Browsing Category: "reviews"
The Lenovo IdeaPad U150 features an 11.6 inch screen and an Intel CULV processor. It’s available in a variety of configurations with up to 4GB of RAM, 320GB hard drive, and a 1.3GHz Core 2 Duo SU7300 CPU, and a choice of a 3 or 6 cell battery.
There are a lot of things to like about the IdeaPad U150. It has an distinctive textured lid, an attractive two-tone keyboard, and a combo eSATA/USB port, which is something you won’t find on a lot of ultraportable laptops. But there are a few down sides as well. While the laptop gets decent battery life, it doesn’t last as long as I’ve come to expect of a laptop with an Intel CULV processor. And while the keyboard is attractive, I found it mildly uncomfortable to use.
The unit Lenovo sent me to review features a 1.3GHz Core 2 Duo SU7300 dual core CPU, GMA 4500MHD graphics, a4GB of DDR3 RAM, a 320GB hard drive, and a 6 cell battery. It features 802.11b/g/n WiFi and runs Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit and has an 11.6 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display. This model is available from Lenovo for a starting price of $749, but there’s also a $649 model with a slower processor, less RAM and storage.
The Dell Inspiron Mini 10 with an Atom N450 processor is just the latest Dell laptop to bear the Mini 10 name. It follows the Dell Mini 10 and Mini 10v, which had Atom Z520 and N270 processors, respectively.
Performance-wise, the new Dell Inspiron Mini 10 is a lot like the recently retired Mini 10v. But thanks to the new energy-sipping CPU, it gets significantly better battery life. And Dell has given the 10 inch mini-laptop a major design overhaul as well.
That includes a battery that no longer sticks out of the bottom of the laptop, and a new keyboard layout. Unfortunately one thing that hasn’t received a major update is the touchpad, which features difficult-to-use integrated click areas instead of dedicated left and right buttons.
The unit featured in this review has a 10.1 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display, a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N450 processor, 802.11b/g WiFi, Bluetooth, an HSPA modem, 1GB of RAM, and a 250GB hard drive. It runs Windows 7 Starter Edition.
Asus has been pumping out netbooks for longer than anyone. And in a lot of ways, the Asus Eee PC 1005PE is just an incremental update over previous models. The laptop still has a 10 inch screen, chiclet-style keyboard and Intel Atom processor. But as the first Eee PC with an Atom N450 Pine Trail CPU, the Eee PC 1005PE represents the biggest change in the Eee PC line since the jump from 7 inch screens to 9 and 10 inch models in 2008.
Fortunately, Asus got a lot of things right in the latest update. The laptop is thin and light, and while it gets stellar battery life, the battery doesn’t jut too far out from the bottom of the laptop. The keyboard is very easy to use, and the textured touchpad supports multitouch gestures.
As for the new processor, it’s a mixed bag. It doesn’t offer much of a performance boost, and the PC actually feels like it might be slower at some tasks than one with an Atom N270 or N280 processor. But Intel’s goal wasn’t so much to boost performance with the new CPU, but to improve power consumption. And the Asus Eee PC 1005PE gets the kind of battery life that will let you use your laptop on a cross-country trip from New York to LA… twice.
The demo unit Asus sent me to review came equipped with a 1.66GHz Intel Atom N450 processor, GMA 3150 graphics, 1GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth, and Windows 7 Starter Edition. It has a 6 cell, 5800mAh, 63Whr battery. You can pick one up for under $370 from Amazon
The Dell Inspiron 11z is a thin and light laptop with an 11.6 inch display. It’s a bit larger than Dell’s Inspiron Mini netbook line, and it comes with an Intel CULV processor, which provides more power than the Atom chips found in Dell’s netbooks. But the Inspiron 11z is still portable, cheap, and a little slow compared with many of the company’s larger laptops.
The laptop comes with a variety of configuration options. Dell sent me a review unit with a 1.3GHz dual core Intel Pentium SU4100 processor, Windows 7 Home Premium, a 250GB hard drive, 2GB of RAM, and a 6 cell battery. This configuration sells for $544 (or actually, $584, since this model has a $40 jade green lid), but the base model is available for just $379.
Of course, to get the lower price, you’ll have to settle for a 3 cell battery, single core processor, smaller hard drive, and Windows Vista.
The ASRock ION 330 nettop is a small desktop PC that’s not much wider than a typical optical disc drive. It’s a bit chunkier than some nettops from MSI, Asus, and other companies, but unlike many of those models, the ION 330 actually makes room for a DVD burner as well as a 1.6GHz Intel Atom 330 dual core CPU, and NVIDIA ION graphics.
ASRock sells the ION 330 nettop as a barebones unit, which means that it comes with everything but the operating system. The model NVIDIA sent me to review came loaded with Windows 7 RC, but I’m not going to spend too much time dwelling on the software in this review.
The model I tested also had 2GB of RAM, a 320GB hard drive, Ethernet and HDMI ports, but no WiFi. Other versions of this nettop may be available with media center remote controls, WiFi, Blu-Ray drives, and other options.
The HP Mini 311 was the first notebook with NVIDIA ION graphics to hit the United States. While this 11.6 inch notebook has a little competition today, it’s still the cheapest NVIDIA ION powered ultraportable, with a starting price of just $399.99. And that could make the HP Mini 311 an attractive computer for anyone looking for a machine with better-than-netbook graphics at a netbook-like price.
