Lenovo positions its ThinkPads as company laptops whereas advertising ThinkBooks to small workplaces, however not all large companies have large budgets. The corporate payments the economical ThinkPad E collection as “conventional, entry-level enterprise laptops.” The E16 Gen 1 (begins at $638; $909.99 as examined) is a desktop substitute that jettisons the standard 15.6-inch, 16:9 side ratio show for a barely taller 16-inch, 16:10 panel. It is nothing fancy, however this ThinkPad is a wonderful deal for firms looking for a enterprise pocket book of modest means.
Configurations and Design: An AMD Benefit?
The Intel-powered ThinkPad E16 begins at $638 with a thirteenth Gen Intel Core i3 processor, 8GB of reminiscence, a 256GB solid-state drive, and a 1,920-by-1,200-pixel non-touch display. Our Home windows 11 Professional assessment unit (mannequin 21JN0040US), $909.99 at Finest Purchase and about $5 cheaper at B&H, doubles the RAM and storage, steps as much as a Core i5-1335U chip (two Efficiency cores, eight Environment friendly cores, 12 threads), and contains an IPS contact display.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)You may also purchase an E16 with AMD silicon inside, beginning at $613.25 with a Ryzen 3 7330U CPU. Curiously, consumers on Lenovo.com can configure an AMD mannequin with a sharper 2,560-by-1,600-pixel show not obtainable on Intel techniques.
Like its brandmates, the ThinkPad E16 has handed MIL-STD 810H checks towards journey hazards like shock, vibration, and excessive temperatures, however cuts prices in a number of methods. Its processor skips Intel’s vPro IT administration tech. In the meantime, the laptop computer’s acquainted matte black chassis combines an aluminum prime with an ABS plastic backside; you may discover some flex in case you grasp the display corners however not a lot in case you press the keyboard deck. Its webcam lacks Home windows Hey face recognition (although you’l discover a fingerprint reader within the energy button) and its wi-fi networking follows the older Wi-Fi 6, not Wi-Fi 6E customary.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)You will not mistake it for an ultraportable, however the Lenovo is pretty trim at 0.77 by 14 by 9.8 inches and three.9 kilos. The 16-inch HP EliteBook 865 G9 we reviewed 13 months in the past is sort of similar in measurement and weight, whereas the extra performance-oriented Dell Inspiron 16 Plus is heavier at 4.54 kilos. You will discover two M.2 slots for solid-state drives (one PCI Specific 4.0, the opposite 3.0) and one reminiscence socket plus 8GB on the motherboard for a ceiling of 40GB.
The laptop computer’s left facet holds two USB-C ports—one 3.2 Gen 2, one Thunderbolt 4, both appropriate for the AC adapter—together with USB 3.2 Gen 1 Kind-A and HDMI ports and an audio jack. A retro USB 2.0 port joins an Ethernet jack and Kensington safety lock slot on the appropriate.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)Utilizing the Lenovo ThinkPad E16: Fancy Digicam Methods
The 1080p webcam centered above the show has a sliding privateness shutter. It captures well-lit and colourful pictures with minimal noise or static. A Lenovo Good Look app places the digicam by its paces with choices to blur or substitute your background (superimposing you in entrance of, say, chaise lounges at a pool); body your face; or contact you up by softening your pores and skin tone, narrowing a spherical face, or shrinking your schnoz. It may well additionally blur the display if somebody comes up behind you, dim it in case you look away, or lock the system in case you go away.
Lenovo’s display itself is not a spotlight—it is a little bit dimmer than supreme, and I discovered myself tapping the F6 key in hopes of getting extra brightness. Likewise, its colours are extra bland than daring. On the optimistic facet, viewing angles are huge, and distinction is first rate, whereas particulars are clear, with no pixelation across the edges of letters. White backgrounds are clear as an alternative of dingy, helped by the power to tilt the display again so far as you want.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)Backside-mounted audio system produce modest sound that is not very loud even at prime quantity. You will hear no bass to talk of, however you may make out overlapping tracks. Dolby Entry software program gives dynamic, film, music, voice, and recreation presets and an equalizer; the film and dynamic choices make audio a bit louder however imprecise and hole.
The backlit keyboard follows the time-tested, reviewer-approved ThinkPad format with devoted House and Finish keys on the highest row and Web page Up and Web page Down keys by the cursor-arrow cluster. You will discover a full-size numeric keypad at proper. The Fn and Management keys are in one another’s place at backside left, however if you cannot alter you possibly can swap them with the provided Lenovo Vantage utility. High-row command keys embody a pair to put and finish Microsoft Groups calls.
