The ultrabook anarchy of 2011 has become a deluge in 2012, which agency one thing: lower prices. If you were hunting for a analytic attenuate Windows laptop with acceptable array activity at a reasonable cost, you couldn't accept best a added acceptable time. The Lenovo IdeaPad U310 is a absolute example: it's an amend of sorts to the IdeaPad U300s, one of the aboriginal Windows ultrabooks we advised
aftermost abatement that agitated a MacBook Air-like $1,195 amount tag. This time, the amount is a bald $799 -- but, with some compromises fabricated forth the way.
aftermost abatement that agitated a MacBook Air-like $1,195 amount tag. This time, the amount is a bald $799 -- but, with some compromises fabricated forth the way.
The IdeaPad U310 is a altered machine: it's got a decidedly added and thicker anatomy and a accepted alluring platter-type automated adamantine drive instead of a solid-state drive (SSD). However, its centralized specs are actual good, with a third-gen 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U processor, 4GB of RAM, a 500GB adamantine drive, and all the ports you'd charge (Ethernet, USB 3.0, SD agenda reader, HDMI). It's still an ultrabook by definition, but not absolutely as glassy a product.
It's a appealing agnate amalgamation to what the analogously priced Sony Vaio T offers, although the Vaio T is lighter and has a added acceptable array life. It's additionally agnate to what the fresh Dell Inspiron 14z offers, although the Inspiron 14z additionally has committed AMD graphics.
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)
So, area does that leave the IdeaPad U310? It's not a bad accord for what's beneath the hood, but the U310 doesn't feel as hasty as aftermost year's U300s. Nor is it. It's absolutely the abate accessory of the IdeaPad U400: a MacBook-like Lenovo laptop with a acceptable keyboard, a solid set of features, and a adorable architecture that could accomplish an accomplished back-to-school computer. Students should attending into the IdeaPad U310, abnormally if it's on sale. You ability appetite to comparison-shop the growing mural of affordable ultrabook-alikes at the time of acquirement and see if you can do better, but the basal band is this: be happy. Ultrabooks accept beyond adamantine drives (without SSD), and are cheaper than ever. That's a acceptable thing.
Price as advised $799
Processor 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U
Memory 4GB, 1,333MHz DDR3
Hard drive 500GB 5,400 HDD
Chipset Intel HM77
Graphics Intel HD 4000
Operating arrangement Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)
Dimensions (WD) 13.1x8.8 inches
Height 0.7 inch
Screen admeasurement (diagonal) 13.3 inches
System weight / Weight with AC adapter 3.68 pounds / 4.2 pounds
Category ultrabook
At 0.7 inch blubbery and 3.68 pounds, the IdeaPad U310 is attenuate and light, but not absolutely as attenuate and ablaze as added 13-inch ultrabooks. It's about amid "normal" 13-inch laptop and ultrabook, and feels added like the former. It's added than the Sony Vaio T ultrabook, and lighter than the fresh Dell Inspiron 14z.
Unlike the sleek, atramentous IdeaPad U300s, the U310 is both blanched and candy-colored. Its beyond accessory that it looks the best like is the IdeaPad U400, a apparatus that was afterpiece in admeasurement and action to a 13-inch MacBook Pro. The U310 is added backpack- and small-bag-friendly, but additionally ditches the slot-loading DVD drive in the process.
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)
You'd added acceptable get acclimated to hearing, "Hey, you've got a fresh white MacBook!" because you're activity to apprehend it a lot at coffee shops. The IdeaPad U310 is MacBook-like, and there's no way about it. Sure, the alien wraparound Aqua Dejected aluminum on the lid and base (also accessible in Graphite Gray and Cherry Blossom Pink) is distinctive, but accessible the lid and the white surfaces, atramentous aloft keyboard, and ample blow pad -- alike the bezel about the awning and keyboard -- about scream "MacBookalike." The anodized, colored-aluminum exoteric sandwiches the hardly fair artificial autogenous aback closed, giving the laptop a two-tone attending and a booklike profile.
It's a able laptop to use, too: the approach blow is spacious, the multitouch clickpad gigantic, and the keyboard about as accomplished as best Lenovo keyboards.
Why nearly? Because the keyboard's not backlit, and the keys themselves accept an ever-so-slightly lower-quality feel compared with the aerial bar of ThinkPads. It's still good, but I begin keys not registering every already in a dejected moon, and the cavalcade of keys on the appropriate ancillary makes the Backspace key actual adamantine to locate by touch. To accomplish affairs worse, the keyboard apparent some angle on our analysis model. At atomic the action keys are antipodal (the media-control buttons for aggregate and awning accuracy assignment after the Fn key captivated down).
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)
The actual ample blow pad is the aforementioned admeasurement as that on a MacBook, but not as good. Pinch-to-zoom and two-finger scrolling are beneath instantly acknowledging and added decumbent to jumpiness. Chalk that up beneath to Lenovo than to Windows 7.
The audiovisual acquaintance on the IdeaPad U310 is analogously able but not outstanding. A ablaze 13.3-inch awning has an absolutely accustomed 1,366x768-pixel resolution, but is decumbent to awning glare. The awning isn't all that ablaze at its accomplished setting, and off-axis examination angles are poor. It's accomplished for a account computer. The stereo speakers are louder than you'd apprehend from an ultrabook, but articulate alveolate and collapsed aback arena aback music or cine trailers.
On the added hand, the included 720p Webcam looked aciculate via the preinstalled Cybervision YouCam software.
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CNET Editors' Rating
3.5
stars
Very acceptable
Set amount active
Review Date: 7/03/12 Updated on: 6/17/13
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The good: The IdeaPad U310 offers up an adorable architecture and all the basal accretion and whistles of a 13-inch ultrabook for $799, including affluence of USB ports and Ethernet.
The bad: The thicker, added architecture weighs a bit added than aftermost year's U300s, and there aren't any SSD-only advancement options.
The basal line: The Lenovo IdeaPad U310 is an all-around appropriate ultrabook that's altogether priced for back-to-school shoppers, but there are affluence of alternatives with about analogously prices and features.
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