Should You Still Buy a Lenovo Yoga Book?

Blaberhead

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JS0pmbVcHGQ

Six months ago, the first pieces of coverage I saw about the Lenovo Yoga Book made it seem like the future was here... until I learned how it performed. Six months later, the Yoga Book is an absolutely awesome piece of hardware from corner to corner.... that’s figuratively rough around the edges.
Opening up the box, the tablet comes with a plethora of accessories. There’s a notebook you can write on for the tablet, a stylus, as well as the tablet.
I went on to truly admire the amazing build of the Yoga Book. The overall size and weight of the tablet made it feel like a low-profile notebook rather than a tablet. The black front and back make it inconspicuous yet the metal hinge on the side gives the tablet a feeling of stature. On the sides, there’s a micro HDMI port, a Micro USB port, and a headphone Jack.
Of course, the build doesn’t end there, that premium hinge is one of the best parts of this tablet. It allows you to use the tablet in the four laptop/tablet hybrids we’re all so accustomed to by now. Laptop, tablet, tent and stand mode all work well and the overall versatile build is something that I’ve just become accustomed to that makes looking at the 1920X1200 display great.
While opening up that display, you notice two things: it’s beautiful and those bezels are way too big. Colors on the display look amazing, brightness got as low as I wanted (it’s a small thing but I feel it’s often overlooked), and my hours of binge watching Kevin Riazi videos were very enjoyable on this bad boy. However, the bezels are straight out of 2010. To be fair, I don’t notice them when I’m caught up in the glimmer in Kevin Riazi’s eyes but otherwise, they were simply too big for such an otherwise well-made tablet. Consuming media with the speaks on the side was alright but they were a bit too ease to cover with my fingers.
During all those hours of binge watching videos, my battery held up very well. I get about a day and a half of battery life on the Yoga Book with typical usage. When I use my Yoga Book on a more intensive day, my battery still lasts a day with no problem.
There are two sides to every coin and to every Yoga Book. The Halo Keyboard on the Yoga Book is by far the most eye-catching thing about this device. I can’t tell you how many times opening up this laptop felt like opening up the Lost Ark. The Halo Keyboard’s glow and overall futuristic design is just jaw dropping. Seriously. Of course, just like the Lost Ark, the Halo keyboard is riddled with issues... they’re not Nazi face melting problems but problems nonetheless.
As cool as the halo keyboard is, simply put, typing on this isn’t half as fast as I would have liked, it’s uncomfortable and often unresponsive. Typing with more than two fingers has proven to be really difficult with this keyboard because my fingers will land on keys and randomly hit the up and down arrows or the function key... keys that I barely use anyways. Overall, while it’s nice having the Halo Keyboard, typing on it isn’t up to par. However, Lenovo’s software adapts to how to type and makes my experience typing much better than day one with the Yoga Book.
The touchpad on the Yoga Book is also great for drawing with the included stylus. I’m by no means an artist but I can pretty confidently say that this is the best drawing experience with a tablet I’ve ever had.
Other than the Halo Keyboard, the only other gripe I have with the Yoga Book’s hardware are the two cameras. Each performs decently in lowlight and work fine for video calling but they’re honestly nothing special.
With hardware out of the way, let’s run down the software. Lenovo has their own custom version of Android 6.0.1 on the Yoga Book to make it feel more like a laptop. It’s one of the best adaptations of Android for tablets I’ve seen. For the most part, the skin is fairly straight forward but the multitasking bar at the bottom of the display at all times and the multi window support on this tablet make using the Lenovo book feel like an optimized experience, rather than a haphazard attempt to make a bloated phone like we’ve seen from other tablets in the past. Performance has also been very good with the Yoga Book. Other than the keyboard stuttering I occasionally get when I type on very specific keys and some lag when I’m working with too many apps in the background, the tablet is smooth as butter. The Yoga Book has been able to handle all my school work with ease and even graphically intensive games such as Bullet Force run well. There’s not too much Lenovo has really done for the tablet otherwise. Yes, there are some nice built-in apps for getting work done but overall, you’re getting a pretty vanilla Android experience. Lenovo says there is going to be a 7.0 update later this year.
So... is the steep price tag on this bad boy worth your cash? Maybe. As much as I love the Yoga Book book, it’s still an Android tablet, meaning it’s still got the faults of an Android tablet. While the experience of the Yoga Book itself is very good, for the amount you can buy this for, you’re better off getting a Chromebook convertible with a more reliable keyboard for a fraction of the price. While I have not used it, perhaps the Windows 10 version is more competitive, check out the review on Windows Central here. However, if you’re an artist or a student who wants to take notes with your hands but still wants some tech for the classroom, the Yoga Book is amazing. At the end of the day, you should think less about the actual tablet and more about the stylus that comes in the box. If you plan to use that stylus as much as you can, the Lenovo Yoga Book is practically unrivaled.

Eric Anthony
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B. Diddy

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Welcome to Android Central, and thanks for the review! I'd probably find the touch keyboard a dealbreaker -- it seems very awkward to use, especially for someone who learned how to touch-type at a young age.