In this video, I will be reviewing a 14" 2-in-1 convertible laptop from Lenovo that supports
an active stylus pen.
Its Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5i, where the i stands for Intel chips, specifically the 11th generation
intel processors.
Now I have already reviewed the AMD version of this laptop here on this channel.
You can find a link to that video over here and in the video description below.
In that video I came out highly impressed with the performance of these 6 and 8 core
AMD Ryzen processors.
So is the new Intel version of Lenovo Flex 5i better than AMD?
Keep watching to find out!
BTW at the time of making this video, the 11th gen intel model of Lenovo Flex 5i cost
more than the equivalently speced AMD model.
But the prices tend to fluctuate, so please check out the links in the video description
below.
I have put country specific links, with most up to date pricing and availability information.
Please note that some models of Lenovo Flex 5i may not be available in your country.
But I expect lenovo to make them available later in the year.
I will try my best to keep these links up to date
Let's talk about the build quality.
Lenovo Flex 5i is built using premium materials.
The top half is made from aluminium while the bottom half is built using a 30% fibre
glass reinforced polycarbonate material.
This results in a laptop chassis boasting higher strength, rigidity, and dimensional
stability than a typical ABS polymer budget laptop.
Its exterior body has a fine sand-blasted metallic finish which feels very grippy and
secure when holding in hands.
My review unit is platinum grey in color with a minimalist silver colored "Lenovo" logo
which looks very professional.
Since this is a 2-in-1 laptop, the quality of the hinge is very important and lenovo
does not disappoint.
You are getting a pair of metallic hinges that are built like a tank.
These should last for many years with minimal wear and tear.
Lenovo Flex 5i weighs about 3.3 pounds or 1.5 kilograms which is fine for a 14" laptop.
It's definitely not the lightest 2-in-1 laptop that I have used, but considering its superior
build quality, I am not complaining.
You are getting a 14" Full HD widescreen touch enabled display that supports active stylus
pen.
It's an LED backlit IPS panel with a maximum brightness of 250 nits.
Lenovo Flex 5i's glossy screen makes videos and pictures pop out.
The text looks sharp and I find it a pleasure to work on this laptop for long hours.
When it comes to color reproduction, this display delivers about 45% NTSC color gamut
which is fine for most folks.
But digital professionals who do color grading on Davinci Resolve and Adobe Photoshop will
be disappointed.
Such folks will be better off connecting this laptop to an external color calibrated monitor.
Now, hands down the best feature of Lenovo Flex 5i is the writing experience with included
active Pen.
This pen provides over 2000 levels of pressure sensitivity, and coupled with its low latency,
you are getting an excellent writing experience.
Of course no digital surface will ever feel like real paper, but the included Active Pen
has impressed me a lot.
I have tried active pens on various laptops like Acer Spin 3, Dell Inspiron 2-in-1, Hp
Envy x360, but Lenovo Flex 5i always comes out on top and delivers the best note taking
experience.
I mostly use Microsoft OneNote app and Windows Ink Workspace for taking notes, writing equations
and making diagrams.
Lenovo Flex 5i's included active pen comes with 2 programmable physical buttons.
By default the first button acts as an eraser while the second acts as right mouse click.
This pen is powered by a single quadruple-A battery that lasts for over a year, so you
don't need to worry about charging it daily.
I think the inclusion of an active pen makes Lenovo Flex 5i a really compelling laptop
for students and working professionals.
My Lenovo Flex 5i is powered by an 11th generation Intel Core i5-1135G7 processor.
You also have a choice of going with faster Intel Core i7-1165G7 configuration.
Here is a chart showing the key differences between these CPUs and their AMD counterparts.
The biggest difference is in the core count.
Intel Core-i5 and Core-i7 are quadcore CPUs while AMD Ryzen 5 and Ryzen 7 are hexa-core
and octa-core CPUs.
Intel chips offer hyper-threading which is disabled in Ryzen processors.
So that means both Core-i5 and Core-i7 offer 8 threads as opposed to only 6 threads in
Ryzen 5 and 8 threads in Ryzen 7.
So how does all this translate to real world performance?
Let's first take a look at the Cinebench Single-Core benchmark.
Intel chips are the clear winner here.
Even the core-i5 is beating AMD's high end Ryzen 7 4700u processor by almost 12%.
And this is not surprising, because these 11th gen intel chips are using a brand new
TigerLake micro-architecture.
Now let's take a look at the Cinebench Multi-Core benchmark.
Here Ryzen 7 4700u comes out on top thanks to its 8 physical cores.
But interestingly the 6-core Ryzen 5 4500u loses to both Intel core-i5 and core-i7 even
though they have only 4 cores.
Intels secret weapon is the hyper-threading technology which doubles the number of execution
threads helping it outperform AMD.
Now let's compare the graphics performance of Intel and AMD chips.
Here is the iGPU FP32 benchmark where Intel's Iris Xe integrated graphics completely demolishes
AMD's integrated Vega graphics.
I am really impressed with what intel has delivered with these 11th generation tigerlake
chips.
My Lenovo Flex 5i easily handles anything that I throw at it.
Day today tasks like internet surfing, running office productivity apps like word processor,
excel and powerpoint is a breeze.
It also handles complex tasks like software development, video editing in davinci resolve
17.2 and Photoshop.
Engineering applications like Autocad loaded without issues and I was able to tinker with
basic autocad projects files with ease.
I also played fortnite at default settings and got an average frame rate of about 60
fps, pretty good for a smooth gaming session.
Overall Lenovo flex 5i is a performance beast that has thoroughly impressed me.
Let's talk about the keyboard.
Lenovo Flex 5i comes with an island style keyboard which is backlit enabled.
Its keys are platinum grey in color with white lettering.
