Revisiting the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i: The underrated tablet PC dream

Starting at $1,699.99

During the summer of 2023 I took Lenovo’s weird dual screen laptop for spin, and I thought it was full of potential but only for a handful of specific instances. A year later, I’ve softened on the practicality of the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i, and I believe it’s just a good laptop that happens to be a Swiss Army knife of functionality for open-minded customers.

Microsoft may not be engineering Windows 11 for dual-screen devices anytime soon as it focuses its efforts on all thing’s artificial intelligence, but that doesn’t mean that tossing windows of applications all over the place isn’t something users can’t utilize with twice the screen real estate on the Yoga Book 9i, and that’s where potential becomes functionality.

Specs

Quick Flashback

I’m not going to rehash all of my opinions on the look, feel, or even the performance of the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i because nothing has fundamentally changed over the past year for the device.

The Yoga Book has seen a few holiday discounts and currently sits at around $200 less than it did at launch. Waiting until the Fourth of July or Labor Day in the US might net a new customer some additional discounts but expect to pay over $1,600 for Lenovo’s dual OLED screen laptop soon.

Fortunately, the $1,600 plus price tag does include all the things that makes this Swiss Army knife of a laptop functional in day-to-day and niche occasions, such as Lenovo Smart Pen, Bluetooth keyboard, and carrying case/stand.

For those new to the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i as a product or discussion, it’s a 13-inch dual screen device which main selling point is that it offers an OLED display where a traditional mechanical keyboard normally resides. The concept of eschewing the traditional keyboard in favor of a touch-focused computing experience has been the selling point of the iPad until recently, and while Microsoft hasn’t done enough to make Windows a viable touchscreen alternative OS for customers, its partners have been experimenting with tangential efforts and the Yoga Book 9i may be the most functional bridge for Windows users.

With its 13-inch frame, the Yoga Book 9i is a familiar portable computing experience, and at just over 3lbs, it’s about the weight of a tablet with attached keyboard.

Customers can appreciate the four hundred nits of brightness being pumped out by both 16:10 OLED 2.8K resolution displays, as well as the patented speaker hinge which clears audio in any position.

What’s Changed?

In short, me.

The hardware of the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i hasn’t been updated yet with new chips or design changes, but my initial idea of what and who this device is for has, especially considering tablet/PC manufacturers charging hundreds of dollars for accessories, looking at you Microsoft.

The included Bluetooth keyboard for the Lenovo 9i is a nice consideration for customers attached to the tactile feedback of a traditional keyboard press. The keyboard sits snuggly on the second screen at either the top or bottom depending on their preference, however, it’s not entirely necessary like it would be for the Surface Pro, iPad Pro or Galaxy Tab S9 Series.

However, the form factor lends itself to the more ‘pro’ tablet experience the Surface Pro, iPad, and Galaxy Tab series are chasing. Each other aforementioned tablet computers feature a slim handheld computer that’s typically accompanied by an attachable keyboard with or without mouse-pointer support to transform from a touch-friendly environment to a more precision based feel needed for more professional applications.

I’ve been using the Yoga Book 9i rarely without the included accessories of the keyboard and origami stand, and just as a tablet with a versatile second screen that can be used for typing, precision pointing, or expanded display when necessary, and the experience has been very freeing.

For roughly the same weight as a Surface Pro with attached keyboard, the Yoga Book 9i offers a capacitive keyboard with mouse that can be folded back and used without the anxiety inducing feeling of accidental key presses a similar action would cause with the tactile feeling of the Surface Pro Type Cover.

In addition to serving as a digital keyboard, the Yoga Book 9’s second display offers extended experiences a traditional 13-inch ‘Pro’ tablet can’t such as two full sized applications running at the same time, or four moderately sized apps running side by side. I didn’t feel constraint to figure out Tetris like configurations of opened windows to maximize productivity or creativity, I was able to just open apps and tuck them away into the expanded display real estate.

Another area the Yoga Book 9i succeeds as a ‘Pro’ tablet is in the coveted lapability. With the evolved speaker hinge of the Lenovo Yoga line and a full-sized secondary screen serving as both an additional display and keyboard, the ‘top heavy’ phenomenon of the Surface Pro, Galaxy Tab or iPad Pro was non-existent.

As with most modern computing experiences, the Yoga Book 9i has limited port availability but still more than the modern tablet experiences out there with three Thunderbolt ports that offer pretty decent extensibility.

The Yoga Book 9i also excels at audio due to its full-sized speaker hinge. While the Yoga Book 9i is a denser tablet-like experience when compared to the Surface Pro and iPad Pro, it does offer the better speaker experience, especially when held in the hand. Microsoft, Apple, and Samsung have done admirable jobs in how much audio they squeeze from their speakers while conducting audio jujitsu to amply the sound with how they place their speakers, the Yoga Book 9i just places a large speaker along the spine of its device that’s rarely incumbered in any position.

The Yoga Book 9i sits on the lap as any other laptop would with a sturdy hinge to prevent any sort of wobble or wiggle when typing.

Beyond the physical advantages of dual screen laptop serving as more functional ‘Pro’ tablet experience, the Yoga Book 9i runs full Windows 11.

There is no need to ‘find’, emulate, or convert any app experiences. For those in data processing, all the productivity suites are at the fingertips. A full and robust web experience with Chrome, Edge, Opera, Firefox, and others, as well as Google Drive and OneDrive File explorer extensions for robust file management are just there as they have been on any other Windows device.

For creators, the Yoga Book 9i runs the same creative suite as any other Windows or Apple device sans Final Cut Pro and Garage Band. The performance is familiar on Adobe’s execution as a Creative Suite on Windows so performance depends on the projects being executed, but the main point is that the Yoga Book 9i can server as production studio equipped with the hardware to do impromptu or mobile creative tasks far better than perhaps an iPad Pro or Galaxy Tab device, and matches any Surface Pro options.

Summary

When I first reviewed the Yoga Book 9i, I did so as a traditional laptop and chided the differences between traditional clamshell computing with a dedicated keyboard over the possibility of the device. As time has passed and I see more people learning to compute with a new brand of ‘Pro’ mobile devices, primarily tablet computers, the more appealing the Yoga Book 9i has become.

Understandably, it’s still too heavy as a device to be considered a full tablet experience replacement, but when it comes to filling the void between tablet and ‘Pro’ tablet PC, it’s unique second display design might be the most extensible execution of the concept. Microsoft, Apple, and Samsung have started charging low-end PC level prices for their “optional” keyboards because they presumably understand they are necessary to fill that gap between tablet and ‘Pro’ PC experience. Whereas Lenovo is offering a secondary option of retaining the familiar clamshell experience while allowing the user to creatively engage with the tablet PC vision, included in the box.

If Lenovo can get to a fanless design for the Yoga Book 9i thanks to more efficient chips from maybe Qualcomm or AMD, this idea of leveraging a second screen as keyboard or drawing pad may ultimately usurp the attachable keyboard concept that continues to be a liability in the ‘Pro’ tablet computing experience.