This laptop computer’s typing really feel is shallow however snappy, with optimistic suggestions and a quiet response. Lenovo’s trademark TrackPoint mini-joystick cursor controller is positioned on the intersection of the G, H, and B keys, with three massive mouse buttons under the area bar and a smooth-gliding touchpad under them. The pad has a slightly hole however comfy click on.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)Lenovo’s pre-installed Vantage app handles system updates, energy choices, Wi-Fi safety, and community optimization or prioritization on your favourite apps. It contains pitches for $29.99 annual Good Efficiency upkeep and $49.99 annual Good Lock antitheft and restoration plans. AI Assembly Supervisor software program helps worldwide videoconferencing with real-time translation, dictation, and subtitles. A McAfee safety trial generates loads of pop-ups, nevertheless.
Testing the Lenovo ThinkPad E16: Taking Care of Enterprise
Premium cellular workstations apart, we’ve not reviewed many 16-inch enterprise laptops, and the HP EliteBook 865 G9 ($2,189 as examined) is not a good struggle for the under-$1,000 ThinkPad E16. So our benchmark charts function a more in-depth competitor, the $1,199.99 Acer Swift Go 16, and a $999.99 client convertible, the Lenovo Yoga 7i 16 Gen 8.
One other consumer-oriented 2-in-1, the HP Envy x360 15.6, matches the Acer Swift Go’s value. The Asus Vivobook Professional 16 is the final desktop substitute in our group. It is also the most costly at round $1,400, because of a speedy Intel Core i9 processor and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 graphics.
Productiveness Assessments
We run the identical normal productiveness benchmarks throughout each cellular and desktop techniques. Our first take a look at is UL’s PCMark 10, which simulates quite a lot of real-world productiveness and workplace workflows to measure total system efficiency and likewise features a storage subtest for the first drive.
Our different three benchmarks give attention to the CPU, utilizing all obtainable cores and threads, to price a PC’s suitability for processor-intensive workloads. Maxon’s Cinebench R23 makes use of that firm’s Cinema 4D engine to render a fancy scene, whereas Geekbench 5.4 Professional from Primate Labs simulates fashionable apps starting from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine studying. Lastly, we use the open-source video transcoder HandBrake 1.4 to transform a 12-minute video clip from 4K to 1080p decision (decrease occasions are higher).
Lastly, we run PugetBench for Photoshop by workstation maker Puget Techniques, which makes use of the Artistic Cloud model 22 of Adobe’s well-known picture editor to price a PC’s efficiency for content material creation and multimedia purposes. It is an automatic extension that executes quite a lot of normal and GPU-accelerated Photoshop duties starting from opening, rotating, resizing, and saving a picture to making use of masks, gradient fills, and filters.
The ThinkPad E16 simply cleared the 4,000 factors in PCMark 10 that point out first rate productiveness for on a regular basis apps just like the Microsoft 365 (nee Workplace) suite and posted a wonderful rating in Photoshop. As the one Core i5 towards two Core i7’s, a Ryzen 7, and a Core i9, it predictably trailed in our CPU checks however held its personal towards the Core i7 Yoga. This ThinkPad isn’t any barn-burner, however no slouch both.
Graphics Assessments
We take a look at Home windows PCs’ graphics with two DirectX 12 gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark, Night time Raid (extra modest, appropriate for laptops with built-in graphics) and Time Spy (extra demanding, appropriate for gaming rigs with discrete GPUs).
Moreover, we run two checks from the cross-platform GPU benchmark GFXBench 5, which stresses each low-level routines like texturing and high-level, game-like picture rendering. The 1440p Aztec Ruins and 1080p Automotive Chase checks, rendered offscreen to accommodate totally different show resolutions, train graphics and compute shaders utilizing the OpenGL programming interface and {hardware} tessellation respectively. The extra frames per second (fps), the higher.
The Asus laptop computer’s GeForce discrete GPU humiliated the built-in graphics of the opposite 4 techniques, whereas the E16 introduced up the rear in each take a look at. It is wonderful for video streaming and solitaire puzzles, however a nonstarter for the most recent video games or GPU-accelerated graphic-design and rendering duties.
Battery and Show Assessments
We take a look at laptop computer battery life by enjoying a domestically saved 720p video file (the open-source Blender film Tears of Metal) with show brightness at 50% and audio quantity at 100%. We make certain the battery is absolutely charged earlier than the take a look at, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off.
To additional gauge show efficiency, we additionally use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and its Home windows software program to measure a laptop computer display’s colour saturation—what proportion of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 colour gamuts or palettes the show can present—and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per sq. meter).
The ThinkPad confirmed first rate stamina in our battery rundown, although nothing close to the prodigious runtime of the Yoga 7i. Alas, its economy-class display paled subsequent to the extra upscale IPS panel of the Vivobook and the OLED shows of the Swift and Envy, with mediocre colour and barely enough brightness.
Verdict: You Get What You Pay For—a ThinkPad
Lenovo’s ThinkPad E16 will not persuade model loyalists to surrender their mainstream ThinkPad T or premium ThinkPad X collection laptops, nevertheless it additionally will not price them almost as a lot. We want the show was brighter, and that Intel followers might order the higher-resolution display provided with AMD configurations. Nonetheless, the the E16 makes few compromises for its low value, making it a wonderful various to a ThinkBook or client laptop computer.
