In “shut up and take my money, maybe” news, Lenovo’s new Yoga Book makes Microsoft’s Surface look like ENIAC. It’s a cheap, unbelievably slim tablet computer, yet promises the genuine utility of a laptop by unusual means: a Wacom-powered touchpad that doubles as a keyboard. The Verge is so impressed its got a longread up already.
But it’s the other half of the Yoga Book that makes it special and different from the many tablets already out there. Where you might expect there to be a physical keyboard or even a second screen, instead Lenovo opted for a specialized, touch-sensitive panel. Open up the Yoga Book, and you’ll see a flat, black expanse. Dimly glowing lights outline a keyboard and trackpad, or you can tap a button and it switches into a pen-recognition mode, powered by Wacom technology. Because it’s a Wacom surface, you can even put a stack of paper on top of the panel and write notes with real ink that are instantly digitized. The panel is attached to the screen with a hinge comprised of 130 different pieces and can be rotated behind the display entirely, similar to how the keyboard on Lenovo’s Yoga laptop line works.
Whether this thing is worthwhile will come down to typing on that flat, glassy panel. There’s a mention of “haptic feedback.” Either they nailed it or they didn’t—and it would be the greatest technical feat in this thing by far if they did.