So I got a Thinkpad Yoga yesterday.

BJonson · Jul 6, 2014

Went to the mall yesterday to check out the Mac Pro finally. Nearest apple store is over an hour away so don't get down there to often but right before I made it into the apple store I came upon the Microsoft store. My kids were blown away by the 3D Printer they had setup and the guy printed a bunch of toys for my kids. I wanted to check out the Surface 3 I have been hearing so much about so while I was doing that I noticed they had a thinkpad Yoga setup. I have a 13" Macbook air so I wanted to see how it compared to what microsoft had in their store but when I started playing with the thinkpad I could not believe how awesome it was and ended up walking out with one. Typing on it now.

So why did I buy it well...

It's got a 400nit IPS 12.5" panel which is just flat out amazing. I can't even tell you how much I wish I had this panel on my macbook air. It is just stunning. Perfect white, bright and perfect at any angle. 1920x1080 resolution too. Just gorgeous.

On top of the image quality, its a touch screen and its anti-glare. WOW.

Its a tablet. Has a wacom digitizer with pen and everything. The screen flips around and I have a tablet just like that.

It has an amazing keyboard and trackpad. I know everyone says the trackpad sucks but its actually way better than any of my other thinkpads.

The "i" in the thinkpad logo is the led light. Cool.

Fan makes no noise, runs cool. I have the 1.8ghz i7 with 8gb ram and 256gb ssd. Also, that ssd is a standard ssd hard drive so I can upgrade it. The ram is soldered like the macbook air.

So as expected windows 8 kind of sucks but I'm getting used to it. Has some useful cool apps for touch and I am starting to like it.

The laptop is actually smaller than my air in width and height.

So I'm impressed. Love my macbook air but until now I thought it was the greatest laptop ever. Now its just the greatest apple laptop ever as I think this Yoga takes the cake. Now when can we expect a screen of this caliber to appear on a macbook air?

E.Lizardo · Jul 6, 2014

BJonson said:
Went to the mall yesterday to check out the Mac Pro finally. Nearest apple store is over an hour away so don't get down there to often but right before I made it into the apple store I came upon the Microsoft store. My kids were blown away by the 3D Printer they had setup and the guy printed a bunch of toys for my kids. I wanted to check out the Surface 3 I have been hearing so much about so while I was doing that I noticed they had a thinkpad Yoga setup. I have a 13" Macbook air so I wanted to see how it compared to what microsoft had in their store but when I started playing with the thinkpad I could not believe how awesome it was and ended up walking out with one. Typing on it now.

So why did I buy it well...

It's got a 400nit IPS 12.5" panel which is just flat out amazing. I can't even tell you how much I wish I had this panel on my macbook air. It is just stunning. Perfect white, bright and perfect at any angle. 1920x1080 resolution too. Just gorgeous.

On top of the image quality, its a touch screen and its anti-glare. WOW.

Its a tablet. Has a wacom digitizer with pen and everything. The screen flips around and I have a tablet just like that.

It has an amazing keyboard and trackpad. I know everyone says the trackpad sucks but its actually way better than any of my other thinkpads.

The "i" in the thinkpad logo is the led light. Cool.

Fan makes no noise, runs cool. I have the 1.8ghz i7 with 8gb ram and 256gb ssd. Also, that ssd is a standard ssd hard drive so I can upgrade it. The ram is soldered like the macbook air.

So as expected windows 8 kind of sucks but I'm getting used to it. Has some useful cool apps for touch and I am starting to like it.

The laptop is actually smaller than my air in width and height.

So I'm impressed. Love my macbook air but until now I thought it was the greatest laptop ever. Now its just the greatest apple laptop ever as I think this Yoga takes the cake. Now when can we expect a screen of this caliber to appear on a macbook air?

HaHa end of story for me.No hardware on Earth can overcome the lack of OS X for me(No I'm not interested in a hackintosh).
Glad you like it though,hope it turns out to be a good choice for you.

ihatepants · Jul 6, 2014

but....how much did you pay?

ZombiePete · Jul 6, 2014

Glad you found something that is meeting your needs and expectations!

EDIT: One of the things I am always curious about when it comes to portable computers is battery life; what's the rated battery life on the Yoga, if you don't mind me asking?

BJonson · Jul 6, 2014

ZombiePete said:
Glad you found something that is meeting your needs and expectations!

EDIT: One of the things I am always curious about when it comes to portable computers is battery life; what's the rated battery life on the Yoga, if you don't mind me asking?

