Lenovo Legion 5/5 Pro/7 2021 Discussion

I have tried modifying the fan table config files for Control Center manually myself but for some reason the settings do not always take. If you still have the Vector Pro and want to try yourself they are here:

C:\Program Files\OEM\Eluktronics Control Center\UniwillService\MyControlCenter\UserFanTables

Probably replacing Eluktronics with Node. If you are on the Gaming Mode, Profile 1, then modifying M1T1.json seems to work and be reflected after a reboot.

Although I completely agree that minimum fan speed should be configurable from the app to begin with!

 

I just got the IETS GT500V1 laptop cooler for use with my Legion 7. The cooler is amazing, dropped CPU and GPU temps on benchmarks by 15-20C compared with sitting on a wooden desk (with thermal performance mode both times). It's loud af when on full fan (5000 rpm!), but the fan is entirely variable via a knob, so you can have it off or very quiet. Also has 3 usb ports built in.

The foam encapsulated the legion 7 perfectly with no noticeable gaps in the seal around the base.

Highly recommended.

US amazon link here: https://www.amazon.com/IETS-Powerful-Turbo-Fan-Infinitely-13-17-3inch/dp/B09D6J56NS?th=1

 

Appreciate the insight but the laptop has been reset, packed, and is waiting to go back to MicroCenter next weekend. Plus I just received the notification that my 6600M L5 shipped so that deal was legit.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

My Legion 7i order was placed on October 1, Est. shipped October 25 and ETA November 3. Now it's Est. shipped November 30 and ETA December 7 . I don't know which specific component Lenovo is having trouble procuring.

You know we're in a deep crisis when I could manage to buy a PS5 and an XBSX at MSRP within a month and not a bloody gaming laptop

 

Is it a custom order? They usually take a long time. I cancelled 2 custom orders that were going to take forever and got a pre-built in my hands within a week.

 

The only thing 'custom' in it was changing the default 16GB RAM to 32GB. Everything else was stock. But on Lenovo Australia even the stock Legion 7i is listed as 'More than 8 weeks'. Ironically I already had a pair of Crucial Ballistix ready to go and was planning to sell the OEM RAM sticks once laptop arrives.

 

I used to think I changed computer frequently.
You all are nuts!

I want to see more driver maturity with the 6600/6700/6800 to see if that improves the amount of performance spread between games. Still seems too much for a finalized architecture. 5/10 FPS was normal back in the day between AMD and Nvidia, but the swings in the data are too large.
Each card can either match or exceed the tier above it on the nvidia side or perform worse than the equivalent tier in others.

I hope he does a longer term follow up, but the utility of that may not be worth since next gen is probably going to be announced next year.

 

Is this the same chassis as the Lenovo Legion? It features the same QHD screen according to the specs.

https://www.eluktronics.com/Prometheus-XVI/

I was looking for alternatives since the ship times for Legion7 is 2+ months.

 

Lenovo is large enough to produce its own laptop designs. Eluktronics sources its systems from Tongfang.

 

Hey everyone wanted to ask what are your recommendations for a new L5P buyer, I am getting one this week (3070/5800h) and wanted to upgrade the ram to 32gb and was looking around and as it wont support XMP needs to have JEDEC 3200mhz cl20 what are the recommended kits?

And any tools for CPU management like TS on the AMD side of things? and any BIOS tips and tricks.

Thanks

EDIT:

Found these models

KF432S20IB1
HX432S20IB1
HX432S20IB2
HX432S20IBK2

All seem to have exact similar specs just different prices any ideas?

 

Finally, finally received a Legion 7i with a perfect screen. Only took 4 tries, ridiculous. Now on to the fun stuff re: CPU and GPU voltage and OC.

 

This thread will give you most of the info about the RAM:

https://old.reddit.com/r/AMDLaptops..._ram_will_work_in_your_new_ryzen_4000_laptop/

It says Ryzen 4XXX on the title but most of it carries over to the 5XXX cpus.

 

I'm running into the same issue with W11. I've disabled core isolation in security settings and still get the "unable to start" error when starting up XTU. Would you mind sharing what other steps, if any, you did? I really don't want to wipe the drive and go back to W10 if I can avoid it.

