The concept of a 2-in-1 is the ever elusive chase for the ultimate do-it-all product. I have never found anything that does it well; however I must admit though that convertible cars have come a long way from the soft top, noisy yacht-like sailing roofs to removable hard roofs, to now the hard top convertible. Whilst the noise has been eliminated, the convenience improved; there is still the issue of the extra weight which turns a sports car into a sedan/saloon type drive and the total loss of boot space. You’re nice to have, but just not really great at anything.

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The Spork; how I despise you. You are neither a spoon nor a fork, and I cannot see you improving. You are utterly hopeless when you’re plastic and at best half-functional with meats and vegetables even when made from metal. If you are unaware of what a spork is, then allow me to explain. A spork is an ugly eating utensil that is a mutation of a fork and a spoon seen in prisons, take-away shops and airlines. I liken the spork to a mini shovel to bulldoze things with the assistance of something else like my finger or toothpick in my mouth. I sincerely hope that someone in the airline industry who is a shot caller gets wind of this and seriously reconsiders deploying their new metal sporks, they are in need of a refresh.

Now, moving on to the 2-in-1 laptop computer; the half-tablet, half-notebook device which does neither job well. It continues to disappoint me with the flimsy, rubbery keyboard or the catchy removable keyboard base which always leaves me asking; ‘Hmm, is it going to rain?’ ‘Where do I put the hard top roof?’ ‘Leave it in the garage or just leave it on the car?’ Simply put, will I need the base or will I leave it at home/office/hotel room, etc. It makes me wonder of what people in the 80’s had to do with these hard top convertible cars if there was a patch of clouds in the sky. The case of ‘What do I do with the base?’ was just too hard to make. The rubbery keyboards are just too horrid to type effectively on and those machines suffer from being underpowered. The performance orientated 2-in-1 machines are overpriced, outgunned and have a very average battery life. So very spork like.

We can argue about how good tablets are themselves, which is a discussion for another day. What is clear though is this; a large smartphone will do everything a tablet can, yet a tablet cannot do near as much as a notebook computer. So it’s essentially stuck in the middle of the spectrum. A phablet, i.e- iPhone 6 Plus, is demonstrating to the world that tablets are slowly becoming obsolete and will share the same fate as a netbook computer. Yet another product that is good but not great at anything.

The finally brings me to the Flip Style 2-in-1 device, such as the Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga, Yoga Pro and the ASUS Flip. Dell launched the XPS 12 Convertible, which is one of the best attempts so far at a 2-in-1; but is still very gimmicky for my tastes. The 2-in-1 that Lenovo created which goes by the name of Yoga combines a traditional notebook design with a touchscreen that flips backwards 180 degrees. When in tablet form the buttons on the keyboard are depressed, rendering it unusable which creates a true tablet experience. It is by far one of the most intricate designs and it’s a fantastic piece of hardware. Yet it shares vast similarities with the hard top convertible; convenient, functional yet overweight, outperformed and lacking in certain major key features.

As there is a need to compensate for the added 2-in-1 functionality, space is lost. Therefore, battery size and performance take a step back. Once the device is able to accommodate a larger battery, it eventually becomes overly large and heavy, so to counter this, the performance is cut back. Eventually you’ll have a mobile PC system with underwhelming performance, a device that can do most things good, but nothing great.

So, the best 2-in-1 convertible/Yoga style system today, is just as good as a convertible hard top vehicle.

It’s nice to look at, fun to use, but not an everyday driver.