ThinkPad Z Series sustainable design and next-gen AMD Ryzen Pro processor targets eco-friendly business users
Lenovo's ThinkPad Z Series delivers power in an eco-friendly chassis
Lenovo is coming out swinging at CES 2022 with a pair of new business laptops with eco-friendly components and up to an AMD Ryzen Pro processor to help you churn through your work.
The ThinkPad Z Series features either a 13-inch (Z13) or 16-inch (Z16) display with ultra-narrow bezels and a 16:10 aspect ratio, both deliver the highest screen-to-body ratio that we've seen on a ThinkPad.
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Lenovo ThinkPad Z13
The smaller member of the Z Series family still doesn't skimp on power with up to an exclusive AMD Ryzen 7 Pro processor inside its recycled aluminum frame. The 13-inch display is similarly impressive with up to a 2.8K touchscreen OLED available.
The recycled materials don't mean that you are giving up a high-quality look and feel with artic grey, black or even a black vegan leather finish available along with the bronze or artic grey accents. The eco-friendly materials go beyond the laptop itself with 100% recyclable and compostable bamboo and sugar cane packaging and even the AC power adapter is 90% post-consumer content.
Security is course paramount with any business laptop and the AMD Ryzen Pro processors offer the Microsoft Pluton security processor to further harden the security built into Windows 11. The match-on-chip fingerprint reader integrated into the keyboard offers additional security and convenience.
The laptop also boasts MIL-Spec 810H certification, so the ThinkPad Z13 should be able to handle any drops, bumps or even rougher work environments.
The keyboard will be familiar to any longtime ThinkPad fans with the TrackPoint safely nestled into the center. The TrackPoint now offers a useful double-tap function to access the Communications QuickMenu for camera and microphone controls. The large 120mm glass haptic ForcePad is color-matched with the palm rest, making for a clean and likely comfortable typing and navigation experience.
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The 1080p webcam offers a large 1.4μm sensor, which should make for superior performance in even less than ideal lighting conditions. It also features an electronic e-shutter to ensure your privacy.
The ThinkPad Z13 starts at $1,549 and will be available starting in May.
Lenovo ThinkPad Z16
The big sibling to the ThinkPad Z13, the ThinkPad Z16 offers an extremely similar feature set with just a few notable upgrades to go with its larger display.
One is a bump to the max resolution with a 4K OLED option available. Internally the AMD Ryzen Pro processor is an H-Series (compared to the U-Series in the (Z13) and optional AMD Radeon discrete graphics.
The Z16 delivers the same sustainable build as the Z13, but you are limited to the artic grey recycled aluminum finish.
For workloads that move beyond basic productivity into content creation (or even some casual gaming) the Z16 is going to be the superior choice, but both should offer solid performance and excellent battery life when used for standard business tasks.
The ThinkPad Z16 will also be available starting in May and starts at $2,099.
Sean Riley has been covering tech professionally for over a decade now. Most of that time was as a freelancer covering varied topics including phones, wearables, tablets, smart home devices, laptops, AR, VR, mobile payments, fintech, and more. Sean is the resident mobile expert at Laptop Mag, specializing in phones and wearables, you'll find plenty of news, reviews, how-to, and opinion pieces on these subjects from him here. But Laptop Mag has also proven a perfect fit for that broad range of interests with reviews and news on the latest laptops, VR games, and computer accessories along with coverage on everything from NFTs to cybersecurity and more.