ThinkPad P16 Gen 2: What Real Users Say About This Beast

I had to replace my TB3 workstation dock because it was not charging my P16 Gen 2. Try looking for a model that comes with the 230 W charger, or plan on purchasing the Thunderbolt 4 dock. This is a power hungry device.

I custom ordered an almost fully maxed out P16G2 in February, OLED touch, 13980HX, RTX 5000, 128 G RAM, etc. And I love it. Bought it for editing and resource heavy CAD/modeling. It runs a little hot under max load but otherwise I love it.

Large businesses prefer having these over desktops for intensive tasks. It helps with hotdesking, WFH and things like making it easier for IT to repair and swap out broken ones as well as send stock around multiple office locations or to people WFH. It's not for using on the go but more for being able to take it around and plug it in at different locations/desks.

It is a big heavy brick with a great keyboard and screen. Certainly nicer than the laptop I used myself for past 8 years. On the other hand for that model it is pretty bare bones with slowest cpu and gpu. You have purchased the heaviest, most durable and most expensive laptop chassis but configured with its bare minimum performance.

The ThinkPad P16 Gen 2, with the latest BIOS update, does support the Lenovo 300W AC Adapter and can fully utilize it. I purchased the Lenovo 300W power adapter, plugged it directly into the machine, and it is correctly recognized by Lenovo Vantage.

Compared to a desktop, the P16 would be closer to a mid-range setup. It will be no match for a high-end setup due to limitations in the laptop form factor. For a laptop, it's very powerful and can be used as a desktop replacement compared to the desktop that you were working with.

It is pretty handy for simulating a small network of computers by running them simultaneously as virtual machines.

Snagged one with 13980HX, 4K OLED touch, RTX A1000, from Ebay for $1700. Should be arriving in a day or so, hyped!

Don't expect a great battery life. The P16 Gen2 is a power hungry beast, draining the battery pretty fast. Depending on your mobile work load, 2.5h might be the maximum time you get out of the battery. Especially so, when running additional VMs.

I have had it for about 3 weeks. It has been great so far, but battery life was a concern I took into account. I am mostly plugged in, however, when on battery I have been getting about 3 hours from my experiences so far with max brightness, VMs running, multiple browser windows, etc. Not bad, definitely better than what I had expected, but would be nice if I got another hour or two.

Not really. A coworker has this and it's quiet. He only uses it for CAD and 3D printing. I have only heard the fans once and he did a deliberate stress test.

The P16G2 replaced a few outdated dual Xeon Workstations in our company. It's my first ThinkPad as well. I'm actually quite happy with mine.

Do not buy this computer. It crashes constantly, and can't even handle Word, Excel and the internet at the same time. Maybe I got a lemon, but I'm baffled at how terribly this $3500 machine performs. Never ever buying Lenovo again.

I would not buy it. If I compare it with the old P52 it is garbage. The fan is always on even during sleep. It is really heavy I cannot handle it in one hand. It looks pretty cheap and plastic. It is not easy to open its back cover so you cannot easily replace its battery. There are just two USB-A and no ethernet.

The only thing I don't like about my P16 gen2 is that the keyboard gets really hot because just beneath it is the SSD and the RAM. Everything else as temperature seems fine but this is so irritating.

Memory speed is locked to 4000MHz no matter what RAM you install! CPU is thermally throttled and current limited, the max TDP will be around 50W at sustained load which is terrible for this price point. Very heavy, above 3 kg! You can buy similar spec with higher TDP and lighter gaming laptops.

I searched a bit on rtx ada 2000. It seems to be close to 4060 in performance. I think it has ECC and a different set of drivers compared to the gaming versions. After much thinking, I ordered the laptop yesterday. The only thing that's haunting me is the weight of it. The backpack alone weighs 1 kg. Laptop + backpack + charger + a tablet are going to be like 5kg. That sucks.

Thank you for the good wishing and responding back to my comment. I am super excited for this laptop and your input was really insightful. With all of my laptops, 5 hours (on the lower end) for battery life is extraordinary. I'm still shocked that in this day and age a 30W TDP chip can produce what it does and last the amount of time Lenovo claims.

