A few months ago, while on a late night Zoom call, my suburb was hit by a mass power outage. I was plunged into the dark in the middle of my living room, and my meeting was prematurely ended because of the internet modem shutting off along with everything else that ran on electricity. There wasn’t much else I could do, so I shut down my laptop and went to bed.
It never powered up again.
I took it to the repair shop and they couldn’t fix it (to be fair, it was nearly five years old).
I’m not a gamer but this laptop was built for gaming, so it impacted me more than had it been one of my other laptops (I’m a former Microsoft Systems Engineer so yes, I like my tech).
You might ask – why would you need a gaming laptop to livestream cooking videos, especially in this day and age when you can go Live with the push of a button on your mobile phone?
Well, it depends on what kind of live video setup you’re aiming for. I personally don’t like going Live from my mobile phone – apart from the small screen and having to squint to read the comments, and never being quite sure where to look when it’s on landscape layout – I also want the bells and whistles of using custom layouts, overlays and other branding elements as well as being able to broadcast simultaneously to multiple platforms and channels etc. etc.
With the right laptop, I just need to plug in one or two external webcams (depending on how many angles I want to display when cooking) via USB and position them as needed.
Apart from doing Live cooking videos from my laptop using different tools including XSplit broadcaster (which is basically like OBS), I also do a fair bit of video editing, so all that put together means I do need a laptop with a fair bit of muscle.
I was able to get my hands on a Legion 7 Super RTX 20280 gaming laptop – it’s not the latest model, but I needed one quickly to replace my old Ideapad, and this was what Lenovo could send out immediately for me to review.
Model: Legion 7 Super RTX 20280
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10750H CPU @ 2.60GHz 2.59 GHz
Installed RAM: 16.0 GB (15.8 GB usable)
System type: 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
I posted a photo of it on social media and it received a lot of interest, probably because people only ever get to see what’s on camera, not what it takes to run my livestreams.
To answer some questions that came up, yes the keyboard does light up with colourful lights – and not just the keyboard but also the ports, the vents and even the Legion logo. You can change it so it’s mono-coloured, but I prefer it the way it is.
I also like that the power outlet and most of the ports are at the back, because it helps with cable/cord management.
Ports at back of Legion 7 with colourfully-lit vents
The ports are as follows –
Right Port:
USB 3.2 Gen 1*
Rear Ports:
2 x USB 3.2 Gen 2**
1 x HDMI™ 2.0
1 x RJ45 Ethernet
1 x Kensington® lock slot
1 x Power-in
Left Ports:
Thunderbolt™ 3 Type-C™ (Thunderbolt™, DisplayPort™, USB 3.2, HDMI™)
USB-C (DisplayPort™ 1.4, USB 3.2 Gen 1*)
Headphone / mic combo
Other features I really like about the Legion 7 are that it comes with a comfortable tactile keyboard, it’s thin and light, and it stays cool and silent despite heavy use. Its 15-inch display is smaller than the 17-inch one it replaced, but performance-wise, this laptop is by far an improvement on the old unit.
More details and specs on the current model of the Legion 7 Super RTX 20280 can be found here – https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/legion-laptops/legion-7-series/Lenovo-Legion-7/p/81YT0006US
