Lenovo N23 Yoga Chromebook

Lenovo N23 Yoga Chromebook

A few weeks ago, when our daughter's ten-year-old DEL laptop had a fall and met an untimely end, our three-year-old Acer Chromebook got moved on and a new Chromebook took its place - the Lenovo N23 Yoga.

At NZ$481, the N23 Yoga isn't the cheapest Chromebook around though it was cheaper than our old Acer Chromebook had cost three years ago. We chose the Lenovo, based upon its excellent reviews, physical flexibility (it is a Yoga, after all), ability to run Android apps and its price. We have not been disappointed.

Chromebooks make great family computers. As I write this, I have another family member's Windows 10 laptop sitting on the table. It is only a few weeks old and was driving the user crazy because it had slowed to a crawl. On inspection, it seemed to have slowed because it had started a Windows update. I let it run its course and the update eventually took about six hours - this is not a problem Chromebook users experience.

Having a Chromebook that can run Android apps is a huge advantage. No longer are users limited to a relatively small number of Chrome apps and cloud services, but a vast array of Android apps can be installed and used locally just as you would on a phone or tablet. Nearly all my photo editing is done on a desktop, but, when not in the office, it was great to be able to edit pictures on the Yoga using the Android app "Snapseed" rather than having to upload the picture to a web service and edit it in the cloud.

The Lenovo comes with an ARM processor (as did the Acer). Booting from cold in the morning takes less than 10 seconds and during the day it is instantly 'on' from standby. The battery lasts about 8-10 hours of actual use. Fold the touch screen into tablet mode and it effectively becomes an 11.6inch Android tablet (though a rather heavy and thick tablet). With 4Gb of RAM and 32Gb storage, the Lenovo is no slouch either - even with several Chrome tabs open, it flys along at a more than acceptable pace. The keyboard is a typical chicklet 'button' type, though it is good and responsive and I can keep up a good typing pace.

Chromebooks are great for non-technical users or as a spare device and the Lenovo N23 Yoga is a great Chromebook at a reasonable price.

Gemini and Bip. A marriage made in ... China.

I bought an Amazfit Bip to go with my new Gemini PDA. The Amazfit displays all the notifications from the Gemini (including who's calling) without having to open the Gemini or take it out of a pocket or bag. Other reasons for choosing the Amazfit include its exceptional battery life, easy to read display and very low cost (about US$60). After a couple of months (it arrived before the Gemini) the Amazfit Bip isn't disappointing.

As a reference, my last watch was a Samsung Gear S2. Before that, a Ticwatch and before that a Pebble Steel 2 and an original Pebble. Functionally, the Amazfit Bip is most like a Pebble 2 watch though, from a few feet, it looks like an Apple watch until you notice that the crown (button) is in the middle of the right side rather than displaced toward the top.

Like the Pebble, the screen is a low-resolution reflective colour display covered with Corning Gorilla Glass. The screen is the main reason the Bip has such a good battery life. Expect to use about 3% of battery a day, without GPS tracking or heartrate monitoring. Be aware though that loading any of the custom watch faces from the phone app will severely increase battery consumption; even when that face isn't active on the watch (don't ask me why; I don't know). Unlike a lot of expensive watches, the display is perfectly readable in bright sunlight and has a good back-light for darker situations.

If you are more of an active type, the watch supports activity tracking for running, walking, cycling and treadmill. Activity tracking will use the GPS (except treadmill) and will monitor your heart rate. Stats will be synchronised with the phone app. I am not a sporty person, but I am getting older and trying to avoid 'death by rocking chair' - the Bip is ideal for measuring and prompting for this basic fitness level and beyond.

As well as activity tracking and notifications, the Bip shows weather, alarm, timer, and stopwatch. It is also exceptionally light at only 32g. If you are worried about the light, polycarbonate, construction then consider that you can get more than five Amazfit Bips for the price of one Apple watch. My Bip is two month's old now and there isn't a mark on it but, at US$60, it's very replaceable.

Gemini has landed

After months of waiting, my Gemini finally left the production-line and landed on my desk.

I think that, like many others, when I first heard about the Gemini my thoughts ran along the lines of, "great, now I can write on a phone without losing half the screen, wrestling with swipe input, and having autocorrect get me into trouble." Well, after forty-eight hours with the Gemini, that is exactly what I have found, but also that there is something more significant going on - a sort of paradigm shift in how I think about and use my new 'phone'.

I thought that the Gemini was a phone with a keyboard. I was wrong; it is a mini-laptop that also acts as a phone and message centre. That might sound like semantics, but it actually points to a paradigm shift in thinking and use. The Gemini is not just a phone replacement; it can replace both phone and laptop when away from home base. The operative word is 'can' because It depends on how you work and what your work entails.

For a few years, I have attempted to use mainly 'cloud' based tools so that I could pretty much work anywhere, on any device that was available. Typically I would use a desktop, one of two laptops (small and large) and a phone. The Gemini is managing to replace both of my laptops and my phone. Which means that I  use a desktop (mainly photography and graphic design) and the Gemini - nothing else is necessary; the Gemini and the desktop cover all the bases.

This is big. It reduces my reliance on so many separate devices and the Gemini is sufficiently capable that I have even found myself using it to write when sitting in front of the desktop - simply because I am doing something else on the desktop screen - the Gemini and its keyboard are that good. Yes, I am only forty-eight hours in and the Gemini still has to prove its reliability but, once that is confirmed, I'll probably be moving a couple of laptops along to a new home.

Read about the Gemini here and here.

Sanity is a good backup

As I write this, I am being saved - or at least my data is. My HP laptop which has been little more than three years of extended and expensive malfunction, has finally died. Good riddance is all I can say. Problem is it took my business data with it. Darn.

I do, of course, have backups - on an external drive. But, they are a few weeks old now. You know how it is; busy, always in a rush, forget to kick off the backup. So the latest invoices, the last half day accounting marathon, isn't there. Again, darn. Fortunately, I do have another backup, a Carbonite backup.

I started using Carbonite two years ago as my 'off site' backup solution. It costs me about NZ$70 a year but I figured it was worth it. Carbonite sits there in the background, copying everything in selected folders to the Carbonite servers without any intervention on my part. Fortunately, I haven't needed an off site backup yet, but Carbonite just proved it was a more meticulous on-site backup solution than my own local setup.

There it's just finished restoring my files now and, again, yes; absolutely every last item is there, all safe and sound. Thanks Carbonite. You might want to check them out, that's www.carbonite.com.