TL; DR:
+ Processing, price / performance, volume / heat generation
0 no operating system, micro, camera, keyboard / touchpad
- Display, battery capacity
Delivery: The next day (Prime), original box was padded with extra wrapping paper in a good-sized carton.
Scope of supply: device, battery, 2-piece power cable, info / Warranty leaflet, "protector" between the display and keyboard, CD / DVD with Windows 8.1 drivers (according to label is not used)
Planned use: The device is for my better half, the order done mainly light image editing, web research and Office. Occasionally one or the other Browserspielchen and media consumption in the form of audio and video. In principle, the device is thus already oversized for it, but you know not so, what the future holds.
Processing: A lot of plastic, metal little (actually only in the soil to stiffen the chassis). Sometimes the plastic is slightly rough and optically provided with "effects" that makes it a little more ago. The display cover is for my taste a little too thin and accordingly not very rigid, is relatively easy to be depressed beyond. So who transported the device without separate bag, a towel should similar Laying between the display and keyboard to avoid finger grease-marks on the display. Apart from that I've seen in this class already significantly worse, eg knarzen much not me, but of course, can not compete with a Macbook or higher devices like Thinkpads the device.
Setup: The device comes with no known operating system and does not operate with us with Windows, according to this, I can not comment. Currently running on the device in the form of a Linux openSUSE (13.2), whose installation made no effort.
First, you should attach the device to the power, then press the small round button next to the power supply, then the unit turns on and you can choose to boot the system or the BIOS or UEFI to arrive. The latter I did, but there is certainly not so many options, like a higher-priced device or a desktop motherboard. (: The CPU supports neither, but only VT-x virtualization technology Supplement) is by default not activated principle, the preferences for the average user enough, only VT-d.
Thereupon I the USB stick connected with the installation image of openSUSE and booted it. Secure Boot queries whether you (in this case, therefore openSUSE) would rely on the manufacturer's Key. This affirmative and the installer booted normally.
In the installation process, of course, everyone has to know himself what he wants. As a note was just thrown in here that the CPU Intel AES-NI support and makes encryption of the (entire) system by hardly noticeable - so if you take the device with regularly should think whether their own (or even business) data so require.
So was installed with two partitions, a small FAT32 partition UEFI for the kernel, and an LVM in LUKS (AES256: XTS: plain + Jacuzzi) with LVs for / (50GB, btrfs, snapshots), swap (6GB) and / home ( ext4, residual amount of ~ 410gb) and the KDE4 desktop.
After installation is complete, the system booted directly clean up and all installed hardware runs without further intervention out of the box, only the button for screen choice had to be configured brightness settings, volume and WIFI on / off directly fulfilled the function.
I do not know if Windows here causes more problems, the whole comments ala "that's too complicated" personally do not understand, unless the query regarding a. The Keys, I could not have a negative impact of the UEFI Secure Boot or notice.
Operation: sowei the unit is very quiet, the fan comes on occasionally, then hums but acceptable to himself. Under full load, he turns occasionally good, but that's disturbing in my opinion not great, it always remains a relatively deep and uniform sound, no high whimpering, as you know from other fans ev.. What one hears occasionally, the HDD is in connection with access, this is built probably not decoupled. However, this is also quite low and should in quiet environments hardly noticeable (if in doubt you can see the plate so replace it with a SSD).
For performance there is not much to say, the CPU delivers what you expect from her (in our case, of course, minus a few percent because of encryption, provided that it is written to the disc / read about it). The unit remained until now always cool to the touch at various points and by thermally induced throttling the CPU is nothing to see.
The Wi-Fi seems to be strong enough, at least it gets us in the living room, about 15m air line by 2 reinforced concrete walls, still 3 out of 5 bars and the transfer performance is acceptable to good.
The built-in speakers are especially loud and thereby very middle-heavy, there is little bass and the highs are in higher volumes no pleasure, for a fun "cat Video" or similar but this is sufficient, just for video calling. The Headphone output is a significantly better signal, is therefore to prefer whenever possible.
Built camera is sufficient, but also crap, every good phone now has a better front camera. After a little play with the settings affect the colors of course, in general, the picture is quite dark and even with slightly darkened room (passing clouds, for example), there is a clearly visible noise. The micro is ok, miracles can not be expected, of course, one should sit in front of it and a relatively pure talk, slight offset in the position pays for itself quickly noticeable.
We come to the biggest criticism, the display: Everywhere is now full HD (or even higher) of the hype (see cell phones the last 2-3 years), at the end of the 90s I had CRT monitors, which still went beyond and still is today in this price range is still 1366x768 standard (for comparison, which I had in 2006 already on a 11 "Sony Notebook). Once there is in Germany, the official distinction between HD (720p, 1366x768) and Full HD (1080p, 1920x1080) Otto Normal man does not know the difference but I suppose that's partly due to the advertising, if anywhere "HD display" dransteht.
The display is sufficiently bright and quite unexpectedly perspective stable, but also not really keen and offers at native resolution accordingly little space (especially, of course, in the vertical, especially when / down task or menu bars are up yet). 1440x900 or better it would have liked to have been, without compromising on the facilities there's the rule but only from 400, - upwards.
For DVD drive, I can not say anything yet, except on and it has not been tested. The card reader itself works, speed test I have not done, worked on the first try at least not slow. Only be carried out at 3 USB ports as a USB3.0 is a bit of a shame, but at the same time there is probably only rarely that you connect really more than one device, the speed also needs (especially fast in two devices, the disk becomes the limiting could be a factor). Because this device probably mainly aimed at consumer, I find the Kensington lock superfluous, since one would not install another USB port or can make separate connections for Micro and Headphones.
The keyboard is ok, not great, but still better than many competitors. The pressure point is acceptable, the layout used to (at least for me), just the placement of the right shift key in combination with the arrow keys makes touch typing not easy. The touchpad is relatively small and brushed what may be uncomfortable for some. There's pretty much and the gestures (for now only scrolling and zooming tested) work without problems. The touchpad is, as can be seen in the pictures, not centrally relative to the housing, but fairly central relative to the normal keyboard (without number pad einzuberechnen) placed. In my opinion, this is not optimal, especially for people with large hands or "strong" forearms makes the positioning in front of the device a little more complicated.
Another problem child is the battery, depending on which of the two imprints one might think, it comes with 1970 or 2200mAh therefore - according to Lenovo are also only a maximum of 4 hours duration to. To the extent that seems realistic to play with low pollution and without the settings, we came so far to around 3h20m, mind you under Linux.
Conclusion: For 299, - it is a great device for people with small claims and / or a budget, also for 350, - it is still a good deal. In the same price range, there are also some Chromebooks, usually with slightly better processing and better display at smaller dimensions (usually 11-13 "), but often with less power (i3 or ARM CPU), smaller hard drive (usually 32GB) and ChromeOS (which can be replaced without problems mostly by a real Linux).
If you can live with the display, what you in this price range can already almost must find little to no alternatives that are equivalent to or even better if you look at the Gesammtpaket of performance and processing. The above is complain complain at a high level and low price level, I have to complain about even in my ~ 1300 Thinkpad lot, perfect notebook's in my eyes, somewhere is always a compromise.
To this extent, buy recommendation for those who no longer want to spend or can and are satisfied with Linux or an existing Windows license. Who can wait a bit, save or spend more, should look elsewhere and mainly invest in a better display.
