We don’t like Yoga. Someone once bought us vouchers for Christmas. We spent 40 minutes playing what felt like the worst game of musical statues ever devised, desperately trying not to fart or fall over. We much prefer the Lenovo Yoga 11s.
Designed to make the most of the point-and-pinch world of Windows 8, the Yoga gains its name from its nimble party trick. Approach it as a closed book and it looks much like any other 11inch laptop, weighing an agile 1.4kg. Open it up and you’ll find an unspectacular keyboard (well balanced, and comfortable to use) and a track pad. It’s all very normal. But as you continue to open the Yoga, you find its well knuckled hinges just keep going, allowing the screen to arch 360 degrees with eye-watering ease.
This fold-over flexibility allows the Yoga to achieve where many other laptop-tablet hybrid designs fail: to act naturally as a laptop, and successfully imitate a tablet. For PowerPoint and Word based tedium, we assumed the laptop position. For videos and Skype, we kicked the screen back further and let the keyboard act as a stand. For web browsing, we folded the Yoga flat, turning it into a chunky tablet (albeit with an oddly lifeless keyboard on the back).
The Yoga is also a nifty little mover, powering up in a few seconds and holding its battery juice for roughly 6-8 hours. The touch screen works brilliantly, easily interpreting our clumsy flicks and stabs, though it isn’t the most remarkably colourful or vivid display we’ve encountered.
If you’re looking for a device that fulfils your laptop/tablet dreams, check out the Yoga. It vastly outdoes the likes of Microsoft’s Surface Pro and from £629, is cheaper to boot.
You can find the Lenovo Yoga 11s here
