Newer Isn't Always Better - Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i (Gen 11)

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Newer Isn't Always Better - Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i (Gen 11)

Hardware Canucks 30.04.2026 194 204 просмотров 611 лайков

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Let's compare three generations of the same laptop in this video Sponsored by Lenovo. The Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i has been evolving for the last few years but does the 2026 Gen 11 version take a step backwards in terms of performance, battery life, temperatures and more? It has an Intel Panther Lake CPU and one of the best screens in the industry but can than offset the price? Buy the Yoga Pro 9i (Gen 11) here - https://lenovo.vzew.net/PRO9iGEN11 (Affiliate Link) SUBSCRIBE ►https://bit.ly/SubHWC Chapters: 0:00 - 3 Generations of Yoga Pro 9i 0:16 - Small Design Updates 1:55 - Keyboard Gets Juiced 2:36 - Haptics Enters the Chat 4:12 - Faster Ports? 4:43 - Tandem OLED FTW 6:05 - Meteor Lake vs Arrow Lake vs Panther Lake 7:11 - We noticed Something… 8:23 - Multicore Results 9:00 - GPU Acceleration 9:29 - Creator Apps 9:46 - The BIGGEST Improvement 10:41 - Gaming 12:04 - The State of Laptop Pricing… This video is sponsored by Lenovo. As per Hardware Canucks guidelines, was received from manufacturer. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Follow us for more updates! Twitter https://bit.ly/HWC_Twitter FaceBook https://bit.ly/HWC_Facebook Instagram https://bit.ly/HWC_Instagram ---------------------------------------------------------------- #yogapro9i #productivity #Intel #LenovoYoga #intelcoreultra

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3 Generations of Yoga Pro 9i

This is a new Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i or Edition Gen 11. It's been refreshed with Intel's new Panther Lake processors and it sports a completely new design while still keeping the core features that made the previous generation great. So, I thought what better way to see how far

Small Design Updates

Lenovo has come than to put it head-to-head against its predecessor and the one before that. So, we have the Gen 9 from 2024, Gen 10 from 2025, uh, with Intel's Meteor H and Aerolake H processors, respectively. So, this would be a great showcase or a great example to showcase the architectural advancements, if any, Intel's new Pantal processors bring to the table, but also go through some of the physical differences between these three generations of laptops. Huge thanks to Lenovo and Intel for partnering with us in this video. Now, don't expect any major GPU surprises here. Lenovo is carrying over the same RTX 50 series options from last year, but that's not what this comparison is about. What I really want to know is whether, you know, we've gained any tangible CPU performance generation over generation. Uh if battery life has actually improved and whether these new design updates uh and of course touch point upgrades over the past three generations are worth the upgrade. Let's start with design updates. Gen 9 and Gen 10 were essentially identical from the outside, aside from the different logo placement on the lid. Gen 11 changes that it's roughly 3% thinner and 8% lighter than Gen 10. Although the form factor essentially remains the same. Uh albeit this is the 16-inch laptop, so they are fairly huge. But you do get a new thermal bump design for better heat dissipation, larger vents at the bottom for uh better or improved intake and a new thunder gray finish which is slightly very slightly darker than the previous generations. But the biggest

Keyboard Gets Juiced

change has to be with the interior space. So Lenovo has completely eliminated the dedicated numpad in favor of a more symmetrical layout. Now, I know that this is going to be divisive, but I'm a fan. The trackpad is now more centered, which immediately makes the whole deck feel a lot more balanced. The keyboard has been updated as well. You get black key caps that contrast nicely against the gray chassis. Uh, the same concave key caps still make their way here. The key travel has been bumped to 1. 5 mm, and there's an anti-fingerprint coating. It feels really good to type on. Lenovo has always had one of the best laptop keyboards on the market and the new Yoga Pro 9i, it still manages to deliver the exact same experience from the previous generations and that's not a bad thing. Now, about this new

Haptics Enters the Chat

trackpad, Lenovo went allin with haptics here. They're calling it the Force Pad, and the concept is appreciated, but the execution still needs a little bit of fine-tuning. I ran into some issues trying to select multiple files using my thumb and index finger to drag and select. It's not quite there yet, but it is a noticeable upgrade in terms of quality compared to the previous generation Yoga Pro 9i. The surface, in my opinion, at least feels a lot more smoother. The left and right clicks, it just feels a lot more satisfying compared to the button style layout on the previous generation. Uh I really like the Surface. It's super nice to work with, and it's arguably one of the best haptic integrations that I've seen on a Windows laptop recently. You also now get an included Yoga Pen Gen 2, which lets you use the trackpad as a drawing surface. I tried to get a little creative with it, but the experience feels a bit disconnected. If you start a stroke at one point, it sometimes jumps to a miscalibrated position on the pad. And again, I just want to let you guys know that the pen does not work with the display despite it supporting touch support, which is really bizarre. Now, if you do plan to use this, um, you just need a lot of patience. But if you take this pen out of the equation, I think this keyboard and trackpad combination works really, really well for day-to-day operations. The hinge has also been stiffened up significantly. So, there's not a lot of wobble compared to the previous generation. And you still get the magnetic lid uh which gives you that satisfying snap just like the previous generation. You also get the signature features like the comfort edge design which makes it easier to carry and grip the laptop on the go. And on the port

