Mini consoles are not a new species, but Lenovo’s Yoga Mini i really challenges everyone’s expectations. It is a mini PC under the Yoga brand from Lenovo. It was previously unveiled at CES 2026 and has recently begun to appear on official store pages in different regions. The most interesting thing is that in China, the pre-order version of this machine is said to use DingOS (an operating system that focuses on AI and can raise crayfish out of the box) instead of preloading Windows.
Specifications are not stingy: Core Ultra 5 / Ultra X7, Arc B390, LPDDR5X up to 32GB
Official Lenovo information lists two Panther Lake options: Core Ultra 5 325 and Core Ultra X7 358H. The display part goes up to Intel Arc B390, and the memory is LPDDR5X, available in 16GB or 32GB. Storage is a 512GB, 1TB or 2TB PCIe Gen4 M.2 SSD. The body size is also "what a mini console should be": 130×130×48.5mm, and the official label is about 600g, 0.65 liters.
The connection ports are also quite complete: two Thunderbolt 4, two USB-C 3.2 Gen 2, one USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, HDMI 2.1, RJ45 mesh and 3.5mm audio hole; the wireless is Wi‑Fi 7 + Bluetooth 6.0, and it is paired with a 100W power supply.
Yoga Mini i also adds some small "laptop-like" features: built-in speakers and microphones, integrated fingerprint recognition on the power button, Adaptive Lighting (adaptive lighting effects), use of accelerometers to support touch-sensitive Smart Connect actions, and Wi-Fi sensing presence detection. The activation of Smart Connect is said to be pushed through OTA updates, and the time may vary in different regions and models.
DingOS, a system entirely based on letting Ai operate a computer
DingOS is a new operating system for the era of artificial intelligence, but it is not currently free to download and install like Windows or Ubuntu. It is often combined with specialized AI computer hardware to provide an agent with the ability to perform tasks automatically. This kind of system emphasizes AI as the core, allowing users to control the computer through natural language, showing a new model of human-computer interaction in the future.
DingOS focuses on the AI Native (AI native) operating system concept, using natural language as the core interface (Native UI), allowing users to issue commands using voice/text; it also emphasizes proactive work with deep AI integration (such as automatically understanding user operations and actively assisting in completing tasks). According to Lenovo, it is also used for one-click "crayfish farming" settings like OpenClaw, which turns environment configurations that originally required fiddling with Windows into out-of-the-box use, and has permission/security control at the system level.
To put it simply, this is a customized operating system that specifically allows you to “raise crayfish”.
It’s worth noting that the Chinese pre-order page only has the DingOS version, while Lenovo’s Australian page lists Copilot+PC and Windows. It’s hard not to make people guess: Is this purely a supply strategy, regulatory/cooperation factors, or is it the CCP’s requirement to launch AI PCs first in the Chinese market?
Price starts from US$699.99 in the United States, pre-order in China is 5500 RMB
Lenovo mentioned during CES that the Yoga Mini i starts at US$699.99 in the United States and plans to be available from June 2026; this translates to approximately TWD 22,389.94 / HKD 5,486.04 / MYR 2,826.04. On the other hand, a lower-end version of Core Ultra 5 325, 16GB RAM, and 512GB SSD is currently available in China. It is priced at about 5,500 yuan, which is approximately equivalent to US$797.71 (approximately TWD 25,515.66 / HKD 6,251.91 / MYR 3,220.56). It is estimated to be a head-to-head competition with the Mac Mini.
For Southeast Asian players, the immediate impact of this update will depend on execution quality, platform stability, and whether follow-up communications provide concrete details around lenovo yoga mini i mini host is equipped with panther lake to compete with mac mini, and the chinese version i.