Digital Engineering – August 2019

DigitalEngineering247.com /// August 2019 DE| Technology for Optimal Engineering Design (^35)
supply (7.8x3.9x1.0-in.) adds an-
other 2.12 lbs, including its cables.
Raising the lid reveals a 17.3-
in. display and 105-key backlit
keyboard with separate numeric
keypad. As we have come to ex-
pect, the excellent, spill-resistant
Lenovo keyboard is perhaps
the best available in any laptop.
Lenovo offers a choice of two
in-plane switching matte surface
displays—full high definition
(1920x1080) or ultra high defini-
tion 4K (3840x2160)—neither
of which are available as touch-
screens. The 4K panel provided in
our evaluation unit added $300 to
the price. A 720p webcam flanked
by a pair of microphones is cen-
tered above the display, with an
infrared camera to its left.
A round power button is located adjacent to the upper-
right corner of the numeric keypad while a fingerprint reader
is positioned to the lower-left of the keypad, just below the
cursor keys. A 4x2.25-in. touchpad with three dedicated but-
tons is centered below the spacebar. There is also a red point-
ing stick nestled between the G, H and B keys with its own
three buttons directly below the spacebar.
A pair of stereo speakers is concealed beneath a perforated
screen just above the keyboard. The caps lock and number
lock keys each have their own LEDs as do the function keys
dedicated to the speakers and microphone as well as the ESC
key, which doubles as FnLock. There are also hard drive
activity and Wi-Fi lights located in the hinge area below the
center of the display.
Many Choices
The Lenovo ThinkPad P72 is built around one of the latest
six-core 8th-generation Intel Core or Xeon Coffee Lake pro-
cessors. The base Core i7 configuration, which has a starting
price of $1,529, comes with a 2.2GHz Intel Core i7-8750H
CPU, or you can upgrade to a 2.6GHz Core i7-8850H. The
Xeon version of the ThinkPad P72 starts at $2,739 for a sys-
tem equipped with the 2.7GHz Xeon E-2176M.
Our evaluation unit came with the 2.9GHz Xeon E3-
2186M, which added $300 to the price. That CPU has a
12MB SmartCache, a 45-watt thermal design power rating,
and a maximum turbo frequency of 4.8GHz.
Although all four available Intel CPUs include Intel
HD Graphics P630, every ThinkPad P72 model also
includes an NVIDIA Quadro graphics processing unit
(GPU). The base Core i7 configuration uses a Quadro
P600 with 4GB of memory, or you can opt for an NVIDIA
Quadro P2000, which adds $195.
Systems equipped with the Core i7-8850H CPU can
also be upgraded to the NVIDIA Quadro P3200 VR-ready
graphics card. The base Xeon configuration includes an
NVIDIA Quadro P4200 graphics card with 8GB of memory,
but systems equipped with the more powerful Xeon CPU
(like our evaluation unit) are automatically upgraded to the
Quadro P5200 with Max-Q for an additional $965. That
GPU includes 16GB of GDDR5 memory and 2,560 com-
pute unified device architecture (CUDA) cores. It has a 256-
bit interface and delivers a bandwidth of up to 230GB per
second while consuming 150 watts.
The ThinkPad P72 base configurations come with 8GB
of DDR4 2400MHz memory, but with four memory sockets,
P72 systems can be equipped with up to 128GB of RAM
(or 64GB for Xeon-based systems equipped with error-
correcting code [ECC] memory). The computer we received
came with 16GB of ECC memory (adding $200 to the cost),
installed as a single 2400MHz small outline dual-inline
memory module.
The P72 supports up to two M.2 solid-state drives (SSDs)
as well as a 2.5-in. SATA hard drive. Although the entry-
level systems come with just a single 256GB SSD, Lenovo
offers M.2 drives with capacities up to 2TB for the primary
drive, but oddly limits the second M.2 drive to just 256GB.
Our evaluation unit came with both a 512GB Lenovo PCIe
NVMe OPAL2.0 M.2 primary drive (a $200 upgrade) and
a 1TB Seagate 7200rpm SATA drive (adding an additional
$90). A 2TB 5400rpm SATA drive costs just $25 more.
Price/Performance chart based on SPECwpc Product
Development benchmark dataset.
PERFORMANCE
PRICE
Price vs. Performance of Recent Workstations
DE_0819_Review_Lenovo_Cohn.indd 35 7/11/19 11:29 AM