Faster Ports?

side, not a lot has changed compared to the previous generation, but there are two noteworthy upgrades. The type A ports have been bumped to Gen 2 at 10 Gbits per second over the previous generation at 5 Gbits per second, and the fulls size SD card slot is now UHS2 compliant, which makes a real difference when you're pulling footage or photos from something like my Sony FX3. There's only one head scratcher, though, and that's still the implementation of Thunderbolt 4, but that's actually a Panther Lake limitation. It's not a Lenovo decision, which is really unfortunate. And then we get to the

Tandem OLED FTW

display. So last year we saw Lenovo debut their Pure Sight Pro Tandem OLED display. Just a refresher, Tandem OLED uses two stacked layers that effectively doubles the brightness output. And the result is blindingly bright, guys. I mean, this thing is just crazy. We're getting over 900 nits of peak SDR brightness, making it arguably the brightest laptop that I've ever seen. Um, the same thing goes for the Gen 10. It's just crazy. Like these things are awesome and I'm a sucker for brighter displays, so these things just fit the bill perfectly. This is still a 3. 2K 16inch display. Still has a 16x10 aspect ratio. It's a great canvas uh to experience watching videos, uh editing my photos and videos, of course, for the channel. Uh it covers 99% DCIP3 and it's pretty color accurate. Now, I do appreciate Lenovo for pushing forward with the tandem OLED technology over here, and it seems like that's the industry standard going forward, but it still would have been nice if they kept the mini LED option in their lineup. Maybe add an anti-glare coating to cut down on reflections because this is a glossy panel. Uh, but I guess the insanely high brightness output kind of negates that. Interesting fact, the Gen 9 from 2024 had a 165 Hz display. So, if you're coming from that, the 120 Hz option might feel a bit of a downgrade. Uh although the brightness kind of again it just it's so good. It's one of the best displays that I've seen on a laptop. So those are the physical

Meteor Lake vs Arrow Lake vs Panther Lake

updates across three generations. But what about actual performance? Is Panda Lake a step up over Aerol Lake and better yet Meteor from 2024? Now before I get into the numbers, let me quickly run down the specs of each laptops. So, Gen 9 from 2024 is running the Core Ultra 9185H with 22 threads, 64 gigs of RAM, and an RTX 4070 laptop GPU. Gen 10 steps it up to the Core Ultra 7255H, though with six less threads. Uh, it still has the same memory capacity and an RTX 5070 laptop GPU. The new Gen 11 is where things get a little interesting. You're getting Intel's latest Core Ultra 9 386H with 16 threads just like Gen 10. we are working with an RTX 5060 laptop GPU instead and that puts it at a clear disadvantage against Gen 10 on the GPU side. Now, there is supposedly an RTX 5070 12 GB variant coming later this year, but right now we're looking at 50/50 and 5060 options on the current Yoga Pro 9i lineup. Now

We noticed Something…

as we ran our usual suite of tests, we realized something across these three generations. It seems like Lenovo is shifting their priorities. It used to be about raw performance, pushing power limits, but now it seems like they've gone in on efficiency and design. Here's how. If you look at the average power being pumped into the CPU, the current Yoga Pro 9i, it's consuming 20% less power compared to Gen 10 in their highest performance mode. And when you combine that with the improvements to Lenovo's X power cooling design, which now uses heat pipes covering a larger surface area, you're getting slightly lower temperatures across the board. And the end result, well, I'm just going to say it up front. Gen 10 is faster than Gen 11. And that's not a knock on Panther Lake. It's actually a deliberate trade-off Lenovo made. And the numbers tell that story clearly. When you look at Cinebench 2024, for example, single core, Gen 10 and Gen 11 are basically identical. We're talking less than 1% difference. Multi-core conveys the same story within about half a percent of each other. So, Panther Lake is matching Aerolake thread for thread. The difference is that Gen 11 is doing that at nearly 20% less power and that is really impressive. But when you

