IdeaPad S10-3t: netbook tablet with touch screen

This year, Lenovo revealed three touch-screen mobile computers at once: the IdeaPad S10-3t netbook, the powerful ThinkPad X201 Tablet, and the one-of-a-kind IdeaPad U1 hybrid laptop. In addition, ordinary laptops without a rotary screen, such as the ThinkPad T410s and W510, are equipped with touch displays. The IdeaPad S10-3t netbook can be purchased at a price of 16 to 18 thousand rubles, and this is one of the most affordable mobile computers with a MultiTouch touch screen.

When testing a netbook, I first of all wanted to find out how convenient the touch screen is when working with everyday tasks. Is it possible to comfortably work with a laptop in tablet mode when the keyboard and touchpad are not available? And if the keyboard is also at hand, is the touch screen used? In short, yes, comfortable and yes, used. Moreover, in some simple and regular tasks (pause the video, scroll through the web page, click “OK” in the “Are you sure?” Type window) I used only the touchscreen. In the article, in addition to describing the capabilities of the netbook itself, I gave examples of programs familiar to me in which the touch screen was very useful.




The “tablet” IdeaPad S10-3t is not a modification of a regular S10-3 netbook - these are completely different models. The device turned out to be quite narrow and slightly elongated: due to the screen with an aspect ratio of 16: 9 and enlarged sidewalls, necessary to keep the tablet on weight.



This is how the screen mount looks - completely metal and very massive.



In comparison with the IdeaPad S10-2 netbook, the design and size of the keyboard have changed. Buttons now occupy the entire surface, and are no longer flat. Due to this, typing on the keyboard is quite convenient. To increase the area of ​​the touchpad, it was deprived of individual buttons. Now they are located directly under the touch panel and are indicated by two red dots.



On the left are the connectors for the power supply, Ethernet, headphones and microphone.



On the right is the VGA port, two USB connectors, a hardware switch for the wireless modules and a dummy plug in place of the antenna connector: for modification with an integrated television receiver. The SD card slot and integrated microphone are located on the leading edge.



A few more buttons are located on the edges of the display. One of the keys is responsible for turning the screen, and on the right is the power button. It is easy enough to press it accidentally, but using the switch, the button can be locked.

Technical specifications
Processor : Intel Atom N450 1.66 GHz
Memory : 1 GB DDR2 (2 GB maximum)
Display : 10.1 inches, 1024x600 pixels
Hard disk : 160 GB (up to 320 GB)
Video system : Intel GMA 3150
Wireless modules : Intel WiFi / WiMax 6250, Bluetooth 2.1
Connectors : Ethernet, VGA, audio, SD / SDHC card reader, 2xUSB
Web camera : 1.3 MP
Battery : 4-cell or extended 8-cell
Dimensions : 280x174x15-20, 2 mm
Weight : 1.25 kg with a standard battery

How it works

Next I will give some examples of the use of the touch screen in practice.

Lenovo IdeaPad S10-3t is currently only available with preinstalled Windows 7 Starter, in which MultiTouch is not supported. This problem is solved with the help of a whole set of Lenovo NaturalTouch programs optimized for working with a touch screen. The proprietary shell interface looks like this:



Naturally, you can navigate through menus and lists using gestures. NaturalTouch allows you to watch videos, listen to music, read books, leave notes, drawing right on the screen. In a simple photo editor using the "two-finger" gestures, you can rotate images, zoom in or out.

Despite the lack of MultiTouch, in Windows 7 Starter it’s quite convenient to use a touchscreen. If you leave the default size of buttons in browsers (IE or FireFox) and sections in the Start menu, it will be difficult to miss them.

Also, the laptop was tested with Windows 7 Home Premium. Compared to Starter, you get a few new features. First, a link to the on-screen keyboard appears every time you click on an input field in any program. In Win7 Starter, the keyboard will have to be called up each time, it is best to make a separate shortcut for this. MultiTouch is rather useful not for zooming (this is not such a frequently used function), but, for example, for invoking a context menu. If in Windows 7 Starter you need to press and hold your finger until the menu appears, then in Home Premium just click on the desired item and touch the screen with your second finger somewhere nearby.

Browse Web Sites



In Internet Explorer, by default, you can scroll through the contents of a page using gestures (swipe up or down), as well as quickly move forward or backward (respectively, left or right). In Mozilla Firefox, you need to install a special extension that works in a similar way, but allows you to more accurately “twist” the page to the right place. In all browsers, you can use the on-screen keyboard, although for the most frequently visited resources it is best to make an always accessible link bar.

Music and video

In principle, there is not much difference what kind of music player to use, if only the main buttons are big in it - so as not to miss. Fully optimized for the touch screen branded music player Lenovo Natural Touch:



And standard for Home Premium Windows Media Center:



Both programs look very nice, but it’s more convenient to use the touchscreen in Lenovo’s proprietary music player. At the same time, it takes too long to process a voluminous music library on a netbook, so I installed a simple and fast Foobar for music.

To play the video, I used Windows Media Player and Media Player Classic. There are much fewer requirements: it is enough for the program to respond to touch and pause the film.

A photo

In the standard program for viewing Windows images using MultiTouch gestures, you can rotate images and zoom. Lenovo's proprietary program supports these gestures, even if you have Windows 7 Starter. In my favorite IrfanView photo viewer, the “zoom” also works, but you can only rotate images using a combination of keys or buttons on the dashboard.

Reading books

Support for the FB2 format is important to me, so I downloaded the free AlReader “ reader ” , which, as it turned out, works great with the touch screen. The program supports the so-called "tap-zones" - sections of the screen, clicking on which activates a specific function. The easiest option: set the page to scroll forward and backward by tapping the edges of the screen.

Performance and battery life

Despite the change of the Intel Atom platform to a more modern and small increase in productivity, the IdeaPad S10-3t is still a netbook: a device for office tasks and communicating on the Internet. But it should be noted that officially the netbook is available in two versions: for sale in Russia so far there is only a model with an N450 processor, but in the future a more powerful version with an Atom N470 processor and a frequency of 1.83 GHz will become available. A laptop with a standard battery lasts about 4 hours, in video playback mode I got 2 hours 54 minutes. Again, we are waiting for the sale of a modification of the model with a large eight-cell battery, with which the laptop can work up to 10 hours.

Retera.ru netbook reviewwith an assessment of performance and battery life



Impressions

In the course of getting to know the S10-3t, of course, I periodically missed the small interface elements. One of the solutions to the problem is to increase the “buttons” using standard Windows tools, but I decided to leave it as it is. But the virtual keyboard turned out to be very convenient: it can be typed with two fingers at a fairly high speed and a small number of typos. MultiTouch gestures probably didn’t take root, apart from opening the context menu. In general, the touch panel adds extra comfort to working with a netbook. This is especially important when dealing with such a small device: changing a small touchpad to a touchpad the size of a screen turned out to be a very good idea.