Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 2 Pro

The Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga Pro 2 is the follow-up to the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13 ($ 999) we saw late last year. Its screen swings around so you can use the system from different positions, can some of them are better for playing touch, or for viewing videos. It is a hybrid ultrabook that usually plays like a clamshell notebook, but can be reconfigured to work as a slate tablet while holding it in your arms or on the flat surface. QHD The Pro's Yoga 2 + (four times higher than 1080p HD) screen resolution makes it more attractive for the early adopter and graphics arts mavens, but the system is a bit short of achieving our highest recommendation still .

Design and Features
Yoga 2 Pro is a convertible ultrabook with four modes, Laptop, Stand, Tent, and Tablet-screen when you swing around from the closed shells, all the way around to where the screen acts such as using a slate tablet. Our review unit has a bright silver top and bottom lid and black colored keyboard deck, screen bezel, and side to side. It looks a bit like a reverse Oreo sideways view, but on the whole it works.

The black keys on the keyboard with white lettering and backlit for use in darkened rooms. The keyboard is very comfortable to use, with a very slight bowing under each key for comfort. There is a touch-sensitive Windows keys below the screen, which is always active and help navigating all modes, especially Stand, Tent, and tablet modes.

Only joking about the left is that the keyboard is still exposed, and the key can still be manipulated (but not register) when the system is in tablet mode. Other manufacturers have tried to cover the keyboard with a favorable interest as Sony VAIO Flip 15 (SVF15N190X) ($ 1,199) and Dell XPS 12 ($ 1,199), the slide of the screen similar to the Sony Vaio Duo 13 ($ 1,399), and one detachable keyboard like Pro 700T Samsung Ativ SmartPC (XE700T1C-A01US) ($ 1,199).

Yoga 2 Pro is lighter than the first-generation Yoga 13, but it was pretty heavy and hard to handle anyway. The system measures about 0.61 by 13 by 8.75 inches (HWD), and weighs 3.02 pounds. It's still way too heavy to use in tablet mode full time unless it is resting on a surface. Detachable or smaller systems are really the way to get the ultra-mobile.

Pro Yoga 2 Yoga improves older and quirkier models like the Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 14 ($ 999) by the inclusion of a screen 3200 through 1800 (QHD +) resolution, matching the high end editor ultrabook 'Choice-winning Samsung Ativ Book 9 Plus ($ 1,399) and high-end ultraportable EC Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch (2013) ($ 1,299). This pushes more pixels than the Toshiba KIRABook ($ 2000) with 2560 by 1440 resolution of its screen. What you get those extra pixels? When using photo-editing programs such as Adobe Photoshop CS6, the extra resolution lets you see more detail without zooming in on the picture. It also means that you can see the "4K" online video closer to the native resolution (up to 4096 by 3072, but quoted 4K resolutions vary). Granted, these videos take longer to download on laptop than regular 1080p HD video.

The IPS screen Yoga 2 Pro is very bright, and viewing of 4K video screen gives you that feeling hyper very used to a person when they first saw 1080p HD 10 years ago. One of the downsides of this screen higher resolution is that when you run a program that does not automatically scale the text and UI elements, text elements and UI will look small in 13 - inch screen. Rare examples during our tests include Adobe Photoshop CS6, the Heaven benchmark control panel, and Internet Explorer 11 desktop mode menu.

Lenovo calls this program with Yoga Selection, suggesting a variety of apps for four different screen configurations. For example the stand mode is heavily watching the video, and Tent mode touch-screen game committed. Thankfully, most of the tiles in Yoga Selection is the link to download the Windows Store. That way, they are taking up valuable space on the 128GB SSD. That said, there are a small number of pre-loaded apps, including Evernote Touch, Zinio, hightail, FilmOnTelevision, Kindle, eBay, rara music, Accuweather, Office (test), and Dragon Assistant anyway. Lenovo Group also includes the Lenovo Yoga Co-branded apps like Phone Yoga, Yoga Chef, Lenovo Veriface, Lenovo Motion Control, Lenovo Co, etc. All said and done, the system has 80.9GB free on the C: drive when you take it out of the box. Yoga 2 Pro is a one-year warranty.