Lenovo Chromebook Duet Gen 9 Review: A Tiny Laptop

For astir of my big life, the thought of utilizing a laptop with a surface nether 13 inches made maine reflexively recoil. That whitethorn look a small unfair, but I came of property erstwhile shoddy netbooks—with their tiny screens, debased prices, and horrible performance—were hitting bargain bins everywhere. That experience, on with having to speech respective household members looking for a bully woody retired of buying one, near a sour sensation successful my mouth.

I accidental each of this to convey however incorrect I was (and possibly thatch a acquisition astir letting aged biases go, but I digress). It’s not similar determination has been a glut of sub-12-inch laptops retired determination since the netbook marketplace died, but its main modular bearer, the Lenovo Chromebook Duet, has garnered precocious praise since its archetypal iteration successful 2020. Now, the company’s latest mentation is here, and it perfectly won maine over.

The thought down the Chromebook Duet is simple: It’s an ultraportable Chromebook with a detachable keyboard that lets you rapidly power betwixt tablet and laptop modes. The 11-inch Chromebook Duet Gen 9 carries that thought forward, swapping successful a MediaTek Kompanio 838 processor for a small much power. This isn’t meant to beryllium your main computer, but a compact instrumentality you tin rapidly flip successful a container and usage conscionable astir anyplace without overmuch fuss.

Beyond the MediaTek processor, the Chromebook Duet Gen 9 comes with 4 GB of RAM and 64 GB of retention for $370 oregon 8 GB of RAM and 128 GB of retention for $400 (my reappraisal instrumentality is the latter). In either case, you’ll get an 11-inch LCD flanked by 2 speakers, on with an 8-MP rear camera and a 5-MP front-facing camera with a privateness shutter. The surface is wrapped successful a sturdy metallic chassis, portion the detachable keyboard has a metallic apical platform with a grey leather-esque worldly connected its rear.