Yoga 2 Pro Release Thread

Anyone know the release date for Ireland? I'm going to return Vaio Pro 13 because of the wifi issues. For those who already own Yoga 2, are there any issues, like wifi, noisy fan...?

 

Seconded, I have one, it's a great little mouse.

 

I'm also interested in the release date for Ireland. Have being waiting a good ultrabook to hit this country for a while. Was going for the Vaio Pro 13 but couldn't bear the wifi and noise. Our best estimate by now is November 1, when Amazon.co.uk will start shipping it if this link is correct.

 

I do not know about Ireland, but in Singapore the Lenovo Singapore Facebook page states end of November as release date. From my experience, Singapore is a rather late adopter so I guess end of November will be one of the latest dates the Y2P will be available in any country.

 

Thanks. Which bloatware did you end up uninstalling? thx

 

For those who have acquired one of these computers, how is the color?

Mine (i7/8GB/256GB) appears to have a problem. Oranges and yellows appear too green. I have not altered the default video settings. The problem appears on all the websites I have visited.

The problem is also obvious in the "paint" program when selecting colors. None of the colors appear yellow in the edit colors selection box. The closest is a pale greeninsh in the second column from the left.

TIA

 

Update on Yoga 2 Pro battery and a mini review:

When looking at the log last night it counted the time in between it shutting off and me turning it back on again as part of the battery life. So obviously that skewed things a bit. Also I'm not sure if it's just a "feature" of Win8 or a bug with Battery Eater or something, but every time I run a test the battery goes to 6% an then shuts off. Looking at NotebookCheck's reviews the same thing happens in their tests.

So anyway, I ran a few more battery tests. The first was Battery Eater's "Classic" test which renders a 3D image (I set it to 3200x1800) that fully taxes the CPU/GPU. Brightness was set to 100% (354 nits) and the keyboard backlight was on. So this test is designed to give you an absolute minimum battery life.

The classic test resulted in a run time of 2h2m to 6%. So a full depletion would be about 2h11m.

Then I ran the web browsing test again, this time at 40% brightness though (142 nits) since I think that's a bit more realistic than 105nits. Same thing - it looped a series of web pages every 40 seconds.

This web browsing test resulted in a run time of 7h2m before it shut off at 6%. So at full depletion we would get just about 7h30m.

This is roughly 2.5 hours longer than the Yoga 13's battery life while having the same battery capacity and a much higher-res screen.

Compared to the competition, this gets almost an hour more than the only other QHD+ ultrabook, the Samsung Ativ Book 9+. Looking at other Haswell ultrabooks, it gets roughly the same battery life as the Aspire S7 (although the test methodology wasn't exactly the same since it was an Ars review but close enough) and 2 hours longer than the Vaio Pro 13, both of which have only 1080p displays. The only one that beats it is of course the Macbook Air (with a 900p display), although the Yoga 2 outperforms it in the "Classic" test.


So here are the positives after using it for almost 48 hours:

- Build quality is fantastic. Definitely what you would expect from Lenovo. The chassis does not twist/flex/creak in the slightest. The hinge is solid and going by my experience with Lenovo/Thinkpad hinges there will be no issue with it even after several years of use. The display does flex but considering its thinness I think it is acceptable.

- The keyboard is great. It's a bit shallow, but apparently improved from the Yoga 13 and considering the thinness of the laptop and the fact that it had to be recessed for use in stand mode, it's a lot better than I imagined it to be. The size and spacing of the keys is great, although the backspace and right shift keys are about 3/4 size and take some getting used to. The backlight only offers one level of brightness but it's not too bright nor too dim and is evenly lit. The top row function keys are great unless you use F keys a lot, which require the Fn button. There is absolutely zero flex in the keyboard, so overall typing on it is a fantastic experience.

- The trackpad is great as well. My fingers glide smoothly and two finger scrolling is effortless. The click mechanism is good as well, and there is no flex in the trackpad as reported in the Yoga 13.

- The screen, for the most part, is gorgeous. Colors are bright and accurate, covering the entire sRGB spectrum (if I used/interpreted my dad's Spyder3 correctly). Being an IPS the viewing angles are unbelievably good. Watching a 4K video even with Youtube's compression is mind-blowing. With a maximum brightness of 354 nits it is definitely usable outdoors and the glare isn't terrible considering it's a glossy touchscreen.

- Battery life, as mentioned above, is great and for the most part better than the competition. Especially when you consider the crazy resolution.