-Edit- went back to Windows 10, XTU works perfectly. The downgrade was surprisingly easy for those who received Legion 7i's with Windows 11 installed. I downloaded the W10 installation media and just ran the tool, selected "keep nothing" and it worked. There was even a folder containing all of the Lenovo drivers which I didn't expect. Installed Vantage, up and running. Will hold off on Windows 11 for time being.

 

Here is my run at Timespy with a GPU OC of +150/+500 and CPU 8-core OC set to 4.5ghz in XTU utility. I have an undervolt of -.020 so far. How do you guys get such high graphics scores out of your 3080s (i.e., 13,500+)?

 

@jlp0209 Curios. When and where did you order your 7i? I just want to gauge an estimate since Lenovo OVP ETAs have changed TWICE for me now, each slipping further than the last.

 

I ordered through the Lenovo site (U.S.) , the pre-built i7 11800 / 3080 is still in stock. It shipped the day after I placed the order.

 

Swapped stock single rank RAM with dual rank Kingston RAM, also was able to maintain a 4.6ghz frequency on all 8 cores using XTU. Bumped up my Timespy scores a bit! This laptop is very impressive.

13,016 overall, 13,210 graphics, 12,021 CPU.

http://www.3dmark.com/spy/23655708

 

Nice scores. Note that there is some variability with Time Spy runs which you may observe after many repeated runs (anecdotally seems to be in the range of +/- 200 Time Spy Graphics). The following has been passed on by @MagillaGorilla (who scored >14k Time Spy Graphics on an L7i 3080) to me several weeks ago:

"Nothing too crazy.. I have repasted.. was on Kryonaut, now on KPX.

To start, I always head to the BIOS.
- Discrete Graphics Mode
- Advanced Graphics OC, Max it to 150 and 300. (We end up overriding this with Afterburner any way)
- With Advanced BIOS, look for “ASPM” in either Pcie or DMI sections (I forget and am away) and disable it.. my understanding is it is related to GPU Power management..

The rest is in the OS..
- Vantage Perf Mode
- Nvidia panel: gsync + vsync off, triple buff off, prefer max performance mode, antialiasing and filtering off..
- Afterburner, set core to +180 sometimes I do 210 (it ends up downclocking no matter what)
- Set Mem to +1200-1600 I set my offsets, then open vfcurve and lock at 875-900mv and a straight line after that point

For better cooling, I use Legion Fan Control and lock it betweeen 75-85 If you have a cold ambient temp, you’ll get even higher scores

Other than that, it’s silicon lottery"

Besides the advanced BIOS suggestion, I have followed this and done vfcurve testing over the last few weeks. The best seemingly stable (in Time Spy, i.e., no artifacts seen so far) setting I've eked out is a +150 core offset and +500 mem offset with 1890 mhz @ 881 mv. My CPU is core uv -0.04 with no cache uv and oc similar to yours with a single core on 5.0 ghz. I have some crappy mem latency on gear 2 with a dual rank 32gb crucial set so I wonder if I will get a higher cpu score with a single rank 32 gb set on gear 1, but other than that I am pretty pleased. It may be possible to oc higher on core for my gpu, but it seems incredibly sensitive to that and usually freezes Time Spy requiring a hard reboot.

https://www.3dmark.com/spy/23663114

The actual stable setting in games is more like +105-120/+500, a locked voltage near 900mv, with same CPU settings which nets me about ~13300-13500 on Time Spy graphics, but maybe I'll test stability a little bit more with this new score (or more likely at +135).

Hope this is helpful.

 

Very helpful, gave you +rep. I can't access the advanced bios for the life of me. I tried sliding my fingers over all of the rows of letters as per prior instructions, and also tried the FN+R, FN+N method, neither of these ways worked. Once in the advanced bios, you are able to edit the ASPM setting? This is likely the culprit, would be huge if I can disable it. Or do you need the custom advanced bios that is being shared on that discord?

Edit- signed up for the private discord discussions, excited to try out the fan control utility.

