Lenovo ThinkPad P16 laptop review: RTX A2000 now with full power

[Redaktion]

A mobile workstation has to offer high performance in all aspects. We were correspondingly disappointed in the first test of the ThinkPad P16, whose RTX A2000 ran with a handbrake. The retest shows that this was probably a special feature of our first test device.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-P16-laptop-review-RTX-A2000-now-with-full-power.725557.0.html

[On]

Lack of RJ45 is just stupid and disqualifies this notebook as a workstation.

[BlueSeg]

16gb ram for 3000 euros?

[NikoB]

They simply force owners to buy a docking station (or adapter) and carry it with them. It feels like the development department is just cutting the budget. What matters is not the result, but the process. As long as such workers are not fired because the beneficiaries of the company do not pay attention, they exist calmly and comfortably. It is worth coming to someone who demands a result (because otherwise the company is bankrupt and no one will save it), as all such employees are immediately swept out of the house with a filthy broom, hiring adequate ones, or these immediately come to their senses and begin to do everything not as nonsense to them in the head, but as the client wants. The target audience.

Who buys such laptops at retail, piece by piece at such prices? Rare professionals.

Who buys such series in bulk? Purchasing managers for kickbacks. So it's these kickback purchasers who are the real target audio retailers for HP, not the independent pros who buy them with their own money.

Where are these managers? Usually where the owners of the company do not conduct a thorough audit. After all, usually in a private company, audits are quite strong, if it is not too large and mired in the problems of companies at the level of TNCs. And where is usually a bad audit? In companies that work for the authorities and cut the state budget, i.e. taxpayers' money, pensions, social funds. Health care, all sorts of agencies, etc.

The casket always reveals simply why such strange decisions, for what seems to be your own money and quite a lot...

[NikoB]

Who buys such series in bulk? Purchasing managers for kickbacks. So it's these kickback purchasers who are the real target audio retailers for HP, not the independent pros who buy them with their own money.

Edited: Who buys such series in bulk? Purchasing managers for kickbacks. So it's these kickback purchasers who are the real target audience for HP, not independent professionals buying them with their own money.

[NikoB]

Sorry, not HP, Lenovo..))

[Oleksa]

It's not even funny, Lenovo is just mocking.
It was stolen here:
- 112Gb RAM
- 7Tb ssd
- 4K display (garbage was installed in its place)
- 5-10Gbe network + rg45

[NikoB]

The professional series can also be evaluated by overall reliability (here I personally have a negative attitude towards Lenovo) and therefore this also matters.

But in general, even for 2022 for 3000 euros, there should be 32GB of RAM and at least 2TB of SSD as a basic minimum configuration. Especially in 2023.

Compared to auto, the configuration with 64GB of RAM fits the "Comfort" category, and 128GB is the top version, obviously it will cost more.

Even in 2021, 16GB of RAM was no longer called upon by professional buyers, nothing. except for Homeric laughter - this is a volume for housewives, not professionals.

Now the norm for professionals is quickly shifting to 64GB, as the base volume - 32 is slowly becoming small ..

SSD with the current price drop is already the norm for workers at least 4TB in the basic configuration.

Accordingly, everything is decided by the price - they will sell you this model for about $ 1600 - take it, but of course you should not take it for $ 3000 in such a configuration.

As for the 4k screen - Ali 4k @ 120 costs about $ 150-180 and this is the full price, and not the price relative to fhd or 2.5k panels. So I don't understand the redneck of all manufacturers with the installation of exclusively 4K@120 in the series.

It's time to forget about fhd and 2.5k screens as an anachronism.

5Gbps RJ45 has been mandatory for professional series for a long time, only it provides access to NAS and servers at the speed of at least SATA SSD. And it's all worth a penny in reality.

[Neenyah]

As for the 4k screen - Ali 4k @ 120 costs about $ 150-180 and this is the full price, and not the price relative to fhd or 2.5k panels. So I don't understand the redneck of all manufacturers with the installation of exclusively 4K@120 in the series.

It's time to forget about fhd and 2.5k screens as an anachronism.

In the past 18 months there was exactly 25 different laptops with 4K 120Hz (or better; 144 Hz, 3840x2400 120/144 etc.).

You say that the i9 12950HX is obsolete for more than 1 year...

This is clearly not a top-end laptop, even by the standards of a year ago, and the review is outdated by a whole year ...

...so a laptop which you want to see literally doesn't exist yet. Out of currently available options, excluding random small manufacturers and "manufacturers", here's the whole list:

• Acer Predator Helios 500 (17.3" mini LED 4K 120Hz)
• Aorus X17 (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• Alienware X17 (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• Asus ProArt StudioBook One (15.6" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 15 (15.6" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 (16" 16:10 IPS 4K+ BUT with WQUXGA 120Hz or FHD+ 240Hz)
• Asus ROG Zephyrus S17 (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• Gigabyte Aero 17 (17.3" mini LED 4K 120Hz)
• HP ZBook Studio (16" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• MSI Creator 17 (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• MSI GE66 Raider (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• MSI GE76 Raider (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• MSI GS77 Stealth (17.3" IPS 4K 120Hz)
• MSI GT77 Titan (17.3" mini LED 4K 144Hz)
• MSI Stealth Studio (17.3" mini LED 4K 144Hz)
• Razer Blade 15 (15.6" IPS 4K 144Hz)
• Razer Blade 16 (16" mini LED dual-spec 4K 120Hz or FHD 240Hz)
• Razer Blade 17 (17.3" IPS 4K 144Hz)
• Schenker Key 17 Pro (17.3" IPS 4K 144Hz)

Almost all gaming laptops. So you get a gaming laptop or you are not a professional user, eh? Yet you still complain in the comments for almost all of them so I'm assuming that on the whole planet there is not a single existing professional user then (except you, of course).

