We weren’t thrilled by the Intel-powered Lenovo Yoga 7i 2-in-1 Gen 9, and its AMD cousin, the Yoga 7 2-in-1 Gen 9 seen right here, is not any higher. Whereas this 16-inch laptop computer ($799.99 as examined) options a pretty steel chassis and comfy enter units, it is too heavy to benefit from its convertible design, and its subpar display screen and scanty 8GB of reminiscence are severe drawbacks. And although its battery life is first rate, it does not stand out. You will discover higher choices for mainstream big-screen productiveness, amongst them the Acer Swift Go 16Models and Design: Trendy, if SizableLenovo’s Yoga laptops pioneered rotating screens that permit them to flip and fold from laptop computer to pill mode, however the characteristic is extra of a novelty than a real attraction once you’re coping with the 16-inch measurement. At 4.63 kilos, this 2-in-1 is kind of an armful, as are its opponents, the 4.4-pound Yoga 7i talked about above and the 4.8-pound Dell Inspiron 16 2-in-1 (mannequin 7640) now in our overview pipeline. Against this, the non-convertible Acer Swift Go 16 weighs simply 3.5 kilos.
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(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
Our Greatest Purchase mannequin 83DM0004US comes with a 1,920-by-1,200-pixel contact display screen, an AMD Ryzen 5 8640HS processor with Radeon built-in graphics, 8GB of reminiscence, and a 512GB solid-state drive in addition to Home windows 11 Residence. It was priced at $799.99 at presstime, although I briefly noticed it drop to $549.99. The convertible carries a one-year guarantee.Sadly, Greatest Purchase models don’t embrace a digital pen. Lenovo presents the identical specs for $723.60 and throws in a stylus, although not with all configurations—even the top-tier $899.99 mannequin, which has a Ryzen 7 8840HS chip and doubles the RAM and storage to 16GB and 1TB, respectively, does not have it.
The 8GB of RAM in our mannequin is insufficient for severe multitasking (and has been for a number of years), making the upgraded mannequin your solely viable possibility in our view, because the reminiscence is not user-upgradable right here. Against this, the Intel-based Yoga 7i, which was on sale for $599.99 at this writing, presents 16GB of RAM normal.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
The Yoga’s aluminum chassis offers a stable really feel and spectacular rigidity. The design appears understated however elegant, with branding restricted to small reflective logos on the lid. A notch on the high homes a considerably grainy 1080p webcam, which has a sliding privateness shutter and Home windows Good day facial-recognition assist. A fingerprint sensor within the palm relaxation is an alternative choice for passwordless logins.Measuring 0.75 by 14.2 by 9.8 inches, the Lenovo within reason sized, although there isn’t any denying this can be a large machine. The show bezels aren’t ultra-thin, which retains your thumbs off the display screen when holding the machine in pill mode.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
Connectivity is passable, with two USB 3.2 Sort-C ports (each usable for charging), an HDMI 2.1 monitor port, a 3.5mm audio jack, two USB 3.2 Sort- A ports, and a microSD card reader. In contrast to the Yoga 7i, the AMD mannequin has no USB4 ports. The facility button is on the proper edge. Wi-fi assist consists of Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
Utilizing the Yoga 7 2-in-1 Gen 9: Snug On a regular basis ProductivityThe 1,920-by-1,200-pixel decision is good on the Yoga’s 16-inch diagonal, providing room for viewing two paperwork facet by facet with out resizing. The panel helps contact and a digital pen (which, as famous, our Greatest Purchase mannequin lacks). Lenovo sells a Digital Pen 2, half quantity GX81J19850, for $39.99.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
Display high quality is the Yoga’s weakest level, with an image that surpasses funds laptops however falls brief on this tier. Shade saturation is barely common, although brightness is first rate. Whereas I discovered the darker scenes in The Batman to be barely washed out, I nonetheless loved watching the film on the roomy display screen.The keyboard, however, is great. I managed 123 phrases per minute with 98% accuracy within the MonkeyType on-line typing check, which is near my private finest. The keys have a stable really feel, with adequate journey distance to be partaking. The 2 ranges of white backlighting could be toggled with a Fn+area bar shortcut. I additionally loved utilizing the big touchpad, which presents stable, quiet clicking motion.
(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)
The Yoga 7’s Dolby Atmos assist offers first rate sound high quality. Whereas I believed the vocal notes in Cyndi Lauper’s “The Goonies ‘R Good Sufficient” sounded a bit strained, the quantity and bass proved passable for private leisure. For comparability, this laptop computer is noticeably louder than my iPhone 15 Professional Max.An underrated characteristic of this laptop computer is the preinstalled Lenovo Vantage app. It presents helpful instruments corresponding to a battery-charge limiter to cut back put on and an in a single day charging mode that smart-charges the battery to full simply earlier than you begin your day. Moreover, it has a display screen color-temperature adjuster to cut back eye pressure. Non-obligatory touchpad shortcuts can be enabled for adjusting display screen brightness by swiping alongside the left edge and swiping throughout the underside to regulate quantity. As well as, a microphone noise-cancelling characteristic could be skilled to choose up solely your voice. The app additionally handles system updates.Thermally, the Yoga proved well-behaved in our efficiency checks. Its single cooling fan was audible however not intrusive. The laptop computer bought heat however not scalding to the contact above the keyboard close to the cooling exhaust.Testing the Yoga 7 2-in-1 Gen 9: Simply Sufficient OomphTo recap, our Greatest Purchase machine combines a Ryzen 5 8640HS processor (six cores, 4.9GHz turbo), AMD Radeon built-in graphics, a skimpy 8GB of reminiscence, and a 512GB solid-state drive.
