Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″) review – the Ryzen 7 5800U is crazy fast

Small laptops with powerful hardware are kind of the new thing in 2021. Of course, this trend is not exactly new, as Apple is making 13-inch Pro devices for a long time. Today, we will check out the brand new IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″), and we will evaluate Lenovo’s choice to put the Pro moniker in its name.

Although it comes in a well-known form factor at 14 inches, the new device actually has a screen ratio of 16:10. It is combined with a 2.2K or 2.8K resolution, and it should be a lot more comfortable for work than the traditional 16:9 1080p panel.

Additionally, it is exciting to see that Zen 3 ULV processors are finally hitting the market. You know, the Ryzen 5000H series debuted all the way back in January. So did a couple of Ryzen 5000U CPUs. However, the latter featured rebranded processors from the last generation. They were not bad, whatsoever, but we’re eager to see the difference from generation to generation.

And if you need that little splash of GPU power, you can configure the notebook with the GeForce MX450.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/lenovo-ideapad-5-pro-14/

Contents


Specs Sheet

Lenovo IdeaPad 5 / 5i Pro (14", 2021) - Specs

  • MNE007ZA1-1 (CSO1402)
  • Color accuracy  1.8  1.3
  • HDD/SSD
  • up to 4000GB SSD
  • RAM
  • up to 16GB
  • OS
  • Windows 11 Home, Windows 10 Home, Windows 11 Pro, Windows 10 Pro, No OS
  • Battery
  • 60Wh, 4-cell, 56.6Wh, 56.5Wh
  • Body material
  • Aluminum
  • Dimensions
  • 312.2 x 221 x 15.99 ~ 17.99 mm (12.29" x 8.70" x 0.63")
  • Weight
  • 1.41 kg (3.1 lbs)
  • Ports and connectivity
  • 1x USB Type-A
  • 3.2 Gen 1 (5 Gbps)
  • 1x USB Type-A
  • 3.2 Gen 1 (5 Gbps), Sleep and Charge
  • 1x USB Type-C
  • 3.2 Gen 1 (5 Gbps), Power Delivery (PD)
  • 1x USB Type-C
  • 3.2 Gen 1 (5 Gbps), Power Delivery (PD), DisplayPort
  • HDMI
  • 1.4b
  • Card reader
  • SD, SDHC, SDXC, MMC
  • Ethernet LAN
  • Wi-Fi
  • 802.11ax
  • Bluetooth
  • 5.1
  • Audio jack
  • 3.5mm Combo Jack
  • Features
  • Fingerprint reader
  • optional
  • Web camera
  • HD & IR
  • Backlit keyboard
  • optional
  • Microphone
  • Dual-Array Microphone
  • Speakers
  • 2x 2W, Dolby Atmos
  • Optical drive
  • Security Lock slot

All Lenovo IdeaPad 5 / 5i Pro (14″, 2021) configurations

#CommissionsEarned

What’s in the box?

Inside the package, there is a 65W USB Type-C power adapter, as well as some paper manuals.


Design and construction

Unsurprisingly, the IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″) looks and feels more classy than its non-Pro sibling. Its weight is low – 1.38-1.41 kg, while the profile goes from 16-18mm. In terms of its structural quality, we can’t say that it is top-notch, but we see little flex from both the lid and the base. Ultimately, they are made out of aluminum and give a cool touch feeling.

One of the best things about this notebook is its hinges. They are super smooth and allow the lid to be opened with a single hand. Also, the bezels around the matte display are thin, and there is an HD camera with an IR face recognition sensor array at the top.

Next in line – the keyboard. It is surrounded by some speaker grills and has a backlight. Although its travel is decent, while the clicky feedback and the large keycaps definitely add up to the good experience. At this screen size, you can’t expect to see a NumberPad section. Also, the device lacks a fingerprint reader.

Looking a little further down below, we see the touchpad. Its size is decent, and it provides a relatively smooth gliding experience. Tracking is accurate as well. While we are here, we have to mention that there is a bit of deck flex.

Now, if you turn the laptop upside down, you will only see the rather big ventilation grill, while the hot air escapes from in between the lid and the base. Also on the bottom panel, there are a couple of cutouts for the speakers.

