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Lenovo is not only updates the current line of notebooks this year, but also announced a brand new ThinkPad, model Edge. This notebook is designed to be a link between the models for small and medium businesses and models for retail buyers, he brings colors and style in the current line of Thinkpad. The biggest innovation that will be noticeable after a glossy cover, it is reworked in a modern style keyboard Chiclet. In this review, we consider 13-inch ThinkPad Edge and see how good it is compared with previous models of ThinkPad.

Specification of our 13 “Lenovo ThinkPad Edge:

• OS: Windows 7 Professional 32-bit
• Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo SU7300 (1.3GHz, 800MHz FSB, 3MB Cache)
• Display: 13.3 “1366 x 768 WXGA, glossy
• Video Card: Intel GMA X4500M, built
• Memory: 4GB DDR3 RAM (2GB x 2)
• Data Warehouse: 320GB Fujitsu 5400RPM Hard Drive
• Networking opportunities: Intel 6250AGN + WiMax, Bluetooth 2.0, Gobi WWAN 2000
• Battery: 6-cell 11.25v 63Wh
• Dimensions (WxDxH) 32 x 22,6 x 1,2 – 3,6 cm
• Weight: 1,77 kg

At Lenovo ThinkPad design, focused on retail customers, which comes from the design ThinkPad’ov series SL. At that time, as the SL looks like a ThinkPad with a rubber coating, replaced by glossy paint, the Edge completely new shape and contrasting color. Edge of the screen and keyboard are trimmed with silver plastic, and the main part of the notebook – the glossy paint or black plastic.The display in this notebook glossy black, similar to those in a series of SL, but Lenovo offers a few additional colors to choose from. Even one small izmeneneniyu were status indicators, which were replaced by a single red LED, designed as a point in the letter i Series title ThinkPad. Design is so different from other models of ThinkPad, that if the shield logo sticker on the other model, and no one guesses that this ThinkPad (in fact, no one believes that this ThinkPad, when he talks about it).Build quality is above average, compared with other notebooks for the retail market, but lower than ThinkPad’ov for corporate users. In part this may be due to the fact that our laptop was the debug party, but it seems to me that the series copies will be the same deficiencies. The first thing that caught my eye immediately after unpacking the laptop, is a small loop of the screen and not very high quality gloss paint laptop. ThinkPad line has always been famous for strong, almost eternal, wear-free, loops of the screen. On smaller models, like the X200, of course used loop reduced size to fit the general design, but hinges on the ThinkPad Edge in comparison with them look fragile. The quality of color – the second shortcoming, which threw me in the eye. Glossy finish looks worse in quality than most other notebooks. Disadvantages immediately visible when light is reflected from flat surfaces and give them a mixed glossy – matt appearance. While this may be especially debugging Party, which will be corrected in the serial samples.

Chassis laptop looks quite sturdy plastic panels almost no bend. Unlike the more expensive models ThinkPad, Edge does not have the internal structure of a metal alloy, but Lenovo still gave him enough strength. Supports the wrist, touchpad and keyboard do not bend under strong pressure and the frame does not bend, if the laptop to raise one of the corners. The only thing I would improve in the Edge – a cover of the screen. With an average click on it, on the screen appear the divorce … first model ThinkPad.

Users who require a laptop upgrade components will be pleased to see a single lid, closing access to the hard drive, wireless card and system memory. The cover is made of thin metal and has a dual role, closing the notebook and replace components giving, at the same time, the laptop extra strength, being totally screwed. We did not find any labels warning of the removal from the safeguards in the event of opening the notebook.

The screen and speakers

Our Lenovo ThinkPad Edge is equipped with 13.3-inch glossy screen with WXGA resolution of 1366 x 768 and aspect ratio of 16:9. Compared with other consumer notebooks of similar size, the display medium, in terms of color and contrast. It is good for viewing photos and movies, but some colors look washed out, even with near-zero angles. Reduce the brightness of the screen helped to improve the contrast. At maximum brightness the screen perfectly readable in bright light. If the display surface would be matte instead of glossy, it also could easily be used outdoors. The vertical viewing angles of the display medium, washing out colors and distortion begins at 15 degrees deflection forward or backward. Horizontal angles do not spoil the picture up until the reflection from the glossy surface does not begin to prevail over the image.

Speakers at the ThinkPad Edge located on the corners, just under the front edge of the palm rest. If the laptop does not have a flat surface of the table, then they can easily be blocked and the sound will be muted. Sami dynamics average, compared with other laptops on processors CULV, they lack bass and most of the midrange frequencies. They have enough to listen to music and watch video from the Internet, but if you want to enjoy the movie, then the best solution is to use headphones or miss the sound through an HDMI output to an external stereo system.

