If there’s one thing you can assume at CES, it’s that a manufacturer is attempting to build a new kind of laptop. We’ve seen the craziest variants over the years, and this year Lenovo is attempting the ThinkBook Plus Gen 5 Hybrid, a combination of a Windows tablet with a detachable keyboard and an Android tablet.
These are in fact two separate devices that can work independently, but can also be connected to form a single laptop. The keyboard contains all the hardware for the Windows laptop: an Ultra 7 CPU from Intel, up to 32 GB of memory and up to 1 TB of SSD storage. You can also connect the keyboard to an external monitor. However, if you want to use the whole thing like a laptop, the screen, or rather the tablet, comes into play.
Android briefly remains active in the background in case you want to use the laptop with Android as the operating system, because that is possible too. You can easily switch between operating systems via a button on the keyboard. If you work in Windows mode for more time, then hibernate the tablet’s hardware, so that the battery does not drain too quickly. The whole thing has two separate batteries: a 38Wh battery for the tablet and a 75Wh battery for the laptop.
Lenovo has adapted the software on both devices so they can work better together. For example, there is shared storage accessible from both devices, and the manufacturer includes Hybrid Stream software. This makes it possible to stream Android apps to your Windows system and use them in a small window.
Sometimes these kinds of crazy laptop variants are clearly early prototypes, with the build quality to match, but the fifth-gen hybrid feels sturdy and is well finished. The keyboard has the famous ThinkBook keys which have little travel, but are still pleasant. The tablet also seems sturdy. With a double dose of components everything doesn’t feel very light; the keyboard weighs 970g and the tablet 785g. That’s not a lot for a 14″ tablet, but a 14″ laptop weighing almost 1.8kg is far from light. The whole thing is also quite thick at 1.6cm. Given the large number of components, all this is easily explained, but this does not make it more convenient to use.
You have to make quite a few concessions when you start working with the Gen 5 hybrid, so for whom is it worth it? After all, there are numerous comparable devices on sale in which it is possible to separate the screen from the keyboard. However, they run Windows or Android and not both. So, if you think that Android is a nice tablet OS and not a nice laptop OS, and vice versa for Windows, you are in for a treat with this device. I imagine the market is not huge and not even Lenovo itself will probably expect record sales numbers.
If you belong to the niche this product is intended for, you can start with the Gen 5 Hybrid as early as this summer. The final price has not yet been announced, but Lenovo aims to keep it under $2,000.
2024-01-17 05:00:00
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