Lenovo IdeaPad 5 2-in-1 14Q8X9 review: Affordable Qualcomm ARM convertible

[Redaktion]

The IdeaPad 5 2-in-1 14Q8X9 is one of the least expensive convertibles available running on a Qualcomm Snapdragon X Plus processor. However, its performance leaves a lot to be desired even after accounting for the low starting price.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-IdeaPad-5-2-in-1-14Q8X9-review-Affordable-Qualcomm-ARM-convertible.935350.0.html

[ptrkhh]

I have this laptop, just bought a week ago. My requirements were Snapdragon and 2-in-1, so this laptop was my only option.

Pros:
- Battery life is crazy good, I charge it once every 2 days, quite a departure from my previous laptop (XPS 15 9560) where I had to charge twice a day). Power consumption averages at 4W (rn its 3.8W as Im typing this)
- Rarely hear the fan spins, only when power consumption exceeds 5W for over 5 minutes
- Sleep power consumption is consistent at 10%/16h (per battery report) but it hibernates long before 16h
- Still somewhat manageable in tablet mode

Neutral:
- Somehow OLED is not all that impressive on a laptop, it feels the same as a good LCD laptop

Cons:
- Speaker is garbage, who decided its a good idea to put a top-firing speaker in a 360 convertible???
- Fingerprint sensor sometimes say "Something went wrong" when waking up from sleep, had to input PIN manually
- 1080p (1200p) is just terrible for a laptop in 2024, had to resort to font smoothing hacks

If you have further questions let me know

[Konstantinos]

Really nice laptop for the price. But battery is not that impressive (Wifi use).

My main question is: Can you install Linux? All my workflow is on Linux and it is so much better for arm CPU since all applications are natively compiled for arm.

Does anyone know?