Lenovo's ultra-skinny LaVie Z are here to fight Apple's MacBook
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Apple may have got its indecently-skinny MacBook to market first, but Lenovo is counting on a one-two punch to give it the edge with its LaVie Z notebooks, freshly on sale. Announced back at CES 2015 in January, the pair of ultrabooks each pack a 13.3-inch multitouch display – the LaVie Z 360 is a convertible, with a 360-degree rotating hinge to twist it into a tablet – and a fifth-gen Intel Core i7 processor, for a hefty nine hour battery life while tipping the scales at as little as 1.87 pounds.
The Lenovo LaVie Z is the lightest model, just 0.7-inches thick too, despite accommodating two USB 3.0 ports, an HDMI output, SD card reader, and a combo headphone/mic jack.
As for the Lenovo LaVie Z 360, it's a little heavier at 2.04 pounds, but still 0.7-inches thick and with the same ports.
For those keeping score, that makes the non-convertible LaVie Z lighter than Apple's MacBook – which is 2.03 pounds – but the OS X notebook does still have the edge in thickness, the 12-inch ultraportable just 0.52-inches at its thickest.
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Of course, the decision between the two may well come down to which operating system pushes your buttons. Right now, for the Lenovo that means Windows 8.1 – though Windows 10 will be a free upgrade once it's released by Microsoft – running on a Core i7-5500U 2.4GHz processor.
Each has 8GB of RAM, a 256 GB SSD, and a 2560 x 1440 display as standard, along with WiFi and Bluetooth, and Intel HD Graphics 5500.
They're fairly high specs, and the prices are high accordingly. The LaVie Z is available to order now at $1,499, while the LaVie Z 360 is $1,699; back in January, Lenovo also confirmed there would be Core i5 versions with 4GB of RAM, priced at $1,299 and $1,499 respectively, and we expect they'll filter into the company's store in due course.
MORE Lenovo LaVie Z / LaVie Z 360