Ideapad Yoga?

Awesome, I wonder if the MacMall adapter will work with my various T400 adapters I have at home that I use for work. My fear is that the polarity is correct the same as the barrel chargers. I will inquire with Lenovo / MacMall before trying.

 

My calls to Lenovo resulted in stating that this would work. I tried to order the part from Lenovo direct but they could not find one to sell me. I ended up ordering one from MacMall. I will report back when I get it. Hopefully no plumes of smoke will bellow from my beloved Yoga.

 

Well I ended up requesting a return for my Yoga. I got the $639 deal from Lenovo this past weekend and after reading about wifi issues, I'm out. I travel a ton and will be in hotels most nights. I need very strong wifi and I just didn't think the Yoga, based on the realtek and internet flipping out about it, it would be good enough.

I have an X230 with a 6205 and it pulls in pretty much anything. Was tempted by the Yoga due to the price (I like having two computers, sue me) but even with software updates I just didn't want to chance it with the Yoga.

So while I posted the power adapter links, I canceled that order as well.

 

Well it's been about a week since I picked mine up and did the 8GB ram upgrade and I have to say that I love this computer. The partition issue was already resolved when I received the unit. The Wifi issues do not exist and luckily I have no problems with paint quality. This unit I have is very solid and my only qualm with the unit is the lackluster webcam picture quality. After using some of the higher end Logitech webcams on my now parted out and sold desktop, I guess I was spoiled. The touchpad works just fine and although I have a BT mouse, I have not even used it since I was so comfortable with the touch pad. Being my first Windows 8 computer, I am getting my bearings still, the launching of apps for the first time is a bit slow, but subsequent uses are quick and responsive. I am using the Lenovo sleeve with it for storage. During transport I insert them in a generic neoprene zippered sleeve I already owned.

 

Has anyone successfully performed a clean install with the W8 Pro Upgrade DVD? I see numerous reports of the W8 Pro Technet version from MSDN that gets activated as the base W8 version with the key stored in the BIOS.

But, for those who have actually purchased an uprade Pro key (with DVD), reports are flaky with regards to a clean install with no mention as to how they accomplished it, for those who were successful. Any confirmation as to whether the DVD can be used to clean install W8, or W8 Pro?

 

I managed to do it without too much hassle a while ago... you need to prepare it before install. From what I remember, all you need to do is to create a file called PID.txt and enter your product key in there. The file should look like this:

[PID]
Value=xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx

I unfortunately don't remember exactly where on the drive it should be, but a google search should give you enough further information.

 

Hey thanks. I did see several "copies" of this relatively recent version of the instruction set on various blogs. It almost sees too good to be true that it could be that easy. Here's a link to one such blog, where he outlines in 4 steps how to clean install, and this is the second part. -----> Solve Windows 8 Clean Installation Product Key Do Not Match Problem | InfoSoftOne

So, that's all you had to do? I assume you now have a clean install of Pro?

Also, could you tell me whether you had deleted any (or all) partitions prior to preparing your USB W8 install? It seems, for whatever reason, that all the "clean install" success stories are coming from those who have deleted partitions, which makes me think that the install (or possible checks?) is made easier by getting rid of those smaller (<1 GB) partitions.

 

Yes, that's all that's needed. Just create your PID.TXT file, put it in the sources folder, and boot from the USB.

I have a clean install of Win8 Pro, and it's running well. For the partitions, I wiped all the partitions as part of the installation procedure, and then let Windows install the ones that were needed (recovery, EFI, etc.). I'm unfortunately not sitting at the Yoga right now, so I can't help further than what my memory serves me.

 

Thanks. Yet another success story wherein these little partitions had been wiped. I have yet to come across someone who was successful without wiping those little partitions.

Now, I'm wondering if anything is lost by deleting them. One more stupid question if anyone would like to oblige. With the clean install on a GPT disk with un-allocated space, does the W8 installer partition the disk automatically by creating those EFI and recovery partitions? If we look at the original Yoga disk, one can see that there is a recovery image partition and a much smaller recovery partition. I wonder if the latter gets installed by W8 without user intervention. I can't imaging the former would however, as I can't see windows slicing up a big chunk of your hard drive to dedicate its own image to, but I've seen weirder things I suppose.

 

$639 ??? How did I miss this one, thats a great deal. Was it just clearing out the previous gen ivy trail machines with the refresh or is it something they might do again?

 

I think they were the old ones people returned. I bought one of the $639 units and it was manufactured back in Oct 2012 so it's almost 5 months old.

It seems OK physically except one corner of the keyboard is loose.

