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- Sep 7, 2009
Lenovo has been known to make some really good low-cost systems that are powerhouse systems without all the "extras" the other laptop makers throw into their systems. Their notebooks tend to be very thin and extremely portable, which makes Lenovo systems perfect for a frequent traveler or anyone on-the-go. This model, the IdeaPad U350, has a 13.3 inch display, 3GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive, and has excellent battery life.
The design of the Lenovo IdeaPad U350 is made to be very thin because of the lower-power processor which makes for less cooling requirements, so there are very few fans. In total, it weighs only 3.5 pounds and measures about 13 x 9 x 0.8-inches, which qualifies it as being an ultra portable notebook. The look of it is very thin in your hands, which is a good thing for most as that's what they are looking for. The keyboard is black with the surrounding area and palm rests are silver. The lid of the U350 is a deep brown with a diamond pattern texture.
While it's hard for us to weigh design over performance when looking at a laptop, products such as the Lenovo IdeaPad U350 make it a little easier. As another entry in the growing field of affordable CULV thin-and-lights, the compact and really great-looking U350 is Lenovo's MacBook in terms of design. Lighter than it is thin, the Pentium U2700 processor-packing machine is clad in minimal silver and black and aims to keep a stylish low profile. And while the U2700 processor is both low-power and low-performance by Core 2 Duo standards, this thin-and-light is perfectly capable of running Windows Vista and mainstream applications.
At a starting price of $629 ($749 for our configuration), the U350 is less affordable than a 12-inch Netbook such as the Lenovo IdeaPad S12, while not as expensive as some professional-grade thin-and-lights such as the Lenovo ThinkPad T400s. And as such, it's a success.
While we'd like to see this same design with a more powerful processor and better battery, it's another valid alternative to the MSI X340 and Acer Timeline 3810T for those looking for a lightweight laptop who don't require an optical drive or significant graphics.
Thin and light
We really liked the overall look of the IdeaPad U350, in case you didn't already figure that out. Compared with Lenovo's business-oriented and more expensive T400s, it's far more attractive. While the T400s does have a reinforced crush-resistant chassis, we prefer the business/personal tone of the U350, which cleverly bridges the gap between office and home in its design. A savvy mix of textured black patterns on the outer lid and glossy black on the inner, coupled with brushed metal around the keyboard, comes close to mimicking the MacBook Pro's look.
The IdeaPad U350's glossy 13.3-inch 16:9 LED screen has a resolution of 1,366x768, absolutely standard for this size. Icons and text looked sharp, and the colors and brightness generally looked very good when watching movies and video. The tucked-out-of-sight internal speakers are also amazingly loud, much louder than we'd expect for a machine this size. A built-in Webcam and microphone above the screen were also clear and crisp during video teleconferencing.
The keyboard is similar to other Lenovo offerings: the tapered keys have a comfortable feel but are a little softer than those on a ThinkPad. The touch pad has a tactile friction that makes multitouch easy; it's covered with a finer grain than Lenovo's more heavily dimpled IdeaPad Y pads. The touch pad buttons, while large, are soft to the point of being mushy. While they worked fine, not having a click was distracting. Above the keyboard are just a few dedicated buttons: one for volume mute, and one for instant access to Lenovo's OneKey data backup and recovery software. Volume and screen brightness are controlled through a function button-arrow key combination.
There is no optical drive in the U350, much like in other thin-and-lights such as the Acer Timeline series and the MSI X340. In that sense, the U350 is a closer cousin to the MacBook Air, although a bit thicker (the U350 is 1 inch tall). At first glance, the U350 looks thick enough to have handled an optical drive, but the lightweight feel without it is refreshing.
http://technetnews.com/?p=1251
The design of the Lenovo IdeaPad U350 is made to be very thin because of the lower-power processor which makes for less cooling requirements, so there are very few fans. In total, it weighs only 3.5 pounds and measures about 13 x 9 x 0.8-inches, which qualifies it as being an ultra portable notebook. The look of it is very thin in your hands, which is a good thing for most as that's what they are looking for. The keyboard is black with the surrounding area and palm rests are silver. The lid of the U350 is a deep brown with a diamond pattern texture.
While it's hard for us to weigh design over performance when looking at a laptop, products such as the Lenovo IdeaPad U350 make it a little easier. As another entry in the growing field of affordable CULV thin-and-lights, the compact and really great-looking U350 is Lenovo's MacBook in terms of design. Lighter than it is thin, the Pentium U2700 processor-packing machine is clad in minimal silver and black and aims to keep a stylish low profile. And while the U2700 processor is both low-power and low-performance by Core 2 Duo standards, this thin-and-light is perfectly capable of running Windows Vista and mainstream applications.
At a starting price of $629 ($749 for our configuration), the U350 is less affordable than a 12-inch Netbook such as the Lenovo IdeaPad S12, while not as expensive as some professional-grade thin-and-lights such as the Lenovo ThinkPad T400s. And as such, it's a success.
While we'd like to see this same design with a more powerful processor and better battery, it's another valid alternative to the MSI X340 and Acer Timeline 3810T for those looking for a lightweight laptop who don't require an optical drive or significant graphics.
Thin and light
We really liked the overall look of the IdeaPad U350, in case you didn't already figure that out. Compared with Lenovo's business-oriented and more expensive T400s, it's far more attractive. While the T400s does have a reinforced crush-resistant chassis, we prefer the business/personal tone of the U350, which cleverly bridges the gap between office and home in its design. A savvy mix of textured black patterns on the outer lid and glossy black on the inner, coupled with brushed metal around the keyboard, comes close to mimicking the MacBook Pro's look.
The IdeaPad U350's glossy 13.3-inch 16:9 LED screen has a resolution of 1,366x768, absolutely standard for this size. Icons and text looked sharp, and the colors and brightness generally looked very good when watching movies and video. The tucked-out-of-sight internal speakers are also amazingly loud, much louder than we'd expect for a machine this size. A built-in Webcam and microphone above the screen were also clear and crisp during video teleconferencing.
The keyboard is similar to other Lenovo offerings: the tapered keys have a comfortable feel but are a little softer than those on a ThinkPad. The touch pad has a tactile friction that makes multitouch easy; it's covered with a finer grain than Lenovo's more heavily dimpled IdeaPad Y pads. The touch pad buttons, while large, are soft to the point of being mushy. While they worked fine, not having a click was distracting. Above the keyboard are just a few dedicated buttons: one for volume mute, and one for instant access to Lenovo's OneKey data backup and recovery software. Volume and screen brightness are controlled through a function button-arrow key combination.
There is no optical drive in the U350, much like in other thin-and-lights such as the Acer Timeline series and the MSI X340. In that sense, the U350 is a closer cousin to the MacBook Air, although a bit thicker (the U350 is 1 inch tall). At first glance, the U350 looks thick enough to have handled an optical drive, but the lightweight feel without it is refreshing.
http://technetnews.com/?p=1251
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