Review of the "green" netbook Samsung NC215

    Last summer, Samsung launched the world's first production netbook equipped with a solar panel, I was lucky enough to become the owner of this gadget and I want to share with you my feelings about its use.

    Foreword


    This is my first post on a hub, in which, for the most part, there will be my subjective sensations from using a netbook in the A01RU configuration, for two months, taking into account the fact that I have been using Samsung RF710 for more than a year, but I will try to be as much as possible objective. I apologize in advance for the bad photos.

    Contents of delivery


    The netbook is sold in a rather simple box, the delivery kit is standard for such devices, the netbook itself, a separate battery, a power supply, a cable for connecting the power supply to the mains and some waste paper.



    Appearance


    Almost the entire outside of the cover is occupied by a photocell under transparent glossy plastic, painted black around the perimeter. The screen frame is made of textured glossy plastic into a small dot, four rubber pads are located in the corners, on the upper side of the frame there is an eyelet of a 0.3 megapixel camera.
    The space under the keyboard is matte, silver, it seems to me that it is very convenient, since it highlights the keyboard keys, the area next to the touchpad is scratched very quickly, I remind you, I have been using the netbook for two months and that is, only in isolation from the main machine. I would have liked it better if the bottom was black as on the RF710.




    To the left of the touchpad there are five LEDs, from left to right, Caps Lock, disk access indicator, wireless network indicator, external power indicator (orange is charging, green, battery is charged) and the power indicator which is duplicated by the backlight of the power button on the right side.

    Screen


    TFT Screen 10.1 inches with LED backlight, matte, almost does not glare and thanks to some innovative Samsung technology, the colors do not lose brightness due to this matte coating, to be honest, I have nothing to compare with, therefore, this technology works or No, I can’t, I take my word for it, but the colors are really bright, although it happens better. The aspect ratio is 16: 9, the screen resolution is 1024x600.

    Interfaces


    Left: Power connector, LAN 10/100, USB 2.0 with the function of charging in sleep mode, I really like this function, since I own an Android smartphone, I am very glad that I can always charge a smartphone that has sat down in the middle of the day on the road.

    Right: Power button, Kensington Lock, VGA (D-Sub 15pin), two USB 2.0 ports, microphone input, headphone output.

    Nothing on the back, only SD card slot on the front


    Hid


    This typewriter does not have the most responsive touchpad, the scroll area does not work right away and generally behaves very unpredictably, multi-touch gestures are supported, but only two fingers, scroll left-right and up-down and zoom.
    The island type keyboard is the same on the RF710. As I said, the keys stand out against the silver background, typing in blind is also convenient, the distance between the keys is about 4 mm, which, in my opinion, is quite enough. There are problems with the spacebar button, when you hit the bottom left corner of the button with your left hand, the spacebar does not work, but I quickly got used to this feature.



    Noise heating


    The netbook is very quiet, especially when compared with a 17-inch laptop. As a rule, I work for him in crowded places, sometimes even in public transport, so we can say that he does not make noise at all. The situation is similar with heating, it warms up very slightly, at least it does not burn the knees.

    Performance


    The netbook is equipped with an Intel NM10 chipset, which does not support HDMI and more than 2Gb of RAM, a 1.66GHz dual-core Intel Atom N570 processor and 1Mb second-level cache, with Hyper Threading technology. It is equipped with 2Gb DDR3 RAM with a frequency of 1066MHz (one slot). Integrated Intel GMA 3150 graphics accelerator with 256Mb of memory. I can’t say a lot about performance, I didn’t communicate with other netbooks, but this one seemed pretty nimble to me, although it sometimes slows down, but if you don’t overload it with unnecessary processes, it works fine.

    Working time, charging


    The kit includes a 6-cell lithium-ion battery with a capacity of 8850 mAh, which, according to the manufacturer, should last 14.5 hours. According to my observations, this indicator is very close to reality, with an average intensity of use (per day ~ 1 hour on the Internet, 0.5 hours of watching videos and about 1.5 hours of writing, the rest of the time I used adult computers) in “balanced” In the mode, I charged the netbook once every four days, while I never waited for a complete shutdown, put it on charge, at night, so that in the morning it would be full of strength and ready for use. It charges quite quickly, I can’t give exact numbers, it happened once that I forgot to put it on for night, on charging and decided to charge it in the morning, before work, it was enough for an hour to charge it by half. The manufacturer also assures that Samsung PowerPlus intelligent charging technology allows the battery to maintain 80% of its original capacity for about 1000 charges, I hope the numbers here are also close to reality. I didn’t succeed in verifying the operation of the solar battery, after all, in the winter in St. Petersburg it is quite difficult to do, but in March I am going to Thailand, I’ll check there (if someone doesn’t do this earlier) and I’ll definitely tell you about it either or in his blog, as the habrasociety wishes. While I made a couple of synthetic measurements using the Eco Mode program, a 100-watt spotlight, when directly hit from a distance of 25 cm, produced 0.247 watts of power, 500 watts from the same distance of 1.020 watts, despite the fact that the power consumption in the "balanced" mode is 9-10 watts.

    Software


    The netbook is running Windows 7 in the Starter / Initial edition, so far I have left everything as it is, maybe later I will install Ubuntu, not until then. The kit includes a few Samsung programs, Control Center, Fast Start, Recovery Solution 5, Update Plus, Easy File Share, Easy Content Share, and Eco Mode. The latter is a normal mode switch, there are four to choose from, “environmental protection”, this mode is the most truncated, “energy saving”, slightly less truncated, “Functioning that does not upset the natural balance”, “normal” mode, and the customizable mode “Settings for specific tasks. " The mode is configured separately for battery operation and for mains operation; you can configure the power management scheme, "sleep mode", "standby mode" and the processor's sleep switch. Screen options, "dimmer time", “Turn off the screen”, and “brightness level”. And a few more on / off switches, “USB Charger”, “Wireless Network”, “Bluetooth”. Also, the program can show current energy consumption, CO2 emissions and the power of the charge from the solar battery (when the power cable is disconnected).



    Conclusion


    The device turned out to be very successful, I do not regret the money spent on it, but I spent a little more than 14,000 rubles. An excellent keyboard, a good screen, a 320Gb hard drive, a very good battery life and a solar battery bribed me. Still living where this solar battery can be used, as expected, but that's another story.
    UPD: Judging by the reviews, the people of Habra did not like my post, those who are interested in continuing here

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