Lenovo’s Yoga line has offered some of the most innovative tablet form factors around, from modular projectors to digitizing pads of paper. The A12 borrows the latter from its predecessor — and manages to do so at a dollar under $300.
The specs are fairly middling, as out would expect from the price point, but the 12.2-inch HD display swivels around at 360-degrees from the keyboard, so users can position it as a laptop, slate or kickstand for movie viewing – you know the deal.
Between the pricing and convertibility, the Yoga looks positioned to take on the likes of Chromebooks like Samsung’s new offerings, though Lenovo’s entry is targeted directly at Android users who don’t want to leave the mobile operating system behind when graduating to a laptop-style computing experience. You also get the bonus of Android’s big ecosystem of apps, though most Chromebooks will be able to say the same thing in the near future.
Inside is a mobile Intel Atom processor and an admittedly scant 2GB of RAM, coupled with 32GB of storage space. There’s also a battery that promises 13 hours of life on a charge, according to the company.
The most interesting bit here is no doubt the Halo keyboard, first introduced on the pricier Yoga Book, which swaps the standard keyboard for a flat typing experience that admittedly takes some getting used to. Flip a button, however, and it converts to a digital sketching/note-taking surface. It also helps keep the system thin.
The tablet will be available February 8th, in gray or rose gold.