The backlighting has a cool white color which enhances the visibility of each key when using
the laptop in a dark room.
The intensity of the backlighting is user adjustable and it can also be completely turned
off.
The typing experience on this laptop is fantastic.
It trumps most other 2-in-1 laptops in the market delivering adequate key travel and
springy tactile feedback.
I am someone who types a lot, and I have really enjoyed typing on Lenovo Flex 5i.
There is also a fingerprint reader under the right arrow key, which is great for passwordless
login.
The trackpad measures 4.2 by 3 inches which makes it taller than most other trackpads
found on typical 14" laptops.
The build quality of this trackpad is pretty good.
It does not wobble and gives a satisfying click when pressed.
Its surface is smooth and feels great when you slide your fingers across it.
In addition to performing simple things like scrolling and pinch and zoom, the trackpad
allows advanced gestures to toggle between various open apps, see all open windows, switch
virtual desktops and quickly minimize to desktop.
Overall this is a pretty good trackpad with larger than average size and a snappy performance.
Now let's talk about the system memory and on board SSD storage.
Lenovo Flex 5i comes in various configurations.
My unit has 16GB of DDR4 3200 MHz RAM.
Unfortunately The RAM is soldered to the motherboard and cant be upgraded.
Now 16GB is more than enough for most folks, so it shouldn't be an issue.
I was able to run over 20 chrome browser tabs and seamlessly switch between them without
any issues.
The laptop always felt very snappy when running productivity apps like microsoft word and
excel sheet.
When it comes to disk storage, this laptop is rocking a 512GB NVMe M.2 Solid State Drive.
This is the fastest form of SSD storage and 512GB should be plenty of most folks.
Fortunately, Lenovo does allow you to upgrade this SSD to a bigger one.
If you are interested in SSD upgrade, please checkout links to compatible PCIe NVMe SSD
in the video description below
Let's talk about the battery life.
Lenovo Flex 5i ships with a 3 Cell 52.5 Whr battery which is a beefy battery for a 14"
laptop.
The 11th generation intel chips are built on the newer 10 nm SuperFin process technology
which has resulted in significant improvement in battery life.
I got an amazing 11 hour battery life during continuous 1080p video playback at 150 nits
of brightness.
I also tried the PCMark 10 Battery test which simulates real world usage by running common
office applications at regular intervals.
I got around 8 hours of battery life which is pretty impressive.
The included 65-Watt A/C adapter uses USB type-C charging port and is able to charge
the laptop from 0 to 80% in under an hour.
If your battery is running low, thanks to the Quick Charge technology you can get 2
hours of extra runtime with just 15 mins of charging.
Regarding thermal heat dissipation, Lenovo Flex 5i has a large cooling fan and a dual
pipe heat-sink to keep the CPU cool.
Under heavy workload, the laptop ran cool without getting too loud.
It never felt hot when running demanding jobs like video editing or software compilation.
Overall, for a thin and light laptop, I am pretty happy with both the battery life and
the thermal performance of Lenovo Flex 5i
Let's talk about audio.
Lenovo Flex 5i comes with top firing stereo speakers which deliver a total 4 Watt sound.
These speakers get reasonably loud in laptop mode because they are facing upwards.
There is minimal distortion and they sound decent while watching videos & listening to
music.
In tablet mode, when you flip the screen back, the speakers are facing away from you so they
don't feel as loud.
Let's talk about the webcam.
So you are getting a 720p webcam which comes with a physical shutter for extra privacy.
As long as you have a good lighting condition, the video quality produced by this webcam
is fine for video conference calls.
But I do wish that Lenovo had put a 1080p webcam.
Laptop makers need to step up their game when it comes to onboard webcams.
Luckily it's very easy to add an external 1080p USB webcam.
I will drop a link to my favorite 1080p webcam that can be directly plugged into this laptop.
For a thin and light laptop, Lenovo offers a good selection of ports.
There are 2 USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports supporting data transfer speed upto 5 gbps.
There is also a USB Type-C 3.1 Gen 1 port which can also be used to charge the laptop.
But unfortunately this USB Type-C port does not support displayport protocol.
So you will have to use the HDMI port for connecting the laptop to an external monitor.
I tested the HDMI port with my 27" 4K monitor, and Flex 5 had no trouble driving 4K resolution
at 60Hz refresh rate over HDMI cable.
There is also a full size SD card reader which is great for camera nerds like me.
This laptop supports the latest WiFi-6 and Bluetooth 5.0 standards.
You also get a headphone microphone combo jack if you don't like bluetooth headphones.
So I think the port situation is pretty good.
Other than missing the ethernet port, lenovo has all your bases covered.
So here is the bottom-line.
I think the latest Intel model of Lenovo Flex 5i is one of the best 14" thin and light 2-in-1
convertible laptops in the market.
It has class leading CPU and GPU performance while simultaneously delivering long battery
life and excellent thermals.
The keyboard, the trackpad and the overall build quality of Flex 5i is excellent.
I love using this laptop in tablet mode, especially for taking notes with the included active
pen.
I think this pen is a great accessory for students and working professionals.
It's low latency coupled with great palm rejection results in a very natural writing experience.
Overall, if you are in the market for a 14" 2-in-1 laptop, I would highly recommend going
with Lenovo Flex 5i.
Links to quad-core Intel configuration as well as the 6 & 8 core Ryzen configuration
of this laptop can be found in the video description below.
So what do you guys think of Lenovo Flex 5i ? Are you Team Intel or Team AMD?
Please let me know in the comment section below.
If you found this video useful, please like and subscribe.
Also checkout technopandareviews.com for more reviews focusing on laptops and gaming PCs.
Thanks for watching and I will see you guys in the next one.
Bye!