Have one and love it. Use a P14s at work and it's literally just a jumbo version. Love the 4k screen and laugh at the fact that 250% is the 'recommended' setting but everything is too tiny for my older eyes under 150%.

It can still happen with the RTX 4000, less than with the RTX 5000, you can buy a 300 watt slim tip charger, and it will max out at 255, and that should be enough for most use cases.

I just got one and can answer. Mine is not overheating and shutting down. In high performance and even balanced modes the device turbos itself for max performance, cpu runs at 5600GHz then dials back because of heat to keep chip temps at or below 100C.

I got it almost two years and I learned few things: one of BIOS updates failed, resulting in bootloop, there was no possibility to downgrade it, after some research 'discrete gpu' was the problem so I could run it without that, after a month they fixed it with yet another BIOS release. Also no LAN port in such a big laptop and WLAN chip soldered on board — this is a shame in such a big and heavy computer. SLEEP mode is not working — this is ridiculous.

The short answer is you will only ever get 3600/4000MHz speeds regardless of what RAM you install, how many modules, or what speed they're rated for, even if it's rated for faster. The speed selection is hardcoded in the BIOS and can't be changed.

I bought my P16 Gen 2 specifically for ECC support, making sure to choose one with a CPU that supports ECC. My refurb came with 32 GiB of non-ECC RAM, so I've been trying to upgrade the amount of RAM and switch to ECC.

Thinkpad FOR SURE. If you're into a laptop that you can keep changing over the years, in terms of parts, it's an awesome choice. There's a small cult following for thinkpads, and one of the main selling points is the customization.

I just purchased Thinkpad P16 Gen 2. Right now there are problems with Nvidia and Intel graphics switch and suspend mode does not work at all.

I got it for $1269 but I'm going to watch the website through the end of the month for any prices lower than that because Lenovo will match. Thanks for the tips!

These are end user serviceable/upgradeable. Use some of the money saved to upgrade to a more premium and on-site warranty option.

In my experience that laptop will melt your table making the sound of a jet engine.

I have a cooling pad and it keeps temperatures extremely manageable. I even use my work device for 4K gaming.

Still loving this laptop. It has become my daily driver. No issues at all with the heating, or anything hardware related. Battery life is around 5-6 hours with 80% brightness and general usage. My only gripe is the keyboard. I wish the keys were as spongey as they are on my T15 that I use for work, but it's not a bad keyboard by any means. I think if you're able to pick this up on a sale, it's a no-brainer.

Unless we get custom BIOS configurations, I think that the P16 will be limited to DDR5 3600 and 4000 speeds. On the Lenovo forums, people were asking about the possibility of undervolting the CPU as well, something that Lenovo has thus far not granted.

Go Thinkpad, don't go Asus. At least with Thinkpad you can change things relatively easily. Since you want to do AI, maybe go with the P16 if you're planning on personal projects.

Same problem here with keyboard overheating, and unable to undervolt.

When my 'black' P16s Gen 2 arrived I was disappointed that the casing is kind of grayish and lighter than the keys and trackpad. I was not expecting that color mismatch.

If you're around 60-75% screen brightness and use power saver mode, I think you can easily hit 7 hours or even more if you're just typing stuff, using PowerPoint or some YouTube. I watched the entire first two Lord of the Rings extended cut movies the other day which each equal like 3 hours, and the laptop still had 22% battery when I was done.

I read that fans are still spinning when the machine is in sleep mode. Is this problem still persisting? It's one of the main things stopping me from buying it.

I'd personally spec down the CPU a bit, spec up the GPU. Maybe try a 13700H and RTX A3000? That CPU seems ridiculous for the GPU it has.

The RTX 2000 ADA does not have ECC VRAM, you have to step up to the 3500 ADA to get ECC VRAM. In today's world not all professional GPUs have ECC VRAM sadly, which is understandable, but should be communicated much more clearly.

If you game for a long time on the P16, you will need to take a break every now and then to let the machine cool down. The performance that the P16 gives out should make you more than satisfied, but it is thermally limited for long duration runs.

Does your P16 freeze and dump like mine? Be careful.