 

One more here who did a clean install. I backed up all the original partitions as compressed images using dd in a linux live CD. Then I wiped the disk and ran the standard Windows 8 installer. I don't have the yoga in front of me, but I believe by default Windows 8 creates a main partition, a recovery partition and maybe a suspend/resume partition.

If I remember correctly, the only partitions you "lose" by wiping are a Lenovo-specific restore image and a small one with the driver files in it. I didn't need the restore image since Windows 8 lets you create a clean one of your own, and I didn't need the other because I copied out all those driver files for storage elsewhere. But since I made backups I should be covered either way.

If you're doing a fresh install I recommend the Windows 8 guide over at Ars Technica. It has some good info on creating your own "Refresh and Reset" image. I was able to do it as a file within the main Windows partition rather than a separate recovery partition. I think that gives me more flexibility and easier backup.

 

Thanks for remembering, one of those questions was from me. Since I asked, I returned the Yoga13 for which I had paid full price due to many annoying bugs and just bought a refurb Yoga13 from the outlet for much less money. So far, the refub is doing ok except one corner of the keyboard is loose. The quirks I disliked at full price are much less annoying for $636.

I like your idea of going with USB-->VGA adapter since that will last you years and be usable with many different machines if needed. I almost followed your lead and bought the same one...then I saw the official Lenovo HDMI-->VGA adapter was only $14.99 on Amazon so I thought I'd give that one a try.

Edit: I tried the Lenovo HDMI-->VGA adapter this week with a projector. It worked great of giving presentations (no audio, just screen mirroring).

 

Link will go to an error page of Out of Stock:
http://outlet.lenovo.com/SEUILibrar...E4F2C44807BDD88B14FA6B5576&item-eol=1&redir=y

They seem to get them back in stock almost daily.

Try in the morning, or sometimes people seem to indicate stock gets in at NOON EASTERN.


My friend scored one last Friday shortly after 1pm ET I think.

 

I posted this over on the Lenovo-forum but would like to ask here as well, does this happen to you?

I've noticed a big difference in multimedia applications performance depending on whether the Yoga 13 is in laptop-mode or tablet-mode! I don't remember marketing mentioning anything about perforance being affected by in what mode the computer is used...

Can anyone else please confirm this happens (measured with fraps)?

Examples:

• Civilization V 3D-graphics laptop-mode: FPS ~25-30
• Civilization V 3D-graphics tablet-mode: FPS ~8-15 (unplayable)
  
• Civilization V 2D-graphics laptop-mode: FPS ~60
• Civilization V 2D-graphics tablet-mode: FPS ~30
  
• 1080p Youtube-video in Chrome in laptop-mode: FPS ~30
• 1080p Youtube-video in Chrome in tablet-mode: FPS ~2-10 (stuttering a lot)

 

Tabet Mode is slow:
-Lenovo under-clocks the processor to 800Mhz in Tablet Mode to keep the heat low. If you don't want this, do one of the following:
-Uninstall Intel Thermal Framework in Remove Programs. Removing this will prevent it from doing that. I haven't done this, so I don't know if it's recommended. I did do the following:
-Alternatively, Hold POWER Down for 10 seconds to COMPLETELY turn off the computer. Start it up and hit F2 to Enter BIOS, switch to 2nd page, disable DPTF, save and exit. I haven't done any benchmarking to verify this works.

From this thread Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13 Convertible Touchscreen Ultrabook (Refurbished): Core i5 3317U, 1.70GHz, 4GB DDR3, 128GB SSD, 13.3" 1600x900 IPS LED, Intel HD 4000, 4-cell, Windows 8 $636.5 03-09-2013 - Slickdeals.net

 

Thanks, disabling it in bios did the trick. Now I wonder why it comes enabled, there must be some reason to it.

Sent from my HTC One S

 

Cheap(er) Yogas were in the Outlet again last night, picked one up for the wife for $629, too good to pass up.

 

I can confirm that the MSDN ISO works fine to reinstall WIndows by picking up your bought-and-paid-for W8 BIOS key. I diid attempt the "N" Euro version (without WMP) and that didn't work, but the normal Win 8 did however. I played it very conservative though, because I want a surefire way to restore to factory conditions. So, first I made a whole disk backup with Macrium using theiir UEFI-compliant WinPE 4 boot drive. No fiddling with Legacy boots. Then, in Windows I created a recovery drive with the option "copy contents of recovery drive" to the recovery drive. I now have a backup of the recovery partition. And, while probably unnecessary, I also created a system image, which I was happy to see creates images of both the WinRE and EFI partitions as well.

