Lenovo’s fanless laptop makes AirJet feel real at last | usagoldmines.com

In 2022, I broke the story on Frore Systems and its AirJet Mini and AirJet Pro, two solid-state cooling solutions that could replace traditional fans in laptops. Since then, readers have been grumbling: “Where are they? Is the AirJet just vaporware?”

Apparently not, as Lenovo has built them into its Project AeroBlade concept that will ship, at a guess, in 2027.

Here’s what the AeroBlade concept means: By using Frore’s solution, Lenovo can eliminate traditional fans and therefore shave off weight (from the traditional heat pipe) and reduce noise. It’s also a critical validation of Frore’s tech as a viable laptop cooling mechanism. Solutions like the AirJet should usher in a new wave of truly thin-and-light laptops, and that matters. This is Lenovo—not every prototype comes to market, but the majority of them do. This is a transformative technology.

So, Lenovo’s Project AeroBlade promises to be the lightest 14-inch laptop on the market, right? Well, no. But it may be the better device.

Mark Hachman / Foundry

This week at IFA, Acer announced the Swift Blade, a 14-inch laptop weighing 0.8kg (1.76 pounds). Lenovo’s AeroBlade concept weighs “under 830g [1.83 pounds],” according to the company. Put another way, that’s about the weight of a full 24oz refillable water bottle.

There’s a key difference, however. Acer is basing its Swift Blade on Intel’s “Wildcat Lake” processor, the Core 7 350, which performed capably but not competitively in my review of the Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3i, which used the same chip. Lenovo’s AeroBlade will be based on Intel’s older Core Ultra 200 (“Lunar Lake”) chip, which outperforms all other x86 chips in terms of battery efficiency, based on my tests of the Snapdragon X2 Elite.

We don’t know which Core Ultra 200 chip Lenovo will eventually include, but the Lunar Lake architecture includes four performance cores to Wildcat Lake’s two, and it can reduce the total core count. Based on numbers alone, the AeroBlade is likely to be more powerful and power-efficient.

Since it’s just a concept, Lenovo isn’t revealing much. I was able to wave the AeroBlade around and marvel at how easy it is to carry. The keyboard felt solid, though not especially great, and we weren’t able to power the device on to check the processor or even if the device sounded “fanless” even under load.

Mark Hachman / Foundry

What’s neat is that the sub-10mm-thick chassis had to expand outward to accommodate traditional laptop ports like USB-C. Impressive! And while Wildcat Lake doesn’t have Thunderbolt capabilities—those laptops use a generic 10Gbps USB-C port instead—Lunar Lake is fully Thunderbolt capable, which will give users access to more powerful peripherals.

Frore nears its coming-out party

The Frore-Lenovo solution is called the Lenovo Active Flow Thermal Solution, and it implements the latest version of the AirJet Mini inside the laptop. Frore’s Airjet technology uses a vibrating membrane to suck in and expel air, all through vents mounted inside the AeroBlade’s hinge. (My late colleague Gordon Mah Ung walks you through AirJet in this video.) According to Frore, the Airjet Mini is 27mm wide and 41mm long, and each of the current AirJet Mini devices dissipates 7.5W.

Lenovo told me there are four modules inside the AeroBlade, which should accommodate the 17W thermal power of a Core Ultra 5 or 7 Lunar Lake chip, but whose combined 30W of cooling won’t quite handle the maximum 37W of cooling power those chips are designed for. In short, the AeroBlade could still thermally throttle down under load.

Mark Hachman / Foundry

Still, it’s a win for solid-state cooling, which has had a surge of competition. While xMEMS seems content to use its MEMS diaphragms to power earbuds and other small speakers, Ventiva has its own fanless cooling solution waiting in the wings with partnerships between Intel and Dell, though there hasn’t been any public movement recently.

By the way, Acer’s laptop apparently doesn’t include any similar fanless cooling solutions. When asked how Acer achieved its low weight inside its Swift Blade, a representative indicated that Acer had designed it around a carbon-fiber chassis and used the simpler Wildcat Lake package for its laptop design alongside a 51Wh battery.

There’s nothing wrong with that. Competition benefits everyone, no matter how a laptop is architected. Still, just pushing thin-and-light laptops to new extremes of size and weight means that thin-and-light laptops actually matter, and are carving out new niches for users.

Mark Hachman / Foundry