- Wifi signal is great. Even being in the basement two stories below the router in the opposite corner of the house my signal level never went below -60dbm. It is however only a single-band ABGN card. But according to Intel the 7260 in this is mini PCI-e so while I haven't cracked it open yet it should be user replaceable if you want/need the dual-band AC capability.

- The versatility is not something I was specifically looking for in an Ultrabook, but I'm very impressed by it. I find myself using it in tablet mode a lot more than I expected, probably because the screen is so damn good looking. The stand mode is great too, and I can't wait to use it on airplanes since it'll be perfect for setting on the tray table and watching movies.

- Performance feels good, although I haven't done any benchmarks to get some quantitative results. For what most people use Ultrabooks for I don't think there is any real-world difference between this and the competition. There is absolutely no lag in the display in metro - swipes are smooth with no stutters, which was something I was worried about given the resolution.


The only negatives so far are:

- Contrast ratio. The black levels are much brighter than the competition so although the brightness is very good in a dark room the blacks are annoying. The contrast ratio of 454:1 is half as much as the old Yoga and significantly lower than the AB9+ (772:1). I'm really hoping that it's just my panel, because if the blacks were better I would give this thing a 10/10.

- SD card slot is only half-depth. So the SD card sticks out halfway when using it. This is a very minor nitpick, and actually I might be able to look at it as a positive because I know I will not forget to put my SD card back in my camera anymore.

- While it is thinner and lighter than the Yoga 13, it is slightly thicker and slightly heavier than the competition. But at 3.06lbs and 0.6" it's still very thin and light, and considering the versatility and build quality I think it's a very worthwhile tradeoff.

- The webcam is ty.

- Integrated graphics aren't as good as they could be, but I don't think many people are buying Ultrabooks to game. I can play Dota 2 on it comfortably so I don't really personally consider this too much of a negative.


Overall I am extremely impressed with the Yoga 2 Pro. Especially when you look at the price, which if it ends up being correct, is hundreds of dollars cheaper than the competition.

If there is anything I didn't touch on here that you want me to talk about and/or test just let me know and I'd be happy to.

 

Thanks, great review! Anyone cracked one open to see if the RAM is upgradeable? Here in the UK it seems we can only (right now) get the 4gb version, but personally I wanted 8gb.

 

I haven't opened mine yet because I'm considering exchanging it if other people report having displays with a better contrast ratio.

But the RAM should be replaceable, as well as the SSD since it's mSATA.

 

I didn't notice the color issue until you mentioned it... Mine looks the same, there's no true yellow anywhere on the Paint color palette. I wonder if that's a graphics setting under the selected power mode (I currently have it in daily mode) or if that's a display issue...

 

The Lenovo website now has full pricing and model details available.

The i7/8GB/256GB model we are all buying from Best Buy for $1,200 is listed at $1,500.

Lenovo model link
Best Buy model link

Either I'm missing something, or Best Buy is losing out on a decent chunk of change right now.

 

For those of you that were skeptical of Best Buy's pricing, your thoughts have been confirmed. Lenovo's Yoga 2 page has been updated with pricing and the available to buy and it looks like the pricing is 1049 (i3) 1399 (i5) and 1499 (i7) and a few Lenovo.com deals can bring that down a bit, but what Best Buy is selling is clearly lower than Lenovo is now advertising it for. Course this means I have to hunt Best Buy all day for the i7 just in case the pricing levels out eventually but the i5 version can be ordered to ship right now which will lock in your price at $999 if you are worried.

edit:I see someone else saw the site at the same time and just beat me to the news...

 

$300 difference in price is pretty crazy.

Although does anybody see at the top "Save 17% on select Yoga 2 Pro models"?

I can't find the details on it anywhere, but 17% off of $1,500 would bring it down to $1,245 - so about the same as the BB price.

 

I believe that's the YOGA2PRODEAL e-coupon. The models page shows it as being valid on the i5 models and the top end i7 model with the 512GB SSD. Doesn't look like it works on any other models.

 

The hardware manual is available here

It looks like the RAM is soldered on the motherboard and there is only one SSD connector.

 

I was thinking about getting the 512GB model in Orange. Yep, that's the one combination they don't have.

 

Yeah, having the same issue here yellows aren't true yellow. Hope this is just a software issue. This could be a big issue for Lenovo if it is hardware related. I suggest everyone check their Yoga 2 Pro's, just to check if it's widespread. Hopefully this is something simple that a user can adjust. (i7/8gb/256gb bestbuy m)

 

Here is a quick summary of what's currently posted on lenovo.com

i3, 4GB, 128SSD, silver - $1049
i5, 8GB, 256SSD, orange - $1399 (promo of $1149)
i5, 8GB, 256SSD, silver - $1399 (promo of $1149)
i7, 8GB, 256SSD, orange - $1499
i7, 8GB, 256SSD, silver - $1449
i7, 8GB, 512SSD, silver - $1649 (promo of $1599)

From this it looks like those of us who scored the i7 from Best Buy got quite a deal.

