New Lenovo Legion gaming PCs pack AMD power — and some pretty low price tags

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Lenovo's Legion line gets supercharged with AMD CPUs

Lenovo Legion 5
(Image credit: Lenovo)

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Lenovo Legion 5 won a "highly recommended" honor for best budget gaming laptop in the Tom's Guide Awards 2021 for gaming.

Lenovo's Legion series of gaming laptops and desktops have long offered solid gaming power for attainable prices — and they just got a key new upgrade. The PC maker just took the wraps off its latest line of gaming laptops and towers, all of which pack AMD processors for the first time to deliver dependable performance within slim (and affordable) packages.

If you've been looking for an entry point into the world of PC gaming, Lenovo's lineup looks like a good place to start. Here's a quick breakdown of the company's new AMD-equipped lineup.

Lenovo Legion 5

(Image credit: Lenovo)

Leading the pack is the Lenovo Legion 5, which packs Lenovo's familiar all-black Legion design and comes in both 15.6-inch and 17.3-inch variations. This laptop can be outfitted with up to an AMD Ryzen 7 4800 H-Series CPU and Nvidia RTX 2060 graphics, making it a good choice for playing modern AAA games in 1080p at respectable settings.

Other key features include a 144Hz refresh rate with Dolby Vision support, Harman Kardon speakers, up to 16GB of RAM and up to 1TB of SSD storage. The system's Coldfront 2.0 technology should keep it cool during heated play sessions, while its TrueStrike keyboard is built to deliver accurate inputs and minimal ghosting. The Legion 5 launches in September starting at $1,089.

Lenovo IdeaPad Gaming 3

(Image credit: Lenovo)

Looking for something more casual and wallet-friendly? That's where the IdeaPad Gaming 3 comes in. Starting at just $659, this laptop can be configured with up to an AMD Ryzen 7 4800 CPU and Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 Ti graphics, making it a solid entry-level gaming PC. There's also an optional 120Hz display for smoother action, as well as Dolby Audio speakers, up to 32GB of RAM and up to 1TB of storage. 

Lenovo Legion Tower 5

(Image credit: Lenovo)

If it's desktop power you're after, the Lenovo Legion Tower 5 packs up to an AMD Ryzen 9 3560X CPU and up to Nvidia RTX 2070 Super graphics that can handle ray-tracing and some 4K gaming. This slick black machine supports Wi-Fi 6 and can pack up to two 1TB SSDs, 2 2TB hard drives and 128GB of RAM. And with a 150w cooler and customizable fan speeds, the Tower 5 should stay cool during even the most intense multiplayer matches.

The Legion Tower 5 launches in October starting at $829, making it an enticing desktop options for folks who want to see what PC gaming is all about without breaking the bank.

Other new additions to Lenovo's lineup include the Lenovo Legion 5P laptop, an esports-centric version of the Legion 5 that comes in silver, and the IdeaCentre Gaming 5, an attractive chameleon Blue desktop that supports up to Ryzen 7 and RTX 2060. However, Lenovo currently has no plans to bring these two systems stateside.

Michael Andronico
Michael Andronico

Mike Andronico is Senior Writer at CNNUnderscored. He was formerly Managing Editor at Tom's Guide, where he wrote extensively on gaming, as well as running the show on the news front. When not at work, you can usually catch him playing Street Fighter, devouring Twitch streams and trying to convince people that Hawkeye is the best Avenger.