As CES was ending last week, I got a chance to pick up Lenovo’s new ThinkPad 8, an 8-plus-inch tablet that bridges the worlds of handheld and desktop. Designed for business use, the ThinkPad 8 is a little heavier than similarly sized tablets, and it doesn’t have all of the bells and whistles of strictly consumer options. But it does exceed the field as it can also plug into a USB 3.0 dock and become a respectable desktop machine—and it’s the first Windows 8 pure tablet that has made me think I might actually want a Windows tablet.

There are a few things that are fairly average about the ThinkPad 8. Its eight-hour battery life, when taken out of context, is pretty much standard in the Windows tablet field right now. It’s also a little heavier than most of its competition, weighing 0.9 pounds in its lightest configuration. Its back camera is a pedestrian 8-megapixel device, while the front-facing camera is a mere 2 megapixels—good for a Skype call, but not so much for self-portraiture.

Most of those somewhat banal numbers start to take on new meaning when you look at the whole package, though. The ThinkPad 8's 8.3-inch 1920×1200 pixel display is larger and higher resolution than other Windows tablets of its approximate size. It’s not quite the resolution of the current iPad Mini, but it's close enough that it’s not noticeable thanks to the responsiveness of the processor’s graphics engine. The screen has an ambient light sensor that automatically adjusts screen contrast based on indoor or outdoor lighting, and its touch sensors support up to 10-finger touch gestures.

Inside is an Intel Bay Trail T CPU, which runs the full 32-bit Windows 8.1. It comes with 2GB of RAM and either 64 or 128 GB of storage (with a microSD port for additional storage). It has micro-HDMI and micro-USB 3.0 ports for connecting to external monitors and devices. All its configurations come with Wi-Fi (802.11 a/b/g/n) and Bluetooth; there's also a global 3G/4G mobile wireless option.

The ThinkPad 8 feels like Lenovo’s other ThinkPad devices. It’s stiff and sturdy thanks to a machined aluminum chassis, and it has the same sort of satin finish ThinkPad notebook users are familiar with. It’s not shiny, but it won’t easily slip out of the hand. I found I could one-hand the device phablet-style with little effort, even with its magnetic cover folded over its back. (The nearly one pound of mass is not so heavy when you realize that the tablet could probably be used as a blunt weapon in a pinch.)

About that cover. The “Quickshot” cover is an extra, much like the iPad’s. But it includes a neat trick—its corner can fold over to expose the 8 megapixel back camera, and this automatically turns on the Windows 8 camera app thanks to a magnetic sensor. It also puts the device into standby mode when the cover is closed over the screen, or it can “tent” the tablet for landscape mode on a desk. Another extra is the ThinkPad USB 3.0 desktop dock, a $179 hub with two DVI-driven monitors, audio and Ethernet ports, and four additional USB 3.0 ports. It will work with any computing device with a USB 3.0 port out.

Without the extras, the ThinkPad 8 will start at $399 (with Wi-Fi only and 64GB storage). It ships this month and should be landing in customer hands soon. We’re hoping to give it a more thorough shakedown in the near future.