It’s not hard to see why Chromebooks have dominated the budget laptop scene for the last few years. They offer all the basic functionality you need from a computing device for a fraction of the price and double the battery life you would get on a Windows machine.
Now, Lenovo wants to double dip in the affordable, cloud-based laptop space with a new IdeaPad 100S running Windows 10. With a $189 (about £123, AU$269) starting price, this 11.6-inch laptop is a potential Chromebook killer.
Packing a 1.33GHz Intel Atom Z3735F processor, 2GB for RAM and only 32GB of storage, Lenovo offers an almost identical device running Google’s Chrome OS. To compete with Chromebooks’ Google Drive offers, this machine comes bundled with a one-year subscription to Office 365.
The Lenovo IdeaPad 100S is also available as a 14-inch notebook that comes standard with a 1.6GHz Intel Celeron N3050 chip and 64GB of storage for $229 (about £150, AU$331).
Design
A pitfall that cheap laptops often stumble into is that they look and feel as if they were pulled out of the bargain basement. Thankfully, that isn’t the case with the IdeaPad 100S. The laptop’s plastic body is solid, though it has a tendency to pick up greasy fingerprints quickly. Likewise, keyboard feels surprisingly uncramped despite the small size of the notebook. It’s also easy to quickly navigate across the Windows 10 desktop, thanks to the large and smooth touchpad.
For a sub-$200 machine, the IdeaPad 100S has a surprisingly serviceable screen. It’s definitely not going blow your mind with its 1,366 x 768 resolution or vibrant colors, but the display will do for your everyday web browsing, streaming the occasional movie and word processing tasks.
Unfortunately, the laptop was not loaded with any tunes, so I was unable to give the speakers a go. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if they sounded tinny, judging by the low price and size of this machine.
Speaking of which, the IdeaPad 100S is incredibly thin, measuring 0.69 inches (17.5mm) in height, nearly matching the 0.68-inch (0.7mm) thick, 11-inch MacBook Air. Sure, the Asus Chromebook Flip is even shorter at 0.6 inches (15.6mm), but it has the advantage of fanless engineering. Lenovo’s little affordable Window 10 machine is definitely worthy of the “S” moniker, which the company has started pinning on its slimmer devices.
Pinch runner
The Lenovo IdeaPad 100S did not feel saddled by its low-power configuration in my short few minutes using the notebook. Scrolling through the Start Menu was snappy, and apps launched quickly. The most rigorous task I was able to put it through was opening a dozen or so web browser tabs.
The limited 32GBs of storage is something you can easily get around by popping in an SD card, plus there’s the unlimited online space available on OneDrive. However, I’m wary of how much you can do on Windows 10 with just 2GB of RAM. (Though, we have seen how it runs on even less.) Even Chromebooks equipped with the same amount of memory start running speed bumps when trying to view more than 15 tabs in a row.
The good news is Windows 10 does not seem to put too much of a hamper on battery life. Lenovo claims the IdeaPad 100S can run for eight hours, but estimates tend to be a bit exaggerated.
Early verdict
Even though I’ve only had a short time with the Lenovo IdeaPad 100S, I’m excited about it. The idea of a cloud-based Windows 10 machine is refreshing (albeit unoriginal), and the laptop looks and feels surprisingly solid for the price.
At the same time, I’m a bit hesitant to call it a must-buy before putting it to task as my daily driver. In the past, I’ve seen how well Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 works on limited hardware, and it is an exercise in frustration. Stay tuned for our full review in the coming months.
from www.techradar.com