 

New BIOS Update H1CN35WW. Any noticeable changes? Still no Advanced BIOS per the Change log it seems

 

There is an advanced BIOS that was given out by a Lenovo rep named Ben on the official Legion discord, but several people tried it and bricked their computers after trying to OC their ram (they likely played with other settings) - something about a flaw in the BIOS healing step. Afaik several of those people had to get their units replaced or repaired. I would only pursue this route if you are prepared for this outcome . . . otherwise I don't think anyone has found a key combo to unlock advanced BIOS

 

Yeah, considering that it took 4 tries to get a defect free screen I would be very mad at myself for bricking it. I’m happy with the current performance, with CPU undervolt + OC and GPU OC. I’m consistently getting 12,000+ for CPU and 13,200 graphics in Timespy. I had a weird bug where my CPU would go down to 2.5ghz, resolved by uninstalling / reinstalling Timespy. Gaming temps are also fantastic so far.

 

Wow!

Well after a lot of research & nailing it down to 4 choices (Alienware x17, msi ge76 raider, Asus Zephyrus GX703HS & the Legion 7i), I just pulled the trigger on this model:

Legion 7i Gen 6 Intel Laptop, 16" i7-11800H RTX 3080 - it’ll be my first laptop ever (always used desktops before).

I placed the order this morning & it’s already shipped (supposed to get here Friday), so I’m very excited & your post certainly gives me ease of mind in terms of selecting this brand.

Any recommendations as to what to do first, etc (Been reading a bit of the battery app thing with some people uninstalling it)?

Thanks!

 

Lenovo Vantage? I’d say no to uninstalling it. It does several handy things imo.

 

All-AMD Legion 5 is in the house. Still working through the out-of-the-box setup, but I have a few initial impressions. Note the model I have is the $1386 special referenced earlier in this thread: 1) The panel is about perfect with no noticeable backlight bleed. 2) The 32 GB of RAM is the slower x16, tRFC 880 variety with 4 GB reserved for the iGPU. Assuming I keep the laptop past its return date, I'm going to swap it out for the faster x8 Mushkin Essentials kit I used with my former Legion 5 Pro. 3) SSDs are a pair of 1 TB SK Hynix PC711 not running in a RAID configuration. 4) Battery is the lower capacity 60Wh. Haven't measured its life yet, but I can't imagine it will be greater than 3-4 hours even doing modest tasks using only the iGPU. 5) Keyboard is white backlit, so the only customization available is between two levels of brightness with Fn+spacebar. 6) There is some fan whistle under load, but it's nowhere near as bad as the Ryzen 7+RTX 3060 L5 I returned to MicroCenter a couple weeks ago. 7) Cinebench R23 score is 11,241 in Performance Mode with CPU temps spiking to a maximum of 92C as each rendering pass starts during the 10-minute benchmark loop. It then settles down to around 86-87C with all-core clock frequencies sitting just shy of 4.0 GHz.

While I'll need to live with it for at least a few days before deciding whether or not to keep it, it's looking good so far.

 

I have the same model, you’ll love it. Definitely don’t uninstall Lenovo Vantage, it’s very useful. Do uninstall Corsair iCue, that’s the battery hog.

If you plan to undervolt the CPU I had a heck of a time trying in Windows 11, couldn’t do it. Installed Windows 10 and all is well. Post your impressions when you receive it, enjoy!

Glad you’re having a good experience so far, hopefully it is a keeper. What’s your next plan if it doesn’t work out?

 

MicroCenter took back the Vector Pro without hassle, though it was only the second laptop I've returned there, the other being the aforementioned RTX 3060 Legion 5. Should the RX 6600 model not work out, I'll probably order another L5 Pro with a 3070 when it goes on sale at Lenovo direct. I've never been able to catch the cheap Walmart version when it pops up on their website, and I've struck out on the brick-and-mortar front with at least 20 different stores in three states. Only one even had it as a display model, which they refused to sell.

