Lenovo's 360-degree Yoga 900 laptop answers the Surface Book's challenge
Crafted from more than 800 individual pieces and capable of 360-degree rotation, there’s still nothing else like this mechanism on any other device, and it remains a standout feature for the now-renamed product line. Lenovo also says it improved the hinge, making it smoother to operate.
Not that this laptop is starving for highlights. The Yoga 900 is a superslim 0.59-inch laptop weighing a mere 2.8 pounds. Inside, the Yoga 900 will show off all the latest hardware upgrades. Start with the CPUs: 6th-generation Intel "Skylake" chips, either the Core i5-6200U or the Core i7-6500U. The various SKUs will offer 8GB or 16GB of DDR3L memory, and 256GB or 512GB of Samsung SSD storage.
The 13.3-inch IPS display offers a crisp, 3200x1800-pixel resolution (QHD+) and 10-point touch. There appears to be nothing that special about the integrated graphics—Lenovo offered no details. By comparison, the Surface Book offers a discrete GPU on some pricier models.
Lenovo claims the battery on the Yoga 900 will last up to 9 hours.
The Yoga 900 will be available at Best Buy and Lenovo’s website starting Monday. Prices will start at $1200 and top out at $1500. You even have three color choices: Clementine Orange, Champagne Gold, and Platinum Silver. (All the photos in this article show Champagne Gold.) Stay tuned for a review once we get our hands on a unit.
Why this matters: Lenovo didn’t know about the Surface Book when it was developing the Yoga 900—no one did. Microsoft’s surprise super-laptop has made an already-competitive flagship market downright brutal. The Yoga 900 lacks the discrete GPU offering on some Surface Books, but it still has a versatile design on its side.