Lenovo goes netbook with IdeaPad S10

We've seen Lenovo beefing up its consumer offerings of late, but this is really taking it up a notch. The company just announced its very first netbook, the recently spotted 10.2-inch, Atom-powered little wonder. Sadly, there's little of note in the design -- it seems to have more in common with the MSI Wind and the Eee PC than its Lenovo siblings -- but the $399 starting price is certainly pleasing. That model brings 512MB of RAM and a 80GB hard drive, while a $450 version will be available with 1GB of RAM and 160GB of storage, with both being powered by 1.6GHz Atom chipsets. Windows XP will be preloaded initially, but Linpus versions will be available eventually. The display is 1024 x 600 and LED backlit, and the touchpad does multi-touch. Lenovo didn't skimp on the trimmings either, with WiFi, Bluetooth, ExpressCard, 4-in-1 card reader and a 1.3 megapixel webcam. The S10 hits China on September 5th, and will land in the States in early October. A 9-inch version is also in the works for other countries.

[Via Laptop Mag]

Gallery: Lenovo goes netbook with IdeaPad S10

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[Pochi @ Aug 4th 2008 8:50AM]

Wow. Way to differentiate yourself, Lenovo.

[OneLove @ Aug 4th 2008 11:08AM]

Only 512MB of RAM? Basically saying, buy this and put memory in it.

[OneLove @ Aug 4th 2008 11:10AM]

Here a S10 video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jAryv0s5Yo

[spass @ Aug 4th 2008 11:19AM]

I actually think it's a great design.
Finally making a boxy notebook, that would differentiate itself from the all oter wedge-shaped sub-notebooks I've seen lately.
Looks sleek. This is something I would buy over Asus, Acer or MSI.

[d00b @ Aug 4th 2008 11:50AM]

This compares directly with the MSI Wind. I prefer the Wind's beveled shell, but the S10 has more features for lower cost. The unspoken question will be, what is the S10's battery life vs the $550 Wind's?

The great thing about this is that the Wind will have to eventually drop its price to match, just as the Asus 1000H had. Base price w/ XP for netbooks looks to be $400 for this year.

[Pochi @ Aug 4th 2008 12:01PM]

OneLove is right. Add the price of a RAM upgrade right onto the sticker price, because not many techies will be happy with 512MB.

And I said HAPPY with it, I don't need 20 comments now extolling the virtues of 512MB of RAM to me.

[Don @ Aug 4th 2008 2:21PM]

Another one without a dvd bruner.....Sigh

[liv @ Aug 5th 2008 2:32PM]

I'll buy this, install OSX on it, maybe dual boot with XP and I have the trendiest Hackbook of the lot. Macbook who?!?

[Shenzhov @ Aug 4th 2008 8:57AM]

Wow, is this another Eee PC? I sure as heck looks like one.
Eee PC 1000 L Lenovo model.

[Guises @ Aug 4th 2008 9:17AM]

Oh come on! Of all companies, Lenovo should be putting a trackpoint in one of these.

Fitting in small spaces is what trackpoints do best. This is why their X-series laptops always had trackpoints and not touchpads - there isn't room for a decent sized pad.

[LondonConsultant @ Aug 4th 2008 9:32AM]

I agree. Hopefully Lenovo will release a ThinkPad netbook one day. This Lenovo looks more like the Eee 900 than the Eee 901 does! And Lenovo's S10 model name is even similar to Asus's upcoming S101 name.

Apart from that "rip off" moan, this S10 actually seems a nice machine...

[whowhatme @ Aug 4th 2008 10:13AM]

but I'm liking that multitouch

...you'll be doing a lot of scrolling with 600 pixels of vertical real estate

[Jon @ Aug 15th 2008 9:02PM]

There is the s30 series that was released to E. Asia back in '01.
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:S30

[ChrisM @ Aug 4th 2008 9:18AM]

Who came up with "netbook"? It's such a dumb name. Whats the difference between a sub-compact, SFF notebook and a netbook? I can't keep up with these stupid names.

[ScOObyDoo @ Aug 4th 2008 9:49AM]

Psion came up with that name, back in 2000 when similar machines were popular. Everyone had a netbook sized machines (Compaq, HP, Vadem etc...). Then all of a sudden, they all vanished.

