Lenovo Yoga 9i is slick, well-rounded laptop

Few laptops or ultrabooks end up truly being at the crossroads of luxury as well as practicality. Lenovo has tried that with its Yoga 9i that’s geared towards the productivity crowd. It’s particularly suited to those who spend hours photo and video editing on a Windows laptop or would like to get a full day’s work done at office. The question is whether the Intel chip is good enough? Let’s dive in.

Packed with improvements

Yoga 9i is a convertible that’s easy to grip

First, some design tweaks from Lenovo that has made the machine more usable than its predecessors. It’s still 14 inches but from a design standpoint it has gone from a 16:9 display to 16:10, so you get that extra vertical space, which a lot of people prefer for productivity. It tries to reach the zone of a MacBook and does a fairly good job.

The earlier Yoga machines have always looked good but some of them haven’t been comfortable enough to hold.

The old Yoga looks like a traditional ultrabook but the edges of the device didn’t feel good because it was sharp. The new version is much better with rounded edges, so things feel smooth. Further, there is a nice polish to the chassis, giving the machine a touch of luxury.

This is a convertible that flips all the way around and one of the best things I like about the system is how the speaker system works. The combo hinge-speaker bar may not have a minimalist look but it does a fantastic job. The hinge is sturdy with zero flex to the screen while the speaker is deep and packed with bass.

The big thing here is that the sound gets directed at you in practically any mode instead of downwards… towards the table. It is one of the best speakers you can get on a Windows laptop. There is a 360-degree surround bar which houses two tweeters and then on the bottom of the laptop there are two woofers. I could clearly feel the separation between left and right.

The trackpad is bigger than before and there are dedicated keys to handle performance.

Another big improvement — the touchpad. The new one is much bigger, there is more space to move your fingers around, it’s accurate and you are able to do this because they have extended the depth of the touchpad.

The keyboard is similar to the previous generation but they have changed the buttons around. On the previous model, if you had to switch between, say, performance and battery saving modes, you had to hit function+Q. Now there is a separate button on the right-hand side to do this. There is a screen privacy option. The fingerprint scanner is a nicer-looking button. And you have the option of not using the fingerprint scanner because there is a 1080p webcam that supports Windows Hello facial recognition.

Let’s talk about performance

The soundbar- hinge option is among the best on a Windows laptop

You can customise the laptop to a great degree and the display we have on the review unit is OLED with 2880 x 1800 resolution. Now, OLED on a laptop deserves a chef’s kiss, especially if you are using it for productivity and content consumption. Colour accuracy is top-notch. At the same time, there is a quibble — the display is slightly glossy, so you can see some reflection on the screen, especially if the content that’s being played has a lot of deep blacks.

Finally, performance. The review unit comes with 12th Gen Intel Core i7 1280P processor with integrated graphics. Since you don’t get discreet graphics, I wouldn’t suggest you look at the machine only from gaming standpoint. In case you are willing to compromise on graphic settings in any particular game, sure this is a fine machine. The Yoga laptop is for editing and I didn’t find any problem while using Photoshop or Adobe Premiere Pro. Even compiling codes is not a problem here.

With several tabs open and apps running in the background, the machine can flawlessly handle Zoom calls. There is very little in way of fan noise even in performance mode while heat generation is tackled well.

It can pull through with eight hours of heavy-duty work and the battery will last a lot longer if you use it for video consumption. Basically, a day’s usage without fail… all the time.

Also impressive is the selection of ports — you get two Thunderbolt 3 ports, one USB-C, one USB-A, a headphone jack, and that’s a lot.

Should you buy it?

It’s a great convertible. If you are coming from an older model, it will be a great upgrade. The addition of the 16:10 aspect ratio, excellent audio and 1080p webcam seals the deal for me. An old favourite has become better.

At a glance