Then, installed W8 by using the install's format drive function for the C system drive *alone*. That way, I maintain the exact partition structure for an easy, worry-free OEM re-install if need be. The new W8 partition simply re-uses the existing WinRE, EFI boot, and MSR reserve partitions. This is one really nice SSD W8 install guide here -----> Sean's Windows 8 Install & Optimization Guide for SSDs & HDDs.

With all drivers available online and the ability to get Lenovo Companion (Lenovo Transition app available within) and Settings apps in the Store, you can get all original functionality back without all the freeware bloat. The only thing I have not installed is the enormous Intel MEI driver/application. It seems this is entirely unnecessary (for remote access), and there are no driver-less devices left on my system. I have also disabled all the "tray" user configurable front-end software in the startup tab of the Task Manager with no undesired consequences.

I've applied the Lenovo "fan fix" which overwrites the BIOS's EC section to raise temp thresholds for fan speed. I've also used this to get rid of the annoying WMI Provider Host CPU usage bug, where it continues to use around 1.5 - 4% in the background and contributes to wasted heat while idle.

cmd /c start /min "" "C:\Users\root\Documents\Lenovo Yoga\WMI Fix\wmi_fix.bat"

"wmi_bix.bat" contents:

Code:

timeout 5
net stop Winmgmt /y
net start Winmgmt
net start iphlpsvc
net start wscsvc
exit

Now run "task scheduler" (run as administrator) and create a task named WMI Fix. Make sure that:
1) you change user ('When running the task, use the following user account') to SYSTEM (click on 'Change User or Group' and just type it in as SYSTEM),
2) select 'Run whether user is logged in or not'
3) check 'Run with highest privileges.'
4) In the Triggers tab, create new trigger as 'at startup'
5) Click 'Delay task for: '1 minute' (this may not be necessary)
6) In the Actions tab, click new action, Start a Program, and browse to your bat.
7) In the Conditions tab unclick 'start the task only if the computer is on AC power'

That's it! Check to make sure it worked by rebooting your machine. The 'WMI Provider Host' should now consume 0% CPU.

 

Happy to report, after a backorder, I received the adapter and it works perfectly with my Power adapter from my trusty T400 65W / 20V adapter. Same polarity and output amperage (3.25A).

 

Are these still on back order and are the wifi and battery issues fixed?

 

Lenovo forums has a report of new Yoga's listed with an Intel wireless card. I'm not sure how much truth is there, but here's the link if anyone's interested:

Re: If not the Yoga, then what? - Page 16 - Lenovo Community

 

So it could mean it supports WiDi.

 

My thoughts exactly. It's starting to look like just a rumor and a lie from one of the Sales reps. Knowing what we know about the proprietary size and connector, it's hard to imagine how they'd squeeze the Intel wifi inside anyway.

 

Hi guys!

I recently received my first Yoga 13 but I had to send it back because the display just didn't work. I don't know what caused this, but the first problem we noticed was that the power cord didn't go fully into the adapter. (Sorry if my English is awkward! ) I don't know if it was even supposed to go, but at least the picture of the brief user guide showed clearly that the cord should go completely into the hole of the adapter. Either the hole was too small or the picture had something wrong with it. Or they had given us the wrong cord. Anyway, we couldn't read anything on the screen, there were just vertical white lines. Now I'm waiting for my second Yoga.

EDIT: They told us that there weren't anything wrong with the cord and the adapter, Yoga's screen was the problem.

 

Find latest WIFI driver that I got from lenovo forums below. This is unsigned driver. So, you will have to disable driver signing in windows 8 to install this. I installed this on my Yoga 13 and so far no issues. Please note that I take no responsibility for any harm this may do to your machine. I installed it at my own risk and so far I did not have issues.

» Updated: Disable Driver Signature Enforcement in Windows 8 LaslowNET

Driver version is 1021.5.1217.2012
Date : 2012-12-17

https://www.dropbox.com/s/r67hgpli587fxfj/wifi.zip

 

Uh, where did you get this? I would advise not to install this if not available from Lenovo directly.

 

I got this from someone who claimed that their laptop came preinstalled with this new wifi driver. They extracted it from their computer. I installed it and it does not seem to have wrecked anything but it is up to you if you want to use it or not.

 

I installed this updated driver a few hours ago. The connection seems noticeably more stable!!

 

I've been following both threads since the beginning... I'm happy to see the Lenovo thread finally filter over here.

Anyone else unable to install the unsigned drivers? I'm having a helluva time... Been working on this for nearly an hour with no success. Rebooted with the disable driver signing #7, etc... I even disabled secure boot in the UEFI.. still no dice. Any help would be mucho appreciated.

 

Stay tuned to the Ideapad section of this forum.. I've uploaded and posted the proper setup/installation package for the Realtek Wireless Network Adapter driver update for the Lenovo Yoga 13. It's pending Admin approval.

