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ENGLISH – Lenovo IdeaPad S540 13ARE vs 13IML – AMD Ryzen 7 4800U vs Intel Core i7 10710U

Scris de: , in categoria: Notebook, in 24 April, 2020.

Design & build quality

 
No matter how hard I try, both in terms of pictures and words, I can’t fully describe the feeling that you have when you see the Lenovo IdeaPad S540 13ARE for the first time. It is simply a tiny jewel, made entirely of aluminum, except for the glass panel that protects the display. Nothing creaks, nothing bends, as we would expect from a notebook a little bigger than my palm, build with solid polished aluminum plates.

The display takes over 90% of the screen surface – the sides have a thickness of only 2.5mm, while the upper side, which houses the camera, has a thickness of 6.3mm. Due to its small size, we do not have a physical camera shutter, like the ones we can see on the ThinkPad or Legion series, but we can easily turn it off in Lenovo Vantage.

The keyboard and the touch-pad positions are precisely cut by CNC machinery, the perfectly executed contour being a pleasure for the eyes. The backlit keyboard with short stroke, which extends almost the entire width of the case, is precise and pleasant to use. But the feedback is less present than in the case of notebooks equipped with higher keys. Last but not least, the generously sized touchpad is covered with glass, being precise and fast.

On the left side we find two USB-C connectors, one of which is used for charging the laptop, with the help of the 65W power supply included in the package. Thanks to Quick Charge 2.0 technology, the battery can be charged to 80% capacity in less than an hour, a feature that will certainly be useful for those who work a lot on the go, or travel often.

Also, we can use the USB-C connectors to connect to an external display, with the help of a USB-C / Display Port cable. On the opposite side of the chassis we find a USB 3.1 connector, an audio combo connector, and the Power button. We are not getting a card reader or HDMI connector in this case, but we also don’t expect such a thing on a 13″ laptop.

 

Comentarii

35 comentarii la: ENGLISH – Lenovo IdeaPad S540 13ARE vs 13IML – AMD Ryzen 7 4800U vs Intel Core i7 10710U

  1. Vajra a scris pe:

    What a great review, it has everything from tdp, maximum power consumption to gpu tests. Looks like AMD nailed it with the 4000 series, are far ahead of Intel. Unfortunately I don’t understand why is no difference in the vega gpu apu performance from 15 to 25w. Very strange
    Very professional review, much better than some made on bigger review sites.

  2. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    The IGP doesn’t benefit from the CPU power increase, since it is the same chip. We need more GPU power for games

  3. Robert a scris pe:

    Thank you for the review.
    Can you please tell me in what benchmark was the average clockspeed of CPU under different TDP tested?
    Also what was the average clockspeed for IGP during gaming?

  4. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    The measurements on page 14 were done during 10 runs of Cinebench R15.

    During gaming, the average clock speed of the IGP was 1140MHz for 15W and 25W, and 950MHz for 12.5W. The peak was the same every time – 1750MHz

  5. Robert a scris pe:

    Thank you for the reply.
    It’s very interesting that increasing TDP by 10W didn’t have any noticeable effect on higher clockspeed for the IGP, but It didn’t help the CPU to clock much higher either.

  6. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    The CPU TDP increase doesn’t mean we will see higher clocks for the CPU – the CPU will not go over specs. Instead, it means it can run at higher speeds for longer periods of time, which is where we get the performance boost from.

  7. Simon a scris pe:

    All Zen 2 chips on desktop have an actual max boost that is 50MHz higher than the advertised boost. The 4900HS regularly boosts 100MHz over what the specs advertise.

  8. Robert a scris pe:

    I meant average clockspeed not the highest clocks.

  9. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    Simon – you cannot expect that on U CPUs

    Robert – average clockspeed is 10% higher, which seems to be enough for a good performance gain.

  10. Robert a scris pe:

    “Robert – average clockspeed is 10% higher, which seems to be enough for a good performance gain.”
    Yes, the CPU gained some clockspeed and 3GHz on average at 25W TDP is nothing to be disappointed about.
    The disappointing part is the same average clockspeed for IGP at 15W and 25W TDP, the higher TDP for some reason doesn’t help at all.

  11. John Doe a scris pe:

    Amazing review! i loved reading your review and appreciate your efforts!

    Would you suggest this for light gaming (CS GO, DOTA, Football manager) and coding?

    Thanks!

  12. anaconda a scris pe:

    Lenovo should add 4800HS in this laptop instead of 4800H. The HS 10W extra would put the iGPU on par with mx250. I know they could do this because they already did with 3550H, its the same cassis and 35W TDP CPU.

  13. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    @John – if an IdeaPad is not enough, I think any thin & light that combines AMD Renoir CPU’s with GTX 1050

  14. Jakob a scris pe:

    Thanks a lot! Could you maybe run latencymon? This is super important for anyone doing audio. Best

  15. Andrew a scris pe:

    @Jakob Good call! I ordered Ideapad 5 with 4800u specifically for music production and mixing. Let’s hope latency isn’t an issue in this laptop.

  16. Mihai a scris pe:

    Hi Monstru!

    Is there any updated version availabe in Germany?
    Where do I find this model now(on the Lenovo this configuration Ryzen 7 4700U is out of stock)- any ideea Leute if this will be available again/when?
    Mihai!

  17. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    Hi Mihai,

    what do you mean by updated version?

