Lenovo Yoga Book Review: A 2-In-1 With A Trick

Performance summary: The Yoga Book's performance in our standard suite of Windows benchmarks was uninspiring versus more powerful mobile devices, but it was competitive with other low-power tablets, as evidenced by the 3DMark tests. The Yoga Book can handle HD video streaming just fine, and it’s capable of running software like Microsoft OneNote without trouble, but it lacks muscle for more intensive computing tasks. Then again, the Yoga Book doesn’t need to be a powerhouse – it just needs to be capable of handling its user’s sketches and handwritten notes, and it does that very well. The Yoga Book offers strong battery life, however, and put up chart-topping numbers in both battery life tests.


Although there's something to be said for sleek, slate-only tablets, the functionality of today's 2-in-1 devices is hard to ignore. The Yoga Book carries like a tablet, which isn’t surprising considering that it is as thin and light as some mobile devices, but its Halo keyboard is permanently attached, which puts it in somewhat of a different category than traditional 10-inch tablets with similar form factors.

The Yoga Book is designed for people who want to write (or sketch) with a pen, and we think these users will love it. The Wacom sketch pad is fun to use and lets people switch effortlessly between sketching and typing. We like that we could approximate a touchpad (by hovering the pen over the sketch pad) when we needed to open menus or select tools. And the pad’s pressure sensitivity is an excellent, critical feature for a device aimed at artistic types.

We also like the Yoga Book Pad, which locks the paper into the correct position over the sketch pad. Attaching and removing the pad is easy, as is replacing the pad’s paper with Lenovo refills. And Lenovo made the Yoga Book’s most important accessories – namely, the Real Pen, Yoga Book Pad, and paper refills – available on its store at reasonable price points, so losing one won’t be a cause for panic.

As slick as the Halo keyboard is, it might put off customers who find themselves typing regularly. We could see ourselves typing short emails on the Halo keyboard, but we’d save long messages for real keys that register a keystroke when purposely pressed, rather than inadvertently brushed. Some professionals may want to spend some time with the keyboard before relying on it for business use. The again, if you're used to full two hand typing on glass, it might not feel as foreign to you. 
 
If someone asked us for a tablet for an artistic family member, we’d steer them towards the new Yoga Book. Lenovo focused on creating a solid, yet flexible user-input experience at an attainable price, and we think it delivered there. But it’s important not to lose sight of the Yoga Book’s trade-offs too. The Yoga Book is ultimately a light-duty, Atom-based tablet, and most users would probably want some additional horsepower if it was their main computing device. The Yoga Book, however, is well suited to its intended audience that will take advantage of the Real Pen and tablet input, and it offers strong battery life and unique features in an attractive, thin and light form factor.