Lenovo launches new Yoga laptops, Motorola One Zoom, smart home tech and an AR Marvel game
At its TechLife IFA 2019 event, Lenovo has let loose with a dizzying array of announcements, including... an Augmented Reality game?
IFA 2019 is well underway here in Berlin and we’ve been positively swept away by the sheer number of announcements so far. We’ve just attended Lenovo’s TechLife IFA 2019 conference, where a hefty chunk of them have been made and, frankly, we don’t really know where to begin. Shall we tell you about the phones? The laptops? The smart home displays/tablets? Or how about the Marvel AR game?
We’ll say this for Lenovo: there’s something for everyone in its IFA lineup this year.
There’s an awful lot to cover, and some of the announcements are a lot more exciting than others, so let’s just start from the top and work our way down.
Lenovo at IFA 2019: Yoga and ThinkBook laptops
Can there be such a thing as too many laptops? Not according to Lenovo. There’s a whole host of new Lenovo notebooks to wrap your head around here, across the Yoga and ThinkBook ranges. Notably, there’s no new Lenovo YogaBook. Lenovo hasn’t said whether or not it’ll be making another, but having reviewed the last two, we’re not keen on a third.
There are two all-new ThinkBooks, the ThinkBook 14 and ThinkBook 15, both of which are aimed at small and medium-sized businesses, plus refreshed models of the ThinkBook 13s and ThinkBook 14s, now with 10th-gen Intel processors. More interesting, at least from a consumer perspective, are the new Yogas.
The Lenovo Yoga C940 is the follow-up to the Lenovo Yoga C930 we reviewed earlier this year, and it’s a welcome refresh. This updated model, of course, has the latest 10th-gen Intel chips and now comes with the option of dedicated Nvidia GeForce GTX1650 graphics and a 4K display. A larger 15.6in model has also been added and the Dolby Atmos soundbar hinge has been improved, though Lenovo hasn’t said how. Also unveiled were the Yoga C740, Yoga C640 and the affordable Yoga S740 – we’ve also just published a hands-on review of the latter.
Lenovo at IFA 2019: Smart home displays and tablets
Into smart home technology? Lenovo has you spoiled for choice, with three new smart hub products on offer, all of them featuring Google Assistant. First up is the Lenovo Smart Display 7, a smaller version of the first Lenovo Smart Display made for people with “small kitchens”. If your kitchen is too small to fit a 10in smart display inside of it, we’re not sure that knocking off three inches is going to help. Also unveiled was the Lenovo Smart Tab M8, a dinky little tablet that slots into a charging stand to become a makeshift home hub.
Then there’s the Lenovo Yoga Smart Tab, a 10.1in device that Lenovo claims will “make tablets relevant again” (we’ve heard that kind of rhetoric before). Light enough to use for reading, streaming and browsing around the house, it also has a nifty built-in kickstand that’ll prop it up on a counter or tabletop. Side-mounted JBL speakers produce “cinematic moving audio” and far-field microphones will detect smart home commands from a distance. As with the Smart Tab M8, the smart home features will be limited to begin with, but Lenovo has plans to keep adding them post-launch.
Lenovo at IFA 2019: Motorola smartphones
On the phone front, there are two new additions to the Motorola family with the super-budget Moto E6 plus and the mid-tier Motorola One Zoom. The 6.1in Moto E6 Plus will go on sale in the UK for £99 and runs on a low-powered MediaTek Helio P22 processor.
We’re more excited about the Motorola One Zoom, yet another addition to the Motorola One range. This time it’s all about the cameras: the rear snapper has a whopping four sensors. There’s a 10x zoom lens with 3x optics, a depth sensor, a 48MP (f/1.7) main sensor and an ultrawide angle unit. The zoom and wide-angle modes, in particular, are extremely fun to play around with. The Zoom is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 675 processor and will go on sale for just £379 – it’s looking like a real bargain so far. It also comes in a purple variant exclusive to Amazon and supports hands-free Alexa.
When will we see a high-end Motorola phone, though? Well, during one of Lenovo’s press briefings earlier in the week, Motorola revealed that it will be releasing a flagship phone priced between £500-£1,000 in the near future. First, though, it wants to “conquer the mid-range market” before going toe-to-toe with the likes of Samsung and Huawei in the premium smartphone realm.
READ NEXT: Motorola One Zoom hands-on review: Quad camera madness
Lenovo at IFA 2019: Some AR Marvel action
Last and decidedly least, Lenovo today announced a new AR (Augmented Reality) game called Marvel Dimension of Heroes. This is the second Disney-licensed AR title from Lenovo, the first being the (apparently successful) Star Wars Jedi Challenges. It can be played on the Lenovo Mirage AR headset, and also requires a compatible smartphone to run. As of now, it’s focused at the US market, and the full package – which includes the headset, two controllers and a motion sensor – comes in at $249. Oh, and you can’t play as Iron Man.