    Also, regarding availability, all production was affected by the Covind crisis so it might take a while for the stock to refill.

  18. Fataliity a scris pe:

    The problem your having with your graphics tests is your Ram configuration.

    The 4800U you are using, has 8GB of DDR43200 RAM. The intle version has 16GB.
    While this doesn’t affect a dedicated card because it has GDDR memory built into it, it does infact affect APU’s because they share memory with the CPU.

    So running single channel DDR4 3200mhz with an APU vs Dual channel DDR4 3200mhz will make a big difference in gaming benchmarks. Try again with 16GB (2x 8GB), and make sure the RAM is running at 3200mhz. (You can’t buy a 3200mhz XMP stick or it will revert to 2666mhz dual channel.)

  19. Mihai a scris pe:

    Hi Monstru,

    The model I was referring, is Lenovo Ideapad 5 with AMD Ryzen 7 4700U.
    Thanks.

  20. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    Fatalitiy – these are soldered RAM platforms, unfortunately, I cannot change the RAM config I got from the manufacturer

  21. Matthijs a scris pe:

    Fantastic review! And a great laptop, too! I would run to the shop to buy one, if it wasn’t for the fact that it is nowhere to be found :( Even Lenovo’s own psref only makes note of three Asian models*. Maybe that has something to do with production issues due to Covid-19, but surely Lenovo would make note of this laptop of it existed at all, wouldn’t they?

    Hence my questions: Where did you get the review model from? And do you have any links or information about (future) availability?

    * https://psref.lenovo.com/Product/IdeaPad/IdeaPad_S54013ARE

  22. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    I got the laptop from the local office. Which means it should come to Europe, but they are moving very slow. In the beginning, it wouldn’t even show up in PSREF. Now we have 3 Asian versions… so we should see European versions soon.

  23. Savvas a scris pe:

    Hello , great review thanks. May I Know if it is now available and how much was the price. Thanks

  24. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    Hi,

    as far as I know it should be available, but it depends on the region

  25. Vas a scris pe:

    Hello,

    Thank you for your detailed test.
    Looking to purchase one of these new Ryzen ultrabooks and wanted to get your input on which your prefer between the three you’ve tested:

    1. Zenbook um433iq – 4700U
    2. Ideapad s540-13are – 4800U
    3. Yoga/ideapad Slim 7 – 4800U

    The s540-13are hasn’t arrived in Canada yet and strangely the Slim 7 showed up on the Lenovo website with a 4700U here (not a problem to import directly from China though).

    Performance/temperature is important, but overall experience (keyboard, build, screen, touchpad) with the laptop is just as critical for my use case (have a dedicated desktop for most work).

    Thank you for your input and your work with these reviews.

  26. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    Hi Vas,

    the retail Yoga Slim 7 just got on my test bench today. I would say S540 and Slim 7 are in a higher category than UM433IQ, they have much stronger cooling and sturdier chassis.

    From a feeling point of view, UM433IQ and Slim 7 are both different than S540, because of the format. They are longer and slimmer, like an A4 sheet, while S540 has a more natural format, closer to 4:3.

    Unfortunately, I see that in Canada and USA they only have 4700U on Slim 7, but you could easily buy an European or Chinese version. I will publish my Slim 7 review in the following week / weeks.

    Cheers!

  27. GoldSolitude a scris pe:

    Hi there, I’m wondering why the numbers on page 14 for the S540 is the exact same as the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 4800U review. Do you not do specific laptop testing? I find it hard to believe they got the exact same numbers, and especially since I’m a prospective buyer of this laptop I don’t know whether to believe the battery numbers or not anymore. Thanks.

  28. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    What do you mean? We compared 4800U in Yoga 7 with 4800U in IdeaPad. So the numbers for IdeaPad are the same, naturally…

  29. GoldSolitude a scris pe:

    Sorry I understand now, It was a bit confusing from the wording since the Yoga 7 is also called Ideapad and I thought it was an intel varient or something on that review. It’s no problem, I understand now.

  30. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    No worries. Unfortunately I did not have time to also have an english version for the Yoga / IdeaPad Slim article, so I understand the confusion.

  31. FlipStone a scris pe:

    Great review and excellent information, I recently bought a 13-ARE myself (ryzen 7 4800u version, 16GB ram) and am wondering…

    The benchmarks, are they (always) done when plugged in to the charger?

    I get similar results when plugged in, but when on battery performance drops to way lower levels. PCMark 8 Creative Conventional, 4750 on charger and 3600 on battery. Geekbench5 1100/6000 on charger and 700/4700 on battery. Basically not (much if at all) faster then my i7-8550u laptop…

    This is independent of bios performance settings, windows power plans/performance settings (all is set to max on both battery in charger for testing).

    I was hoping to also get improved performance in ‘laptop mode’ but perhaps I need to adjust my expectations a bit.

  32. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    Yes Flip, you are right, we always run the benchmarks plugged in. This is the only way to measure the real power of the CPU, since performance on battery is limited by the power consumption.

  33. FlipStone a scris pe:

    Thanks for the very quick reply and clarification Monstru! Makes sense, but I don’t think I ever see it mentioned in reviews so good to know :)

    Helps interpreting results as well and managing expectations (for me anyway).

    Keep up the great work!

  34. Monstru Post author a scris pe:

    No worries Flip, always glad to help.

  35. Niels a scris pe:

    What a great review, i’m so happy that I found it; keep up the good work!

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