8hrs.

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ihatepants said:
but....how much did you pay?

Since it was an impulse buy I paid full retail of $1499 but they can be had much cheaper.

ihatepants · Jul 6, 2014

BJonson said:
8hrs.

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Since it was an impulse buy I paid full retail of $1499 but they can be had much cheaper.

yikes! get the cheaper one! thats a hell of a hole in the pocket lol

FrozenDarkness · Jul 7, 2014

BJonson said:
Went to the mall yesterday to check out the Mac Pro finally. Nearest apple store is over an hour away so don't get down there to often but right before I made it into the apple store I came upon the Microsoft store. My kids were blown away by the 3D Printer they had setup and the guy printed a bunch of toys for my kids. I wanted to check out the Surface 3 I have been hearing so much about so while I was doing that I noticed they had a thinkpad Yoga setup. I have a 13" Macbook air so I wanted to see how it compared to what microsoft had in their store but when I started playing with the thinkpad I could not believe how awesome it was and ended up walking out with one. Typing on it now.

So why did I buy it well...

It's got a 400nit IPS 12.5" panel which is just flat out amazing. I can't even tell you how much I wish I had this panel on my macbook air. It is just stunning. Perfect white, bright and perfect at any angle. 1920x1080 resolution too. Just gorgeous.

On top of the image quality, its a touch screen and its anti-glare. WOW.

Its a tablet. Has a wacom digitizer with pen and everything. The screen flips around and I have a tablet just like that.

It has an amazing keyboard and trackpad. I know everyone says the trackpad sucks but its actually way better than any of my other thinkpads.

The "i" in the thinkpad logo is the led light. Cool.

Fan makes no noise, runs cool. I have the 1.8ghz i7 with 8gb ram and 256gb ssd. Also, that ssd is a standard ssd hard drive so I can upgrade it. The ram is soldered like the macbook air.

So as expected windows 8 kind of sucks but I'm getting used to it. Has some useful cool apps for touch and I am starting to like it.

The laptop is actually smaller than my air in width and height.

So I'm impressed. Love my macbook air but until now I thought it was the greatest laptop ever. Now its just the greatest apple laptop ever as I think this Yoga takes the cake. Now when can we expect a screen of this caliber to appear on a macbook air?

you can expect it on a 13" rmbp, which is currently the best apple laptop. Size and weight is about the same as your yoga, and price is definitely competitive.

btw, not to judge you, but i'm shocked that you can impulse buy your way out of an operating system. i can't do that. switching from pc to a mac for me took years.

collin418 · Jul 7, 2014

I might be doing something similar soon. Still on the fence.

The Air just isn't as exciting as it was when I first got it. I tried a Pro, but it wasn't worth the price to me to jump up. The Pro isn't exciting either. People getting excited about a decent screen on their Airs is off-putting to me in terms of a company not being at the cutting edge. If you want to buy a computer now, why wait months for a new screen or a slight bump in specs?

If I can find one with the right specs and a good price, I'll buy and go back to Windows for something new and different.

When a company offers something you like, then go buy it. No reason to be loyal when you can find what's to you a better deal or a better experience RIGHT NOW.

maflynn · Jul 7, 2014

How heavy is it compared to the MBA? Is it the newer Yoga, I read complaints thats a nice computer but its for a heavy tablet.

Kebabselector · Jul 7, 2014

The "i" in the thinkpad logo is the led light. Cool.

I'm sold, not sure about the rest of you!

maflynn said:
How heavy is it compared to the MBA? Is it the newer Yoga, I read complaints thats a nice computer but its for a heavy tablet.

The recent Yogas we've had in the office felt heavier than the MBA, plus the flipped design means the keyboard is underneath. The are solid though, the models we had have a small SDD in there, which complicated a few things with regards to deploying Windows 7 from our SCCM server (various same device came with a variation of SDD, some could be disabled some couldn't).

ZombiePete · Jul 7, 2014

FrozenDarkness said:
btw, not to judge you, but i'm shocked that you can impulse buy your way out of an operating system. i can't do that. switching from pc to a mac for me took years.

I "impulse bought" my way into OSX; Best Buy had an open box 13" rMBP and 13" MBA, and my wife really wanted a new Mac so I decided since they were each like $200 off to just buy both of them. She took the rMBP because she does a ton of photography and stuff and I wanted the better battery life. Smash cut to two years later and, well, you can see where I stand today in my sig.

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BJonson said:
8hrs.

