As much as we enjoy reviewing ultra-high-end gaming desktops, most buyers simply lust over those aspirational models and then go and seek out the best value their budget can bear. Enter the Lenovo LOQ Gaming Tower, which provides all the performance you need for everyday 1080p gaming. The latest revision of this LOQ desktop line is dubbed 17IRR9; Lenovo’s basic model runs $899.99 MSRP. Our tested review sample is a step-up model priced at $1,149.99, and it features an Intel Core i5 processor, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 graphics, and 16GB of memory. (The base model employs the GeForce RTX 3050.) Although the MSI Codex R2 remains our top budget pick for its amped-up aesthetic appeal and better value, the LOQ is a decent alternative if you prefer an understated, compact design.
Design: Conservatively Compact
Lenovo’s LOQ Gaming Tower is almost petite enough to be a small-form-factor system, measuring 14.8 by 6.7 by 11 inches. It looks stubby next to the MSI Codex R2 (19.1 by 8.1 by 16.1 inches), which is more of a typical mid-tower.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
This space-saving design has just a few downsides involving future upgradability, which I’ll discuss momentarily. The Luna Gray case is understated, with only a white LED strip running down the front panel for visual flair. The LED supports three brightness levels and can be set to static or breathing patterns or turned off in the Lenovo Vantage app.
Front-facing connections include a 5Gbps USB Type-C port, two 5Gbps USB Type-A ports, and a 3.5mm audio jack. Around the back, you’ll find four retro USB 2.0 ports, an Ethernet jack, and a 3.5mm line-out jack. The motherboard’s HDMI and VGA ports are blocked off since the LOQ’s Core i5-14400F processor lacks onboard graphics. The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 card has one HDMI and three DisplayPort monitor outputs.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
As you can gather from the port mix, this gaming desktop does not have any especially high-speed connections, such as USB4, but we don’t expect any in a budget gaming rig. Internally, it includes Wi-Fi 6 (not the newer 6E or Wi-Fi 7 standards) and Bluetooth wireless. The wireless antenna is built into the case.
Using the Lenovo LOQ Tower: A Little Tight, With (Some) Room to Grow
Interior access requires removing two Philips screws securing the left panel. Although the bare steel interior and its multicolored wires aren’t a pretty sight, you won’t see them often, since the side door is rolled steel.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The motherboard, which looks roughly MicroATX in size but is a proprietary design, features two DDR5 DIMM slots, one M.2 solid-state drive slot, and a PCI Express x16 slot. Although you’ll also find a PCIe x1 slot, it’s blocked by the two-slot GeForce RTX 4060 card. The GPU can be removed without tools; the tower cross-brace releases with a clip along the front edge, and a latch at the rear secures the backplane. Due to the tower’s compact size, GPU upgrades are limited to cards that fit and that can be powered by a single 8-pin connector. The RTX 4060 is a short-board design without branding, so you’ll want to measure carefully, if you can even find an upgrade over an RTX 4060 that can work off one PCIe power connector. (We can’t recall seeing one.)
Note also that only one of the DIMM slots is filled, making up the system’s entire 16GB complement of memory. The presence of just that single 16GB DIMM means you’re running the RAM as single-channel, obviating the advantage of dual-channel DDR5 memory.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
A small intake fan and a rear exhaust fan provide airflow. The desktop operated quietly during my testing, with the fans blending into the usual household background noise. Despite its unassuming appearance, the aluminum CPU cooler is effective. The 500-watt power supply is mounted at the bottom alongside an empty 3.5-inch drive bay with pre-run SATA and power cables. The PSU enclosure looks like a standard ATX power supply, but the connector to the mainboard belies that it is proprietary; it’s a short 10-pin connector, not the usual 24-pin.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The most essential included app is Lenovo Vantage, which provides lighting control, as mentioned, along with system updates, hardware checkups, and support access. Some unwanted trial software is included, such as a Dropbox promotion. Lenovo includes a basic USB keyboard and mouse, so you only need a monitor plus headphones or speakers to run this desktop. The warranty is an industry-standard one year.
Testing the Lenovo LOQ Gaming Tower: The Standard Entry-Level Experience
As mentioned earlier, the LOQ Gaming Tower configuration tested here features the same specifications as the base model—a Core i5-14400F CPU (10 cores, up to 4.7GHz turbo), 16GB of RAM, and a 512GB solid-state drive—but upgrades the graphics card from the venerable Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 to the RTX 4060. These specs should enable it to play any modern game at 1080p resolution and possibly 1440p with reduced visual quality settings.