Multicore Results

push into sustained real world CPU workloads like Houdini, Handbreak, Blender, Gen 10 pulls ahead of Gen 11 by roughly 5 to 8% consistently. It's not a massive gap, but it's there. The one exception is Adobe Lightroom where Gen 11 edges out Gen 10 by a few percent. So in lighter, more optimized workloads, Intel's Panther Lake has the upper hand. Now, if you look at Gen 9 from 2024 across all these CPU tests, it's trailing both new generations by anywhere from 10 to 20% depending on the workload despite it rocking six more threads. So, Intel's optimizations with Panther Lake is really starting to pay off here. In terms of GPU accelerated

GPU Acceleration

workloads, this is again where the RTX 5060 on Gen 11 really starts to hurt. Gen 10 with the RTX 5070 is around 30 to 40% faster in GPU accelerated tasks. Obviously, Gen 11 actually falls behind even Gen 9 in some of these tests with the 4070. So, if GPU heavy work is your main use case, that GPU downgrade is a real conversation that you'll need to have with yourself before pulling the trigger on the new Yoga Pro 9i Gen 11.

Creator Apps

In video editing applications like Premiere and Resolve, Gen 10 is about 12 to 15% faster than Gen 11, but both are significantly ahead of Gen 9, which is lagging behind by nearly 25 to 35%. So once again, either new generation is a real upgrade for video work if you're coming from Gen 9. Now, I did mention

The BIGGEST Improvement

that Lenovo is all in with efficiency earlier in this video. And well, the one area where the new Yoga Pro 9 Gen 11 dominates is in battery life. It flips the script entirely. We got nearly 17 1/2 hours of use on web browsing, which is a nice bonus compared to Gen 10. Just be aware that Lenovo has also generously increased the battery capacity from 84 watt hours to 92. 5 W hours. So that also certainly plays a role here. On our 4K YouTube playback test, Gen 11 lasts about 17% longer than Gen 10 and nearly 38% longer than Gen 9. That's not a small margin, guys. That's a fundamentally different device for all day use. So what does this all tell us? Gen 11 trades a little CPU headroom and noticeable GPU step down for a much more efficient, longerlasting laptop. Gen 10 is the performance pick. Gen 11 is the endurance pick. Now, let's shift gears

Gaming

and talk about gaming. And look, these aren't dedicated gaming machines, but I still have to talk about it because this is where I have to be completely honest with you guys. Gen 11 is a disappointment here. It's not Panick's fault. It's the RTX 560. Lenovo is pumping the GPUs with enough power up to 100 watts across all three generations. And well, the end result across both 1080p and 1600p, Gen 10 is consistently 12 to 17% faster than Gen 11 in most titles. And in some cases, Gen 11 can't even beat Gen 9, a laptop with a 2-year-old GPU. That stings a little, but it is still impressive to see an RTX 5060 getting close to a 5070 from the previous generation. The one exception is CS2. Being a CPU heavy game, Panther Lake pulls ahead here by nearly 9 to 10%. At 1600p, the story doesn't change that much. Gen 10 stays on top. Gen 11 trails behind, and the gap between them remains roughly the same across the board. Now, to be fair, the current Yoga Pro 9i Gen 111 is still a capable gaming machine for casual use. You're not going to be struggling at these settings, but if gaming is your priority and you know, you're choosing between Gen 10 and Gen 11, at least in my opinion, Gen 10 is the better GPU value here. At least until the new RTX 570 12 gig variant shows up later this year. So, where does

The State of Laptop Pricing…

that leave us? Well, there's one last thing that's a little hard to ignore. price. You see, Gen 9 launched at $21. 99. Gen 10 came in at $2,800 and Gen 11 right now is sitting at $3,100. That's roughly a 15% jump over last year spec for spec outside the CPU upgrade. And look, some of that is justified through things like the new haptic force pad, the tandem OLED display, the larger battery, and of course, memory. That's a conversation that's been really, really hot lately. It's a hot topic. Um, these things at cost. That's nearly a $1,000 premium over Gen 9 and $300 more than Gen 10 for a laptop that's slower in most workloads. And it takes a step back on the GPU side. So, here's my honest take. If you're on the Yoga Pro 9i Gen 9 from 2024, I think the new Gen1 is genuinely a compelling upgrade. You get better battery life, a much better design, a significantly improved display, and of course, the upgraded speakers, and you know, this new keyboard and trackpad setup, they are nice quality of life improvements. But if you're on Gen 10, I would sit tight. You're not gaining enough performance to justify the price increase, and you're actually giving up on GPU muscle in the process. And if you're just looking for a premium productivity focused Windows laptop, the new Yoga Pro 9i Gen 11 is beautiful. It's wellbuilt. It's efficient. Just know what you're paying for. This is not a raw performance machine. It's just a refined all day productivity powerhouse with one of the best displays in its class. Thanks so much for watching and don't forget to spend responsibly.

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