 

Thanks for posting this. I had that exact problem on the Samsung ATIV Book 9+, which shares the same resolution as the Yoga 2 pro. Wonder if they are the same? It was so bad I returned the ATIV and now I'm very unlikely to purchase the Yoga 2 with this news.

 

What a pity, it does indeed look like the RAM is not upgradeable.

 

Yes, there appears to be no true yellow. I do have pale yellow and if I didn't look at the color pallet I wouldn't notice much. Not a deal breaker for me, but I hope they can fix it.

EDIT: What's weird is when I compare a search for sunflower images they appears similar on my other laptop with Monitor and the Yoga. The Yoga is a bit dimmer in the yellows, but not bad. Just not as bright a yellow.

 

What to do what to do. The BBuys near me all have i5/4g/128 but none have the i7s. I'm really tempted to order the orange i5/8g/256ssd from Lenovo. So the question becomes, all other things being equal, is there enough real world difference to hold out for the i7? Keep in mind I've been holding off on buying a laptop since July so I'm starting to get pretty antsy.

 

I previously had a yoga 1st gen with i5, but returned it because of a lot throttling in power saver mode. Keep in mind that I had the 3317u not 3337u, if that matters much. It only ran smooth when I had it set to High performance mode. I now have the new yoga i7 8gb 256ssd and run it on power saver, with minimal throttling in performance. It might be the haswell being able to optimize performance or the i7 just being better. This is all from my own experience, so don't take this as fact.

 

Some reviewers out there have said that while there is a difference between i3 and i5, there is little difference between i5 and i7 and that there is no noticeable performance difference except that i7 was worse for battery life. That may have changed with the Haswell, as the posts here suggest the i7 Y2P is doing well with regard to battery life, but it would make sense for the i5 to at least do marginally better with power consumption. I wouldn't expect a big performance difference, based on initial reports of Haswell and the results from teh previous generation of chips. Best Buy's stock says that both the i5 and i7 have a 3mb cache (not sure if that is true, since Lenovo lists a 4mb cache for the i7).

For you it sounds like the color matters, RAM and SSD are the same, and the i7 won't make a big difference in performance and may be worse for battery life, so go with Lenovo since it offers the color you want. For me the bigger question is how soon will the Microsoft Store offer this machine and at what price. Buying from the MS Store is much better because they strip away bloatware like McAfee (but keep the useful stuff from Lenovo and others) and strip away the stupid partition scheme that just wastes space. They also usually give a student discount that I can get with my .edu address. However, I'm not sure what their price will be and how long I'll have to wait, so I may just do Best Buy.

 

People with the i7 from Best Buy: What is the actual cache? On the BB site it says it comes with only 3mb, but on Lenovo the i7s come with 4mb so I want to see if 3 mb is correct. Also does that difference matter much? I'm trying to decide if there is any real advantage for getting an i7, since I can use a student discount with Lenovo and get an i5/256/8gb for $110 less than BB's i7.

 

CPU-Z is reporting 4MB of L3 cache. I'm not sure that there will be a huge different between the i5 and i7 for normal daily purposes. For most (~80%) of users, the i5 will be plenty of horsepower.

 

Really tempted to get the orange model off of Lenovo's site. Don't know that I want to wait for shipping though haha.

 

I wonder how good it runs linux, anybody mind trying to boot some distro on it? preferably debian or ubuntu. despite me buying the i7/8gb/256 no matter what, linux compatability is important to me...

 

This is something that I would like to try on mine, though I don't have a bootable USB at the moment. I spent most of last night just getting comfortable with the system. Tonight I'll try a live boot of probably Ubuntu 13.04 and Crunchbang (#! is what I prefer but I have no clue what kind of support is has to high res displays or touchscreens). Do you know if Ubuntu 13.10 has better touchscreen/high res support than 13.04?

 

Okay so I was looking to see if they had any student discounts, and although the coupons looked like they were for older models or wouldn't stack with the YOGA2PRODEAL coupon, I went back to the Yoga and now it says save 21% off Yoga 2 Pro with the YOGA2PRODEAL coupon (instead of 17% before), it also shows a new USXDISCOUNT coupon (about 8.3% off) for the models that don't apply to the YOGA2PRODEAL coupon.

