Lenovo has announced that they’re updating even more of their product lines at CES. The Miix “mainstream” tablets are getting a proper refresh with newer processors, better screens and even a new model to round everything out.
Lenovo Miix refreshed with a Miix 720 for the power-hungryThe Miix
The Miix is Lenovo’s not necessarily business-class set of tablets with powerful enough innards to be used as full-blown laptops for all daily tasks. In terms of specs, the Miix 720 has Kaby Lake-based processors of the lower, 25-watt m variety. Oddly, they don’t actually list the processor being used, though since they have the HD 620 iGPU, this means we might see a full-fledged i7-7500U as the top-end choice.
The size hasn’t changed, nor has the weight, with the MiiX 720 keeping the same relatively svelte 292 x 210 x 8.9mm dimensions and a slightly mini 780 gram, 1.72lbs weight. (11.5×8.27×0.35” and 1.72 lbs). Despite that, they’ve added a new 12-inch 2880×1920 3:2 ratio panel to compete with Microsoft’s Surface Pro family. This brings the density to 288PPI for the 400 nit Gorilla Glass covered screen. It’s surprising how much the extra vertical screen size actually helps. It can be sorely missed in some laptops, despite having most monitors be 16:9 anyway.
Speaking of the Surface Pro 4, the Miix 720 has far more connectivity three USB ports, with one USB 3.1 Type-C port, one USB 3.0, and one USB 2.0 port. It also offers up to 16 GB of DDR4 memory, and up to 1 TB of PCIe storage. They’ve also included a Windows Hello compatible IR front camera for that most convenient, and actually secure, way of logging in.
In terms of battery life, Lenovo estimates up to 8 hours of battery life with the 41Wh battery inside. That’s not terrible, and if true, would also outclass the Surface Pro 4 depending on the workload they estimate based off of.
The MiiX 720 features a detachable full-sized, backlit keyboard, and there is a new Lenovo Active Pen 2 which will be included on the second wave of device shipments, which offers a clickable shortcut button for Windows Ink, and up to 4096 levels of sensitivity. The technology inside is from Wacom, it seems.
Keeping with the design principles they’ve mastered with the watchband hinge, they’re using that to provide an elegant kickstand with quite a bit of flexibility. That watchband mechanism, as we’ve tested previously, is quite sturdy in it’s design.
The new Lenovo MIIX 720 will be available in either Champagne Gold or Iron Gray at the beginning of April 2017 starting at $999.99. The Active Pen 2 will be available in February for $59.99 as a separate accessory for those first-wave shipments that didn’t come with one.