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GBM InkShow: Thomasin Takes on the Lenovo IdeaPad S10T (Video)

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When it comes to Netbooks, I let my wife Thomasin give them a whirl to find out what she is thinking. You may or may not remember that she has used the original Asus EEE Netbook and continues to use an HP Mini 1100 in her daily chores, which include mostly email, some web browsing and occasional document creation.

The IdeaPad offers her a new twist, (literally and figuratively) as she can rotate the screen and put it in Tablet mode. This is a touch device and not meant for Inkers, at least in my opinion. But Lenovo has added two different UI overlays to make the touch-ability perhaps more pleasant.

The first is a pretty generic UI that offers us up shortcuts to music, photos, notes, videos, etc… along with icons on a task tray to access the Internet, documents, and other tasks. It works like many of these top of touch overlays that we’ve seen before, allowing you to swipe across the screen and move the large icons in a never ending repeatable circle.

The second is a shortcut on the desktop to BumpTop. BumpTop is the 3D metaphor that allows you to group and manipulate items on your desktop supposedly like you would on a normal desk. You can have piles that expand and shrink, toss them up against a virtual wall, and basically manipulate them well. This metaphor does work well with touch, but I think you’ll be intrigued to how Thomasin as a novice takes to this.

The S10T is also using Intel’s Pinetrail processor. As you’ll see in the video the emphasis on battery life leaves something to be desired when it comes to speed, at least in the unit we’re evaluating here. We don’t do a direct comparison, but Thomasin feels (and that kind of experience is worth quite a bit) that it operates slower than the HP Mini.

All in all, if you’re looking for a convertible Netbook, Lenovo has created one that will most likely serve your needs. It is solid, the keyboard is easy to type on, and quite honestly it does feel good in your hand. I’d be wary if you have to do any heavy document creation on this though because of the lack of processing power, but if you’re content with a Netbook for some of your computing and want to reach out and touch, it is worth considering.

All GBM InkShows are sponsored by MobileDemand

5 Comments

5 Comments

  1. HG

    03/24/2010 at 10:47 pm

    I have had the chance to try out a S10-3t and actually performed very well and pretty fast. It was just about the same as the Toshiba NB205. I installed Windows 7 Ultimate on the S10-3t. Here is the S10-3t running several apps here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3oedAql65k

    Warner since Thomasin had trouble with touch screen maybe she would rather use speech recognization. Speech runs very well on the S10-3t. I did a demo of this a few weeks ago. https://hggadgets.blogspot.com/2010/02/speech-recognition-on-lenovo-s10-3t.html

  2. CLC

    03/24/2010 at 10:58 pm

    Always refreshing to see how the non-techies see things. :D
    I myself love touch, though. But I do see how a dedicated UI improves things greatly. But, if there is a specific UI for touch, it definitely becomes an asset in speeding things up. No matter how proficient someone is with a mouse, it is just so much faster to take your finger and touch it.
    Also, multi-touch allows for more advanced editing tools in things like moving paragraphs in documents and editing images and for gesture shortcuts that are easier to remember than keyboard shortcuts, which I still can’t stand.
    Get the right interface and add pen; and things will become far more productive and intuitive.
    Of course,you will need a faster processor than that. Nothing can make working with that faster.

    (The virtual keyboard helps when you don’t have a table around to rest the tablet on.)

  3. Mike

    03/28/2010 at 9:03 pm

    Always lovely to see Thomasin.
    Very much appreciate the perspective of a typical user.
    Hope to see her take on ipad before too long.
    ..and some of the competitors as well.
    Though judging from this, I wonder if she’ll like no physical keyboard at all.
    hahahaha…

    Thanks for the vid.
    – Mike

  4. Donald

    03/29/2010 at 1:30 am

    Always enjoy the Thomasin perspective on the new toys.
    Thanks

  5. Brett Gilbertson

    04/08/2010 at 11:21 pm

    Lol, classic Inkshow Warner and Thomasin. The WAF (Wife Accepatance Factor) on that machine was very low.

    Vendors should test this before they release products…

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