Lenovo’s Intel-powered Yoga 7i 2-in-1 Gen 9 ($899.99 as examined) was a pure inclusion for our benchmark comparability charts. We additionally included the soon-to-be-reviewed Dell Inspiron 16 2-in-1 mannequin 7640 ($799.99 as examined), the non-convertible Acer Swift Go 16 ($899.99 as examined), and a smaller convertible, the Dell Inspiron 14 2-in-1 ($699.99 as examined).Productiveness TestsWe run the identical common productiveness benchmarks throughout each cellular and desktop methods. Our first check is UL’s PCMark 10, which simulates a wide range of real-world productiveness and workplace workflows to measure general system efficiency and likewise features a storage subtest for the first drive.Three different benchmarks deal with the CPU, utilizing all obtainable cores and threads, to charge a PC’s suitability for processor-intensive workloads. Maxon’s Cinebench R23 makes use of that firm’s Cinema 4D engine to render a posh scene, whereas Geekbench 5.4 Professional from Primate Labs simulates common apps starting from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine studying. Lastly, we use the open-source video transcoder HandBrake 1.4 to transform a 12-minute video clip from 4K to 1080p decision (decrease instances are higher).Eventually, we run PugetBench for Photoshop by workstation maker Puget Techniques, which makes use of the Inventive Cloud model 22 of Adobe’s well-known picture editor to charge a PC’s efficiency for content material creation and multimedia purposes. It is an automatic extension that executes a wide range of common and GPU-accelerated Photoshop duties starting from opening, rotating, resizing, and saving a picture to making use of masks, gradient fills, and filters.
The Yoga 7 outperformed its Intel counterpart in the primary PCMark check however did not preserve tempo with the opposite models, notably the Inspiron 16 2-in-1. Its storage efficiency was common, but it surely struggled within the CPU checks, and with solely 8GB of RAM it was unable to finish our Photoshop benchmark.Graphics TestsWe check laptops’, desktops’, and tablets’ graphics with two DirectX 12 gaming simulations from UL’s 3DMark, Night time Raid (extra modest, appropriate for laptops with built-in graphics) and Time Spy (extra demanding, appropriate for gaming rigs with discrete GPUs).We additionally run two checks from the cross-platform GPU benchmark GFXBench 5, which stresses each low-level routines like texturing and high-level, game-like picture rendering. The 1440p Aztec Ruins and 1080p Automotive Chase checks, rendered offscreen to accommodate totally different show resolutions, train graphics and compute shaders utilizing the OpenGL programming interface and {hardware} tessellation respectively. The extra frames per second (fps), the higher.
The Yoga 7’s AMD Radeon built-in GPU proved superior to the Intel silicon of the Yoga 7i, although the Acer and Inspiron 16 led the way in which with their up-to-date Intel Arc built-in graphics. Even so, trendy gaming on any of those machines is not reasonable with out dialing settings means, means down.Battery and Show TestsWe check laptop computer battery life by taking part in a domestically saved 720p video file (the open-source Blender film Tears of Metal) with show brightness at 50% and audio quantity at 100%. We make certain the battery is absolutely charged earlier than the check, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off.To gauge show efficiency, we additionally use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and its Home windows software program to measure a laptop computer display screen’s shade saturation—what proportion of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 shade gamuts or palettes the show can present—and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per sq. meter).
The Yoga 7 delivered ample battery life for leaving house with out the AC adapter, however its display screen brightness at our 50% check setting was fairly dim. The Intel Yoga 7i had one of the best runtime, but it surely additionally suffered from low brightness. The Inspiron 16 got here near the AMD Yoga in battery life however with considerably larger brightness.The Yoga 7’s shade replica was additionally poor, failing to cowl the sRGB gamut or palette whereas the 16-inch Dell did that and extra.Verdict: A Massive, Confused ConvertibleLike different cumbersome and heavy 16-inch convertibles, the Lenovo Yoga 7 2-in-1 Gen 9 is a distinct segment product. It is trendy sufficient and presents first rate enter units and battery life, however its display screen wants higher shade protection and the bottom mannequin’s 8GB of reminiscence is insufficient. The Intel-based Yoga 7i, which presents 16GB of RAM, Thunderbolt 4 assist, and longer battery life for comparable cash, is a greater possibility. Nevertheless, we don’t discover convertible options compelling on a tool of this measurement. For most individuals, a non-convertible desktop substitute just like the Acer Swift Go 16 or a extra transportable mannequin such because the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED Contact (UM3406) is a greater possibility.
Lenovo Yoga 7 2-in-1 Gen 9 (16-Inch)
Cons
Too large and heavy for pill mode
Display isn’t colourful sufficient
Inadequate 8GB RAM cannot be upgraded
No USB4 ports
View
Extra
The Backside Line
It is serviceable as a traditional laptop computer, however Lenovo’s Yoga 7 2-in-1 Gen 9 is just too hefty for in-hand pill use, and it wants a extra vibrant display screen for having fun with video in one in every of its standup modes.
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About Charles Jefferies
Computer systems are my lifelong obsession. I wrote my first laptop computer overview in 2005 for NotebookReview.com, continued with a constant PC-reviewing gig at Laptop Shopper in 2014, and moved to PCMag in 2018. Right here, I check and overview the most recent high-performance laptops and desktops, and generally a key core PC part or two. I additionally overview enterprise computing options for StorageReview.I work full-time as a technical analyst for a enterprise software program and companies firm. My hobbies are digital pictures, health, two-stroke engines, and studying. I’m a graduate of the Rochester Institute of Know-how.
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