Hands-on with Lenovo's new Ideapads

We caught some time with Lenovo's new Ideapads and they're pretty hot -- but a little bit bigger than we were expecting, particularly the 15-inch Y510. The ultraportable U110 was looking pretty flash in sparkly red, but suffering from a bad case of fingerprint-attraction -- enough so that one poor Lenovo PR dude was just hanging out waiting to wipe it clean every few minutes. We were told that the 17-inch unit here wasn't in fact the gaming-oriented version we'd heard about, but apparently we'll see that tomorrow at Lenovo's booth. Check 'em out in the gallery!

Gallery: Hands-on with Lenovo Ideapads at CES

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[Mark @ Jan 7th 2008 2:59AM]

The ultraportable looks prety sweet. Hopefully, it'll be cheaper than the $3300 Vaio TZ..

[Justin @ Jan 7th 2008 3:47AM]

They can pry my IBM T series laptop from my cold dead hands.

[tjm358 @ Jan 18th 2008 1:37AM]

I agree, I have a 2367 (T-30) and I have been using it daily for 6 years.. I am a network admin.

However, I broke down and felt I owed it to myself to geta new toy.

:-)

[hongkongtechkid @ Jan 7th 2008 4:53AM]

ultraportable doesn't look too bad - where are the red knobs. it ain't an ibm, sorry, lenovo if it ain't got one.

[Kinergy @ Jan 7th 2008 6:41AM]

I sure hope the T-series will be kept alive... although the ideapad looks cool, here are the first couple things that I'm wondering about, just by looking at the photos:
* Home and End keys no longer exist independently! These keys are used quite often!!!
* pencil eraser not available, I personally dislike touchpads
* keyboard light may not be there, will truly be missed unless the keyboard has is lit like the Macs
* on larger machine the keyboard isn't centered - Lenovo isn't the only one who does this, but is it only me that dislikes an off-center keyboard?

ThinkPads were loved by many due to the extreme attention to detail, down to the great feel of the keyboard as well as simple things like: Don't put the USB ports on the lower right side where a user uses a mouse!

[Randy @ Jan 7th 2008 3:39PM]

I agree with your comments. I still have t43p that I will not give up since the size/weight is perfect. All other T-series books released since are just too damn large. I wish they they'd releases books with the T4x dimensions again but they won't due to LCD mfrs not wanting to make 4:3 screens that size.

[kev @ Jan 7th 2008 7:17AM]

The photos describe pretty well why I prefer matte screens - a sea of overhead lighting and a smattering of Vista on the edges. Granted this isn't a business machine, but I agree with Justin above - my T series from days of yore, dogeared as it is, has yet to find a worthy successor.

[entropyman @ Jan 7th 2008 10:23AM]

gotta admit I really do like the lenovo design, I have a 3000 series- good heat venting- doors to all needed replaceable HW and similar shape to these- not downing on the thinkpad, but don't down on lenovo......

[wickedpheonix @ Jan 7th 2008 11:03AM]

These are already in stores - I saw the Y510 at my local Micro Center yesterday. Looked cool enough, definitely a consumer contender, but it didn't really stand out amongst all the other notebooks. Maybe if it had the dedicated graphics and "gaming features" of its 17" brother... but its a good start into the consumer market nonetheless. What Lenovo really needs to do now is find some retail outlets other than Micro Center and Office Depot - time to hit Best Buy and Circuit City and then their sales will start to go up.

[web2.oh @ Jan 7th 2008 1:54PM]

Mandatory disclaimer for ALL posts relating to Lenovo laptops:

These laptops have NOTHING to do with Thinkpads. They are not replacements. The Ideapads are a different line, totally separeate from Thinkpads. Ideapads = consumer notebooks, Thinkpad = business notebooks. Kind of like how Dell has the Inspiron and Lattitude models, one aimed for average consumers and another targeted towards businesses.

Thinkpad lovers, you may now pull your underwear out of your crack. Thinkpads are here to stay.

[Mindaugas @ Jan 7th 2008 4:59PM]

Finally they did a smart thing and got rid of that stupid track-point! Why the normal people, which use trackpad had to pay for the inclusion of trackpoint, which was used by the few freaks was difficult to comprehend. Also, to be frank, design wise T series just plain sucked. The quality of materials, buttons, et.c was top, however the design itself was just bricky.