Ports

On the left side, there is a USB Type-C 3.2 (Gen. 1) port, an HDMI 1.4b connector, another USB Type-C 3.2 (Gen. 1) port, and an audio jack. Respectively, on the right, you will find an SD card reader, as well as two USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) ports.


Disassembly, upgrade options, and maintenance

To get inside this device, you need to undo 6 Torx-head screws. After that, carefully pry the bottom panel away from the chassis.

The battery here has a capacity of 56.5Wh.

In terms of upgrade options, we see a very modest setup. The memory is soldered to the motherboard and comes in two configurations. One with 8, and one with 16GB of dual-channel RAM. Storage-wise, there is one M.2 PCIe x4 slot.

As far as the cooling is concerned, the notebook is equipped with two heat pipes, a heat sink, and a surprisingly big fan.


Display quality

Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″) in the configuration we tested has an IPS panel – MNE007ZA1-1 (CSO1402). Its diagonal is 14″ (35.6 cm), and the resolution is 2880 x 1800 pixels. The screen ratio is 16:10, and we are looking at a pixel density of – 243 ppi, and a pitch of 0.10 х 0.10 mm. The screen turns into Retina when viewed at distance equal to or greater than 36cm (from this distance one’s eye stops differentiating the separate pixels, and it is normal for looking at a laptop).

Viewing angles are excellent. We offer images at 45° to evaluate image quality.

We measured a maximum brightness of 408 nits in the middle of the screen and 404 nits as an average for the whole area, with a maximum deviation of 12%. The Correlated Color Temperature on a white screen is 6800K – slightly colder than the optimal for the sRGB standard of 6500K.
In the illustration below you can see how the main display performs from a uniformity perspective. In other words, the leakage of light from the light source.

Values of dE2000 over 4.0 should not occur, and this parameter is one of the first you should check if you intend to use the laptop for color-sensitive work. The contrast ratio is very good – 1530:1.

To make sure we are on the same page, we would like to give you a little introduction to the sRGB color gamut and the Adobe RGB. To start, there’s the CIE 1976 Uniform Chromaticity Diagram that represents the visible specter of colors by the human eye, giving you a better perception of the color gamut coverage and the color accuracy.

Inside the black triangle, you will see the standard color gamut (sRGB) that is being used by millions of people on HDTV and on the web. As for the Adobe RGB, this is used in professional cameras, monitors, etc for printing. Basically, colors inside the black triangle are used by everyone and this is the essential part of the color quality and color accuracy of a mainstream notebook.

Still, we’ve included other color spaces like the famous DCI-P3 standard used by movie studios, as well as the digital UHD Rec.2020 standard. Rec.2020, however, is still a thing of the future and it’s difficult for today’s displays to cover that well. We’ve also included the so-called Michael Pointer gamut, or Pointer’s gamut, which represents the colors that naturally occur around us every day.

The yellow dotted line shows Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″)’s color gamut coverage.

Its display covers 99% of the sRGB/ITU-R BT.709 (web/HDTV standard) in CIE1976.

Our “Design and Gaming” profile delivers optimal color temperature (6500K) at 140 cd/m2 luminance and sRGB gamma mode.

We tested the accuracy of the display with 24 commonly used colors like light and dark human skin, blue sky, green grass, orange, etc. You can check out the results at factory condition and also, with the “Design and Gaming” profile.

Below you can compare the scores of Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″) with the default settings (left), and with the “Gaming and Web design” profile (right).

The next figure shows how well the display is able to reproduce really dark parts of an image, which is essential when watching movies or playing games in low ambient light.

The left side of the image represents the display with stock settings, while the right one is with the “Gaming and Web Design” profile activated. On the horizontal axis, you will find the grayscale, and on the vertical axis – the luminance of the display. On the two graphs below you can easily check for yourself how your display handles the darkest nuances but keep in mind that this also depends on the settings of your current display, the calibration, the viewing angle, and the surrounding light conditions.

Response time (Gaming capabilities)

We test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “black-to-white” and “white-to-black” method from 10% to 90% and vice versa.

