Lenovo ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen 1 review: A compact and flexible business 2-in-1 Review

Lenovo has a wide range of laptops on its guides, which includes the Yoga brand which signifies a 2-in-one system with a 360-diploma rotating monitor. While the ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen 1 is, as its title implies, the first in a new line, it really is also a really near cousin of 2019’s ThinkPad X390. You will find also the outstanding — and expensive — 14-inch ThinkPad X1 Yoga and the traditional ThinkPax X1 Carbon to think about.  

Heritage apart, the ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen one is a little, neat thirteen.three-inch laptop that is created for portability. Charges begin at £1,097.ninety nine (inc. VAT £914.ninety nine ex. VAT) in the British isles, with our superior-conclude overview unit costing £1,511.ninety nine (inc. VAT £1,259.ninety nine ex. VAT). 

The style and design is utterly distinct: an all black chassis, with the ThinkPad symbol on the lid, and the dot of the ‘i’ glowing crimson when the laptop is in use. Inside, the crimson TrackPoint in between the G, H and B keys and its companion three actual physical buttons earlier mentioned the touchpad are also giveaways. 

The X13 Yoga Gen one is solidly created, meeting twelve armed forces-grade MIL-STD 810G tests and exhibiting standard ThinkPad durability in equally the lid and the chassis. You will find a small flex in the lid, but not ample to get worried about, though the foundation is solid, with no flex at all in the keyboard. This hard make does impact the pounds, which starts off at one.29kg. 

Lenovo’s thirteen.three-inch ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen one operates on tenth-era Intel Main i5 or i7 processors with up to 16GB of RAM and up to 2TB of SSD storage. Solutions involve a 4K OLED display screen and LTE cellular broadband.


Pictures: Lenovo

In laptop method, the X13 Yoga has a desktop footprint measuring 310.4mm wide by 219mm deep, and it really is 15.95mm thick. It truly is a compact laptop that will in shape into even my smallest rucksack — in reality, the fairly chunky two-piece electrical power adapter is extra of a suffering to accommodate. 

The 360-diploma monitor hinge is smooth and limited ample to maintain the display screen in any wanted situation. The trade-off with a laptop that is created to operate in pill method is somewhat wide monitor bezels. I calculated the X13 Yoga’s facet bezels at 8mm to the outer edge of the chassis, the top bezel at 17mm to the outer edge, and the bottom bezel at 22mm to the inner edge of the chassis body, with yet another 10mm to the really edge of the chassis. The wider upper bezel is comprehensible, but in these days when the pattern is for taller screens that lessen the bottom bezel to a minimum amount, that 32mm really rankles. The screen to entire body ratio is just seventy two{d11068cee6a5c14bc1230e191cd2ec553067ecb641ed9b4e647acef6cc316fdd}, in comparison to 80.five{d11068cee6a5c14bc1230e191cd2ec553067ecb641ed9b4e647acef6cc316fdd} for the Dell XPS thirteen 2-in-one. 

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If you you should not will need the X13 Yoga’s rotating monitor, the 14-inch ThinkPad X1 Carbon (7th Gen) may well well confirm a superior possibility, as it really is similar in dimension (323mm x 217mm x 14.95mm vs 310.4mm x 219mm x 15.95mm) and noticeably lighter (one.09kg vs one.29kg). 

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The ThinkPad Pen Pro is bundled, and has a home on the appropriate facet of the chassis.


Impression: Sandra Vogel / ZDNet

The monitor by itself is a enjoyment to use. At thirteen.three-inches it really is fairly little if you want to have two working documents open facet by facet, but the quality of the FHD (one,920 x one,080) panel on my overview unit was excellent. I identified it similarly fantastic for seeing online video as for document creation and enhancing. Bear in mind while, that the monitor on the entry-level iteration only provides three hundred nits of brightness my overview unit experienced a five hundred-nits monitor. 

The monitor is contact responsive, and Lenovo supplies its ThinkPad Pen Pro for stylus-centered input. This life in a housing on the entrance appropriate of the chassis, so it really is significantly less probably to be shed or forgotten. 

A 4K (three,840 x 2,a hundred and sixty) OLED panel that supports 100{d11068cee6a5c14bc1230e191cd2ec553067ecb641ed9b4e647acef6cc316fdd} of the DCI-P3 colour house is readily available as an possibility, but there are two security characteristic that are only readily available with the FHD-resolution panel. These are: Privacy Guard, which is invoked through the keyboard and obscures the monitor for people today sitting on possibly facet of the user and Privacy Notify, which employs the webcam to let you know if an individual is hunting above your shoulder. Further more security options involve a fingerprint reader and Lenovo’s ThinkShutter sliding privateness address for the 720p webcam. 

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The X13 Yoga Gen 1’s keyboard is a standard ThinkPad unit, with big and responsive keys. It is backlit, and silent in procedure.


Impression: Sandra Vogel / ZDNet  

The keyboard is a joy to use. The big, pot-bellied QWERTY keys are springy and responsive, the Fn keys are a bit larger sized than you may well hope and squared off, the cursor keys are sizeable, and the Enter vital is double-top and wide. The keyboard is nearly silent in use, and as famous earlier, you can find completely no flex at all. The trackpad is responsive, too.  

Processor-sensible, the ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen one is centered on tenth era Intel silicon. The 7 off-the-shelf configurations readily available in the British isles use possibly Main i5 or Main i7 chips, with my overview unit sporting a top-end Core i7-10510U. RAM is possibly 8B or 16GB, as in my overview unit, though SSD storage differs in between 128GB, 256GB and my overview unit’s 512GB. LTE cellular broadband is built-in into some of the off-the-shelf possibilities, with the SIM caddy on the appropriate edge of the chassis. 

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There are two USB-C ports on the remaining edge, 1 of which supports Thunderbolt three and is integrated into a ‘double dock’ that can also accommodate an Ethernet dongle or a Lenovo docking station. The other USB-C port is employed for charging. Also on the remaining edge is a USB three.one port and a three.5mm headset jack, and house for an optional smartcard reader. You will find a 2nd USB three.one port on the appropriate facet, alongside with a whole-dimension HDMI port, the SIM caddy and the stylus housing. The electrical power swap is also in this article, conveniently found if you want to go away the monitor facing outwards next a pill-method session.  

Lenovo statements a battery existence of up to eighteen.2 hours in its detailed item specs, even though in other places it simply talks about ‘all day’ existence from the 50Wh battery. I employed the system’s default options for my rundown exam, even though in everyday use I may well dial the monitor brightness down a small to preserve electrical power. Around three hours of a mainstream workload involving writing into world-wide-web apps, browsing, and streaming online video and new music, the battery shed 30{d11068cee6a5c14bc1230e191cd2ec553067ecb641ed9b4e647acef6cc316fdd} from a whole cost. On this foundation, people may well wrestle to get through a day’s work and then a motion picture, but immediate charging will get the battery from zero to 80{d11068cee6a5c14bc1230e191cd2ec553067ecb641ed9b4e647acef6cc316fdd} in an hour.   

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Impression: Lenovo

Conclusions

Lenovo’s ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen one impresses on numerous fronts, which includes its solid make, well-created 360-diploma monitor hinge, superior-quality display screen, bundled ThinkPad Pen Pro, and configuration possibilities that involve smartcard and cellular broadband, moreover monitor security options. 

On the downside, the newest 11th-era Intel Main processors are not on offer you, and battery existence is distinctly normal. Bear in mind also that if you want extra than 128GB of storage and a three hundred nits monitor, or cellular broadband, you may have to devote substantially extra than the £1,097.ninety nine (inc. VAT) commencing price.

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