Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13 Review: One Flexible Ultrabook

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danaistina

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I bought a yoga 13 a few months ago. Author of the article obviously has some special version of this ultrabook, which no one else, including me and the people of the Lenovo forums has heard that there is no following problems: touchpad does not support all Windovs 8 gestures, wirerless card has very weak signal, runs very hot and noise from the vents is loud. And finally: windows 8 has not yet up to use touch screen like a android or ios devices.
 

danaistina

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I bought a yoga 13 a few months ago. Author of the article obviously has some special version of this ultrabook, which no one else, including me and the people of the Lenovo forums has heard that there is no following problems: touchpad does not support all Windovs 8 gestures, wirerless card has very weak signal, runs very hot and noise from the vents is loud. And finally: windows 8 has not yet up to use touch screen like a android or ios devices.
 

hothfox

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I contemplated this and the Thinkpad Twist, and wound up getting the Twist, largely because when you flip it around to it's tablet mode, the keyboard and touchpad are covered by the screen, instead of exposed.
 

whyso

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How is the yoga gettng better bandwidth numbers that it is in theory capable of? 21GB/sec for cached read when theoretically it maxes out at 12.8 GB/sec
 

AMKANMBA

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I think the xps and lenovo convertible laptops are the same. No two processors are alike(I am a fan of dell though, happy to see it win).
 
Jun 15, 2013
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I agree with you. I also bought a yoga 13 and the Wifi is really bad. For that money, is incredible that the wifi is only N150. I also have lot of problems connecting to some places. I can confirm that those problems are true.

 

flowingbass

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Stand mode is just stupid. might as well use laptop mode instead, it takes the same amount of space when in laptop mode but no touchpad and keyboard support and your keyboard is at risk of being dirtied up by the surface you put the device on. Tent mode could be somewhat useful, like if you lack the space to put the device on while requiring to still be able to see the screen.

the only useful modes i can see is laptop and tablet mode.
 

clriis

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Quote: Stand mode is just stupid. might as well use laptop mode instead, it takes the same amount of space when in laptop mode but no touchpad and keyboard support and your keyboard is at risk of being dirtied up by the surface you put the device on. Tent mode could be somewhat useful, like if you lack the space to put the device on while requiring to still be able to see the screen.
.....

I find the stand mode to be really ideal when travelling on bus/train/flight and also in general when just sitting in a chair. Place it in your lap and you got a tablet with a 'stand' which you can adjust to an ergonomically correct position and got both hands free
 

clriis

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I have been a Yoga owner for the past 3 months and in general I really like this hybrid though it takes some time finding out new ways of utilising and working with, especially when you are also new to the modern/metro interface but I don't find the learning curve steep and for me it's definitely an enjoyable and amusing process. Overall I have no regrets given that it is also a fantastic traditional laptop. As opposed to others I don't find any problems using Windows 8 in traditional desktop mode with mouse and all and no, I don't miss the Start button.

BUT... as a couple of contributors here have already commented, THE WI-FI / BLUETOOTH MODULE ON THE YOGA IS SERIOUSLY FLAWED. To prove that point just try to Google 'wi fi issues' and see what comes out on top!

In an otherwise interesting review I'm surprised to see that the WI-Fi section deals with only signal strength and not data transfer rates which is supposedly of more interest to the end user. Here the Yoga is challenged especially if you also use one or more Bluetooth devices (like a mouse and streaming audio). Sitting in a space with -61 to -67 dB signal and with no competing or overlapping channels you at times get transfer rates as low as 6 Mbit/s (turning off BT devices increase the speed to around 25 Mbit).

The Yoga apparently is also very choosy in which wireless router it's connected to. I have personally tried 5 different ones at home (TP-Link WDR4300, Thomson, TP-Link WR741 with Gargoyle, D-Link DIR645 and Netgear R6300), and with the Netgear R6300 I, in some cases, get the above nearly tolerable speeds, but not anything that can match my other wireless devices. I'm now contemplating purchasing the Netgear A6300 USB adapter in order to obtain reasonable and stable transfer rates although this step also contains a number of cons.

Despite subsequent driver updates Lenovo/Realtek has not managed to solve these problems. The latest update even includes some kind of USB trigger, installing itself as a running service with log file and all. For all we know it makes the mousepointer flicker every two seconds....hilarious!!!

I (and I'm sure, many others) would be really interested if Scott could elaborate more on the possibilities of utilising the empty slot for adding/changing the WiFi/BT adapter to a PCIe thingi. What would be the real options given the BIOS whitelist and all???
 

timeandspace

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The Lenovo Yoga 13 is big but the 11 is not powerful or fast enough. The yoga 13 is great for anyone who wants the speed and visuals. The other comparable Yoga 11s is great (small and speedy) but expensive.

I've created a comparison chart at: http://angelinaward.hubpages.com/hub/Lenovo-IdeaPad-Yoga-13-Price-and-Review-Dream-Deal-or-Dead-Loss

that compares the Yoga 13 vs Yoga 11 vs Yoga 11s vs Macbook Pro. Based on this chart you'll see that the Yoga 13 still remains the best of the bunch and the launch of the Yoga 11s will do everyone a favour prompting sellers to reduce the Yoga 13 price even more.
 

timeandspace

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I find the stand mode to be really great when travelling on flight/bus/train and also when just sitting in a chair. Place it in your lap and to get a tablet with a 'stand' which you can adjust to an ergonomically comfortable position and got both hands free.
The Yoga 13 is great for when I'm in a hurry or I need to show someone something on the fly and my smartphone screen doesn't cut it, I whip this bad boy out. I manage more than twenty websites and online services for friends/customers and this baby does everything. Not to mention I manage to get in some good Command & Conquer when I'm stuck in-line at the doctors.
The newest one Yoga 11s (small and speedy) sounds great but it’s expensive.

I've created a comparison chart <a href=" http://angelinaward.hubpages.com/hub/Lenovo-IdeaPad-Yoga-13-Price-and-Review-Dream-Deal-or-Dead-Loss”>Here</a>
that compares the Yoga 13 vs Yoga 11 vs Yoga 11s vs Macbook Pro.
 

timeandspace

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Jun 21, 2013
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I find the stand mode to be really great when travelling on flight/bus/train and also when just sitting in a chair. Place it in your lap and to get a tablet with a 'stand' which you can adjust to an ergonomically comfortable position and got both hands free.
The Yoga 13 is great for when I'm in a hurry or I need to show someone something on the fly and my smartphone screen doesn't cut it, I whip this bad boy out. I manage more than twenty websites and online services for friends/customers and this baby does everything. Not to mention I manage to get in some good Command & Conquer when I'm stuck in-line at the doctors.
The newest one Yoga 11s (small and speedy) sounds great but it’s expensive.

I've created a comparison chart <a href=" http://angelinaward.hubpages.com/hub/Lenovo-IdeaPad-Yoga-13-Price-and-Review-Dream-Deal-or-Dead-Loss”>Here</a>
that compares the Yoga 13 vs Yoga 11 vs Yoga 11s vs Macbook Pro.
 
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