The keyboard and touchpad

When I first saw leaked in the Internet photos of the new ThinkPad, I must admit, I was, shall we say, not that greatly pleased them. All the same keyboard – this is one of the original and unchanging parts of all notebooks ThinkPad. Keymap evolved generations and it can always be immediately recognizable. For the new design keyboard Lenovo borrows all the best that exists in the new keyboards for laptops and combine them in a splendid combination of form and function.

Keyboard mixed in a modern style Chictet, with separate keys, which now can be found everywhere, from the latest netbooks to the latest Apple MacBook, with a regular keyboard design ThinkPad’ov. What makes it special is the fact that this is the first notebook-style keyboard Chiclet, which I was very comfortable and easy to print. Most Chiclet-flat keyboard keys, different distances between the keys and move less profound compared with conventional keyboards. Keyboard ThinkPad Edge devoid of all these disadvantages, Lenovo engineers have done what I can safely be called the best design, which I have met so far.

Force and impact when you are similar to those of conventional keyboards ThinPad … so similar that when printing blind can not notice the changes. Proceedings keys similar to my T60, with the same click when pressed fully. If you remove the upper part of the button, you’ll find the same “scissor” structure, like other keyboards ThinkPad. It could be supposed that Lenovo has left the source mechanism of keys, changing only the shell buttons, and adding the inner surface of the keyboard. The keyboard is uncompromising in terms of strength, there is no sagging even slam and furious printing.

Edge is also equipped with a huge touchpad Synaptics, which is almost three times bigger, compared with the touchpad on my T60. If you are accustomed to small touchpad, you have to adapt to the touchpad, before you start using them blindly. During the first few days, I often pressed the bottom of the touchpad instead of the right or left button. It is constantly forced down the cursor and was somewhat uncomfortable, until I got used to the size of the touchpad. In general, the touchpad quite pleasant, with fast response time and virtually absent lag. Sensitivity is excellent, the need for its advanced settings was not. Y touchpad has some of the possibilities mnogopaltsevogo input, including zoom and rotations of the image. Prolonged use revealed no problems with the texture of the touchpad, and clean and perfectly greasy fingers glided over his smooth matte surface. Y touchpad keys move shallow in comparison with other ThinkPad’ami, with a click at the end, but they, it does not, however, still provides good feedback to the user.

Ports and Features

ThinkPad Edge is equipped with three ports USB, VGA out and HDMI, combined plug headphones and microphone and card reader SDHC-cards. It seemed to me that the inside is enough space to install a fourth USB port or eSATA connectivity options for expansion peripherals, but they were not. Card Reader SDHC is not spring-loaded and fully inserted card protrudes slightly from the slot.What I have not liked the minimalistic design ThinkPad Edge, is the lack of full status indicators laptop. In the notebook there is no indicator of the hard disk, nor an indicator of activity of wireless communications. Compared with other laptops, it does not allow to assess whether your wireless connection or not, which is useful when the notebook is equipped with several devices, like Bluetooth and WWAN. Or when you need to assess the workload of the hard disk.

Front: nothing

Rear: Battery

Left: Castle Kensington, vent grille, VGA or HDMI, port Ethernet, one USB port

Right: A Reader Card SDHC, combined plug headphones / microphone, two ports USB, charging indicator, plug the power adapter

Productivity and performance

Our 13-inch ThinkPad Edge is equipped with a processor Intel SU7300 1.3Ggts, integrated graphics card Intel X4500, 4GB of DDR3 memory and hard drive 5400 rpm. Compared with other ThinkPad Edge looks thin, but this is due to a conscious choice slower, but more energy-efficient processor CULV. In normal daily use there had been no performance problems when you print documents, access to the internet, listening to music or viewing HD-video. Edge also coped well with the movie playback 720p and 1080p and high definition content YouTube. Most of the games better, and certainly not to consider, but it is quite expected when buying a laptop CULV.

Comparative results of processors wPrime (the lower the score, the better the performance):

PCMark05 characterizes the overall system performance (the higher the score, the better the performance):

3DMark06: A comparison of graphic performance with laptops with a resolution of 1024 x 768 (the higher the score, the better the performance):

Results of performance hard disk HDTune:

Heat and Noise

Edge copes well with energy integrated graphics card and 1.3 GHz processor Intel SU7300. At maximum performance system was constantly under stress, but the surface of the notebook, located directly under the processor, if warmed to the touch, but, nevertheless, not much. The noise of the system fan was at a minimum even at maximum load. In normal use the fan, basically, was switched off at high load it included, but still was almost inaudible, unless you hold your ear close to the ventilation grates.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010 at 4:11 pm and is filed under Lenovo. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.