We recorded Fall Time + Rise Time = 17 ms.

After that, we test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “Gray-to-Gray” method from 50% White to 80% White and vice versa between 10% and 90% of the amplitude.


PWM (Screen flickering)

Pulse-width modulation (PWM) is an easy way to control monitor brightness. When you lower the brightness, the light intensity of the backlight is not lowered, but instead turned off and on by the electronics with a frequency indistinguishable to the human eye. In these light impulses, the light/no-light time ratio varies, while brightness remains unchanged, which is harmful to your eyes. You can read more about that in our dedicated article on PWM.

Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″)’s display doesn’t use PWM to adjust its brightness at any point. This means it is comfortable for long gaming sessions without harming your eyes in this aspect.

Blue light emissions

Installing our Health-Guard profile not only eliminates PWM but also reduces the harmful Blue Light emissions while keeping the colors of the screen perceptually accurate. If you’re not familiar with the Blue light, the TL;DR version is – emissions that negatively affect your eyes, skin, and your whole body. You can find more information about that in our dedicated article on Blue Light.

Buy our profiles

Since our profiles are tailored for each individual display model, this article and its respective profile package are meant for Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″) configurations with 14″ IPS MNE007ZA1-1 (CSO1402).

*Should you have problems with downloading the purchased file, try using a different browser to open the link you’ll receive via e-mail. If the download target is a .php file instead of an archive, change the file extension to .zip or contact us at [email protected].

Read more about the profiles HERE.

In addition to receiving efficient and health-friendly profiles, by buying LaptopMedia's products you also support the development of our labs, where we test devices in order to produce the most objective reviews possible.

Office Work

Office Work should be used mostly by users who spend most of the time looking at pieces of text, tables or just surfing. This profile aims to deliver better distinctness and clarity by keeping a flat gamma curve (2.20), native color temperature and perceptually accurate colors.

Design and Gaming

This profile is aimed at designers who work with colors professionally, and for games and movies as well. Design and Gaming takes display panels to their limits, making them as accurate as possible in the sRGB IEC61966-2-1 standard for Web and HDTV, at white point D65.

Health-Guard

Health-Guard eliminates the harmful Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) and reduces the negative Blue Light which affects our eyes and body. Since it’s custom tailored for every panel, it manages to keep the colors perceptually accurate. Health-Guard simulates paper so the pressure on the eyes is greatly reduced.

Get all 3 profiles with 33% discount


Sound

Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″)’s Dolby Atmos speakers produce a sound of good quality. Its low, mid, and high tones are clear of deviations.


Drivers

All of the drivers and utilities for this notebook can be found here: https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/products/laptops-and-netbooks/5-series/ideapad-5-pro-14acn6/downloads/driver-list

Battery

Now, we conduct the battery tests with Windows Better performance setting turned on, screen brightness adjusted to 120 nits, and all other programs turned off except for the one we are testing the notebook with. This device’s 56.5Wh battery pack delivers 10 hours of Web browsing, and 7 hours and 33 minutes of video playback.


CPU options

This is one of the first notebooks that come with the Zen 3 Ryzen 5 5600U, and Ryzen 7 5800U.


GPU options

In addition to the integrated graphics, there is an option for a GeForce MX450 dedicated GPU.


Gaming tests

DOTA 2HD 1080p, Low (Check settings)HD 1080p, Normal (Check settings)HD 1080p, High (Check settings)
Average FPS154 fps124 fps91 fps

Temperatures and comfort

Max CPU load

In this test we use 100% on the CPU cores, monitoring their frequencies and chip temperature. The first column shows a computer’s reaction to a short load (2-10 seconds), the second column simulates a serious task (between 15 and 30 seconds), and the third column is a good indicator of how good the laptop is for long loads such as video rendering.

Average core frequency (base frequency + X); CPU temp.

AMD Ryzen 7 5800U (15W TDP)0:02 – 0:10 sec0:15 – 0:30 sec10:00 – 15:00 min
Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″)2.31 GHz (B+22%) @ 55°C2.32 GHz (B+22%) @ 59°C2.41 GHz (B+27%) @ 66°C

Despite the great scores in synthetic and real-world benchmarks, the Ryzen 7 5800U was apparently running pretty modestly. Its clock speed is far from the maximum boost, and the temperature never went above 70°C.

