Lenovo ThinkPad T14s Gen 6 (AMD) First Impressions

This past summer, I reviewed the Qualcomm Snapdragon X version of the ThinkPad T14s Gen 6, but now I have the AMD Ryzen AI version in house. It should make for an interesting comparison, given the stellar battery life and terrific performance I saw previously.

You can see the AMD version I’m now evaluating at CDW. This is a 14-inch ThinkPad T14s with an AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 360 processor and Radeon 880M graphics, 32 GB of RAM, and a 1 TB NVMe SSD. The display is Full HD+ (1920 x 1200) with a 16:10 aspect ratio, and I’m guessing it’s the same entry-level and low-power IPS panel the previous T14s came with.

Expansion looks identical, too. There are two Thunderbolt 4/USB4 Type-C ports and a full-sized HDMI port (plus a combo microphone/headphone jack) on the left, and then two full-sized USB 3 Type-A ports on the right, plus a Kensington nano security slot.

Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.3 are available for connectivity, as with the Snapdragon version. There are two top-firing speakers, with grills on either side of the keyboard, that support Dolby Atmos immersive sound.

And that keyboard is full-sized and backlit, and appears to be Lenovo’s most modern version, with island-style scalloped keys, correct Ctrl/Fn placement, and an overloaded arrow key area with physical PgUp and PgDn keys.

The T14s features Lenovo’s vaunted TrackPoint pointing system, with the nubbin in the center of the keyboard and dedicated keys, plus a small-ish (for these days) mechanical touchpad.

The round power button to the upper right of the keyboard doubles as a Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-In Security (ESS) fingerprint reader, and there’s a Windows Hello ESS compatible webcam too, of course: This is, or soon will be, a full-featured Copilot+ PC.

All the useful ThinkPad bits are present and accounted for, from the light-up red dot on the “i” in the ThinkPad logo on the exterior display lid to the subtle Lenovo branding. It comes in one color, Eclipse Black, as one should expect from a ThinkPad. It’s light for a 14-inch laptop, at just 2.86 pounds.

Power comes via a standard 65-watt Lenovo USB-C power adapter.

Prices start at about $1500 for a model with 32 GB of RAM, 256 GB of storage, and the non-touch display. I’m loading it up with apps as I write this, but I’m eager to get started.

More soon.