Convertible / 2-in-1

Despite swiftly killing off its Chrome OS-based Yoga Book early last year, Lenovo may have been silently working on a brand new Yoga Book 2 all along. The "YOGA BOOK Pen2" could suggest a brand new stylus for a yet-to-be-announced Yoga Book successor. The original Yoga Book launched two years ago as an attractively thin 10.1-inch Windows convertible with a proof-of-concept touch keyboard.

Qualcomm is working on an exclusive SoC for upcoming Windows 10 on ARM devices. Entries for a new Snapdragon chip were found on Geekbench and all clues point it to be a performance-based variant of the Snapdragon 845 adapted for the extra thermal headroom in notebooks and 2-in-1s.

Although its high-end variant is also available in black — unlike the XPS 15 9570 laptop — and features an 8th generation Intel Core i7-8705G processor, the XPS 15 9575 convertible only comes with 16 GB of soldered memory, so there is no upgrade option available. Fortunately, Frank Azor has just confirmed that a 32 GB variant should arrive in the last part of the year.

Laptops, smartphones, and convertibles are slowly eating into the shrinking tablet market. The biggest bright spot is perhaps the convertible notebook market with the only positive compound annual growth rate of 8.8 percent until 2022. Sales of traditional laptops aren't as steep as previous years due in part to the increasing sales of gaming PCs and inexpensive Chromebooks.

The convertible Acer Chromebook Spin 15 promises to deliver a 13-hour battery life and features two upward-facing speakers, as well as full support for Android apps via Google Play. It is expected to reach the North American market in July for a starting price of US$449, while the EMEA region should get it in June.

The latest BIOS update for the Dell XPS 15 9575 convertible should take care of the fans issue, revealed Frank Azor on Twitter yesterday. In the last month, more users complained that the fans of the new XPS 2-in-1 are extremely loud even under light load, some of them even stumbling into this problem on more than just one XPS 15 9575.

Control your smart home with a compatible Acer laptop. The free update will begin rolling out today for Spin 3 and Spin 5 owners with more on store shelves beginning in June. Instead of offering the software as an option, however, owners will have one more pre-installed software application that they will have to manually uninstall if they have no interest in Alexa or if they prefer Microsoft Cortana.

Rumors are flying concerning Microsoft's Surface line, speculating that the Redmond regent may soon produce another low-cost Surface tablet to compete directly against Apple's iPad. If true, the budget Surface will feature a 10-inch screen, rounded corners, and USB Type-C.

Tired of not being able to see your laptop screen when outdoors? HP’s EliteBook x360 1030 G3 is going to be almost three times brighter than the average Ultrabook to overcome both glare and sunlight for improved outdoor visibility. The display will easily be one of the brightest in both the consumer and business markets. Expect availability as early as next month along with new Envy x360 and Elite x2 products.

HP has announced refreshes to its Envy notebook lineup including the Envy 13, Envy 17, Envy x360 13, and Envy x360 15. The standout feature of these notebooks is the new minimalist chiseled appearance similar to the patterning found in sword blades made from Damascus steel. Internally, all notebooks receive an upgrade to the Intel 8th generation CPUs with the Envy x360 offering AMD Ryzen with Vega graphics options as well. The Envy x360 15 also sports a 650-nit bright panel for excellent outdoor legibility.

HP's premium Chromebook X2 is up for pre-order at Best Buy. The x2, which is expected to ship June 7, is one of the first true 2-in-1 Chromebooks on the market that offers a detachable display allowing it to be used as a standalone tablet.

With the 13-inch variant of the Yoga 730, users can get an FHD IPS touchscreen, and can opt for an i7-8550U or an i5-8250U CPU. They can further add 8 or 16 GB of DDR4 RAM and up to 512 GB of NVMe SSD storage. This model specifically impresses with the 2x Thunderbolt 3 connectors that come standard on any variant.

Responding to a question on Twitter, Frank Azor bluntly stated that the likelihood of a dedicated GPU making its way into Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 is slim to none. "Don't hold your breath," said Azor, effectively squashing any hope of a variant of the convertible with a dGPU. However, is that such a bad thing?

There has been a report suggesting that Dell and HP could be working on new high-end Chromebooks. Currently, there are scant options when it comes to choosing a premium Chromebook for use in the enterprise sector; the Google Pixelbook Chromebook and HP Chromebook 13 G1 are two options. It is claimed the new devices would utilize up to 16 GB RAM and operate with Kaby Lake processors.

Although the new XPS 15 2-in-1 (9575) was supposed to begin shipping more than a week ago, Frank Azor has just confirmed that many early adopters still have to receive their machines due to a delay that has been caused by "a small bad batch of the Mag lev keyboard." Even more, the i9 processor upgrade for the XPS 15 9570 is not available yet but will be added on May 10.

