Publications
Partners
Lenovo launched its new premium range of tech products in South Africa on Wednesday at Chartwell Castle, north of Johannesburg.
The range includes new gaming laptops, called Legion, a Yoga laptop-cum-tablet, and new augmented reality and virtual reality headsets.
“The event marks the availability of the new series and we could not be more excited to have consumers in South Africa experience our Intelligent Transformation strategy empowering customers with tomorrow’s technology today,” Thibault Dousson, general manager for Southern Africa at Lenovo, said at the launch.
However, not all the devices will be available immediately because there is a worldwide shortage of components affecting many tech brands, Lenovo’s pre-sales and solutions architect Julian Pienaar said.
“There is a lot of Legion series in country, so the gaming stuff is available. The Yoga series we should have in country by December and the ThinkPad P1 series is already available by order.”
With experiential booths set up we took a walk around to view the latest offerings to the South African market.
Legion gaming laptops
“Stylish on the outside, savage on the inside” is how Lenovo have marketed their Legion Y730 gaming laptops which is fitted with a Nvidia GeForce® GTX 1050 Ti graphics card, Intel i7 (also available in i5) processor with up to 32 GB DDR4 memory and 2TB HDD storage. It comes in either 15’’ inch or 17’’ display and weighs about 2.2kg.
The cool thing, visually, about the Y730 is that it has a backlit keyboard that is customisable with 16 million colour combinations.
Starting retail price for the Legion Y730: R30 000
Yoga laptop/tablet
If you can’t decide on a laptop or tablet, Lenovo have come out with a new flagship – the Yoga C930. The upgraded Yoga series now features a rotating sound bar mounted on the hinges and has a pen to boot. You have choice between the i5 or i7 processor and 8 or 26 GB of RAM.
It also sports up to 1 TB SSD storage.
The weight was what surprised us coming in at just under 1.4 kg.
Starting retail price for the Yoga C930: R29,999
The extreme ThinkPad series
Designed for extreme users require fast, high performance with a splash of personality the ThinkPad X1 features a discrete Nvidia GeForce graphics card and an the latest 8th generation Inter Core processors.
With a 15.6’’ display that supports 4K viewing and touchscreen. It also sports up to 64 GB memory and up to 2 SSD’s for 2TB worth of storage.
The X1 also has facial recognition and fingerprint access with rapid charge technology, with Lenovo saying that it can charge 80% of the battery in 60 minutes.
Starting retail price for the ThinkPad X1: R36,999.
AR and VR
Lenovo also showcased the work it is doing in the AR and VR space with their Star Wars-themed Jedi Challenges AR device.
The Mirgae headseat comes with a tracking beacon and a lightsaber controller allowing you to become a Jedi or Sith lord from the comfort of your living room.
You will also be able to see your surroundings with the headset on.
Lenovo has also come out with the Mirgae Solo, the first Daydream headset that doesn’t require a smartphone.
All you do is put the headset on and the Android-run device lets you be immersed in the virtual world.
The graphics are brilliant with the clarity not hampered by your smartphones screen.
The Mirage also has a camera that allows you to capture VR content with a push of a button.
The 15MP stereoscopic cameras are designed in a compact point-and-shoot style.
You can also live stream from this device which also has a 16 GB internal storage and allows for a memory card up to 128 GB.
Unfortunately, these devices will not be available in South Africa but Pienaar said that you can order it online and have it shipped to country.
Getting after-sales support might not be that easy however.
“A lot of people unplug in the virtual reality world,” Pienaar says, adding that this is why Lenovo had delved into the AR and VR space to bring their innovative solutions to the industry as well as other industries.