Thanks. Not best in class, obviously, but nothing to sneeze at either. If I remember correctly the first Yoga laptops clocked in between 4 and 5 hours; it's amazing how rapidly Haswell changed the scene in regards to battery life.

C. Robert · Jul 7, 2014

If I ever decided to leave Mac (never going to happen) it would be a Lenovo that wins my money.

ZombiePete · Jul 7, 2014

Raffi said:
If I ever decided to leave Mac (never going to happen) it would be a Lenovo that wins my money.

Personally, if I were going to get a computer other than a Mac nowadays, I would very likely get a Chromebook. I've owned a few of them in the past, and Chrome OS has a lot going for it that makes it kind of an OSX-lite (very lite). If I was going back into Google's ecosystem anyway (which I would be if I were leaving Apple), the path of least resistance is Chrome OS; you can get Chromebooks nowadays with upwards of 10 hours of battery life and decent port selections that can absolutely operate as a laptop replacement if you're willing to forgo native applications. I've done it and it works for me, albeit not as well as OSX does (obviously). The biggest drawback in the past for me, non-native .doc editing support in Google Drive, is being rectified so I can't see too many hurdles if I wanted to go back...which I don't.

Oohara · Jul 7, 2014

Wow, I'm jelly. Longtime Lenovo addict here (keyboard quality + that 'nub' beats any trackpad in the world IMO), I've been dying to try this machine out but there's no store that carries it in my corner of the world.

I'd also like to know what Maflynn is asking, regarding weight. Is it actually doable to use this like you would use a regular tablet? Or does it get annoyingly heavy? I've been thinking that at least when sitting down, the "stand" mode (with the keyboard facing down) would alleviate a lot of any weight issues.

ZombiePete · Jul 7, 2014

Oohara said:
I'd also like to know what Maflynn is asking, regarding weight. Is it actually doable to use this like you would use a regular tablet? Or does it get annoyingly heavy? I've been thinking that at least when sitting down, the "stand" mode (with the keyboard facing down) would alleviate a lot of any weight issues.

It's like a half pound heavier than a 13" MBA; would you want to hold your Air up like a tablet for any amount of time?

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If anyone who hasn't played with the Thinkpad Yoga, here is a comprehensive review from the lovely Lisa Gade: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1UeogkPyAc

C. Robert · Jul 7, 2014

ZombiePete said:
Personally, if I were going to get a computer other than a Mac nowadays, I would very likely get a Chromebook. I've owned a few of them in the past, and Chrome OS has a lot going for it that makes it kind of an OSX-lite (very lite). If I was going back into Google's ecosystem anyway (which I would be if I were leaving Apple), the path of least resistance is Chrome OS; you can get Chromebooks nowadays with upwards of 10 hours of battery life and decent port selections that can absolutely operate as a laptop replacement if you're willing to forgo native applications. I've done it and it works for me, albeit not as well as OSX does (obviously). The biggest drawback in the past for me, non-native .doc editing support in Google Drive, is being rectified so I can't see too many hurdles if I wanted to go back...which I don't.

There is not a single product from google that I would ever buy. I use went from BB, to android, to iPhone and only once tried the Nokia 1020 then back to iPhone. I think everything about google is cheap, unfinished, un polished, and offers a terrible user experience. Its just my own view and I know people see it other wise.

ZombiePete · Jul 7, 2014

Raffi said:
I think everything about google is cheap, unfinished, un polished, and offers a terrible user experience. Its just my own view and I know people see it other wise.

Fair enough; everyone is going to have their own experiences/opinions. I've never heard anyone have quite that extreme an opinion of Google apps/services, though.

EDIT: Don't get me wrong, I prefer Apple over Google; if I were going to be leaving Apple for some reason, though, I would rather go Google than Microsoft.

C. Robert · Jul 7, 2014

Oohara said:
Wow, I'm jelly. Longtime Lenovo addict here (keyboard quality + that 'nub' beats any trackpad in the world IMO), I've been dying to try this machine out but there's no store that carries it in my corner of the world.

I'd also like to know what Maflynn is asking, regarding weight. Is it actually doable to use this like you would use a regular tablet? Or does it get annoyingly heavy? I've been thinking that at least when sitting down, the "stand" mode (with the keyboard facing down) would alleviate a lot of any weight issues.

Its too heavy for a tablet.

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ZombiePete said:
Fair enough; everyone is going to have their own experiences/opinions. I've never heard anyone have quite that extreme an opinion of Google apps/services, though.