Now that I think about it, this is my first all-AMD computer in nearly two decades. The last one was a desktop with an Athlon 64 CPU and ATI Radeon 9800 XT GPU. I only remember it because that was the configuration I used to play the original FarCry back in the day. Now I'll need to spend some time familiarizing myself with the AMD control panel and its myriad of options. FreeSync was enabled out of the box on the built-in display, but I needed to toggle it for my external monitor. One minor note: Hybrid mode was disabled out of the box, but then became enabled by default after a BIOS update.

 

Finally completed a full run of Cinebench at 5.0Ghz All-Core!



Really amazed with this 16" Monster of a Machine.

 

That Walmart deal never shows up for me. I got tired of waiting for the CDW deal as well as there was no timeline, canceled that awhile ago.

You should be OK then re: Microcenter. I returned several bad monitors maybe 4+ years ago (Acer / Asus high refresh monitors with crappy AUO panels w/ dead pixels, hairs, eye lashes, dust, all under the screens, terrible BLB). Spoke with a store manager years ago about it because she was "concerned" about the returns. When I explained the issues in detail and offered objective evidence she was fine. I offered to pay all shipping and even re-stocking fees for the returns at Microcenter because it really wasn't their fault and I strongly support their stores / really want them all to do well. She said no way, not necessary. Very cool.

Fast forward to a few months ago, the cashier saw the history on top of my returned Legion 5 (x2) and said "wow you must have really bad luck with screens" and that was it.

How's the heat on this L5? I really dislike inability to undervolt the AMD CPU on these laptops, not to mention the sleep issue that still persists on my Vector Pro after a driver update. Is sleep an issue on your L5? It was a fun 2-3 years aboard the mobile AMD bandwagon but I'm done and back on Intel.

 

There was one day where I saw the Walmart laptops were available, but by the time I got to the checkout process it was too late.

Thermals on the all AMD model are much better than on the 3060 L5 I returned, though they still don't quite match the amazing results I got with my old L5 Pro. Idle temps for the 6600M in Balanced Mode are in the low-mid 40s on the CPU and upper 30s on the GPU. I edited Cinebench CPU temps into my previous first impressions post. The GPU peaks in the low 70s in Furmark. It also sleeps perfectly.

 

Faster than a Threadripper 1950 on a highly parallel load. Impressive.

 

thoroughly impressed with Intel and Lenovo.

 

Thx man, I will - tomorrow is the big day of arrival, haha!

Yes that’s what I meant, the Corsair iCue app. Did you undervolt yours? I’ve never done that, is there a step by step guide somewhere to do that?

 

Good luck! Yes I use Intel XTU. It didn't work for me with Windows 11 so I installed Windows 10. You simply adjust the CPU voltage by millivolt within XTU and that's it. You can also adjust the core clock to max 4.6ghz on all cores. I use a -.070v (or -70 mV) undervolt along with clock speed of 4.6ghz on all 8 cores. Pretty incredible.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/gaming/resources/overclocking-xtu-guide.html

 

My RX 6600M L5 came with the Realtek WiFi card, which is hot garbage. Ordered an Intel AX200 (apparently the AX201 can have problems running on non-Intel systems), which should be here tomorrow. I'll use that opportunity to swap out the RAM for my lower tRFC set.

 

I've had the chance to compare 2 Legion5Pro laptops. Ryzen 7 5800H, 32GB, 1TB, RTX3070. The first one had a left speaker that didn't work. Lenovo told me I could keep it until they shipped out a replacement. Apparently there was no rush getting the first back as I'm actually having to chase them to come pick it up, and in the meantime I've done some testing. I've noticed performance differences due to variations in components

Original:
Micron System RAM: 2x 8ATF2G64HZ-3G2E2 16GB SR
(tRFC (ns) 350, tRFC 560, tRFC2 416, tRFC4 256)
Micron Video RAM
Network Adapter Realtek RTL8852AE

Replacement:
Samsung System RAM: 2x M471A2G43AB2-CWE 16GB SR
(tRFC (ns) 550, tRFC 880, tRFC2 560, tRFC4 416)
Samsung Video RAM
Network Adapter MediaTek MT7921

Same Disk Drive WDC PC SN730 SDBPNTY-1T00-1101 (1024 GB, PCI-E 3.0 x4)

After running a bunch of benchmarks and tests (attempted to record it here), including swapping the System RAM between the machines, I'm thinking the following:
Silicon Lottery was better on the original 5800H
Micron System RAM is better than Samsung
Samsung Video RAM is better than Micron (or other GPU factor is better on the 2nd machine)

Also
SSD on 2nd machine seems better, but I've stored more on the 1st, so maybe that's a factor.

