Lenovo Idea Pad S10 Review - Best Lenovo Netbooks

Lenovo Idea Pad S10 Review - Best Lenovo Netbooks
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Best Features of the Lenovo S10 Netbook

Knowing full well that the netbook market that it was trying to penetrate was already saturated with top major brands like Acer and Asustek, Lenovo took the safe route and introduced their netbook with no fancy frills or innovative features. The company decided to stick to its own brand of notebook in terms of build and quality, and took the same path as most netbook manufacturers. The outcome? A high-performing, high-quality Lenovo IdeaPad S10 with its best feature being that of carrying the Lenovo brand.

What makes Lenovo S10 stand out from the rest of the netbook crowd is the fact that it only has 2 USB ports, while others have 3. Don’t take that as a low-down, but rather as a blessing, since the elimination of the 3rd USB slot gave the Lenovo S10 room for an ExpressCard slot. This earned the Lenovo S10 the distinction of being the second netbook to have an ExpressCard slot (the first was the HP Mini Note 2133). This feature enables users to add mobile expansion cards for mobile broadband capability in addition to the Lenovo’s WiFi connectivity feature.

When the Lenovo S10 was released several months ago, it was among the first few netbooks which came equipped with the new and faster (then) Intel Atom N270 1.6GHz CPU. This was complemented by a 160GB hard drive and 1GB RAM (upgradeable to 2GB) among other standard netbook features and specs (see list below).

So, given that it only has a few new things to offer, there was only one way for Lenovo to make a mark in the netbook market with their S10 netbook - offer it at a very competitive price (currently at $349.99).

Some Minor Flaws of the Lenovo S10

Lenovo’s weight of 2.7 pounds make it the second heaviest netbook released so far, next to the HP Mini Note 2133. But don’t mark that completely against Lenovo S10, as the weight issue is something that all netbook manufacturers have been trying to remedy in their netbook lines.

Another minor let-down of the Lenovo S10 is the default 3-cell battery. With the Eee PC 1000HE, as well as other netbook brands, offering a far superior battery pack with a promise of longer computing hours, this falls short of the market standard. The good thing is that Lenovo has recently offered an optional 6-cell battery upgrade for the Lenovo S10.

Other than this, we really don’t see any other flaws in the Lenovo S10. Some say that its 90% keyboard is an issue, but given that we’re talking about netbooks here, we could let this feature pass.

Full Specs of the Lenovo Idea Pad S10

  • CPU: Intel ATOM Processor N270 (1.60GHz 533MHz 512KB )
  • Operating system: Windows XP Home Edition
  • Graphics: Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 950
  • Memory**: 1 GB** PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM 667MHz
  • Display: 10.2 " WSVGA AntiGlare TFT with integrated camera 1024x600
  • Hard Drive: 160GB 5400
  • Battery: 3 Cell Lithium-Ion
  • Network Card: Broadcom 11b/g Wi-Fi wireless

Conclusion:

There are two things that make the S10 the best Lenovo netbook. First, it’s the only netbook released by Lenovo in the U.S. so far. The Lenovo S10 has a little brother called the S9, but this model never reached the U.S. market. Second, the Lenovo S10 carries the sophisticated and classy form factor of other Lenovo branded machines – something which makes it stands out from the usual toy-like look of most netbooks available on the market today.