Lenovo Legion T5 gaming desktop
ZDNET’s key takeaways
- The Lenovo Legion Tower 5 is available now for $1,880.
- This desktop excels at a wide range of tasks, from gaming to 3D image rendering and graphic design.
- However, because of the PC’s squat design, some users may have difficulty finding a comfortable place for it.
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Building a gaming PC can be difficult if you’re new to the hobby. Fortunately, pre-built desktops remove most of the guesswork; you can expect them to deliver reliable performance straight out of the box. Especially since gaming desktops come with increasingly competitive hardware.
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Lenovo’s Legion Tower 5 (or T5 for short) is a prime example of a solid prebuilt desktop. It is a gaming computer, but as I discovered over the couple of weeks of my testing, it is versatile enough to succeed in content creation. Allow me to explain.
Desktop footprint
Modern PC cases often have a vertically tall design, a style of computer referred to as a “tower.” This shape is popular for a variety of reasons: they facilitate airflow for cooling components, but more importantly, they take up less physical space.
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The Legion T5 does things a little different. Instead of expanding upward, it’s stout. It measures 8.31 x 19.31 x 16.3 inches. Below is an image of the Legion T5 next to my Maingear MG-1 (16.88 x 19 x 8.12 inches) underneath my table. Both computers in the image below are in line with each other. Notice just how much the Lenovo computer sticks out (and how much lower it is).
Cesar Cadenas/ZDNET
Finding a space for the Legion T5 may prove tricky because of its stout frame — at least it was for me. I swapped out my personal PC with the Lenovo desktop for a time, and often found myself bumping the side of the computer with my legs and chair. Thankfully, the edges and corners of the desktop are rounded, so I avoided anything too painful.
All about the aesthetics
The choice between stout and tall tower PCs comes down to personal preference. Admittedly, the Legion T5 looks pretty cool. I really liked the bumpy heat vent at the top. I asked Lenovo if this design had any practical purposes, and they told me it was just for aesthetic purposes. Either way, it was a good call on their end.
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Port selection is surprisingly limited. A bulk of the inputs are located around the back of the desktop. Just to highlight a few, you’ll find three DisplayPort inputs, an HDMI 2.1 for outputting 4K video at 60Hz, and three different audio ports. That’s all great to have, but I really would’ve liked it if the front had more because it only has three: a 5Gbps USB-C input, a 5Gbps USB-A port, and an audio jack.
At best, you’ll have enough room for a pair of headphones, a controller, and one accessory. More should’ve been available within arm’s reach, as there’s plenty of room. Lenovo’s Legion Tower 7i, for example, has three USB-A inputs on the front.
Cesar Cadenas/ZDNET
Another neat thing about the Legion T5 is its ARGB lighting. The “A” stands for “addressable,” which is Lenovo’s fancy way of saying customizable RGB lighting. Via the Legion Space app, users can turn on lights over certain components, like the rear fan or GPU. You can mix and match whatever you like to create fun light arrays.
Dynamic desktop
Under the hood is an AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D processor, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 graphics card, and 32GB of RAM. Unsurprisingly, gaming on the Lenovo Legion T5 felt smooth, even when running demanding titles. This configuration allowed fast-paced shooters like “Call of Duty” and stylized action games like “Hades 2” to run without a hitch, keeping framerates consistently high. I was able to stay focused on matches instead of worrying about sudden dips in performance. Any gamer will tell you that having good stability makes a world of difference.
Cesar Cadenas/ZDNET
The powerful hardware brings out the visual features that make modern games shine. Lush environments, like those found in “Monster Hunter Wilds”, felt lifelike. Particle effects were explosive, and in-game lighting looked true to life. The Legion T5’s ability to support multiple visual enhancers and still get mostly smooth performance allows the desktop to separate itself from the average prebuilt computer.
I say “mostly” because I ran into some visual glitches playing “Final Fantasy 15” at its peak settings. Characters would spaz out, limbs flailing around as the game struggled to run at such a high resolution. To be fair, it’s likely these glitches are the result of some sort of driver issue, not necessarily the hardware struggling to keep up.
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Still, I wanted to highlight this moment as a potential scenario you might encounter. While the hardware is certainly powerful, you can always run into a few performance troubles.
Beyond gaming, the Legion T5 proved to be a powerhouse for creative tasks. Workloads like 3D rendering in Blender benefit greatly from the powerful hardware. They reduce rendering wait times, allowing users to quick hop between preview renders and projects. The workflow speeds up considerably. On Adobe Premiere Pro, video editing felt seamless. I uploaded my own 4K recording, and thanks to the hardware, I was able to seamlessly navigate through the video timeline, applying various effects without slowdown.
Cesar Cadenas/ZDNET
My main gripe with the hardware is that it only comes with 1TB of storage. After installing seven games from Steam, I used up most of the SSD. Today’s AAA video games take up dozens of gigabytes of space, so 1TB just doesn’t quite cut it. If you don’t mind paying a little extra, I recommend purchasing an external drive.
ZDNET’s buying advice
Lenovo’s Legion Tower 5 is currently available at Best Buy for $1,880. That’s a pretty good price. I was honestly expecting to be over $2,000. If you need the extra space, you can head over to Lenovo’s website and purchase the Tower 5i Gen 10, which has a 2TB SSD for $1,980. It has the same graphics card, although the Tower 5i swaps out the AMD processor for an Intel Core Ultra 7 265F CPU.
For gamers on the go, I recommend the 10th-generation Lenovo Legion Pro 7i. It’s a gaming laptop with slightly better hardware and a vibrant 16-inch 250Hz OLED screen.
