It’s fair to say there haven’t been a huge number of ChromeOS tablets or 2-in-1s launched to date, but it appears another one is on the way – and it’s likely to be some kind of successor to the Lenovo IdeaPad Duet 5.
Code hidden in Chromium (which ChromeOS is based on) points to a device with the same battery as the Duet 5, as spotted by Chrome Unboxed (via Android Central). It’s not exactly an official announcement, but it’s a pretty strong hint.
At the moment, the ChromeOS tablet (if indeed that’s what it is) is codenamed ‘Ciri’, and it appears that it’s going to be powered by the MediaTek MT8188 chipset that’s also yet to be announced to the world – and likely to be significantly faster than the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 inside the Duet 5.
While the baseboard for the device was added to Chromium in August, it now comes with the battery specification attached. As Chrome Unboxed notes, this could still end up being a different device (or no device at all), but it’s certainly intriguing.
More detachables
As you’ll see from our Lenovo IdeaPad Duet 5 review, we’re big fans of this form factor: the portability of a tablet when you need it, and the power of a full Chromebook when you attach the keyboard and stand to it.
It’s a ChromeOS device that makes a lot of sense, but we haven’t seen many hybrid computers like this at all. The Google Pixel Slate was launched way back in 2018, while current models are few and far between – the Asus CL3 CL3000 is one option you can try.
There are plenty of Windows 2-in-1s to be had, and Apple continues to push the iPad as a potential laptop replacement too, so we’d like to see our list of the best Chromebooks get a few more detachable options in it.
At least it appears that Lenovo is continuing to fly the flag for the ChromeOS tablet that can also do double duty as a laptop too. An official announcement is probably still some way off, but this is definitely something to keep an eye on.
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