Let me know if you see different conclusions based on the spreadsheet of results.

MediaTek MT7921 was really flaky at first and I was worried I had 2 dud laptops in a row, but it's come good. I haven't really known how to do any testing on the Wi-Fi adapters. Any advice on which is better would be great.

I can swap RAM, SSD, Wi-Fi modules, and want to keep the best and put the worst in the original laptop when I have to send it back on Monday.

What would you do?

 

Got my upgrade parts installed this afternoon. The AX200 just about doubled my downstream speeds while the lower latency RAM modules allowed me to break the 13,000 mark in Cinebench - a gain of nearly 2000 points. Another thing I've noticed is that the palm rejection is way better on this unit than on any previous Legion laptop I've owned or sampled. Not sure if this was due to a design, driver, or firmware change, but I can actually enjoy typing on this thing now that the cursor isn't moving at random.

The only dark specter to haunt this upgrade experience was due to my own stupidity. Instead of letting my plastic pry tool go around the perimeter of the laptop when removing the bottom panel, I only did it about halfway and tried to lift up on it, which caused two of the plastic tabs to snap clean off. Fortunately, the pieces fell right out. From what I can tell, the damage is not visible from the outside, nor has it compromised the structural integrity of the laptop.

So far, I'm quite happy with the overall package, especially given what I paid. It's too bad the stock RAM and WiFi card are holding it back so much.

 

Awesome, thanks!

 

I am legendary finally!

http://www.3dmark.com/spy/23769774

 

https://videocardz.com/newz/lenovo-...s-liquid-metal-and-1250-nits-mini-led-display

New Legion 7i on the horizon - or maybe this is China exclusive.

Fancy new mini-LED screen - probably 2.5K+ 16:10 165hz 1250 nits (same as Acer Predator Triton 500 SE's mini-LED screen if I had to guess) and LM on the CPU (yes!) - but only 11800H (no! but seems to be a China thing, they don't have 11980HK)

Wish it was 4k / 3080 super / Alder Lake instead though.

 

I thought Lenovo wasn't going to do liquid metal because of potential customer support issues.

 

Maybe they've optimized LM application in their manufacturing, like ASUS did (which had its own initial issues). I'm guessing they use a foam barrier or something to prevent defects

 

That's what they said originally, but they have these new thermal modules for sale a couple of months ago and have discontinued the original copper modules. Nickel plated cpu sink. I ordered one. Supposed to ship November 20.

 

Despite there being no visible damage or structural problems with my Legion 5, I decided to be a nerd and order a new bottom panel from AliExpress.

 

I got the 5i Pro and want to use it with my 2 external screens.
Connected via USB-C and DP chaining.

When I connect the USB-C cable only the chained monitor is working, to get the directly connected monitor to work I have to close the lid.

Does the 5i Pro not support 3 screens at the same time or do I miss some setting?

With my work laptop this setup is working fine - internal screen and the 2 external screens at the same time.

 

Why did you order a new one? Do you prefer a totally clean / blank bottom panel without the serial number?

 

Yeah…so…if anyone is thinking of flashing a different vbios to the Legion 7i…don’t do it. Tried it for kicks, laptop is seriously borked. Won’t boot to bios / no splash screen but I know Windows starts because I hear the sound. The keys work. Tried external monitor, nothing. Removed battery and disconnected CMOS battery, no dice. I’ve never bricked a laptop or desktop before, not fun. If anyone has a solution I’m all ears, obviously would prefer to keep this one if I can.

Lenovo is sending a replacement unit regardless. I’m never tinkering with any laptop ever again! Lesson learned.

 

What vbios did you flash it with?

 

An Acer vbios that I tried before with a different 3080 laptop, I think it was from a shunt mod someone did and I wanted to see if it ran even higher than 165w on the L7. So stupid.