 

Thanks! was waiting for a good thread on this to come out. Was too lazy to dig through all the threads here and on the lenovo forums to figure this out any earlier

 

But the standalone driver works fine. Why would someone need to install via the .exe file. These files usually contain unnecessary files....

 

Sorry! Turns out it was the stup_id 09/2012 version .. but my machine has the 12/2012 driver..!!?? I don't get it, I don't understand what wHackjobs are over @Lenovo headquarters running this circus..??!! Bring back IBM!!

 

The hack jobs at Lenovo headquarters are probably at a Sauna in Shanghai getting a Massagi. Can't believe I paid $1100 for this POS. Nevertheless, the wireless has been noticeably more stable with the 12/2012 driver....but nothing like the Asus UX31A's wireless.

 

New I shoulda held out for the touch Zenbook.

 

anyone know any coupons for the lenovo outlet, i am thinking of buying the refurb yoga on there but it comes to $800 with taxes was hoping i could bring it down

 

That's the price I've seen them go for. No coupons as of current. I bought the Yoga 13 when it was on sale for $450 at BB but it turned out to be a 'price mistake'.

 

Here's a later Yoga 13 wireless driver for the Realtek RTL8273A Wireless LAN 802.11n USB 2.0 Network Adapter, dated 1/18/2013, version 1021.6.118.2013 courtesy of diecast17 on the Lenovo community board:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/87513713/Realtek-RTL8723A.zip​

After you download the ZIP file, install the new driver by:

1. Right-click on the ZIP file and select "Extract All...". Select a folder to place the expanded files.

2. In the folder, double-click on the .\Realtek-RTL8723A\Setup.exe file to launch the installer program. Press the Next button in all the installer dialogs.

3. After the installer completes, it will offer to restart your computer. Do so for best results.

4. After the new wireless driver installs, you will have to reconnect to and enter the access keys again for your wireless access points.

5. Charms... Settings... PC Info... Device Manager... Network Adapters... Right-click on Realtek device, select Properties and select the Power Management tab. Change the Power Management settings for the wireless driver -- Uncheck "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".

 

The Yoga 11S looks really interesting. I've really missed my Yoga 13 since returning it but the same in a smaller footprint looks really good. Just hope the smaller profile doesn't impact the battery life too much.

 

I'm curious to know if they've put a better wireless card in it. Did we figure that out yet?

 

I'm trying to find that out, also. Was there only the problem with the Realtek card? And if yes, is that completely fixed with that new 2013 driver? There is so much forum info on this it's hard to get an overview! This is pretty much the only thing keeping me from buying, and I'm ordering in the states for a friend to bring it here, so I can't just send it back if it has the wireless issue...

 

Maybe I can sum it up quickly for you... Many people have no problem at all with the Yoga wireless, but a large amount of people have had major problems, from slow speed to constant drops. For some, the new drivers fix it, for others, the problem persists. Best we can tell, it's a poor wireless card, but even more poor quality control on behalf of Lenovo. See the huge thread of problems on the official Lenovo forum yoga 13 wifi issues - Lenovo Community
Problems are that it's a poor Realtek wireless card (not Intel, which means no WiDi), and it's a proprietary USB connector and not replaceable, also with short antenna cables under the palm rest only, not up to the screen.

Whew. I hope that helps you and others!

 

Sure helps, thanks! Is the problem still there with current laptops? I was going to order, for example, via Amazon. Is there a chance that I'll ge a laptop with the "broken" wireless card, or was that only earlier batches and now they all have a different card in them? If that question can be answered at all, I guess it depends on how old the shop's stock is...

 

Anyone know where I can purchase a 256gb ssd for the yoga BESIDES crucial? It never seems to be in stock and is now not even listed. Any ideas? thanks in advance

 

Try B&H Crucial 256GB m4 mSATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive CT256M4SSD3 B&H

 

$205 shipped and in stock.
Amazon: Amazon.com: Crucial m4 256GB mSATA Internal Solid State Drive CT256M4SSD3: Computers & Accessories
Newegg: Crucial M4 CT256M4SSD3 Solid State Drive - Newegg.com

 

Thanks a bunch aasoror and willybug.
I didn't trust myself purchasing the part (not off crucial.com) without some advice to make sure its the right one.

 

by any chance yoga with backlit keyboard in future?

 

Follow the link to the right model and instructions for installing on my post here: How to Upgrade Memory and Storage on the Lenovo Ideapad Yoga 13 - VMtoday. Other mSATA SSDs may work, but probably not as good performance or quality as the Crucial model I linked to. Good luck!