As for our comparison models, at this writing Best Buy was selling the MSI Codex Z2 (the AMD-powered version of the Codex R2) for $899.99, which has a larger 1TB SSD and a faster GeForce RTX 4060 Ti. Therefore, the LOQ is priced at the higher end of the budget range for RTX 4060 towers.
Our comparison systems include two GeForce RTX 4060 systems, the MSI Codex R2 and the Lenovo Legion Tower 5i Gen 8. While the Dell XPS Desktop (8960) and the HP Omen 35L aren’t strictly comparable in the powerful configurations we tested, their entry-level models are in the same price ballpark. Our comparison focus will be on the MSI and Legion towers.
Productivity and Content Creation Tests
Our primary overall benchmark, UL’s PCMark 10, puts a system through its paces in productivity apps ranging from web browsing to word processing and spreadsheet work. Its Full System Drive subtest measures a PC’s storage throughput.
Three more tests are CPU-centric or processor-intensive: Maxon’s Cinebench 2024 uses that company’s Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene; Primate Labs’ Geekbench 6.3 Pro simulates popular apps ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning; and we see how long it takes the transcoding tool HandBrake 1.8 to convert a 12-minute clip from 4K to 1080p resolution.
Finally, workstation maker Puget Systems’ PugetBench for Creators rates a PC’s image-editing prowess with various automated operations in Adobe Photoshop 25.
The LOQ Tower performed similarly to the Legion and was placed slightly behind the MSI in PCMark. Although it didn’t challenge the overpowered Dell and HP, we didn’t remotely expect it to. On the CPU front, the LOQ performed within expectations, scoring in line with the Legion and MSI.
Gaming and Graphics Tests
We challenge all desktops’ graphics with a quartet of animations or gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark test suite. Wild Life (1440p) and Wild Life Extreme (4K) use the Vulkan graphics API to measure GPU speeds. Steel Nomad’s regular and Light subtests focus on APIs more commonly used for game development, like Metal and DirectX 12, to assess gaming geometry and particle effects.
We then turn to Solar Bay to measure ray tracing performance in a synthetic environment. This benchmark works with Vulkan for Windows and Android and Metal for Apple devices, subjecting 3D scenes to increasingly intense ray-traced workloads at 1440p.
Our real-world gaming testing comes from the in-game benchmarks of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Cyberpunk 2077, and F1 2024. These three games—all benchmarked at full HD (1080p or 1200p), 2K (1440p or 1600p), and 4K (2160p) resolution—represent competitive shooter, open-world, and simulation games, respectively.
We run the Call of Duty benchmark at the Extreme graphics preset on desktops, but the test still aims to maximize frame rates to evaluate compatibility with fast displays. Our Cyberpunk 2077 test settings aim to push PCs to the max, so we run it on the all-out Ray Tracing Overdrive preset without DLSS or FSR. Finally, F1 2024 at Ultra High represents our DLSS (or FSR on AMD systems) effectiveness test, demonstrating a GPU’s capacity for frame-boosting upscaling technologies.
The LOQ Tower again scored similarly to the Legion and MSI across all tests, a result we expected given they all use a GeForce RTX 4060 graphics card. The one curious shortfall was a very low score with Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p. Otherwise, it’s a competitive-enough system for 1080p gaming versus the other RTX 4060 models here; 1440p might be a stretch without reducing the visual quality settings in more demanding games.
Verdict: A Fine Compact Entry-Level Alternative
Lenovo’s LOQ Gaming Tower provides value-minded gamers a way to get their foot in the door. Equipped with a Core i5 processor and a GeForce RTX 4060, it delivers reliable performance for 1080p gaming, though its 512GB SSD won’t hold an extensive library and the case and largely proprietary platform is hostile to future upgrades. While it isn’t particularly eye-catching, its compact design is a space-saver.
However, Lenovo could improve pricing: At $1,149.99 as tested, it’s easily outclassed on value by the Editors’ Choice award holder for budget gaming PCs, the MSI Codex R2. The LOQ Gaming Tower is nevertheless a decent alternative for gamers who prefer a lower-key look, especially if you spot it on deep discount.
Lenovo LOQ Gaming Tower (2025, 17IRR9)
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The Bottom Line
Lenovo’s LOQ Gaming Tower budget gaming desktop delivers effective 1080p gaming performance in a compact design, though it’s not the best bargain in its class.
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About Charles Jefferies
