Lenovo Yoga Tablet 2 Pro review - the 1st projector tablet

Aside from its huge 13.3in screen, the versatile Yoga Tablet 2 Pro stands out from the crowd thanks to Lenovo's characteristic bulge at the bottom, which contains a miniature projector to turn any wall into a screen, a pair of stereo speakers and a hinge, so your tablet can stand up by itself.

The latter is most useful for watching films hands-free or to display recipes in the kitchen, but you can also fold it out flat to hang the tablet on a hook, or even fold the hinge in and use the tablet's bulge to make it easier to hold. Its size and near-1kg weight makes it unlikely you'll use it one-handed for any great length of time, however.

Tablet maximus

The Tablet 2 Pro is the largest Yoga model we've seen, and it also has the highest-resolution screen. Its big 13.3in display has a 2,560x1,440-pixel resolution; we're used to seeing 2,560-across screens on premium tablets such as the Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet, but on a display this size, the resolution equates to a lower than average  220ppi; the 8.3in, 1,920x1,080 Tesco Hudl 2 has a 265ppi screen, for example. Nonetheless, the screen is sharp and clear, and while you can see the pixels making up various letters, you have to get your head pretty close to the screen.

Our objective tests didn't flatter the display. Its brightness figure of 387cd/m2 is above average, but coverage of 71.1% of the sRGB colour gamut is more like the kind of figure we'd expect from a budget tablet display. The visualisation produced by our calibration software showed the screen fell well short of the gamut in the red part of the spectrum. A contrast ratio of 625:1 is also nothing to shout about, although we were happy with the screen's performance in our subjective tests, where it was able to show a decent amount of detail in dark areas without blowing out the highlights. The screen is also around 40% larger than a 10in tablet, so Lenovo is bound to have had to save costs somewhere.

You can also hang the Yoga Tablet 2 Pro on a wall

Popcorn time

Lenovo has gone all out on the tablet's film-watching capabilities. As well as stereo speakers in the front and what Lenovo rather optimistically calls a subwoofer on the back, there's even a projector on the right side of the bulge. We were impressed with the difference the speakers made to films; dialogue, sound effects and even music had much more depth and presence than when put up against a normal tablet, which made voices sound thin by comparison.

The tablet's built-in projector is just about good enough for sharing a film with friends

We were initially sceptical about the projector, but after messing around with it for a while we began to see the point. The lens is set to project upwards, so you'll be able to put it on the floor or a low table and project the tablet's screen at a comfortable height. Auto-keystone adjusts the shape of the projected image depending on where you place the projector, but you can disable this in the tablet's settings.

In a darkened room we found we could project a 32in image on to a white wall without losing too much brightness. We didn’t think there was much advantage for one person over watching the film on the tablet's own screen, but it may appeal if you want to watch a film with a friend - and the tablet's speakers are loud enough to cope without you needing external speakers. Another possible use is for makeshift presentations.

An unusual Android

We were less happy with performance. Web browsing with Chrome is a jerky, chuggy experience; web page scrolling is far less smooth than on even a budget tablet such as the Tesco Hudl 2. The Hudl 2 has a slower Intel processor than the Yoga Tablet 2 Pro, but runs Android faster overall; the Hudl may have fewer pixels to deal with, but Lenovo's spin on Android is fairly heavily modified, so we're inclined to suspect the Lenovo software is slowing things down.

Lenovo's version of Android is quite a departure from the norm. Instead of having homescreens for your most frequently used apps and an app tray for the remainder, the app tray has disappeared, leaving all your apps on the homescreens. This is a similar approach to that used by Huawei with its Emotion UI, and may not appeal to those who like their homescreens uncluttered.

Lenovo seems to be aware of this, however, and ships the tablet with several folders already created to help keep your apps tidy; whenever you install an app from the Google Play store, it prompts you to put the icon straight in a folder rather than just dumping it on the desktop.

Lenovo has also added a multi-window feature to take advantage of the screen's high resolution; tap the icon at the bottom-left of the screen and a panel will pop up showing apps that support the feature, including Chrome, the email client, calculator and Gallery. These windows are set to always be on top, and you can drag them around the desktop, but they're fixed to a quarter of the screen size. This is just about all right for the calculator and some web pages, but those used to a desktop computer's window management will find it very frustrating.

Conclusion

There's lots to like about the Lenovo Yoga Tablet 2 Pro. We like the hinge design, the big screen, the speakers and even the built-in projector. However, we're not happy with performance, which compares badly with models that cost a quarter of the price, and its 7h 22m battery life is below average.

Unless you really want the projector and are happy with a smaller screen, the 10in Yoga Tablet 2 (£190 from www.currys.co.uk) is a better buy, and if you're after a premium tablet you're better off with the iPad Air 2, Google Nexus 9 or Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5.