EDIT: Don't get me wrong, I prefer Apple over Google; if I were going to be leaving Apple for some reason, though, I would rather go Google than Microsoft.

I know, but I am very anal when it comes to certain things. I like how mac os is a second thought. It just works and never complains. I don't like lag, insane amounts of notifications, outdated software, cheap plastics, over saturated colors, constant hardware updates, lack of any type of function, etc. Its just me but I know its in the thought process of most professionals minds when choosing phones and computers.Chromebook isn't functional enough for me and a lot of people. I did research at a local computer store and it was impossible to sell chrome books. I can't remember selling a single one.

ZombiePete · Jul 7, 2014

Raffi said:
I did research at a local computer store and it was impossible to sell chrome books. I can't remember selling a single one.

Interesting. Your experiences aside, they do sell and review pretty well; definitely not for everyone but in this increasingly cloud-centric world, they do offer enough utility for a lot of casual users who might have otherwise opted for something like a tablet as their go-to portable computers.

But I digress; I don't want to derail the thread anymore than I have except to say that there's a computer/platform out there for everyone and I think that's great.

Oohara · Jul 7, 2014

ZombiePete said:
It's like a half pound heavier than a 13" MBA; would you want to hold your Air up like a tablet for any amount of time?

Raffi said:
Its too heavy for a tablet.

Thanks guys. Have anyone of you used this machine extensively though?

Conclusions based on theory might be useful to a certain extent, but in this case I'm curious as to how heavy this particular hybrid feels in actual use. And I'd be willing to accept quite a substantial hit to comfort given the benefit of having a device which is a bona fide laptop as well as being able to carry out some tablet duties.

BJonson · Jul 7, 2014

So after using this all last night and this morning here are my thoughts.

1. After being able to touch the screen on this Yoga to do things it is making it really hard to go back to anything without a touch screen. It's like it just makes sense, even in laptop mode to just reach into the screen and zoom, or swype and when lying on the couch the pop up onscreen keyboard is awesome since typing on the regular keyboard in that position is rather difficult.

2. Weight is not a problem. Its heavier but really now, nothing beats an ipad for that function but its nice to be able to use your laptop that way if you need to and I have already needed to do that a few times and it was great.

3. Computer is very sturdy and strong. Doesn't feel cheap at all. Feels like a solid well built computer.

4. Did I say the screen is amazing? So tired of making sure the Macbook air screen is in the correct viewing position. With the yoga it can be at any angle and it looks the same.

5. Fan hardly ever comes on. Only came on when installing all the windows updates and even then its hardly noticeable.

BJonson · Jul 7, 2014

Here is a quick shot of the screens of the Yoga and 13" Macbook air side by side. This is the haswell 1.7ghz air with samsung screen. If you notice the Yoga screen is tilted even farther back than the Air. The Air is almost completely washed out while the Yoga is perfectly viewable at any angle. Colors all stay the same no matter how far you move the screen but the air just loses the picture entirely.

Close up of the air.

Closeup of the Yoga

ZombiePete · Jul 7, 2014

BJonson said:
Here is a quick shot of the screens of the Yoga and 13" Macbook air side by side. This is the haswell 1.7ghz air with samsung screen. If you notice the Yoga screen is tilted even farther back than the Air. The Air is almost completely washed out while the Yoga is perfectly viewable at any angle. Colors all stay the same no matter how far you move the screen but the air just loses the picture entirely.

It's really not fair to judge a computer screen from a picture, but I have to say...I can actually read the text on the MBA whereas it's all washed out on the Yoga. I believe you when you say it's a superior screen because you're looking at/using it and I am not, but I don't think those pictures necessarily do justice to what you're trying to convey. Totally, 100% could just be me.

Windows 8...*shudder*

EDIT: No backlit keyboard on the Yoga?

Boyd01 · Jul 7, 2014

collin418 said:
The Air just isn't as exciting as it was when I first got it.

Does a computer have to be "exciting"?

I have been using a MBA since 2011 and got an 11" i7/8gb/512gb exactly one year ago. I continue to find new ways to use it and appreciate it even more today than I did last summer.

deeddawg · Jul 7, 2014

Boyd01 said:
Does a computer have to be "exciting"?

I suspect it's more a matter of novelty and learning something new.

My computers are about as exciting as my hammers, drills, or table saw. They're all tools that enable me to complete other tasks / projects.

(Come to think of it, I specifically do NOT want my table saw to cause excitement, that would be BAD...

)

So I got a Thinkpad Yoga yesterday.

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