Lenovo made some headlines when it signed Ashton Kutcher as a ‘product engineer’ — yes, he who played Apple founder Steve Jobs in the recent Jobs movie — and the collaboration has finally borne fruit today after the Yoga Tablet was announced at an event in Los Angeles.
The device Lenovo’s first multimode tablet, which means it straddles the PC-meets-tablet market position that Microsoft, among others, is focused on with its Surface.
Lenovo says that the device will “break the mold on the current ‘sea of sameness’ designs” — those are bold words, and how will it deliver on that promise?
Answer: Functionality, in theory at least. The Yoga Tablet can be used in three ways — ‘hold’, ’tilt’ and ‘stand’ — thanks to a cylindrical handle that rotates and can be used as a stand and a handle when the device is held in portrait mode.
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Getting down to details, the device runs on Android 4.2 and quad-core processors — for both the WiFi and cellular models — coming in with 16 GB or 32 GB in on-device storage. The screen is a high-def 1280 x 800 display, while the Yoga Tablet also includes a five-megapixel camera on the back (for selfies, Skype, etc.) a front camera, micro SD slot and a micro USB connection.
Most interesting is Lenovo’s claim that the device has “up to 18 hours of battery life.” An impressive feat, if true, but we’ll reserve judgment until we’ve reviewed the device.
The Yoga Tablet is in the US from October 30 and is priced at $249 and $299 for the eight-inch and 10-inch models respectively. There’s no confirmed word on global launches, but we understand it will be available outside of the US before the end of the year… and in time for Christmas, of course.
You can find more details on Lenovo’s website here.
Images via Lenovo
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