Dell has introduced a new SKU to its lineup that halves the storage capacity for a cheaper introductory price of $1300 USD. Core specifications are otherwise untouched from the Core i5-8305G CPU, FHD touchscreen, Radeon Vega M GL GPU, and 8 GB of DDR4 RAM. The new SKU is a smart move since the SSD in the XPS 15 9575 is easy to upgrade if necessary.

The new Dell Precision 5530 2-in-1 is a less powerful — but convertible — sibling of the 15.6-inch Precision 5530 mobile workstation. Its specs are similar to those of the Dell XPS 9575, but this mobile workstation features Radeon Pro WX Vega M GL graphics and is scheduled to hit the market in July/August.

Dell has launched the new Inspiron 13 7000 convertible and Inspiron 15 5000 notebooks powered by AMD Ryzen APUs without much fanfare. Both notebooks come with options of either the Ryzen 5 2500U or the Ryzen 7 2700U APU and are available in a range of price options. However, initial user reviews on Reddit have criticized Dell for reusing a 2016 Inspiron 13 7368 chassis.

The Samsung Pro now comes with its most requested feature -- a backlit keyboard. In all other respects the device remains the same, but its newest feature makes it a viable alternative for users who normally buy higher end Windows or Apple notebooks.

Sales of desktop PCs and laptops are continuing their downward trend into the new year according to Gartner. While EMEA is seeing a slight uptick, the sharper declines in other regions worldwide paint a more pessimistic picture. This latest quarter marks the fourteenth in a row of slowing PC sales. Note that the data does not include iPads or Android tablets.

With the promise of all-day battery life, always-on LTE, and smartphone-like standby and resume, the first Windows 10 on ARM devices are here. Windows 10 on ARM may be great feat of engineering, but it does come with limitations unique to it, impacting what one can and cannot get out of an ARM-powered PC. Windows 10 on ARM is still in its infancy and, in its current manifestation, is better worth skipping for future refinements.

HP has refreshed the Pavilion and Pavilion x360 lineup with modern thin bezel designs, borrowing many cues from the premium Envy series. Both the Pavilion and the Pavilion x360 come in 14 and 15-inch versions and come in a range of configuration options and price points.

If Microsoft is serious about keeping its Windows 10 on ARM dreams alive, it needs to bring support for 64-bit x86-based apps to the platform as soon as possible. A new SDK set to be introduced next month could help make this happen sooner rather than later.

The newly announced HP ZBook Studio x360 G5 is a creator and designer focused convertible that packs workstation class Intel Xeon and Nvidia Quadro hardware into a flexible device. It features a screen that meets 100% of the AdobeRGB color standard and a pen with 4000 levels of sensitivity. HP claims it is the most powerful convertible notebook in the world, placing it ahead of the Microsoft Surface Book 2 and new Dell XPS 15 9575

The new Inspiron 15 7000 2-in-1 Special Edition brings dedicated 10-series Nvidia graphics for improved hardware acceleration in supported software. In a nod to creators and those who prefer to hand write digital notes, Dell has included an active stylus in the box and 16 GB of RAM to handle editing and design applications.

The Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 finally gets a listing on Dell's website. The convertible notebook comes with a choice of Intel 'Kaby Lake-G' Core i5 and Core i7 processors and offers a few other configuration options. Prices start from US$1,499 with financing options directly from Dell.

Dell's much-awaited 15-inch convertible, the XPS 15 9575, went on sale yesterday. Although Dell originally touted up to 32GB of RAM, it seems that this configuration is impossible to attain for the time being. The XPS 15 9575's RAM is all soldered, and the 32GB SKU will not be available for some time.

The latest Voyo Vbook i5 is almost as fast as a Surface pro, but comes at nearly half the price. Apart from the slower CPU that comes in the form of an Intel Pentium 4415U, the Vbook i5 integrates 8 GB of DDR3, a 128 GB SATA3 SSD, all the usual connectors and a 12.6-inch 3K IPS touchscreen that seem on par with what Surface Pro has to offer.

The much anticipated Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 will launch this week if a tweet by Dell's Frank Azor is anything to go by. The launch of the Intel 'Kaby Lake-G'-powered convertible has eluded fans ever since it was announced at CES 2018 and Azor's tweet could offer some respite for those looking to lay their hands on one.

The Intel-AMD technology promises to be as fast as a GTX 1050 or GTX 1050 Ti all in a single 65 W processor package. The suggested starting price for just the 8 GB SKU, however, is going to burn a hole through most wallets. HP has yet to announce any plans for a SKU utilizing the even more powerful i7-8809G CPU.

The highly anticipated foldable phone from Samsung might include a slide-out display system, which would provide a wider screen suitable for movie-watching, streaming and playing games, especially when the 5G networks go online. This could add to the overall thickness of the device, but the benefits easily outweigh the downsides.