Lenovo 14e Gen 2 Chromebook and Lenovo 14w Gen 2 focus on durability to withstand the vagaries of remote learning

Lenovo is introducing two education-centric devices — the Lenovo 14e Gen 2 and Lenovo 14w Gen 2 — powered by entry-level AMD chips. Both the 14e and 14w sport very similar specifications. However, the 14e is a Chromebook while the 14w comes bundled with Windows 10 for Education.

Both models meet the MIL-SPEC 810H standard for added durability to take on the vagaries of school life. This includes rubber-reinforced ports and hinges, enhanced spill resistance, up to 360 ml water resistance for the keyboard, and screen protection via Corning Gorilla Glass.

Lenovo 14e Gen 2

Lenovo indicates that the 14e Gen 2 is powered by the AMD Processor for Chromebooks, though it does not mention exactly which SKU. Last year, AMD introduced Zen+-based Ryzen CPUs for Chromebooks including the Ryzen 7 3700C and the Ryzen 5 3500C, so these could be the likely options. Up to 8 GB RAM and and up to 64 GB of eMMC storage can be configured.

Lenovo offers several display options for the 14e Gen 2 including 14-inch HD non-touch and FHD touch and non-touch panels — the FHD touch panel can offer up to 300 nits brightness. A 57 Wh battery that is slated to offer up to 10 hours of battery life powers the innards.

Port selection includes 1x USB Type-C, 2x USB 3.1 Type-A, 1x HDMI 1.4-out, and a combo audio jack. An Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX200 WLAN adapter caters to all the networking needs.

The Lenovo 14e Gen 2 will be available from May 2021 at prices starting from US$334.

Lenovo 14w Gen 2

The Lenovo 14w Gen 2 shares a lot of commonality with the 14e Gen 2 but offers Windows 10 for Education instead of Chrome OS. However, the Lenovo 14w is powered by the AMD 3015e dual-core processor, which is a passively cooled 6 W Zen-based APU with Radeon RX Vega 3 integrated graphics. While the rest of the specifications are similar to the 14e Gen 2, the 14w Gen 2 also offers the option of choosing between 128 GB eMMC and 256 GB M.2 SSD storage.

The Lenovo 14w Gen 2 will be available from May 2021 at prices starting from US$334.