and use it however you like. That's in addition to two intermediate configurations that make the laptop's keyboard more discrete for greater convenience while performing video and touch screen-dependent tasks. Interestingly, both the Flex 5i and the Yoga 7i showed great variance between 100% and 50% brightness, with the Flex 5i shifting from 400.8 nits at 100% all the way down to 47.6 nits at 50%. The Yoga 7i had 324 nits at 100% and 39 nits at 50%. The Acer Spin 5 had a more expected variance, 552.8 nits at 100% brightness to 223.3 nits at 50%.
Related:
Great Deal 
New Comment