[Ignatius @ Aug 4th 2008 11:25AM]

And a million voices across the galaxy cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

Then the Eee arrived to murder the rest.

[Fara @ Aug 4th 2008 9:19AM]

Linpus? Is that a specifi Linux distrobutoin, or did you guys just misspell.

[giuliop @ Aug 4th 2008 10:15AM]

Looks like a purulent distribution of Linux.

[Fara @ Aug 4th 2008 9:20AM]

It's Intels fault.

[cabby @ Aug 4th 2008 9:22AM]

hmm. wonder how much it weighs..

decent specs for a netbook. im typing this on a eee pc 1000h..and i gotta say. i want to return this eee pc and get ummm...

THAT ONE!

[Aaron @ Aug 4th 2008 10:13AM]

I just got my 1000H last Friday,and I definitely have to agree. I'd love that little Lenovo!

[Cal @ Aug 4th 2008 9:26AM]

So that'll be £300 when it comes here, and I just got a proper (and decent) laptop (Lenovo N200) for £320... These 'netbooks' need to start heading toward the £200 mark (or even $200...)

[John Bailey @ Aug 4th 2008 10:15AM]

True enough.. But it will most likely be bigger. Remember when tiny under powered laptops were more expensive than their bigger heavier cousins?

[Cal @ Aug 4th 2008 10:27AM]

Yeah it's a 15.4", but it is still hard, at least for me, to justify buying something that's supposed to be cheap and portable for almost the same price as a fully fledged laptop (which is why I got a laptop not a 'netbook')

[KoKo @ Aug 5th 2008 12:13PM]

Congratulations! You were the first dork to say that for $400, you can get a chihuahua that poops little brown nuggets or whatever, like somebody always does with every new netbook article.

Your "proper" laptop will weigh about double this S10. See the difference?

[bob sakamano @ Aug 4th 2008 9:26AM]

yeah

whats linpus

[avester @ Aug 4th 2008 9:42AM]

Linux Distro, if you ever heard about a thing called Google...

Xpresscard (Just like Nokia likes to spell it) is very useful, if you ever get a external graphics card for another laptop, you could hook this up too and play Quake 3.

I'm waiting for the Gigabyte 912 more, since I think that a touchscreen is pretty good with this form factor.

[Jason @ Aug 4th 2008 11:16AM]

@ avester - if bob had simply asked "what's linpus" then your response would be correct.

However, bob wrote, "yeah whats linpus," as in

"yeah who the hell ever heard of linpus?" OR
"is that not about the most absent freakin' distro ever?" OR
"why the hell is lenovo putting such an obscure distro on a high profile offering like this?"

I think the answer is that the one detail the article misses is this is probably Linpus Lite, which is specifically targeted at netbooks/ultramobiles. Although, I know of at least a couple of other distros I would've used instead.

While the choice of Linpus seems rushed, lenovo couldn't have just slapped this thing together at the last minute, you think?

[kam @ Aug 4th 2008 9:41AM]

to all those who are "poo-pooing" this device as just another one of the many, lets not forget the $450 gets you

-multi touch (although i would love to have a trackpoint)

-a huge 160 gb hard drive

-and the main selling point for me... an express card slot. to me, someone that has a sprint express card wireless modem, this is key and makes this the perfect portable.

[OneLove @ Aug 4th 2008 11:14AM]

lets hope it has a 6 cell battery.

[helixtimestwo @ Aug 4th 2008 11:30AM]

>a sprint express card wireless modem

USB modems are available from Sprint, VZW, At&t...gives more flexibility with the option to use it in a desktop.

Or better yet, just get tethering for your cellphone. No expensive hardware to buy OR contractual commitment.

But I wonder if these netbooks will have the option of getting broadband access built-in.

[Mystic Alpaca @ Aug 4th 2008 12:38PM]

I agree Express Card is the killer feature here. Ram/Harddrive, those can be upgraded but you can’t add a WAN device as easily without at a port for it.

A USB modem is not a great option when you just want to pull this out of a small knapsack and don't really want to deal with keeping and plugging in a USB accessory. Sure you could tether it via your cell phone if you didn’t have a crippled Windows Mobile Smartphone with sketchy Bluetooth DUN/PAN support.

