Any Lenovo Yoga 3 14" 940M owners?

Ha! I may try encoding a bluray just for giggles. The CPU is no powerhouse for sure, but I am amazed at what it can do considering it is only a dual core, low voltage CPU. It's miles ahead of what the ULV CPU's were in utraportables in the past.

It will play all of my games, and many of them at high settings. I've played probably 20 hrs out of my 70+ hrs of Mad Max on this thing with no problems.

Temps are awesome, I think the CPU maxed out in high 70's and GPU was high 60's (don't remember exact temps). Overclocking the GPU gave me 11-20% better FPS and didn't affect the temps much.

 

I finally got around to measuring the card/slot. The standard card sits in the slot about 17mm or 11/16 in. I think this card would work fine. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00MTHLURE If it didn't quite seat well enough I would just trim the lip off. It would be harder to remove but I would leave it installed most of the time anyway.

The downside is the max size is currently 128GB, It's still enough for either local backups or some expansion if you only have a small SSD installed.

 

How decent is the gaming on this computer? I mostly play blizzard games and a year old steam games. Im considering this, an asus UX303LN or the ThinkPad 14 yoga with the same gpu in it. Looking for for something smaller than my safer np9150 to travel with. Another option is a gigabyte g34v4 but that's a true gaming laptop and a bit bigger than these other two options. And more expensive.

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Gaming is acceptable if you are willing to turn down the resolution and/or graphics, possibly even down to low, in order to run some demanding games. Also you cannot expect 60fps on every title, a goal of 30+ is more realistic, and in many games you can get higher if you're willing to turn down the settings enough. If those statements scare you then you won't be happy with one of these machines. The p34w (14" with 970) is many times the machine in both CPU and GPU power, and would have been my choice if it wasn't so much more expensive, and if it was a 2 in 1 like the Yoga as I was looking for a 2 in 1.

I would not have this as my main gaming rig, but as a portable one you use whenever away from a desktop or gaming laptop, then it works great. It works great for vacations, LAN parties, or just playing in a different room in your house. It is super portable and that's its greatest benefit but also it's greatest limitation (tiny 40w power adapter).

This user has a ton of videos to give you an idea of what you can expect. The i7-5500u CPU in the Yoga 3 is slightly better than the one he uses but close enough. He tends to crank up as many settings as he can to keep it around 30fps.


Personally I do the opposite, I will try to keep it closer to 60, or at least 40-50 if I can by turning down resolution and settings. I do try to maintain 1280x720 as a minimum resolution since its still HD and widescreen. Honestly on that small of a display there is not much difference between that and 1920x1080 anyway in games other than the UI size differences. That being said, plenty of older games you can play at 1080 and higher settings anyway.

Mad max played at "normal" preset at 1280x720 between 45-55 fps IIRC and I have zero difficulty playing it for hours on end even after playing at 4k on my desktop.

I think the hardest game I've ran on mine is Witcher 3 and indeed I did have to turn most settings down to get 40fps at 1280x720 but it still looks good on that small screen.

 

Thanks for the detailed reply. How's the heat when you end up gaming on this for two hours or so pushing the card? The build quality of the yoga seemed little shaky but the ThinkPad 14 was decent and same components.

The g34v4 price is prohibitive to me as well. I have a gtx 670m right now in a sager and it crushed most everything I use on it. However, the weight and size is too much to travel with. I wonder if I would feel the same for the g34.

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Off the top of my head I think the temps maxed out for me around upper 70s for CPU and upper 60s for GPU. Idle was crazy low, I don't remember the numbers but it was lower than I expected. I know it was very cool compared to the higher end components in the larger laptops I was used to using. Overclocking the GPU gave me 15-20% better FPS in the games I tested with a 1C increase in GPU temp. I think the limitation is the 40W power adapter, and I couldn't find a larger one with the proprietary connector unfortunately. A small 65W adapter would be great for gaming and allow overclocking while not getting so hot.

I picked the Yoga 3 over the Flex 3 series because I wanted it to be a better build, that would last and not have hinge problems. It feels solid to me but it's not going to be the same build as a Thinkpad for sure. Keyboard feels squishy to me and I wished the screen brightness was 20% higher but those are my only real complaints.

Are you talking about the P34W V4? I am not familiar with a G34V4.

I think I would love the P34W, very small and lots of power. I would expect some throttling with it being so small, especially on the CPU, but still much more capable for gaming. I had a Gigabyte P35X and loved it, and would easily buy the brand again.

 

What are peoples general assessments of the quality of these? I'm finicky about fan noise, and a good touch pad.

Also- battery life holding up? Thx

 

I really want to buy this laptop since its exactly what I am looking for, but it worries me that if I buy it now, it will get an upgrade to skylake soon. I asked two different reps and they didn't have any news about it.

 

Can anyone who opened the laptop please confirm if a standard 7mm SSD (like the Samsung 850 EVO) fits?

 

It will fit fine, but I recommend removing some padding so it isn't squished so tightly.

 

hi, just want to share. about the fan noise. the 16khz pitch is fixed. but the two fans are a bit to loud for me. specialy when there are out of sync! so i disconnect one of them.
it seems to be no problem because the cpu and gpu are share the same heatpipe.
with one fan the temps top out while gaming between 60 and 75 °C no problems so far... ;o)

have fun
inteks