The world’s biggest PC maker is preparing to unveil the Yoga 3 Pro, an Intel Core M Broadwell-class convertible ultrabook tablet with Retina-class display that could give competitors serious contortions.
Lenovo’s answer to the MacBook Air, Asus Zenbook, Toshiba Portege and Microsoft’s Surface Pro 3 is coming soon as the Yoga 3 Pro.
It will also compete against the brand new Asus Transformer Book Flip, which was officially announced this morning – look for our story on this new model within the hour, which we will link to here.
With a screen able to be open up all the way around to the base of the keyboard, the Yoga Pro is Lenovo’s solution to the 2-in-1 problem: how to make an ultrabook work as a tablet without bits that separate or screens that are too heavy compared to the keyboard.
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| The Yoga 2 Pro – the 3 is expected to look very similar. |
It has been a popular model amongst 2-in-1 aficionados, but the Yoga 3 Pro promises to be the very best yet, so much so that Lenovo is expected to use the new model to spearhead its long awaited consumer push into the Australian marketplace.
Interestingly, searching for ‘Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro’ in Google brings up an entry at Lenovo’s online store for the model, but when you click the link, you’re taken to a page that says: “Shhh. Can’t talk now.”.
It then has an image of an orange carper with roped barrier, meant to look like the traditional red carpet with the message: “404 page not found. The requested URL may exist some time in the future.”
Under the image of the roped-off carpet is the message “Psst! Want to be sure you’re on the list?” followed by an orange “SIGN ME UP!” button.
TechRadar points to German website MobileGeeks which confirmed that a Scandinavian tech vendor has already listed the 2-in-1 convertible on its site (Google Translate of the article here).
Despite reports that Intel had suffered delays with its Broadwell-class CPUs, Intel announced three of them during its keynote at the IFA tech fair in Germany, with the Yoga 3 Pro expected to use the fastest of the three of them, the Intel Core M-5Y70.
Although this dual-core chip “only” runs at 1.1GHz, Intel’s Turbo Boost technology can accelerate this processor to 2.6GHz when needed.
It has hyperthreading and Intel HD Graphics 5300.
TechRadar reports the chip sips power at just 4.5W, far less than Haswell-Based processors which were themselves feted for dramatically lower power usage compared to the now older 1st, 2nd and 3rd-gen Intel Core processors.
Like its predecessor, the Yoga 3 Pro is also expected to have a 13.3-inch Quad HD+ screen with a resolution of 3200 x 1800, which is super sharp compared to the sub-Full HD screens of old.
It is expected to weigh 1.4kg.
The Yoga 3 Pro still hasn’t been officially announced by Lenovo, but we expect it will happen soon, so if you’ve been bent out of shape by the wait, relax and strike a pose: you shouldn’t have to wait much longer!