This may be the netbook to beat, let's see what Dell can do.

--Bill
PDAToday.com

[helixtimestwo @ Aug 4th 2008 8:12PM]

What's the difference in pulling out an express card modem vs a USB modem from your knapsack? They both have a similar form factor. The only advantage is that it will free up a USB port if you use an ECmodem , but almost every lappy has 2 usb ports.

Tethering is even easier; you will obviously have the phone with you so alls you need is a data cable. And a 'crippled' WM6 phone is probably the easiest to use as a modem..all I had to do on my tilt was copy Windows>'Internet sharing' file into the start menu folder. Oh, so difficult.

[anonymousaversa @ Aug 4th 2008 9:50AM]

Sure, they're hopping on the bandwagon, (why are they always white?) but Kam has good point.

Decent specs, and multitouch-

If it's as durable as a Thinkpad, it might be a worthy competitor to all the rest. More competition means more pressure to drive down prices and innovate right? It can't be all bad.

Sure, its no toughbook, but Lenovo usually makes good machines. I once spilled a full drink on my T61 and it worked perfectly an hour later.

Do you guys think this thing is Lenovo tough?

[Rubin @ Aug 4th 2008 10:00AM]

What an original name...

[ye @ Aug 4th 2008 10:02AM]

The Asus ee can never look as good as this.

[Jason @ Aug 4th 2008 10:57AM]

You're right, it would need at least another 'e' to achieve that.

[Pwnz @ Aug 4th 2008 10:06AM]

I believe that Lenovo will make this as tough as other Thinkpads and tablets. For 2 consecutive years, Lenovo always fare better than the rest of the pack in terms of quality and reliability in the recent ranking survey.

[wayan @ Aug 4th 2008 10:11AM]

Damn! That's the hottest 4P Computer I've seen yet. I want one!

[vitosnap @ Aug 4th 2008 10:16AM]

calling all OEM " find all 3yr old laptop components! lets make some $$"

[Slick @ Aug 4th 2008 10:18AM]

The size is good too, any smaller and typing becomes cumbersome - like a 7 in EEE PC for example...

And yes, I would know, I tried typing on one in bestbuy: FAIL

[Jon Doe. @ Aug 4th 2008 10:21AM]

Subnotebook.

[Brian K @ Aug 4th 2008 10:42AM]

Anyone else really annoyed that all these 'could-be' awesome netbooks are held back by their incredibly crappy screen resolution? Seriously, if this was 1280x800 or 768.. whatever the ratio is, I'd buy one in a heartbeat. But screen resolution is not the thing i want to skimp on. I'd rather have less storage or lack of a card reader. C'mon netbook manufacturers! Give us resolution fiends what we want!

[avester @ Aug 4th 2008 11:09AM]

Gigabyte M912 mate.

Anyways, 1280x800 is the resolution on my 15,4" laptop, and it is more than enough...

[Ninjakamster (PS360 FTW!) @ Aug 4th 2008 11:37AM]

HP MiniNote 2133 has an 8.9" screen and 1280x768 resolution, but crappy as hell Via C7 processor....

[Pizzicato @ Aug 4th 2008 11:40AM]

What’s crappy about it? I agree that for websites 800 width ist too small nowadays, but 1024 is quite good for the vast majority of the web. If you think the resolution is grainy, think about that again. 800x480 on a 7" display equals 1600x960 on a 14" - i’d like to see that. 1024x600 on 9" (10") would be 2048x1200 on a 18" (20) display. I don’t hear many complains about the usual 1600x1200 on 20" TFTs.

[AdvWar @ Aug 4th 2008 4:45PM]

Thats some very dodgy math Pizzicato, resolutions don't work like that.

[Matt @ Aug 4th 2008 7:18PM]

Actually, they do. He's talking about the DPI of the screen.

[chop @ Aug 4th 2008 11:18AM]

this is sweet. although theres no talk about battery configurations...3cells, 6cells?

[Pizzicato @ Aug 4th 2008 11:34AM]

Both, but as always the 6-cell option will demand some extra money.