Lenovo has unveiled the latest addition to its ThinkBook product family for SMBs, as well as a fresh crop of laptops and Chromebooks for consumers.
Introduced three days after an earlier wave of ThinkPad and smart office products, the new devices made their debut at the 2020 CES conference, which is taking place this week in Las Vegas.
The new ThinkBook, called the ThinkBook Plus, features both a 13.3-inch FHD main display and a separate 10.8-inch e-ink display on the cover. When used in tandem with the unit’s built-in Lenovo Precision Pen, the outside panel is designed to help meeting attendees capture diagrams and notes without opening the lid. To keep users focused during meetings, the clamshell laptop shows only essential items like upcoming calendar appointments, instant messages, and important emails on the cover.
Inside the device, users will find Harman speakers, hotkeys for controlling Skype calls, and a fingerprint reader. Additional security features include a camera shutter and integrated dTPM 2.0 hardware protection. “Modern Standby” functionality retrieves emails and updates even when the lid is closed, while support for Amazon’s Alexa virtual assistant lets users perform common tasks through voice commands.
The ThinkBook Plus runs on 10th Gen Intel Core processors and comes with a standard SSD as well as optional Intel Optane storage. Intel plans to begin shipping the new product in March for $1,199 and up.
Lenovo introduced the first two ThinkBooks last May, and then added two additional units later in the year. The product line’s combination of style, affordability, and durability won Lenovo a place on ChannelPro‘s 2019 list of All-Star award winners.
Among the consumer-oriented laptops announced today was the Lenovo Flex 5G, which will be known as the Yoga 5G outside of North America. According to Lenovo, it’s the world’s first 5G PC, though HP Inc. made a similar claim about one of its new products yesterday.
Also the first PC to run on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx 5G Compute Platform, according to Lenovo, the Flex 5G comes with nine built-in antennas that support both millimeter wave full-band and sub-6GHz 5G networks. 5G service for the device will initially be available exclusively through Lenovo’s launch partner, Verizon. Lenovo says the device enables download speeds of approximately 4Gb/s3.
The Flex 5G’s 14-inch Full HD IPS touchscreen offers 400 nits of brightness. Weighing in at 2.86 lbs., the unit features Qualcomm Adreno 680 graphics and user-facing stereo speakers powered by Dolby Atmos. The battery, according to Lenovo, lasts up to 24 hours on a charge.
Though the Flex 5G is tailored to the consumer market, Lenovo has commercial 5G products in development as well. Selling and supporting those systems will be rich sources of incremental revenue for IT providers in 2020, according to Rob Cato, Lenovo’s vice president or North American channels.
“I think that’s really going to open up a whole new area of opportunity for us and our channel partners,” he says.
Also new for CES are the IdeaPad 14 and IdeaPad 15, clamshell laptops primarily for consumers that will be collectively named the Yoga Slim 7 outside of North America. Both devices utilize Lenovo Q-Control Intelligent Cooling technology powered by artificial intelligence to increase battery life by an average of up to 20 percent, according to Lenovo.
IdeaPad 14 (pictured left) buyers can choose between an all-metal unit with a Full HD display that’s 0.58 inches thin and weighs 3.30 lbs. and a slightly bulkier model with a 4K HDR panel that’s 0.60 inches in height and weighs 3.41 lbs.†
Users can also choose between models containing up to 10th Gen Intel Core i7 processors plus Intel Iris Plus or NVIDIA GeForce MX graphics and others running AMD Ryzen 4000 Series chips with Radeon graphics.
Due in April, the Intel-based IdeaPad 14 will start at $1,209.99, while the AMD-based unit will start at $849.99.
The IdeaPad 15 features a 15-inch FHD display, up to 10th Gen Intel Core processors, up to 16 GB of LPDDR4X memory, up to a 1 TB PCle SSD, and up to NVIDIA GeForce GTX graphics, plus optional Wi-Fi 6 connectivity. According to Lenovo, it provides up to 13 hours of battery life, a 30% improvement over its previous generation 15-inch predecessor.†
Also slated to ship in April, the IdeaPad 15 will list for $1,209.99 and up.
According to Lenovo the IdeaPad 14 and 15 will be the first of its PCs to feature a package of integration options for Amazon Alexa that will soon be standard on many of its products. Those include a “Smart Light” accessory that illuminates like an Amazon Echo device when Alexa hears a command, and provides power, volume, and push-to-talk buttons; the ability to broadcast announcements (like “dinner time”) through a user’s PC to all of the Echo devices in their house; and smart home functionality that can activate pre-defined groups of Internet of Things devices through a single instruction.
Lenovo has two new Chromebooks on display at CES this year as well. The Lenovo Chromebook Duet (pictured left), which will be known as the IdeaPad Duet outside of North America, comes with a 10.1-inch IPS Full HD display offering up to 400 nits of brightness and 70 percent color gamut. Equipped with a detachable keyboard, it provides up to 10 hours of power per charge. Lenovo plans to begin shipping it in May at prices that will start at $279.99.
The Lenovo Chromebook Flex 5, which will be called the IdeaPad Flex 5 outside North America, is a 13-inch model that weighs 2.97 lbs. and delivers as much as 10 hours of battery life. According to Lenovo, it’s the first 13-inch Chromebook to offer built-in user-facing dual stereo speakers and the first Lenovo Chromebook to support a digital pen.†
Powered by up to a 10th Gen Intel Core i5 processor, the device comes with up to a 128GB PCIe SSD and 8GB DDR4 of memory. Its Full HD IPS touchscreen display provides up to 300 nits brightness. Scheduled to reach market in June, it will list at $359.99 and up.
According to Cato, Lenovo partners can expect to see more Chromebooks generally and convertible Chromebooks specifically from the company this year. “We’ve seen a lot of interest in the last 12 months in more of a Yoga-type form factor for K-12 customers, and so I think that’s going to be a big opportunity for us in 2020,” he says.
Cato outlined additional partner opportunities for the new year, along with pending enhancements to the vendor’s partner program, in a recent conversation with ChannelPro.