Real-life gaming

NVIDIA GeForce MX450GPU frequency/ Core temp (after 2 min)GPU frequency/ Core temp (after 30 min)
Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″)1395 MHz @ 69°C1395 MHz @ 70°C

Here, we saw that the MX450 was running at the base clock for the 25W version of the GPU.

Comfort during combined load

Although the device doesn’t get too loud during combined load, it can reach temperatures in excess of 47°C, which is a bit warm.


Verdict

We knew that this one was going to be special from the beginning. The main reason for that? AMD. The Zen 3 ULV processors are simply in a league of their own when it comes to computational power. In fact, they are getting pretty close to their 45W brothers, and we think that they can actually be used for CPU-intensive tasks. In fact, we feel that AMD has just made the older Intel generation of processors obsolete.

Lenovo IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″)’s IPS panel in our configuration has a 2.8K resolution, comfortable viewing angles, decent maximum brightness, and a very good contrast ratio. Also, it covers 99% of the sRGB gamut and displays some pretty accurate colors with an average dE of <2.0. This means that professionals can use it for color-sensitive work. Plus, the panel backlight doesn’t use PWM for brightness adjustment.

It is good to have a high-resolution display but we suppose that it is the culprit to some troubles when using the laptop in battery mode. Well, the results are pretty decent, to be honest, but they could have been better, especially on the video playback front. We got 10 hours of Web browsing on a single charge while playing a 720p video on loop drained it in 7 hours and a half, which is exactly half of what Lenovo states.

Unfortunately, you won’t be able to upgrade the memory on this device, as it is soldered to the motherboard. However, not only do you get storage expansion via one M.2 PCIe x4 slot, but there is a full-size SD card reader, two USB Type-A ports, two USB Type-C ports, and more. On the other hand, the Type-C ports are far from the fastest out there in addition to the lack of Thunderbolt connectivity.

Ultimately, the fast processors, 90Hz refresh rate of the screen, and the rather potent GeForce MX450 add up for a super snippy device. Its battery life could have been better, but we won’t rant about it. We definitely think that buying the IdeaPad 5 Pro (14″) is not a bad idea.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/lenovo-ideapad-5-pro-14/

Pros

  • Excellent performance
  • Doesn’t use PWM for brightness adjustment (LG V0GPY-133WF7)
  • Choice of carbon and aluminum for build materials
  • Decent input devices
  • Populous I/O which includes an SD card reader
  • IR face recognition camera
  • Covers 99% of sRGB colors and offers accurate color representation thanks to our Gaming and Web design profile (LG V0GPY-133WF7)
  • High-resolution display options with a 16:10 aspect ratio and 90Hz refresh rate


Cons

  • No Thunderbolt
  • Memory is soldered to the motherboard

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Fred
Fred
2 years ago

Can you also review 16 inch version?

Can you show photo of internals?

Last edited 2 years ago by Fred
Tom
Tom
2 years ago
Michal
Michal
2 years ago
Reply to  Tom

That is a really good question. Same here I can’t choose between these to Yoga slim 7 pro Amd 5800H and IdeaPad 5 Pro 5800U?

Both 14 inch of course.

I guess that the battery would be kind of same on these two.

ch3
ch3
2 years ago

has it got DP via USB-C?

Karol
Karol
2 years ago
Reply to  ch3

I bought one, and yes.
One USB-C port is data & charging only. Second one USB-C is data, charging & displayport – works flawlessly, I have monitor with USB-C charging, DP and data (monitor has hub) and everything works with just one usb-c cable.

Tixati
Tixati
2 years ago

All GREAT, there’s only one, very, very, tiny catch: it’s not available in Europe or the Americas. Or most of Asia. Or in Australia. Oops.

Canol
Canol
2 years ago

There are speaker grills at both bottom and top, but there are only 2 speakers. So are they bottom firing speakers or top firing speakers?

CT Blaze
CT Blaze
2 years ago
Reply to  Canol

Bottom firing, but Dolby Atmos certified, so sound must go up as well