Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x 14 Gen 9 Preview

Today, Lenovo started selling two Snapdragon X Elite-based laptops. I hope to review both in time, but I’ll be starting with the Yoga Slim 7x 14 Gen 9. Here’s a quick look at this offering, and Lenovo’s other Copilot+ PC, the ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 too.

A couple of points up front.

Lenovo, like HP, has decided to go all in on the higher-end Snapdragon X Elite processor family; its first Copilot+ PCs ignore the lower-end Snapdragon X Plus. Indeed, the Lenovo review unit uses the same processor version, the X1E78100, as the HP.

But Lenovo, unlike HP, isn’t using this new generation of AI PCs as an opportunity to rebrand or make any major design changes. The Yoga Slim and ThinkPad T14s are both just new versions of existing products, each of which has been around for several years. This is both good and bad, I guess, but their relatively familiarity could be the right choice and cut down on worries that their Arm-based architectures are in any way problematic.

I spent some time with each PC at the showcase after Microsoft’s Copilot+ PC launch event, and while I generally lean more towards the ThinkPad side of Lenovo’s product family, I was more impressed by the thinner, lighter, more attractive, and more affordable and Yoga Slim. I’m happy to review either, but the Yoga Slim is my preference for now, and it should be a good starting point.

Aside from the processor choice, the two Lenovos diverge when it comes to the displays, available RAM choices, batteries, expansion ports, and more. This has more to do with the respective target markets and products lines than anything else, but here, too, I find myself leaning towards the Yoga Slim configuration in all but a few specifications and component choices.

For example, the Yoga Slim has a bigger and better display panel, though the ThinkPad does give you some configuration options where the Yoga does not. It’s a stunning 14.5-inch PureSight OLED touch panel with a 3K (2944 x 1840) resolution with a 16:10 aspect ratio, a 90 Hz refresh rate, 1000 nits of peak brightness, DisplayHDR True Black 600 and low blue light capabilities, and its conforms to 100 percent of the sRGB and P3 color gamuts.

The more pedestrian T14s gets three 14-inch display panel choices, each of which offers a 16:10 aspect ratio. Two are IPS panels that offer 400 nits of brightness, and one of which provides touch capabilities. And one is OLED, with a 2.8K resolution, 400 nits of brightness, Dolby Vision, HDR True Black 500, and EyeSafe capabilities.

The ThinkPad outshines the Yoga on RAM, offering up to 64 GB of LPRRD5X RAM, while the Yoga tops out at 32 GB. But both can be configured with up to 1 TB of PCIe Gen 4 2242 M.2 SSD storage.

The AV capabilities are similar: Both offer a Full HD MIPI webcam, though only the ThinkPad has the IR capabilities needed for Windows Hello facial recognition. And where the Yoga offers Dolby Atmos sound, the T14s makes do with Dolby Audio.

As the more minimalist PC, the Yoga Slim delivers only Type-C ports for expansion. You’ll find two USB 40 Gbps Type-C ports with Power Delivery 3.1 and DisplayPort 1.4 on the left, and a single 40 Gbps USB Type-C port, again with PD 3.1 and DP 1.4 on the right. I love the consistency there, it’s so rare.

Thanks to its business focus, the ThinkPad T14s delivers a more diverse set of modern and legacy ports, with two 40 Gbps USB Type-C ports, two full-sized 5 Gbps USB-A ports, and a full-sized HDMI 2.1 video-out port.

Connectivity is modern and identical on both: You get Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.3, but there’s no cellular data, even as an option.

Despite its thin form factor, the Yoga Slim has the bigger battery, 70 watt-hour vs. 58 watt-hour for the ThinkPad, though I did notice in May that it has venting on the bottom of the chassis, which could be problematic for cooling. And the Yoga is much thinner than the ThinkPad, with dimensions of 12.80 x 8.86 x 0.51 inches (at its thinnest point), compared to 12.34 x 8.64 x 0.67 inches. But at 2.82 pounds, it’s a tad heavier than the 2.72 pound ThinkPad.

Each comes in a single color: Cosmic Blue for the Yoga Slim 7x and Eclipse Black for the ThinkPad T14s.

They’re both handsome machines. Both feature Lenovo’s “reverse notch” communications bar, and both have speaker grills on the sides of their full-sized, backlit keyboards.

If history is any guide, the ThinkPad keyboard will be slightly crisper, and both feature medium-large touchpads that should prove reasonably reliable. Neither keyboard suffers from superfluous extra keys. Well, aside from the Copilot key, of course.

The Yoga Slim’s $1200 starting price is terrific, given the 16 GB of RAM and 512 GB of storage it includes, and it even undercuts the HP OmniBook X a bit. You can upgrade to 32 GB for $69 and to 1 TB for $45 (and to Windows 11 Pro for $28), all of which is quite reasonable: A fully decked-out Yoga Slim starts at just over $1300 (or $1340 with Windows 11 Pro).

The ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 is quite a bit more expensive. Though this will change, there’s only a single configuration available for sale as I write this–32 GB of RAM, 1 TB of storage, and the base, non-touch Full HD+ IPS display–for $2700. But it does come with a three-year warranty, and Lenovo’s business customers of course get volume discounts.

Comparing these PCs to those offered by HP, Microsoft, and other Copilot+ PCs is a bit difficult until I have them in hand, but across the three or more models I expect to experience during this first month of availability–the Microsoft Surface Laptop I purchased, the HP OmniBook X or UltraBook Ultra (not sure yet), and the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x–I should soon have a pretty good working knowledge of where this platform is at this early stage.

My hopes are high, my expectations are, I hope, reasonable. More soon.