Lenovo unveils the Legion 9i — sibling to one of my favorite gaming laptops ever
Lenovo's latest could be one of its greatest
Lenovo unveiled the 16-inch Legion 9i today, one of its new gaming laptops advertised as the world's first with AI-tuning and a self-contained liquid-cooling system. This of course puts it in the same line-up as the Legion 5 Pro, hardware I highly recommend and called the best gaming laptop under $1,500.
But while that may have been a solid midrange budget laptop, the Legion 9i is designed for gamers with premium taste. Built with one of the most powerful processors and graphics cards out there and adorably referred to as "the king of cool," lets take a deeper dive and see whether or not it's worth being excited for.
Lenovo Legion 9i specs and information
The Lenovo Legion 9i can be built up with an Intel Core i9-13980HX processor, Nvidia RTX 4090 Laptop GPU, up to 2TB of SSD storage, 64GB of 5600Mhz DDR5 RAM and a 16-inch Mini-LED 3.2K display with a 165Hz refresh rate. It's no understatement that these specs will ensure it can handle anything you throw at it, as its graphics card and processor make it among the most powerful gaming laptops out there.
And if you're a big fan of stunning displays with high nits of brightness, we cannot wait to test the laptop's Mini-LED display. While it normally can't reach peaks as colorful as OLED can, it still often looks phenomenal. We also know it'll have an RJ45 ethernet connector, two Thunderbolt 4 ports, an HDMI 2.1, audio jack, SD card reader, two USB Type A and a USB Type C.
The laptop is also built with a triple-fan air-cooling system that's been tuned by AI, which we hope will manage to simmer down that powerful GPU. It's no secret that gaming laptops get scalding, so we'll see if this Lenovo laptop can be the exception.
The Lenovo Legion 9i with Intel processors is starting at $4,399 in North America and is expected to be available starting in October. We're excited to get our hands on this absolute beast and running it through rigorous tests. Will its 99.99Whr battery last in the face of these intense specifications, and will the display hold up to our expectations? Only time will tell.
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Self-described art critic and unabashedly pretentious, Claire finds joy in impassioned ramblings about her closeness to video games. She has a bachelor’s degree in Journalism & Media Studies from Brooklyn College and five years of experience in entertainment journalism. Claire is a stalwart defender of the importance found in subjectivity and spends most days overwhelmed with excitement for the past, present and future of gaming. When she isn't writing or playing Dark Souls, she can be found eating chicken fettuccine alfredo and watching anime.