But while the NVIDIA graphics certainly give the computer a boost when it comes to HD video playback, 3D graphics performance, and any other activities that can take advantage of GPU acceleration features, the HP Mini 311 has the same 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 CPU that graces nearly every netbook released in the last 18 months.
And that means that for every day activities such as web surfing, the HP Mini 311 is no better than an average netbook, albeit one with a high resolution display. And in some ways, it might actually not even be as good.
NVIDIA sent me a demo unit to review. The model tested for this review features an 11.6 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, NVIDIA ION graphics, a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 CPU, 2GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive, and Windows 7 Home Premium. It has a 6 cell, 55Whr battery and weighs 3.5 pounds.
The HP Mini 311 is available from HP.com for $399.99 and up. At the time of this review, the unit I’m configuring goes for about $510.
Microsoft’s Zune HD is a touchscreen portable media player that has a number of things going for it. It’s thin, light, and has a brilliant OLED display. It can play 720p WMV and H.264 videos, which means you may be able to copy movies from your collection without transcoding them first. But the device doesn’t actually have an HD display. Instead, it has a 480 x 272 pixel widescreen display that’s actually smaller than the iPod Touch screen, which may come as a surprise to anyone that assumes a devices with HD in its name would actually display HD video.
The Zune HD is also one of the first consumer electronics devices to use the new NVIDIA Tegra platform, which bundles an ARM-based processor with NVIDIA graphics. This is how the low-power media player can play high bitrate HD video flawlessly. The Tegra processor also enables 3D graphics effects which show up in menu animations and in some of the handful of applications currently available for the Zune HD.
The folks at NVIDIA sent me a Zune HD to review for a few weeks. I recently took it on vacation to put it through the paces. The model featured in this review has 16GB of storage. A 32GB version is also available. They normally sell for $220 and $300 respectively, but you can enter the Liliputing Holiday Giveaway to win this review unit.
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HP has been making all-in-one desktop PCs for a few years, but the HP Pavilion MS214 is one of the company’s first budget models. While other companies including Lenovo, Asus, MSI, and Shuttle have chosen to keep costs down in similar machines by using netbook-like guts including Intel Atom processors and Intel GMA 950 graphics, the HP M214 uses an AMD processor and ATI graphics.
For that reason, it’s easier to compare the Pavilion MS214 to a thin and light notebook than a netbook. In my tests, the computer scroed about as well on most tests as I would expect a notebook with an Intel CULV processor to perform. But the HP Pavilion MS214 isn’t a notebook. It’s a full-fledged desktop computer built into an 18.5 inch widescreen display.
The model featured in this review has an 18.5 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, a 1.5GHz AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core 3250e processor, and ATI Radeon HD3200 graphics. It 2GB of RAM, a 320GB 7200rpm hard drive, integrated 802.11a/b/g WiFi, and an 8x DVD burner.
The HP Pavilion MS214 is available for about $560.
The Asus Eee PC 1008HA is one of the thinnest and lightest 10 inch netbooks available. It measures just 1 inch thick and weighs just 2.4 pounds. The netbook is a grand departure from early Asus netbooks including the Eee PC 1000HE which was one of the largest and heaviest 10 inch netbooks around.
Asus has been selling the Eee PC 1008HA since this summer, but the company recently launched an updated version loaded up with Windows 7. In addition to the updated operating system, the new model also has the latest Eee PC software from Asus as well as 2GB of RAM and a 250GB hard drive. The original model had just 1GB of RAM and a 160GB hard drive.
That’s pretty much it for the differences, so portions of this review will be copied and pasted from my earlier review of the Asus Eee PC 1008HA. But I’ve updated the software and performance sections as well as some other areas. After all, it’s been five months since I reviewed the Windows XP model, and the netbook space looks a bit different than it did at the time I first reviewed the Eee PC 1008HA.
One thing that immediately sets the updated Eee PC 1008HA apart from the crowd is the fact that it’s one of the only netbooks to ship with Windows 7 Home Premium. Most 10 inch netbooks come with the lower priced Windows 7 Starter Edition.
The model featured in this review has a 1.66GHz Intel Atom N280 CPU, a 10.2 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, and Bluetooth. It’s available from Amazon for $411
The Asus UL20A is a 12.1 inch laptop that offers many of the advantages of a full sized notebook in package that’s not much larger than a typical netbook. It’s small, light, and gets good battery life compared to many larger laptops, but it offers significantly faster performance, better graphics, and a larger, higher resolution display than most netbooks.
The UL20A is the cheapest and smallest member of the new Asus UL line of netbooks. I recently reviewed the 13 inch UL30A, which has a larger screen, a higher capacity battery, more RAM, and a larger hard drive than the UL20A. The UL30A also has Bluetooth, and an HDMI output, both of which are missing on the smaller model. But the Asus UL20A sells for about $200 less than its bigger sibling. Are those features worth an extra $200? Probably. But if you’re looking for something smaller and lighter with a price tag near the upper range of the typical netbook, the UL20A is certainly worth considering.
The model featured in this review has a 12.1 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, a dual core 1.3GHz Intel Core 2 Duo SU7300 CPU, integrated Intel GMA 4500MHD graphics, 2GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive, and 802.11b/g/n WiFi.
You can pick up the Asus UL20A from Amazon for $581