This brings the i5 / 8GB / 256GB in orange down to $1099. Man if I had the cash right now I would so jump on this.


I didn't edit it, the jagged cuts are from splicing two screen shots together to get the specs in. Copy the URL and see for yourself.

 

I remember reading from the Q&A on Lenovo's website that Linux compatibility wasn't an issue.

 

Yeah I ended up ordering from Lenovo and my estimated ship date is 10/25 with an arrival of 11/1.

 

I wouldn't bet on good touchscreen support, but the more important things for me are a good trackpad and wifi support, battery optimization (i really eager to know how much time it lasts on ubuntu, during internet and light multitasking usage).

 

I'm planning to get i5 orange from lenovo. Just curious how is the performance. My brother is using i7 yoga 1. He said it is great. But he asked me to get i5 yoga instead of i7. I read people claims that there is no secondary sata. iS it true?

 

Just as an FYI, I decided to go check out my local Best Buy at lunch even though according to the website all they had was the i5 in stock and no i7 models and when the employee put the SKU into the computer for the i7 model it showed that they had a single unit in stock. After searching for 5 minutes or so around their inventory they found it and sold it to me as their computers do not have any street dates attached to it and if its there, then it can be sold.

 

Also just a head's up to anyone who is on the fence about ordering from Lenovo, when I added it to the cart is says, "SAVE extra on this PC when you use eCoupon YOGA2PRODEAL now through November 6." Kind of disappointing that the discount is only for a few weeks. Hoping there will still be deals when I have the cash to buy one.

 

May I know the model that you have? Is it i5 or i7?

 

I have the i7 model.

 

Thanks for the info. Which mode have you used to run those test? Is it "balanced" or "power saver" ?

 

I purchased the Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus last month and I really do love it, but wishing I had held out for the Yoga 2 as I really want the tablet form factor option. Just did not have the patience and since I got it from TigerDirect who only has 14 day return policy (only if defective) looks like I'll either have to stick with the AB9+ or resell it. Color me envious!

 

Looks like there's a good chance the Yoga 2 Pro will be my next laptop. I was really interested in the Samsung AB9+ and the new Zenbooks, but they're asking way too much for the specs. Lenovo's pricing is a lot more reasonable.

 

Is it worth paying for the i7/8gb/512gb version over the i7/8gb/256gb version?

Someone tell me the pros and cons. Also, the difference in battery life between the i5 and i7 will be minimal right?

 

There's an entire review by a purchaser just a few pages back.

 

The only difference between the two models you mentioned is SSD size. So for the 512GB the pro is it has 256GB more space, but the con is it is more expensive.

I would personally go for the i7/8GB/256GB model because of Best Buy's price right now. If you get it at Best Buy, you get the 256GB model for $400 less than the 512GB at Lenovo. You could easily go out and buy yourself a 512GB SSD and still have money to spare.

I wouldn't expect a huge difference in battery life between any of the models. You might be able to squeeze an extra half hour to hour out of it, but I wouldn't count on it.

 

The rundown test was high performance at 100% brightness, the web browsing test was power saver at 40% brightness.

 

Awesome. Thanks a ton. Last question, should I just pull the trigger or wait and see if the new Dell XPS is any good?

 

That I'm afraid I can't help you with. I haven't been following any of Dell's lines lately, so I can't compare.

 

I took your advice and low and behold they had an i7. Now to cancel the order I placed through Lenovo.

 

All of my local Best Buy stores showed out of stock for the i7 1.80Ghz, but I drove to my closest one anyways. Their internal system showed they had 2 in stock for $1199. I bought mine at lunch. Super happy! Lenovo still shows it for $1500.

I am moving from a Surface Pro to the Yoga 2 Pro and so far I think it's going to be a good move for me. I am also going to compliment it with a Dell Venue 8 Pro that I am ordering on Friday. I am constantly on the go, so when I want to go ultra portable, I will carry just the Dell Venue 8 Pro.

Here is my biggest issue, which was also a slight issue on my Surface Pro's 1920x1080 display...but a much bigger issue at 3200x1800. When I RDP into a desktop/server, is there anyway to not be at the native resolution (without changing the resolution on the Yoga)???? It's virtually unusable the screen res is so high without any DPI scaling through the RDP client.

 

Exactly! I just posted a screenshot on Google+ talking about this very experience: https://plus.google.com/u/0/108639891202769955350/posts/XVdYbf3v7rW

It will be interesting to see how things develop out over the next year or two as screens with this density become more common.