The Lenovo Legion Go S arrives at a time when handheld PC gaming feels like the final frontier of console disruption. With an 8-inch, 120 Hz PureSight display and AMD’s custom “Z2 Go” APU with Radeon 800M graphics, it promises desktop-level fidelity in a portable package. Out of the box, it ships with Windows 11 Home, and I dove in expecting seamless integration with my sprawling game libraries. Instead, I found myself wrestling with crashes, sluggish resumes, and endless launcher headaches. It wasn’t until I wiped the drive and installed the official SteamOS that the device transformed overnight, turning a frustrating novelty into a genuinely compelling handheld.
In Australia, the Legion Go S starts at AUD $1,199 for the base configuration featuring Z2 Go APU, 16 GB of LPDDR5X-6400 memory and a 512 GB PCIe Gen 4 SSD and $1599 for the Z1 Extreme variant with 1TB SSD. Seasonal promotions and Lenovo’s own sales events can knock that down to around AUD $999, making it competitive with premium rivals. Retailers like JB Hi-Fi and Officeworks regularly price-match, while Lenovo’s direct outlet allows upgrades—most notably a 32 GB RAM option and a 1 TB SSD, pushing the total closer to AUD $1,500. Compared to the Valve Steam Deck’s starting point of roughly AUD 700, the Legion Go S clearly positions itself as a premium alternative, banking on superior thermals and a sharper display to justify the higher price.
The Legion Go S feels substantial without tipping into unwieldy. Its chassis measures 299 × 127.6 × 22.6 mm and weighs 730 g, striking a balance between solidity and comfort. By comparison, the Steam Deck measures 298 × 117 × 49 mm at 669 g, while the ROG Ally sits at 280 × 111 × 21.2 mm and 608 g. Lenovo’s handheld lands in the middle: denser than the Ally, more refined than the Deck. The white unibody shell brings a militaristic precision, broken only by the RGB glow of its asymmetrical sticks.
Shoulder buttons feature adjustable trigger throws with short and long pull modes, while a small trackpad beneath the right stick offers fine cursor control. Along the top edge sit power and volume controls, plus dual USB4 ports for charging, docking, or peripherals. Ergonomically, it fits larger hands well, though marathon sessions can leave thumbs aching. Even so, it’s the most balanced handheld I’ve used: sleeker than the Deck, sturdier than the Ally.
Inside, the “Z2 Go” SoC couples a quad-core AMD Ryzen CPU with RDNA 2 graphics. Clock speeds peak at 4.3 GHz, with GPU frequency scaling on demand. Despite being newer silicon, the Z2 Go underdelivers against last year’s Z1 Extreme in the ROG Ally, which consistently pumps out smoother frame rates. The 8-inch WUXGA LCD runs at 1920 × 1200, 120 Hz, covering 100 percent sRGB and hitting 500 nits brightness. It’s sharp, vibrant, and fast, but still LCD—not OLED—so blacks lack depth and contrast falls short of rivals.
With 16 GB of LPDDR5X and a 512 GB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, load times are brisk and multitasking responsive, but that base drive fills quickly. Games like Call of Duty can devour storage in a week. Serious users will need a high-capacity microSD or the 1 TB upgrade. In Windows, I averaged 60 fps in Control, Forza Horizon 5, and Shadow of the Tomb Raider on medium to high presets, but only after dialing back resolution or leaning heavily on FidelityFX Super Resolution. Even then, frame pacing stutters persisted, revealing the Z2 Go’s limitations with demanding titles.
Battery life is equally mixed. Lenovo advertises up to 15 hours of mixed use, but modern AAA gaming pulls that down to just under two hours. Push 120 Hz with high graphics and it drains faster still. Lighter indie titles like Hollow Knight can stretch runtimes to four to five hours on power saving mode, and video streaming sits closer to eight. The 55.5 Wh battery recharges quickly via the 65 W Rapid Charge Pro adapter—20 percent in ten minutes—making pit stops practical. Thermals, meanwhile, are kept in check by Lenovo’s ColdFront cooling: dual fans and heat pipes keep skin temps under 45 °C during extended play.
Unfortunately, Windows 11 undermines all of this. Resume from standby was unreliable, often crashing mid-session. Games like Control and Forza froze at menus before dumping me back to desktop. Lenovo’s Legion Space launcher, designed to unify Steam, Epic, Ubisoft, and Game Pass libraries, felt half-baked—some titles refused to launch, forcing manual hunts for executables. Driver updates routinely broke Vulkan support, and power profiles couldn’t balance handheld demands. Booting Windows felt like firing up a desktop: login screens, launcher updates, and unpredictable standby failures—all a far cry from the instant-on console experience handheld gaming aspires to.
Switching to SteamOS was revelatory. The install process was clunky, requiring BIOS tweaks and multiple retries, but once in, it felt purpose-built. The interface highlights your library, clearly flagging Steam Deck Verified titles, and navigation is fluid and responsive. Standby and resume finally worked flawlessly: pause Hades, press power, and resume instantly hours later. Frame pacing improved, temperatures stabilized, and most of my Steam library just worked thanks to Proton. Volume, brightness, and suspend toggles were seamless, though the touchpad remains unsupported in SteamOS.
The limitation, of course, is that SteamOS thrives only within Steam. Epic, Ubisoft, GOG, and Xbox Game Pass demand detours into desktop mode, Flatpak installs, and third-party launchers like Heroic or Lutris. Game Pass requires Wine tweaks. For enthusiasts, this tinkering is part of the fun, but for casual players, it’s a barrier. Every extra layer means more updates, dependencies, and occasional controller mapping woes—miles away from console simplicity.
The Lenovo Legion Go S is a triumph of hardware design, held back only by software. At AUD $1,199, it makes a tough case against the Steam Deck or the ROG Ally which can both be had for several hundred dollars less. But, the brighter, faster display, more RAM, and stronger cooling in a heavier and more refined chassis make the Legion Go S the more desireable console. And while Windows 11 never truly clicked, bogged down by instability and launcher sprawl, SteamOS turns the device into what it should have been from day one: a polished, console-like handheld for Steam users.
If your library is Steam-first, the Go S on SteamOS feels like destiny fulfilled. If you juggle multiple storefronts, prepare for Linux tinkering or frustration. Microsoft is working on a handheld-optimized Xbox UI for Windows, but that could still be a year away. Until then, the Legion Go S proves that portable PC gaming is no longer an experiment—it’s maturing—but it’s still not quite the seamless console replacement we’ve been waiting for.
Lenovo Australia kindly loaned the Legion Go S to PowerUp for the purpose of this review
