Lenovo Legion 5 Pro

[Alexrose1uk]

Ideally I'd go for both upgrades, but if budget allows for one, the 4070 no doubt.
The RAM can be upgraded at a later point in time, but the faster GPU is a no brainer, as it cannot be changed at a later date, and games (and bad programming) will get ever more demanding with time. Don't forget that laptop GPUs are not generally as fast as desktop varieties either, so you definately are better off to get the fastest mobile GPU with the highest TDP you can (the lenovos are generally fairly good on the power they allow to the GPU)

Otherwise it's a nice spec

 

[beachBOYken]

I should have pointed it out it’s the slim legion, not the pro, not sure if that makes any deciding factor.

 

[Alexrose1uk]

If you're going direct through Lenovo (Slim 5 Gen 9?), I'd pay the small extra (£30) to go for the better 240Hz/500Nits panel. It'll do HDR better justice and likely be a higher specced panel given the refresh rate and maximum brightness, which will make using it that bit nicer. If you take the USB RGB mouse off they include, the screen upgrade only ends up costing £10 as they dock £20 off the price if you drop that mouse. For me, at that price, the slightly higher spec panel would be a no-brainer.
RAM still looks to be SODIMM (upgradeable though) so I'd say screen+GPU upgrade are the more important, with RAM later, albeit if you can afford it, go for the 32GB now as well, as then it'll all be covered under any warranty, or any warranty upgrades you purchase.

I believe the Slim 5 Gen 9 may give the GPU the full 140W TGP also, so as far as 4070s go, it'll be one of the potentially better performing mobile variants, cooling allowing.

Honestly, for less than £1500 with all the upgrades including the 1TB SSD, it's looking a decent machine for sure

The 8845HS is 20-35% better than the 6800H which was popular, so it's really quite a potent mobile platform with the 140W 4070!

 

[beachBOYken]

If you're going direct through Lenovo (Slim 5 Gen 9?), I'd pay the small extra (£30) to go for the better 240Hz/500Nits panel. It'll do HDR better justice and likely be a higher specced panel given the refresh rate and maximum brightness, which will make using it that bit nicer. If you take the USB RGB mouse off they include, the screen upgrade only ends up costing £10 as they dock £20 off the price if you drop that mouse. For me, at that price, the slightly higher spec panel would be a no-brainer.
RAM still looks to be SODIMM (upgradeable though) so I'd say screen+GPU upgrade are the more important, with RAM later, albeit if you can afford it, go for the 32GB now as well, as then it'll all be covered under any warranty, or any warranty upgrades you purchase.

I believe the Slim 5 Gen 9 may give the GPU the full 140W TGP also, so as far as 4070s go, it'll be one of the potentially better performing mobile variants, cooling allowing.

Honestly, for less than £1500 with all the upgrades including the 1TB SSD, it's looking a decent machine for sure

The 8845HS is 20-35% better than the 6800H which was popular, so it's really quite a potent mobile CPU!

Yeah I did drop the mouse when I looked at options, my only worry is buying direct the reviews are really poor, I shouldn't let reviews bother me but when you see loads of 1-2 star reviews and plan to spend £1k+ its a bit offputting

 

[Alexrose1uk]

Yeah understood, I've bought from them before and let's just say don't trust ETAs. That said the machines themselves are great as long as there are no BIOS fixes required like the old fTPM issue which never got fixed.
That said they do generally get it to you eventually and sometimes buying direct can get you a bargain over buying 3rd party.

 

[Alexrose1uk]

I mean for context I returned a Legion 5 6800h machine because of the fTPM stuttering which isn't present on these new 8xxx series machines, it was resolved ahead of 7xxx, but needed AGESA code which Lenovo never rolled out to older machines on 6*** and prior.
Also had an early 4800u machine for the family off them which is still working and actually recently had a motherboard and SSD swap on warranty as the SSD or soldered memory was failing (after 4 years of heavy semi constant use by my father in law)

If my Legion machine hadn't had a bad case of that fTPM curse, I'd still have it. The machine was otherwise excellent, with decent power to all the components and good cooling, and I'd give them a go again in future.

Like I say they're terrible at ongoing BIOS support etc, but if the machine works well out the box, they're usually keepers, and as they actually give the GPUs decent cooling and power for thier class, I don't hesitate to dare say that slim is probably one of the better performing thin AMD systems with a 4070, likely only being beaten by bigger machines or those with decent wattage higher end parts.

 

[Snapshot]

If you're going direct through Lenovo (Slim 5 Gen 9?), I'd pay the small extra (£30) to go for the better 240Hz/500Nits panel. It'll do HDR better justice and likely be a higher specced panel given the refresh rate and maximum brightness, which will make using it that bit nicer. If you take the USB RGB mouse off they include, the screen upgrade only ends up costing £10 as they dock £20 off the price if you drop that mouse. For me, at that price, the slightly higher spec panel would be a no-brainer.

This. The earlier 165Hz 500nits panel is a gem and I would definitely go for the better panel if I had to replace my current Legion 5 Pro.

 

[Vandle]

Any dock recommendations for a Legion Pro? Only running one monitor currently but may get another in the near future. Doesn't have to be too fancy but I go to a site a couple of days per week and at home for the rest. Would just like one cable to plug in rather than have to get out the charger out my bag and reconnect speakers (3.5 jack), usb webcam, hdmi etc. Mouse and keybopard are bluthooth so no issues there.
The power unit is a pure 300w brick though. Will that limit options?
Thanks

 

[Snapshot]

You can just about run a Legion 5 from a 100W USB-C supply but it whinges every time it's started. You'd have to select a dock with a non-USB-C PSU to supply enough power for the dock itself and the 100W pass-through. It might be easier to accept you have to attach two cables (dock and power brick) as this will simplify the choice of dock.

 

[OspreyO]

Did you find a USB C that works. Be handy to have an alternative to the power brick, even for light loads. My 300w charger is in a try under the desk, its a pain to get it out if, I was to use the laptop somewhere for non gaming purposes.

I do have a 100W PD charger. The pro gives me dos error on startup. Then when windows loads, a error symbol on the battery. Something about low power charging. No idea if its actually working or not.