Here, i9 13900H is not good, screen is not good, fetishizing numpad...

Let's start with the cons of the MSI Stealth 17 Studio series (i.e. a series for creators, not players!):

Key EPIC FAIL, according to NB review:
1. Extremely poor color accuracy screen - dE>2.5! But I draw your attention to the fact that the author pointed to the same number BEFORE calibration. Consequently, the author did not conduct real measurements and did not perform his work in good faith under the contract with NB.
2. The flicker test is a clear crap. The author must apologize and either we, the readers, ignore this part, which means that part of the author's work is not done in good faith in terms of screen measurements.
3. Weak performance of the i9 13900, it is about 30% worse than the norm.
4. The memory speed is about 10% worse than the norm for ddr5 5600.
5. Again completely spoiled numpad on the layout, which excludes easy switching and fast blind work with the keyboard after the normal desktop one. MSI fire those who make such variants from series to series - you are hurting yourself in mass sales, especially series for work, not games! Make at least a keyboard like in Lenovo Legion!
...

[Neenyah]

So I don't understand the redneck of all manufacturers with the installation of exclusively 4K@120 in the series.

They are just refusing to let anyone do any professional work, they want the whole world to suffer in those "unusable" and "shi**y" 2.5K screens from the 19th century. Pure evil.

[Oleksa]

Yet you still complain in the comments for almost all of them so I'm assuming that on the whole planet there is not a single existing professional user then (except you, of course).

No, professionals have to use only desktop builds.
Laptops for them have not been produced for a long time. Most laptop production is the production of additional garbage with delivery in 1-2 years. Or delivering suffering to users in 1-2 years.

In 2019, I assembled a laptop with a minimum memory of 32 GB, then upgraded to 64 GB. I don't consider myself a professional.
I need so much RAM (cheap) so that I don't waste time optimizing my work and processes:
- active, not sleepy tabs in the browser, with a lot of plugins (which are necessary in today's garbage Internet).
- several Windows sandboxes, or several virtual Linux (or wsl).
- I don't want to count megabytes for some utilities (which perform small operations but require 200-300 MB of memory).
Today, some things are hundreds of times cheaper to compensate for with hardware than with human labor. But laptop manufacturers don't think so.

For this money, a professional will build a Desktop that will save him a lot of time and nerves.
And some people who need "portability" and don't care whether it weighs 3kg or 5kg (because it's still heavy) will assemble or order a Desktop in a portable case with a great screen and keyboard. Which they will transport in their car.
I'm not talking about those mythical creatures who need to do something on the plane on the way from the US to France in CAD.

[Neenyah]

Yet you still complain in the comments for almost all of them so I'm assuming that on the whole planet there is not a single existing professional user then (except you, of course).

No, professionals have to use only desktop builds. Laptops for them have not been produced for a long time.

Define professional then. Be precise because it seems that you are intentionally ignoring about 95%-98% of possible professional usages and narrowing it down to exactly some where desktop is indeed superior in every existing scenario.
 
Let's say you are an I&C engineer with specialization in ABB, you get to work on sites around the globe on commissioning related to ABB control systems (Advant, Simphony+, AC500) so you work on CS for gas and steam turbine control directly on sites in countries like Kuwait, Morocco, France and Indonesia all within 18-24 months. How exactly do you benefit from carrying desktop around and then dragging it around with you on your workspace? Money is not a problem as that's one of the highest paid fields in the world currently.
 

[LL]

Full power but bad performance for GPU rendering. This basically a CAD or Photoshop laptop.

And that only before AI takes over CAD and image editing. The GPU starts to be crucial there too.

[Neenyah]

Can't say about CAD but Generative Fill in Photoshop works on Adobe's side by using hundreds of GPUs and then returning the outcome directly in your Photoshop. It uses Adobe Firefly to work. You can use it equally good/fast with iGPU just as you would with RTX 4090.

Info:

adobe.com/sensei/generative-ai/firefly.html

adobe.com/products/photoshop/generative-fill.html

helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/generative-fill.html

[Oleksa]

Neenyah
At first I wrote a lot of text with real examples... then I deleted it.
I will answer only on your example.
For such a person, a gaming laptop of the maximum configuration is suitable. Or a custom-made portable case with a PC and a monitor.
Because this person definitely does not run around a big city 10 times a day with such luggage in his backpack. And I know only such people, I have not met people who would buy the laptop under review here because it is either inappropriate (for its price and weight) or excessive (for this price and with this weight). The build is not balanced at all.